Tribal Seduction

A new application on Facebook, called Market Lodge will pay users a 10% commission on sales made on their recommendations. And vendors can submit products for approval, so long as they’re willing to cough up a 35% commission on each product sale.

Market Lodge is the brainchild of a startup called bSocial Networks. They’re betting that Facebook users will like the idea of helping merchants sell to their friends. I’m betting it’ll open the doors to a flood of fledgling Marketplace Molesters.

Here’s how you can make sure you don’t become one of them.

If you’re going to test Market Lodge, keep two things in mind

Facebook hasn’t been a friendly place for profit since opening it’s door to developers. I’ve never seen more useless widgets for fun and games in one place than what you’ll find after 12-months of “open door development” on Facebook.

And while Market Lodge is a step in the right direction, the way I see it, it’s got two challenges:

1. Facebook tried to capitalize on membership connections last year by introducing a marketing system that allowed friends to broadcast product endorsements to each other.

That’s been a dud. Mostly because Facebook’s users revolted when they realized there was a feature called “Beacon.” That little devil tracked and shared information about their purchases and other actions made on other Web sites. Users’ are now allowed to turn off Beacon, but it’s still a dud.

2. Online social networks as a whole have had trouble generating big profits from advertising. Even powerhouse Google Inc. has admitted that they haven’t found the right marketing mix partnering with News Corp.’s MySpace.com.

In both cases the problem is rooted in an old-school marketing mindset and interruption-style of communication. Understand this, apply the C.H.A.R.M. Formula of Tribal Seduction, and you’ll be ahead of the pack out of the gate.

Market Lodge is a good idea, but…

It actually makes it easier for regular Joe’s and Jane’s to make money making recommendations. But that’s where the danger lies.

“Average” people don’t know how to market or sell without Molesting friends and family. (Doubt me? Just think of a friend who’s all fired up about the new MLM they joined.)

Hell, most people who call themselves marketers or sales professionals don’t know how to do that. Even fewer know how to seduce.

Affiliates — keep it low key

So if you plan on becoming an affiliate with Market Lodge, keep it low key. Treat your recommendations relevant to topical conversations you engage in.

Unless you have a really strong personal brand that attracts a “clean” list of friends — stay away from network-wide promotional messages. And even if you’ve got that highly focused network of friends, take the time to create some good (connection-based) content as a mass message, and strategically inject a relevant recommendation.

Vendors — give it a shot

If you’re a vendor, you can request that bSocial add your product to their line up. The vendor registration process is ridiculously simple (which to me implies that you may not hear back from them if they don’t like your product.) You can learn more about becoming a Market Lodge vendor here.

If you’ve used Market Lodge, share what your experiences have been. And if you give it a try (either as an affiliate or vendor) come back and share your experience.

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How to Stop Copyright Violators

When you’re out there in the New Media marketplace, working hard to grow your Tribe, you’re sharing a lot of valuable information. In some cases it’s free content you want passed along. In other cases it’s digital products that people have to pay to access.

In either case, there are morons out there who will try to steal your content. Some of these mental midgets will pass along part (or all) of your work and take full credit for it. Then there are thieves who will try to steal your product by repackaging and selling YOUR digital products.

The first is copyright infringement, intellectual theft. The second is online burgularly. It’s no different than stealing money out of your wallet.

Today we’re going to look at some very simple, very effective actions you can take to protect yourself against copyright infringement and online theft.

In this video report you’ll learn:

• What you can do to protect yourself against copyright infringement?
• Who is responsible for tracking it?
• How you can find if your material is being stolen?
• What to do if you find somebody stealing your material?

So that’s how you protect yourself against online theft and copyright infringement. It’s something that we all deal with, in new media marketing with blogs, podcasts, and online video. And you have to be especially diligent if you have digital products.

Protect yourself, take the basic steps covered in the video and “How To Stop Online Content Thieves” PDF Transcript. Put them into action today. Or at least have your assistant doing the monitoring on a daily or weekly basis, and you’ll be protected at least at a base level.

If you have additional resources to recommend, or a story about online content theft, share it in a comment below.

Resources mentioned in the video

DOWNLOAD
“How To Stop Online Content Thieves” PDF Transcript

DOWNLOAD
Word Template for Copyright Infringement letter to ISP:
http://tribalseduction.com/copyrightletter.php

ISP look-up service:
http://centralops.net/

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998:
http://www.copyright.gov/legislation/dmca.pdf

Service to help you search for copies of your page on the Web:
http://copyscape.com

Info on Ebay’s VeRO program:
http://pages.ebay.com/help/tp/programs-vero-ov.html

Google Alerts:
http://www.google.com/alerts

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This is high-resolution 55mb video above and takes a while to load. You can read while it loads or watch it on Revver down below.

Using video to bond with your Tribe in your New Media Marketing will boost emotional bonding.

If you’ve been shying away from using it because you think capturing video needs to be complex or costly — this is going to rock your world and remove any fear. And even if you’re more experienced at filming with an expensive HD camera, you’ll see why this is a “must have tool” for you too!

When it comes to capturing video for New Media Marketing, there’s a new king on the block for simplicity. It’s called the Flip Video recorder. This tiny little recorder (it’s the size of a pack of cards,) holds 60-minutes of digital video. Quality is more than sufficient for Web use, and it even looks good on a regular TV too.

We’ve been testing the new Flip Video in “normal” filming situations. But we wanted to really put it to the test and see how quickly it would adapt to rapid light changes and high speed movement.

As you’ll see from the video, the Flip Video does not disappoint here either. The online trans-coding on YouTube does it no justice, Revver is better.

But above in raw format, and even on Revver down below, you can see that it did as good a job at color and light adjustment under demanding situations. Surprisingly as good as our $2,000 Sony HD camera! You can really see the lush greens of the mountains and deep blues of the ocean even at high speed.

Flip Video is one of the best “bang for your buck” purchases you can make. At around $150 online, Flip Video is a “must have” tool for anyone serious about New Media Marketing.

How could you boost your Tribal Seduction and New Media Marketing with a Flip video Recorder? And if you’ve already got a Flip Video, what are you doing with it to have fun and bond with your Tribe?

Drop us a quick note below and share your ideas.

Play Now:

 Flip Video test: New Media Marketing Tool: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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