Stalking My Readers

Hands up, all you bloggers who closely follow your web visitor statistics! As someone who used to work in internet marketing, I find them particularly interesting. I have a small enough readership that I often recognize my regulars. I hope that doesn't give y'all a complex or anything. I'm always so happy to see you! Are you comfortable? Are you having a good time? Is the material interesting? Can I get you anything?

On the subject of internet marketing, I have a story for one of you in particular.

You know I used to work for this hellish, abusive company in Corpus, right? You might actually know who it is, although of course I've never published the company's actual name, nor the actual names of any of its principals, on my blog. They all have pseudonyms. The nasty owner/CEO is called Ursula after the "unscrupulous seahag" from The Little Mermaid.

When I first started there one of my duties was to coordinate the incredibly busy travel schedules of the VP and sales consultants. But we didn't have any calendaring software, so everything was written in dry-erase marker on a big laminated calendar on the wall outside my office, then copied into everyone's day planner. Anyone not physically in the office, due to travel or telecommuting, had to call me to find out who was where and when; and because trips were constantly being scheduled, rescheduled, and cancelled, merely keeping all the calendars up-to-date was a logistical nightmare. For a company that billed itself as being on the leading edge of internet technology, this was fairly stupid.

"All show and no go," disgruntled clients used to say about us; and the calendar issue was a case in point. Eventually Ursula broke down and sprang for an Outlook Exchange server, but she wasn't happy about it.

So I set up a Yahoo group for us, so that we could use the calendar function, and signed the VP and sales consultants up as group members. It worked great for about a week, after which Ursula put the kibosh on the whole thing. Yahoo, she said, was one of our top competitors. If we used Yahoo groups and the calendaring function, they'd be able to track our every move! They'd know which potential clients we were traveling to visit, which tradeshows we were attending, etc. I deleted our group and went back to the stone-age calendar on the wall, grumbling under my breath. I was pretty sure Ursula had delusions of grandeur. I thought it unlikely that Yahoo was aware of our existence.

Seeing the regular visits on my stat counter from someone at Yahoo/Inktomi has me wondering, though. Are you here for business or pleasure? I can't divulge any company secrets (aside from the fact that I very, very, very much doubt my former employer knows anything about their business that Yahoo doesn't know a hell of a lot better) but if you're contemplating buying them out, do please screw over Ursula for me, will you? And give the employees a raise, poor things. Every single person on staff is salaried, and with the hours they often put in, some of them are effectively making under minimum wage.

(Ursula knew how to hold down the grumbling. "When I see you here until 8 or 9 o'clock at night, that doesn't tell me you're dedicated. It tells me you don't know how to manage your time," she said sternly during a staff meeting once when morale was particularly low - and oddly, did not seem to improve following her remark, though people did stop complaining openly about the long hours.)

And all of you guys, if there's anything in particular you want me to write about, don't be shy! Life has been fairly placid and happy lately and I don't have much to gripe about, so I'd welcome suggestions.

Y'all come back now!