 Poster: A snowHead
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Last edited by Poster: A snowHead on Fri 8-12-17 13:53; edited 2 times in total
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Last edited by Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see? on Fri 8-12-17 13:54; edited 1 time in total
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Ok. I’ll watch with interest.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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"They"?
From Juice's website!
'Meet the Team
Charlie Baron
Juice caught Charlie's attention through his love for technology, skiing and brands. Charlie front's the marketing efforts, looking to expand the brand globally.
Charlie is hoping to get over 100kmph on Ski's in the upcoming season with Juice's help!!'
PS Charlie - you don't need the apostrophe in Ski's, or a capital S for that matter.
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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Last edited by You'll need to Register first of course. on Fri 8-12-17 13:09; edited 1 time in total
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Snowheads is meant to be a community, not a free billboard. People are generally given a bit of leeway to plug cool stuff, IF (and it's a big if)... (a) it's cool enough to be worth plugging, and/or (b) they do actually contribute something to the forum besides plugging products. For some people, that's knowledge and for others it's money. Have you contributed either?
If you can provide some good interesting information on how Juice works, that might be one thing. If you were on the forum every day giving good advice, and periodically mentioning your product... you'd probably get away with that. But just coming on here, plugging it for free and giving nothing back to the forum which gives you an international pedestal to stand on... well it's just a bit rude and disrespectful to the whole concept.
So on the whole I personally think you should go away.
Last edited by After all it is free  on Fri 8-12-17 4:11; edited 2 times in total
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Last edited by You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net. on Fri 8-12-17 13:09; edited 1 time in total
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It doesn't matter if I'm happy. It's about being part of a community and putting in as much as you want to get out.
You can't just come here, post your corporate waffle and expect sales to come flooding in but give nothing back in return.
When I say engage with the community... I do literally mean share your knowledge and experience of skiing without mentioning Juice... be useful to the forum, say stuff that actually helps other people rather than just yourself. And if you do that, and become a valued poster, then mentioning Juice once in a hundred posts won't bother people half as much.
Or alternatively, if you're serious about marketing your product, get in touch with Admin, cough up some cash (not because he's a racketeer but more because it does actually cost money to run a forum like this) and pay to advertise with actual adverts rather than just trying to slip it into the forum unnoticed.
But spamming 3 threads pretending you're just a friend of the owner with no commercial interest, then being found out to have your own section on the website as 'fronting up the marketing', is somewhere between misleading and just dishonest, and in such a community, nobody likes either.
| CharlieBaron wrote: |
I know the inventor whos worked on this for ages! Its quite incredible how well it works, thing is the industry is so backward no one wants to look into it.
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| CharlieBaron wrote: |
| We will be at all the major events this year so maybe see you down there! Look out for the Juice logos!! |
| CharlieBaron wrote: |
| As I said I'm helping out with their marketing! |
That went from "They" to "I know somebody" to "We" to "oh cr@p I've been rumbled" a bit quickly.
Last edited by Ski the Net with snowHeads on Fri 8-12-17 4:13; edited 3 times in total
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Last edited by snowHeads are a friendly bunch. on Fri 8-12-17 13:10; edited 1 time in total
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| CharlieBaron wrote: |
| you just bashing a startup for trying to innovate |
I'm not bashing you for trying to innovate.
I'm bashing you for telling porky pies trying to deceive a community of decent forum users so that you can make money out of them.
By the way I'm not an expert in marketing but my personal experience is that such actions aren't actually too great for PR.
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@CharlieBaron,
dp is the forum Rottweiler (but a very helpful one). I knew he’d be along in short time. He can smell spam from 50 miles away.
You’ve admitted you are new here, so let one newbie help another. There are about 6 or 7 what we call “bashes”each skiing season. They are trips kindly organised by the guy who runs the forum - Admin. The number of attendees varies from 30 to a hundred+, depending upon the type of trip. The trips are in different venues with different temperatures and different types of snow. Some are all off piste. There are 51,000 registered users on this forum. If your product is as good as you say, you would get a far better return on your investment if you gave Admin a few free boxes to dish out at the bashes, as a loss leader. Admin then may be willing to set up a review page, where people can share their views of the product.
Social media is a powerful marketing tool, if used properly. If the product is the dogs do das , as you say it is, then word will spread quickly. If it’s not, well unfortunately, bad news spreads even quicker. The outlay of a few boxes of free samples, even for a small company, will work out a helluva lot cheaper than paying Martin Bell for his endorsement. Using a star to market is old hat, as it is viewed as nothing more than sponsorship, in all but name.
Sorry for stringing you along earlier, but as it says at the bottom of my posts “If you can’t take a joke, you shouldn’t have joined up” Take dp’s advice, contribute.
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You know it makes sense.
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| Awdbugga wrote: |
| dp is the forum Rottweiler |
I know you mean well and light-heartedly but it's not really like that. I value snowheads and the community that it is. I value the neutrality and the freedom of speech. You can say something is great - if you say why it's great. You can say something sucks a donkey's nutsack, if you say why it sucks a donkey's nutsack. You can whinge about the forum and the events and the people too, if you've got a valid gripe. Everyone's generally fair game for a bunfight if the buns are all decent.
But that quality comes from hours upon hours of peoples' own time, contributing useful information and asking interesting questions. There are cumulative centuries if not millenniums of skiing experience to be gathered from this forum and there is no cost... you can create a free account and read every post on the forum free of charge (and then some people - like you and me both - pay money for that privilege because we value it such). Those who post generally do so because they have a genuine care for others to learn as much as they can about the sport, increase their enjoyment of it and do it to the best of their ability. It's a great forum. So it genuinely grinds my gears when representatives of companies sign up for an account and pretend to independently enquire about a product with a sole interest of drumming up business by deceit. It takes a giant dump on all the people who post good information because they want to. This is a community and in any community you wouldn't just turn up, lie to everyone and start taking their money.
It's especially disrespectful when you copy and paste your marketing post onto no less than 5 different threads, which shows to me that you know exactly what you're doing. Referring to the company in the third person and claiming to just be an acquaintance is outright lying and lying has no place in a civilised community where >99% of the content comes from genuine and well-meaning users. It's just dishonest, disrespectful, and has no place at all.
It has to be pointed out, mind, that doing so with a username that just so happens to share the name of the marketing guy from the company you're talking about... that's not even disrespectful, it's just stupid.
| Awdbugga wrote: |
you would get a far better return on your investment if you gave Admin a few free boxes to dish out at the bashes, as a loss leader. Admin then may be willing to set up a review page, where people can share their views of the product. |
To be fair it isn't actually that simple. To hand out free samples of something carries an inherent endorsement and association. I can't speak on his behalf and I'm honestly not trying to, but I do not for a minute think that Admin will give people the privileged association of the snowheads brand, because they send free stuff. Yes you go on bashes and ski tests and so on and there are companies being represented, but I do believe firmly that every company I have personally encountered whilst on a snowheads activity has added value to this community. And that is literally the distinction. There is a community here - and the reason snowheads is awesome and has 51,000 members is because it is a quality community. I'm only a mere snowhead - I'm not acting as judge or jury - but I for one would not ever want to see this community prostitute itself to a business who could not prove to be a useful and genuine part of said community.
The answer to Mr Charlie Baron isn't "send us your free stuff"... the answer is: Start being honest, start being genuine, engage with the community, contribute to the community, and relocate your motivation for being part of the community firmly into the "because I want to be part of a community" park rather than "because I want to generate income for my business" park.
Sorry for the long lecture but I do feel strongly on this and it's really not so simple as being able to buy your way out of it by sending free stuff.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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@dp, apologies for the Rottweiler reference, it was meant as a term of endearment, but you knew that.
I was trying to get across to him that we are not just a forum but a community who actually go on holidays together. I was also trying to express my views that they would get better value for money to publicise positive reviews from a larger number of “normal” people who go skiing, than a few paid for endorsements from stars. And if they are so confident about how good it is, one way they could do that is to provide samples as a loss leader. To be honest, even if he’d come clean from the outset and offered to give away the product free to Snowheads to evaluate, he’d get a honest review, be it positive or negative. But I take your point that a positive review on a free product could be perceived as not being truly impartial.
When I set up a small video production company with my son, we did a number of videos free for clients to begin with. One took us three days on site. But we needed a portfolio to show people what we could do, freebies seemed the best way to achieve this. We then got the videos we needed and they were all willing to provide testimonials. It meant nothing to prospective clients, me simply telling them what we could do, they wanted to see for themselves.
But your right, he was hardly subtle, posting on five threads within the space of ten minutes. I wonder if he’ll be back? He certainly hasn’t done them any favours.
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Poster: A snowHead
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@dp, apologies for the Rottweiler reference, it was meant as a term of endearment, but you knew that.
I was trying to get across to him that we are not just a forum but a community who actually go on holidays together. I was also trying to express my views that they would get better value for money to publicise positive reviews from a larger number of “normal” people who go skiing, than a few paid for endorsements from stars. And if they are so confident about how good it is, one way they could do that is to provide samples as a loss leader. To be honest, even if he’d come clean from the outset and offered to give away the product free to Snowheads to evaluate, he’d get a honest review, be it positive or negative. But I take your point that a positive review on a free product could be perceived as not being truly impartial.
When I set up a small video production company with my son, we did a number of videos free for clients to begin with. One took us three days on site. But we needed a portfolio to show people what we could do, freebies seemed the best way to achieve this. We then got the videos we needed and they were all willing to provide testimonials. It meant nothing to prospective clients, me simply telling them what we could do, they wanted to see for themselves.
But your right, he was hardly subtle, posting on five threads within the space of ten minutes. I wonder if he’ll be back? He certainly hasn’t done them any favours.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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@dp, apologies for the Rottweiler reference, it was meant as a term of endearment, but you knew that.
I was trying to get across to him that we are not just a forum but a community who actually go on holidays together. I was also trying to express my views that they would get better value for money to publicise positive reviews from a larger number of “normal” people who go skiing, than a few paid for endorsements from stars. And if they are so confident about how good it is, one way they could do that is to provide samples as a loss leader. To be honest, even if he’d come clean from the outset and offered to give away the product free to Snowheads to evaluate, he’d get a honest review, be it positive or negative. But I take your point that a positive review on a free product could be perceived as not being truly impartial.
When I set up a small video production company with my son, we did a number of videos free for clients to begin with. One took us three days on site. But we needed a portfolio to show people what we could do, freebies seemed the best way to achieve this. We then got the videos we needed and they were all willing to provide testimonials. It meant nothing to prospective clients, me simply telling them what we could do, they wanted to see for themselves.
But your right, he was hardly subtle, posting on five threads within the space of ten minutes. I wonder if he’ll be back? He certainly hasn’t done them any favours.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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Deleted. Posted in triplicate for some reason.
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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Deleted. Posted in triplicate for some reason. What is going on? Nothing happened then five duplicates get posted. Oh well.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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| Awdbugga wrote: |
| Deleted. What is going on? Nothing happened then five duplicates get posted. Not sure how to delete a complete post. Oh well.. |
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You'll need to Register first of course.
You'll need to Register first of course.
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I'm with dp on this. One of the most valuable things about the advice and information we have on this forum is that we know where it's coming from and can judge it accordingly. We have everything on here from casual skiers to authors, professional instructors, boot fitters, knee specialists, tour operators, etc but we know who they are and can judge their advice and recommendations accordingly (almost unfailingly good because they're being open and honest about who they are and are providing good, insightful knowledge from a position of expertise and experience)
To come on here and pretend to be independent while promoting the products of a company you're involved with is deceiteful and disrespectful and involves lying and blatant spamming because you're trying not to show that you actually know anything about the product and just end up saying 'this is great...'
This guy has totally destroyed the reputation of the company with his deceit and lies and should be ashamed of himself.
He's also making lots of unsupported claims for the product and hitting out at the ski industry. It all sounds like sour grapes to me.
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| CharlieBaron wrote: |
| As I said I'm helping out with their marketing! Clearly skiers are more set in their ways than we first thought... No wonder it took Tesla so long to try and change an obviously dead industry! |
Good marketing move, ‘lie’ about your link with the company and then insult people.
Of course people are sceptical, just telling people that something works isn’t enough to convince them. Especially when what you’re selling sounds a bit like snake oil.
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| Awdbugga wrote: |
But I take your point that a positive review on a free product could be perceived as not being truly impartial.
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That wasn't my point at all. My point was that as soon as Snowheads gives away a free product to it's members at an event, that brand has an affiliation with Snowheads.
There are plenty of businesses who have that association with the Snowheads brand. But they also contribute to the forum. They add value to it. There is a 2-way relationship... there is absolutely an expectation from those businesses that they will generate custom through the forum, but it's OK because they contribute back to the forum too. They share advice, provide demo skis, offer discounts. When you have a 2-way relationship, you're part of the community. When you just try to flog something, that's a 1-way relationship and you're not part of the community, you're just trying to benefit by it.
snowHeads is easily the biggest online ski resource for the UK and Europe. It would be wrong if you could buy affiliation with such a brand, for the price of a few boxes of your product... especially on the assumption that people will review it for you. That isn't what it's meant to be about. You can't just buy your way in at the top of the ladder.
And it's not really 'a community who actually go on holidays together' as you put it. The forum is not bash-centric. There are plenty of regular, high quality contributors who do not attend bashes. And there are people too who attend the bashes and prove great company in real life who never really post anything on the forum. And that's fine. Nobody is expecting that you have to put in what you take out or you have to take out what you put in. Everyone uses the forum the way they want to use it and nobody takes the proverbial, and generally it makes for a pretty sweet little thing. Which is really the reason that when somebody comes on the forum, lie about their credentials and tries to sell a product by deceit; that people get their backs up about it.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I do hope Charlie isn't being paid for his Marketing skills (sic).
That said it's an interesting product and the write up is extensive. Still not quite sure how it works (technically) but there are some endorsements that I'd like to check the authenticity of.
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Hey Charlie,
Deleting all your deceitful comments but leaving the links up. Pure class. 
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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@olderscot, I stand by my belief that he went to the Trump school of PR
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FAQ
