I’m thinking that if I want to treat this whole thing like a business I might need to kick up the professionalism a bit. It’s not really by choice because I don’t like stuffy crap like that, but I’ve just been given a kick in the arse by the people at Moneysupermarket.com that has made me rethink a few things.
I posted a couple days ago about the first link sale on my London site and mentioned the name of the company buying the link. I actually thought twice about posting their name and decided to do it anyways because I really want this blog to be up front and give as much information and help to people as possible. I’m thinking that hasn’t been a smart move.
I got an email yesterday from Moneysupermarket.com guy saying that the deal was off. I emailed back to ask why (it’s annoying I had to ask, especially since they’ve already had a link up for several days without any payment) and he went into a spiel about it not being acceptable that the private details of the deal had been made public… blah blah blah… a professional level of privacy is expected… yadda yadda yadda… trust has been lost… etc etc etc.
I really can’t fault them at all for feeling that way but I don’t think my post was particularly evil, really. I’m guessing that someone read my post and innocently contacted them about selling a link of their own, mentioning my post. I wouldn’t expect someone would have read it and thought to rat me out but if that’s the case then you suck.
This has cost me the deal for the London link, and a couple of other links worth £150 for a total of £250. An expensive lesson, but I’m actually happy to have learned it. Unfortunately for this site it means that I won’t be giving details of the companies I deal with anymore, but I think that actually makes sense. If I keep mentioning who is buying links from me then people with similar sites are likely to try their luck too. Common sense is not one of my strong points so I guess I’ve had to learn it the hard way.
I guess the chatty, casual approach isn’t gonna cut it! Time to treat this thing like the business that it is. This email probably isn’t too professional either but I’ve already been bitchslapped by MoneySupermarket and really have nothing to lose. Plus I think it’s a valuable lesson and I don’t want to see anyone else making the same mistake!
Professionalism starts now. No…….. now. Ok, NOW!
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