Re: GNU/Debian Linux vs. facebook, Twitter and other proprietary social media
On Sun, Feb 05, 2012 at 12:30:05PM +1000, Robert Brockway wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Feb 2012, Nick Lidakis wrote:
>
> >In a nutshell, my wife and I starting a small business in a family
> >oriented neighborhood. We're serving coffee, espresso and baking
> >fresh bread and pastry on premises. The shop will be located at
> >the northern tip of Manhattan in the vicinity of Inwood Hill Park
> >(last remaining undeveloped, old growth forest in Manhattan),
> >Isham Park and Fort Tryon Park.
>
I am self-employed (selling translation services, not coffee),
and I was up to my eyeballs in work before I ever put a page on
facebook.
I made one, c. 2 yrs ago, and do you want to know how many jobs I got from
facebook?
One.
Seriously. In 2 years.
I'm still up to my eyeballs in work.
I honestly have gotten a LOT of work from people who've encountered me
through the FOSS community, on mailing lists for relevant software
(OmegaT), or from my people finding my blog entries, or, through
identi.ca/statusnet, and other Free (faif) social networks (see
www.farcebork.com) and from peer recommendations,
professional associations, and, above all, the number one way people
find me and hire me is just through plain old google searches,
where they've found my website.
It's a different kind of business, since my clientele is all around the
world, and not from down the block (usually), but just a good website,
good SEO, and participation in whichever community is most relevant to
your work, it seems to me, is the best.
I've been on LinkedIN forever, and have hundreds of connections, and I
think that's brought me one or two jobs.
But, my experience is that facebook, linkedin, twitter...they really
aren't effective marketing means, anyway.
I've got three very large projects working now, simultaneously.
Two of these clients found me throught a professional translator's site
(proz.com), and the third found me due to participation in the Debian
community.
At this point, I stay quite busy and do almost no active "marketing",
per se. I have a long client list, and get a lot of word-of-mouth
recommendations.
Local visibility is probably more about signage, word of mouth,
location, than anything facebook can give you. I wouldn't waste time
with it. I don't anymore, and I don't advertise (spam folks) my
services on the faif social networks I use.
I use them to be social, and keep current on events.
Oh, and, indeed, my business is run 100% on Debian GNU/Linux and Free
Software, and has been for a decade.
./tony
--
http://www.baldwinlinguas.com
translations & interpreting
http://tonybaldwin.me
all tony, all the time!
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