I read today an article by The Star: Shift to smartphones clips carriers’ margins . The gist of is that, because carriers like Rogers have to push smartphones and subsidize them their APRU is falling. They also mention that Telus’ profits went down by 5.6 per cent which is largely atributed to its Koodo brand – surprise, surprise!

What can I say to the carriers? boo hoo your APRU was so high historically that you have a lot of place on where to fall. I mean only in Canada we get charged: system access fee, we pay separately for voicemail, caller ID and received SMS messages from online. Even just writting about it makes me mad for the amount of money I pay to Rogers every month and how they still treat me like a second class citizen, because they couldn’t care less.

I guess the honemoon period is soon will be over: you can’t be ripping off Canadian customers forever!

Like a lot of people in Toronto I get bombarded by flyers from Extreme Fitness that usually say: $8 per month, no contract, no execuses etc… I think I receive at least 2 flyers per month from them.  My buddy and I decided to finally check it out, plus we heard they have an MMA program as well. The assumption was to check out the gym see the real costs and what kind of teachers they have for MMA. The conclusion was that it costs way more, they push the sale worse than a used car salesman and their MMA intstructors have more attitude than young Mike Tyson.

The experience started from us filling out some crazy amount of paperwork. After around 10 min a nice guy ( he was actually nice) said that he will show us the gym. He asked us both another 20 or 30 questions about our fitness goals etc… I tried to tell him that we are pretty experienced people and just want to see the gym, get the costs and the schedule for classes. It didn’t matter as he continued the same line of questioning, later I understood that was in order to sell their private lessons. I asked couple of times how much MMA classes costs and he said he doesn’t know “they need to asses my fitness level.” I asked a pretty reasonable question how is the price related to my fitness level? He said don’t worry lets just talk to one of our 2 MMA trainers they both fought in Pride.

So we went to check out the gym which was not bad at all in itself. Then we finally reached George K (couldn’t find his last name anywhere) who is supposed to be the ex Pride fighter. He was leaning back on his chair when he saw us, didn’t even stand-up to shake our hand. Once I explained that I take Muya Thai and Aikido and was just wondering how much MMA would cost here he said “We did you ever see free MMA in this city?.” I said no and I don’t expect it to be free, but I want to know how much does it cost – he still didn’t respond and just wanted to sign us up for a free demo. I can’t explain his attitude in writting, but he acted like he is some undefeated champion of the world and I am kid who wants to get an interview. If I might say quite an asshole attitude.

I finally asked the guy about the prices for the gym itself they are : $66 if you want to use one gym and $74 if you want to use multiple gyms. This price is valid only with long term contract, go figure after all their flyers saying that their is no contract. He still didn’t tell me the price for MMA. Once we were about to leave the manager came and tried to push their sale on us again. He even tried to close the doors till we buy the membership. After we finally left the place I decided to never go back to Extreme Fitness again! Last thing I need in my life are pushy sales and crappy attitude.

When I went home I checked out a bio of the second MMA trainer George Kiriakou their had over there and turns out he is not that nice of a guy either. Check out the video and comments bellow. BTW I didn’t find any single mention of him or his buddy being in Pride. Also as somewhat experience martial artist I can tell you that there is no way two teachers can give you an adequate training in Muya Thai, BJJ, Wrestling, Boxing and Conditioning.

So overall I figured out that Extreme Fitness spends a lot of money on marketing to you, pushing their sales onto to you and then sign you in a long contract. I doubt really that after that they have a good customer service. This is a no for me.

Finally, Russian wrestler tenders apology

]]> http://romanz.org/extremely-negative-experience-with-extreme-fitness-in-toronto/feed 9 http://romanz.org/new-koodo-campaign-succesfull-or-not http://romanz.org/new-koodo-campaign-succesfull-or-not#comments Fri, 10 Apr 2009 16:22:54 +0000 Roman http://romanz.org/?p=195

Almost a year ago I published an infamous post Koodo Mobile in Toronto or why develop a fake brand? which generated a lot of controversy between and my readers (mostly just my friends). Back then I thought couple of things:

1) What is the point in creating of what I call a fake brand or sub-brand of Telus?

2) Originally Koodo was supposed to be targeting younger people and I didn’t understand how is 80′s work out tape relates to the target audience

3) I didn’t think that “fat free mobility” was actually fat free.

So was I right or wrong? I think I was right in some things and that Koodo adjusted in a year and is now looking more like what is supposed to resemble. Here is my reasoning:

-Now almost a year later same advertising agency Taxi 2 changed its advertising campaign from 80′s workout tape to clever new words like “bigbiliffication,” but still kept the same colors.  I think that was a great move as that 80′s tape was annoying the hell out of people. Just check out Twiter if you don’t beleive me. I still don’t know what is the point of people with big mouths, but I think they have a cleaver slogans and it was good they kep the colors to keep the branding going.

-Telus did grow their customer base quite a bit, but is not releasing how much of it is attributed to Koodo.  Somehow I think if the figures were good they would release them openly

-They deviated from “fat free mobility” and now offer: web browsing, mms, call forwarding and when you add all the services it still doesn’t come out that cheap

-They did eliminate service charge – which made them look like an actual discount brand.

I still beleive that brands like Koodo, Fido, and Soho are just one of the way to trick consumers in buyng the same service. Some people do it, because they like marketing others just don’t see any other alternative. My opinion is that when new players like Globalive enter the market Rogers, Bell, and Telus will have to adjust and make their prices reasonable as a a result Koodo, Soho and Fido will have to either disappear or become even more discounted in order to attract customers that would want to use services from new players.

I personally can’t wait for that time. We really need a second GSM company in Canada!

I will be upfront that I am not an expert or anywhere near in social media. I know how it works in theory, but implementation been lagging I just don’t seem to have enough patience or maybe my strategy is just wrong and I need to hire social media specialists. In my mind I compare every life situation with either driving on highway (don’t ask I have a whole theory) or martial arts training, so I figured that social media is like martial arts – never happens overnight, takes practice and lots of patience.
That is a reason why I feel very happy even when I make small steps to improve my social media profile and skills. I did two things in last couple of days to improve:

Twitter:
It seems that everybody on the net talks and uses Twitter these days. I’ve been slow in using it and only have 56 updates – partly due to a simple fact that I had no followers. However, now when T4C is near its completion it is time to reach out to the public of Toronto, I said to myself, it is time to start actually using Twitter. Now, I know that my approach is totally wrong – I should have been developing relationships and followers along the way and now it will take some time till I build creditability with the community and actually benefit from Twitter – but hey, it is better late than never right?

So I did two things:

1) I installed Twitter – Facebook application. What it does is copies my Twitter updates to Facebook, I don’t think it works in reverse. This allows me to tap into more developed Facebook network while building up my Twitter account as well. I think this is a first step one should do.

2) Now before I go to sleep I go to search.twitter.com and search for terms relevant to T4C it is amazing how many people are on Twitter from Toronto while nobody around me doesn’t even know what Twitter is. I read through first two pages and check out interesting people. I don’t want to follow each and everyone, because then really it will be impossible to follow all of them. So I click on user profiles, check out their updates and their blog or website. If a person is interesting – I follow. Then – magic this people start following me as well. So in a day I grew my followers from 8 to 30.

I know that mastering Twitter is a slow process and I also need to bring value to people who follow me and not just promote my content. That is why I am going to take my time to develop this relationship and gradually grow the readership. I think next step would be to get custom designed Twitter page and participate more in conversation of people I follow already.

Toronto Food Blogs
Really there is no direct competition to T4C ( and that is why we started the project), but it doesn’t mean somebody is not starting the same project and you still have to follow other players in the industry. From my perspective the nearest to us in topic are food blogs and entertainment guides. Finding major ones is pretty easy, but how do you go deeper? I used a system that I read from Dave’s Fleet blog :Practical 101s: Google Reader And Persistent Search . So I set a brand new Google account, so it doesn’t mix with the regular feeds I read and set up a system that monitors every media company in Toronto I could think about as well as keywords like “Toronto Restaurants” or “Toronto Dates.”
Yesterday I logged in to this account and scanned the 660 feeds that appeared over there in a matter of 10 min I found 15 local Toronto blogs that are dedicated to food – I was amazed, because I couldn’t find them before when I was doing the research for my business plan.

Now these new websites that I discovered could be our competition or in opposite could become our content partner – you never know. What I do know that as a professionals in what we do – we just have to keep on eye on what these guys do and try to develop a relationship with them where everyone will benefit.

So here they are – my baby steps in social media. I think I will spend more time with blogs and Twitter for now, and not going to use use Stumble or Digg anytime soon – because I want to be authentic and that requires time and patience.

My little brother is finally here, so between playing a parent and celebrating Canada Day (I celebrate anything that gives me a good reason to part) I’ve been a bit busy. I was very keen on writing a post yesterday, but guess what? My Rogers Wireless was down and they couldn’t even fix it, because their own systems were down. This can be pretty disastrous if you work from home and using internet for pretty much everything you do.

Instead of describing my phone calls with Rogers (which were lessons on how not do customer service) I just want to put my two cents in for this whole Iphone in Canada story. As many of you know Rogers reveiled their Iphone pricing couple of days ago and a consumer backlash was phenomenal. I wanted say that I am proud for Canadian consumers who created a website ruinediphone.com and right now already more than 30,000 people signed the petition. Btw I encourage everyone who didn’t do it to sign it right now.

While I don’t think the petition will change anything since Rogers/Fido is an only GSM carrier in Canada and only they have exclusive rights to sell Iphone (which is a total anti-capitalistic approach). They are just milking this thing for whatever they can. I am still proud of Canadia consumers who are so aware that they are being ripped of. When I moved to Canada two years ago from Chicago – I found the prices for cellur service shocking. I was so ticked with the fact that despite the high prices everyone was used to these plans.

It is not a secret that Canadian don’t like to be compared to Americans (we have free medical insurance over here), but I still think that comparing value packages especially now when Canadian dollar is in par with American way is essential in getting what we rightfully deserve. We already pay more taxes when get our salaries and buy goods, why the price is so much more? I still can’t wrap my hear around it.

-why cars made in Canada and exported to USA are cheaper to buy in US bring back here than just buy a car in Canada?
-why books still cost 30% more in Canadian dollars?
-why electronics that are brought from Asia and distributed through Best Buy cost 20%-30% more over here


Just needed to unwind that is what blogs are for.

Check out theIlube picture!

Even though some of my friends thing I am into technology I am really not that tech savvy and for sure I am not a web designer. That is why the decision of outsourcing the web site creation and maintenance was obvious. My believe is that a business can outsource everything except strategic functions – basis for the competitive advantage. In my business competitive advantage is created through creation if unique content, marketing of the media channel to bring visitors and sales relationships with advertisers. I strongly believe that everything else can be and should be outsourced for lean operations.

I am writing a detailed business plan these days (if you still didn’t participate in the survey I sent you – do it right now, that is a part of marketing research) and needed to understand how much the website will costs. I also wanted a break down of how much each feature I want takes time and costs associated with it. My plan is not only to outsource web site development but also to offshore it. I have connections in both Russia and Israel where the website can be created on the same level as in North America, but for the fraction of the cost.

My first step in getting quotes is to use Elance.com it is a great tool to upload some of the simple projects to someone else. I used it to find a designer Steve Sotto to build a logo for the website.

After posting a brief description of what I need “Entertainment Portal based on CMS” I received more that 40 private messages, some firms even quoted me on a project right away varying from $1000 to $20,000. The experience made me write this post dedicated to anyone who sends quotes or proposals for web development and pretty much for any business. I have to provide a disclaimer that I think in my professional life I provided a top notch service to my clients and that is why when I am a buyer I am very picky. So here are my rules:

• Don’t quote on a project till you know the scope of it - Everyone who quoted without even looking into what I need and furthermore wanted to push me into making a purchase decision were eliminated from the list. It is simple as that: if you don’t have time to make sure you have what I need – I am not willing to work with you daily for 2-3 month in creating my baby.
• Remember who you quoted – a guy wrote me an email that he would be “delighted to go over the project details” with me over the phone and that I can call at my earliest convenience. I did call after 15 minutes of receiving his email. To my surprise he didn’t know who I was or what project I am talking about. It took him five minutes to figure it. I even felt that he unhappy that I interrupted whatever he was doing with my phone call. Gone.
• Read what client wrote -after talking to a couple of firms I understood that I have to write a detailed feature by feature description of what I need. It took me almost a day of writing and making schemes in order to try to translate my vision into paper (even though I thought it is plain clear – apparently it is not). I provided pretty detailed explanation of every feature I need along with examples from different websites that use these features right now. I also included executive summary. Sure enough some fast readers read executive summary and didn’t read the explanations. I got bunch of questions I already answered in the original document I sent. Again it mean a disrespect to my work and project. I felt that people just want to get the project as fast as possible without making sure that they are actually right people for the job. All of those guys – gone.
• Send formal proposal - if you expect me to send you a detailed feature by feature request and schemes of the pages, be kind enough to elaborate on your quote as well. Some people answered with once sentence ” You project will cost $12,000 and will take around 60 days. We can iron details as move along. Looking forward to getting started on your project.” I am sorry that just won’t cut it. I need to know what features take the longest time, your maintenance suggestions and what can be done better. All one liners – gone.
• Don’t quote too low – some people quoted me way bellow average like $1500 dollars. This make me suspicious – too good to be true. If everywhere else it costs $5000 and I get it for $4000 that is a deal, if I get for $1000 – it is a scam.
  
• Don’t slam down the competition – I don’t want to hear why other guys are bad. I want to hear why you are good. Concentrate on yourself and what value you bring to me.
• Do what you tell me you will – if you tell a client that you will send an email by the end of today – do it. Don’t send it after 3 days without even apologies – gone.

I am glad to say that 3 businesses passed all my picky tests and moved up to the next level of competition. My next step in weeding out who is gone it is to look more carefully on the previous work done and their expertise. I am not just going to look on their portfolio, but also to contact their previous clients and see if they would recommend them as suppliers. I will then look on who is “getting it” my vision I meant and with whom I would like to work together for at least all of the next year.

So here it is, I am picky – but I apply  same standards to my suppliers that I apply to my own business.

p.s. I am going to also look on a local level and compare the cost savings
p.p.s. my next post will explain exactly on how long it will take to make the website and what features are the most time consuming