A while back, I was looking for a social media expert.
At the time, I was thinking of people to interview for the now dissolved Crackerjack Selling CD Club (which was replaced with my print Crypto Marketing Newsletter afterwards).
And so I put some “feelers” out there.
Specifically, on Twitter and other social media sites.
Got lots of feedback, too.
But mostly it came down to about 4 or 5 names. Three of them turned out to be lame interview candidates (all hat and no cattle, if you catch my drift) and one I didn’t trust.
And the fourth?
Well this person seemed like a smart cookie.
And came well recommended (even by other goo-roo skeptics).
So I checked this person’s site out and was actually pretty impressed. They said all the right things, seemed to have a decent grasp on marketing, and even had lots of articles about social media.
But… something seemed “off.”
I couldn’t quite put my finger on what, exactly.
But I knew something was rotten in Denmark here.
So I did something I like to call the “do they practice what they preach?” test. In this case, the person had an article about how, on FaceBook, you should always send a personal message thanking someone who befriends you, or when you befriend them.
Sounded like pretty good advice.
At least, in theory (although redundant in practice).
So I sally forthed and befriended this person, even including a note saying “cool article about thanking new FaceBook friends” (something like that).
No reply.
What a shock, eh?
Now, don’t get me wrong.
I couldn’t have cared less either way about getting a thank you message (I never send them). And maybe something came up or happened with this person that day.
Who knows?
But it smelled an awful lot like goo-roo to me.
Anyway, what’s the moral of the story?
Goo-roos are a dime a dozen these days.
If you want to know which ones are “for real” or not, simply use the same “do they practice what they preach” test and watch what happens.
It’s not 100% reliable (nobody’s perfect).
But I’ve found it to be extremely accurate most of the time.
Ben Settle
P.S. The April issue of The Crypto Marketing Newsletter goes to print tomorrow:
