Narcissism, Hubris and Me.....

After a drug-induced weekend filled with strippers and booze, I asked my mom to leave the room so I could do some serious soul-searching. I've always been a humble guy, but I just can't help but love the company I work for. You see, I'm not one of those people who works for a company to collect a paycheck (although it is nice). I took a pay-cut out of college as a host at Hard Rock Cafe in San Diego to my first journalism gig in Pocatello, ID.

That's love.

I work at MerchantCircle because we're doing a GREAT and NECESSARY deed. We've built, essentially, a FREE website for every business in America.

Let me explain why I'm going into this. I've recently been called less-than-humble and narcissistic even. Sure, maybe I toot MerchantCircle's horn too much. But it's genuine excitement. How many times do we need to write boring blogs about the importance of blogging, or about building coupons, or about the importance of being found high in search engines? All of which are very important for our merchants.

I write the MerchantCircle corporate blog to try and entertain and let our merchants know about their growing community and about why they should continue to invite their merchant friends.

Now if I were writing just about me, it would be all self-deprecation. Let's start with a long list of embarrassing moments in my life. (I am narcissistic after all!)

- I got beat up in 5th grade by a girl because I tried to take her spot on the Merry-Go-Round. (I haven't fought since, but I will so take you Stephanie Smith from Huntsville, TX if we ever meet again.)

-In high school, a bird once pooped on my head. Fortunately, it was on my brand new fitted Atlanta Braves hat.

-During my first day behind the anchor desk filling in for sports, I read off the teleprompter my own name as 'I'm Kevin Lee-ooo'. (I should have spelled it phonetically or how it sounds. 'Loo' or 'Lue'. Or maybe I should have repeated kindergarten.)

-People at work call me T-Bone and worse yet, I gave myself the nickname.

I could go on, but we'll stop there. You know, a news director once told me, 'be more worried if people AREN'T talking about you'.

Sincerely,
Kevin Leu "Lue"
P.S. I am sooooo not hubristic! (Did I use that word right? I had to look it up several times.)

Building a better MerchantCircle

It's been great to see all of Kevin's posts over the last few months on MerchantCircle's blog. Whether it's him talking about what's going well or what sucks, he is always funny. But, I suppose not everyone thinks so, here is a post mentioned that says maybe we are not humble enough. I think honestly some people are taking Kevin's tongue in cheek style a bit too seriously. Now, I love Sack's blog, I also love the blogs of a lot of other people who share their company story (Check out skrenta.com, rp0229.com, and munjal.typepad.com).


We are very proud of what we do, we have grown by 1000 merchants (A couple of our latest - P2000 Insulation, LMS Video Surveillance Systems, and Happy Tails Pet Care Services) in the last couple of days and that is not even close to being a great period for us. We like the growth but we are driving to get more merchants to use more of what we have already built for them. We just did a big customer survey and found that 40% of our users did not know of some of our features.

We definitely have work left to do.

For example, you can

* Publish your company blog
* Create coupons and have them distributed around the web
* Upload pictures and videos
* Send out a weekly, biweekly, or monthly newsletter

We're constantly striving to improve and will keep asking for your input as to make MerchantCircle the best it can be.


Best,
Ben Smith
Chairman, MerchantCircle

Back to the Big Apple for Some Face Time!

Just months after heading to New York to accept AlwaysOn Media's Award as one of the Top 100 Private Companies and Newcomer of the Year out of over a thousand candidates, we're headed back to New York again - this time for some press interviews on Wall Street. We don't want to spill the beans just yet for whom, but we're pretty excited. In fact, it will be our first on-camera interview.

Of course, we've received a fair amount of attention from online media, including BusinessWeek.com and print publications, including Entrepreneur Magazine, now it's time for the next step in the media chain! At this pace, by the end of the year, expect MerchantCircle to be starring in a feature attraction in Hollywood.

And just one more thing, MerchantCircle recently shot past 100,000 merchants and as of today stands at 112,000. That's 112,000 in just 9 months!!!! Sshhhh, keep it down though, I'll need some plastic surgery and liposuction before Hollywood comes beckoning.....

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

MerchantCircle Owns Reputation Management, you got a problem with that?

Not to be too brash, but sometimes you've gotta call things as they are. I've reiterated time and time again, that the internet is becoming a place full of user-generated-content. The majority of the time, that's amateur content. Not that it lacks credibility, but it's a free-for-all with no journalistic ethics to regulate statements, or reviews for that matter.

Take for instance this article from SFGate.com about how a business owner got nearly driven out of business because of what reviewers were saying on a directory site. That directory site's response? Pay us - and we'll let you have the first comment section to yourself (above of all the negative reviews that people will still see).

Extortionist Tactics?

Bottom line is this: you as business owner need to know what's being said on the web so you can proactively take steps to change your business method. We're the only place, that for FREE, shows you all the sites that allow reviews and show you how your business is listed AND include links back to those sites.

All I gotta say is, I pity the fool who ain't managing their online reputation.

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

What I Learned From the Kelsey Conference

For those of you who don't know; the Kelsey Conference is a summit for those working with local online content. It's mostly the guys and gals behind the scenes trying to figure out how to make the internet more of an intimate space within YOUR community.

I really liked meeting and talking to people at the conference. For instance, a gentleman from Germany approached me with how his company is trying to do what MerchantCircle does in Germany (Here's his company, if you can read German). Even though we're currently only in the U.S., several people from overseas mentioned they had checked out our site before.

It's also real nice to meet and chat with some of the bloggers around the local internet space, rather than just trading e-mails. It helps you see them a little differently. For instance, Greg Sterling has a well-timed sense of humor that unfortunately doesn't come out in his blogs. Peter Krasilovsky is probably one of the nicest guys you'll meet, but it hurts your neck talking to him, because he's so tall! Donna Bogatin minds her business, wary of hearing the 30 second elevator pitch, and constantly nursing a martini. Even Ahmed isn't all that cynical once you sit down and talk with him.

Can't wait to see you all at the next conference!

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

Why Fonzie Would Kick Your Butt

The 'Fonz' on Happy Days knew about his reputation. Heck, everyone knew about his
reputation. He could end fights without even throwing a punch. He could pick up girls
without opening his mouth. If he wanted to, he could steal your customers without breaking a
sweat.

His reputation was managed to a tee.

Here at MerchantCircle, we want to make sure that you can manage your reputation. And
believe me; you have one, not only on the streets, but on the web. (Thanks to that darn Al Gore!)

So to counter this influx of content from consumers, we created a reputation score for you
so you know where your business is being listed, or more importantly, isn't being listed so
you can do something about it. That reputation score goes up as you take back control of
your web presence and reputation and gain more traction with customers.

Fonzie had a kick butt reputation, but once people got close, they could see he had a great
heart as well.

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations

It's Not You, It's Me....

MerchantCircle does things differently that everyone else. No qualms about it.

Other sites give complete control to customers and their reviews. We give complete control to you, the business owner. Don't like a review? Delete it. Want to customize your business listing? It's yours. Upload pictures, blog about your business, build coupons, share tips... whatever you'd like.

We want to make sure that the web isn't a scary place for you to navigate, but we also want to make you aware that customers are writing reviews about your business on the web. We want to show them to you and many times those reviews aren't flattering. Don't take it personal with us. We just want to let you know so that you can manage your online reputation.

We're different. I've already said that, but we're different because we're letting you know that this information is out there. No one else is doing that. The web is a rapidly changing, consumer-driven destination. It's only fair that you can keep track of it all.

Sincerely,
Kevin
Community Relations