“Bad publicity” is absolutely real and can harm you forever.
What bubbles up on social (LinkedIn, X, Threads, let alone Instagram) are cheesy and absurd hooks and openers such as:
– “I’m 34. Here’s what I learned in the past 12 years:”
– “I was broke at 23. Made a million in the twelve months after. Here’s how”
– “The untold story of Warren Buffett will shock you”
– “I made 136131612 followers over the past 6 months. Follow the 8 steps to copy that:”
Massive anxiety here any time I see this crap. Almost as bad as my opener.
The mix of a sleazy car salesman and a tabloid. 🤦♂️
Moreover, we see sales and marketing examples by people who sell:
– Ghostwriting on LinkedIn
– Viral threads on X or Threads
– Pretty carousels on Instagram
– Meme creation
– Video editing on YouTube shorts and reels
You can’t sell water in the desert and claim that works everywhere in the real world – let alone actual businesses.
Or sell a freelance service for $50/hr and expect the same playbook applies to a business with an effective $178/hr breakeven rate pre-tax.
The reason that Connor guy is still not blocked is that bad reviews are a thing, and people are truly scared of that.
I know that Gert Mellak does reputation SEO management in his agency and Richard Laermer does reputation magic on the PR front. Similar services exist – and save businesses out of trouble.
❌ But then you also get epic blasts executed poorly. Same guy, same subject, different emails.
True, it made me look up where we stand here (DevriX does have a single 1-star review by a competitor) – and companies lose business due to mistakes.
But my gmail is 20 years old by now. It’s richer than any of our CRMs. And I always look up contacts there first – and blasts of this sort from a decade ago will still show up.
What works for true B2B in social?
Building actual relationships.
Not falling for viral stupidity.
Participating in comment discussions (Threads reports that 50% of reach is comment replies, not posts).
Delivering business results worth discussing.
Targeted outbound (ABM).
Stop chasing trends.
(And Connor, please leave my inbox alone.)
