In response to Doug's post about e-marketing

E-marketing is definitely taking over the world. It first started off with everyone getting one computer per household. Then it went to another, and another. Then every class room got a computer, and then computer labs per school, then per wing. Then more recently, people are now using phones for the internet. So, if the internet is so easily acceptable, of course marketing is going to be done on it.

E-marketing is huge, there is no other way to put it. Big companies pay websites to let them post their name on the site, for instance google makes all the money strictly on advertisements and people paying to have their names high up on the search list. Although advertising is huge, I feel like the reviews are a big part that is overlooked in these regards.

There are many websites out there that give reviews on products, what the people, us, the customers have to say that buy the product. If I want to know if something is good, what better what way than to see someone that already bought the product feels about it. For instance, when I am looking to buy an electronic item, especially cell phones, I go on www.cnet.com. They have workers that their job is to test products, give reviews and ratings, and also tell you how to use the product, and for an example with a phone, they tell you the features it has and who best to use it. So if there is a business phone for example like a blackberry, it will tell you this is mainly for a businessman, and tell you all the neat stuff it can do.

Of course reviews is marketing and advertising, because if it is a good review, it is good marketing of the product. The good thing about good reviews for companies is it is free advertising. What I mean by this is blackberry isn't paying cnet to give a good review, or tell it's customers how to use the phone, but they are...for free. This is similar to clothing companies. When someone wears an Abercrombie t-shirt, they are advertising Abercrombie and Fitch, just like when I wear a Boston Celtics jersey I am marketing for the Celtics.

Before I buy something, I always go online and read reviews, to see what people have to say. Even if I read a bad review though, it may not stop me from buying it. Do you also do this?

Toyota still trying to sell

I find it quite interesting that if you go on Toyota's homepage, the first thing you see is an ad for a new car. And the recall is on the bottom left, and the color of the box is red. The reason I am telling you that the color is red is because symmetrically on the other side is another red sox talking about special shopping offers. So they really didn't make this recall their number one priority on the web site, rather their brand new Sienna minivan or whatever car they decide to put on the site. I think Toyota really shouldn't have tried to cover this up, and now that it is out, should be making it their number one action to make it easy, find the problem and a solution for that matter, and get this squared away so they can earn their solid reputation back.

I don't know if everyone remembers what happened to Tylenol back in the early 1980s. Someone was taking the pills out and putting poison in the bottles instead. Because back then there was no seal over the bottle so you could easily switch them without a problem. Now, when Tylenol found out about this, they made mass amounts of announcements via television and radio and newspaper (the internet wasn't really around for the general public at that point) saying throw away or turn in your Tylenol no matter what, all Tylenol. They didn't try to hide it, knowing how much it will cost them (that is why car companies try to hide recalls, they'd rather just pay off a few settlements to families than fix the problem), they actually cared about the lives of their customers. Now, they didn't turn around over night, but today Tylenol has grown into one of the biggest medicine producing companies in the world; and many think that it is because of how they handled their crisis situation.

Don't you think Toyota should have handled their situation similar to Tylenol? Although I do think Toyota will get through this and eventually be back on top, I don't agree with anything they have done in regards to handling this awful dilemma. Do you think Toyota will get through this?