Regarding MK's Printing Aplogie

[creative-keyrings]

Hi MK,

First off i believe you have no reason to be sorry. Ive looked at your posts and most replys have been good ones and people wanting your services.

If people didnt want your services they wouldnt respond to posts. It only annoys certain members on here because you are receving good business from your postings.

I say good luck to you and carry on giving people a service they obviousley want!

Regards,

Callum

[Coding Monkey]

Why would it annoy people who have no business regarding printing? I don't complain when Matrixx mentions hosting, or Crossguard says something regarding Trademarks, or Tin speaks about SEO.
And because several people reply doesn't mean it's successful. What about the hundreds who don't? If that's the logic, it's highly unpopular

[Jayne]

At least Matt doesn't hide the fact he's advertising :lol:

Look how many people post replies to posts, saying look at me, I can sell you that and fix the other and others who time after, time say look at my site because xxxxx is wrong with it. Then there's people who give you really big technical post, when a short one would have answered the question, is that not a form of advertising the skills they have. We are all guilty of self promoting, sometime without realising we are doing it. Therefore why should he say sorry for something we are all doing.

Jayne :D

[creacom]

Hi MK,
If people didnt want your services they wouldnt respond to posts. It only annoys certain members on here because you are receving good business from your postings.

Well I dont want to start a debate over a debate here but I dont see why people are annoyed that MK Printing is getting business. From where I stand the majority of people who are becoming frustrated by the long posts/adverts are not even in the same business as him. I dont consider my company to be a competitor of MKs because we are designers and only 5% of our trade is in print. So why would we be annoyed by that ?

Of course we all advertise our business is some way but there are limits. It was said by other members here that although MK Printing is helping a lot of people, the long posts that he makes are mostly about advertising his services.

If we were all to start issuing statements like that every couple of days what state would the forum be in then ?

I would never write in a post here " CreaCom Design is all you need, look no further than us " Quite simply because its not true. There are some great designers on here and they all offer a wonderful service and final result.

This is supposed to be a community where business can be discussed and debated. There are also threads for offers and threads for press releases for those who wish to use them.

Jacqui :D

[Jayne]

Fair point Jacqui

I just hate to see people upset on the forum, whether they do big posts or not. There are some other that do it too, but I wouldn't tell them in case I upset them :D

Jayne

[fastfences]

Because of Matt's apology post being locked, this appears to be the most appropriate forum in which to reply. The following commands a response:
The people that have made the negative comments are all people who have not actually spoken to me directly, I am sure if they did they would have an altered opinion of me.

I am one who raised the issued of multiple promotional posts. There was no derogatory mention or inference against Matt, not was there any form of opinion. Because I have not spoken to Matt, I have no 'direct' opinion, other than to say that I accept that Matt has assisted various members of the forum; but it is the manner in which these now 'clients' have been sourced.

To further respond to creative keyrings gem:
It only annoys certain members on here because you are receving good business from your postings.

I am hardly jealous of business a totally unrelated industry is receiving! But on the other side, I am proud that I do not aggressively promote my fencing services beneath a facade of wanting to help people with their gardens.

Cheers and regards, Nigel

[Steve Roberts]

Possibly I started the debate a while back with this post/thread:

http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/viewtopic.php?p=54518&highlight=#54518

Clearly it's something of a grey area, as to when advice becomes plugging. As such, whenever I've posted anything I'd like to think that the reader doesn't even know what my business does, in case in could be construed as cheap plugging.

[Cornish Steve]

In part, I think it's a learning exercise. Looking back, many of my early messages could have been construed as plugging. I simply did not know the accepted protocol. Now I do, and I hope people find me more restrained.

While I agree that many of Matt's messages are shameless plugging,
I've heard from several people who are grateful for his unselfish help behind the scenes. Personally, I think he's a valuable forum member who just happens to be a little over-exuberant at times.

[bwglaw]

I was one of them complaining too. I was annoyed with the numerous new posts being made and the way it was written was merely promoting his business.

It was one new thread after another. They were all referring to marketing tips so it was construed as a marketing thread and I said it should be in the marketing forum because simply too many people post unrelated threads in the general business forum. Consequently, it was moved to 'Offers'

In response to Tom, his point is quite off the point in my view. MK Printing was not responding to anyone's 'problem' but was in the first instance writing an article with a solution to no problem, which can be viewed as blatantly self-promoting.

Some of you may note that I 'self-promote' in some way, just like everyone else. However, I do not create a thread for this purpose. I spend time analyising someone's problem and respond, usually long-winded, but with constructive advice. Legal advice is rarely one-liners anyway. In *some* posts when I respond with the advice I offer my services and this is usually merely just providing my details.

I fully agree with Nigel on his points.

[directmarketingadvice]

I am hardly jealous of business a totally unrelated industry is receiving!

While I'm not in the printing industry, I would say that I'm in a related industry.

I get paid for helping businesses make more money from their marketing and Matt's been giving away free marketing advice.

My thought on this?

It's none of my business.

As far as I'm concerned, Matt can make whatever posts he wants on here, subject to the rules of the forum.

If someone is transparently promoting himself on the forum, we're all adults here and capable of seeing through it. If someone goes over the line and posts blatant spam, it usually gets deleted by the moderators in double quick time.

The people I know who've picked up a lot business from their presence on UKBF have done so through the quality of the contributions they've given freely.

As far as I see it, Matt's decided to give genuine help to people on the basis that "what goes around, comes around".

And, if I ever felt that my toes were being stood on, I should take a good look at myself as I've given away free consultations here and I have free marketing information on my site.

Steve

[Ian J]

I was annoyed with the numerous new posts being made and the way it was written was merely promoting his business.

I prefer his approach as when I look down the list of new posts I have a good idea what it is going to say so don't bother wasting time reading it as I don't want any printing. It wastes less than 5 seconds of my time.

Others who promote themselves by posting needless and irrelevant answers in other threads waste much more of my time.

[Real World Hypnotherapy]

OK I want to put an end to this because it is getting out of control. This is exactly what I did not want to happen.

I have had over 40 e-mails today regarding this issue, messages of support and saying they find my posts very helpful. This is not the reason why I made the apology, it was done to try and put some closure on the issue yet is has done the reverse.

What I have found is that when I make a large post, a lot of people read them and e-mail or message me privately rather than respond in the forum. I have e-mails and messages from people that I have never seen post ever on the forum. I am not creating solutions to problems that don’t exist, getting more customers and making your company more efficient is something that everyone should be doing.

I do not want to start, or it seems continue, a big public debate about the posts I make. In fact I am not going to comment on this issue any further, I will not answer questions that are asked and I will not take part in any threads that include the subject.

From now on I will stick mainly to posting in the marketing forum, I will continue to make my large posts regarding marketing like I have always done. My posts will always be long, if you do not want to read them then simply do not read posts started by me.

Regards

Matt, MK Printing

[Rob Holmes]

cool,

Maybe we can all let it rest now?

Matts made it quite clear he does not want the issue raised anymore and doesn't want to discuss it.

<<Thread Locked>>

Rob