Author Archive: extrotech

It’s well accepted that posting false reviews is a bad idea. But what happens when an unscrupulous reviewer gets caught? Here, Steven Wyer shares the story of a Boston jewelry store where one of its employees tried to scare customers away from the competition.

Q: Why do customers post fake reviews?

Steven Wyer: Fake, or false, reviews are often posted by businesses hoping to boost their search rankings. They are usually positive and make the business look better to the search engines as well as customers.

Q: What about fake negative reviews?

Steven Wyer: These are often the result of a competing business or a scorned ex-employee. Sometimes, they are more personal.

Q: Can you give us an example of a business trying to sabotage another using reviews?

Steven Wyer: Back in 2013, there was a very high profile case of a review posted by Adam Jacobs. His father owns Boston-based Toodie’s Fine Jeweler. Jacobs posted a lengthy review against another local jewelry store, Stephen Leigh Jewelers, ostensibly in an effort to scare potential customers straight into his father’s shop.

Q: Is that legal?

Steven Wyer: No, not at all. Posting reviews with no merit against competing business is fraudulent and libelous.

Q: How did Jacobs get caught?

Steven Wyer: When the owner of Stephen Leigh Jewelers started tracing reviews from that user’s account, he managed to link it back to Jacobs, who works at his father’s store.

Q: Did the two know each other?

Steven Wyer: Stephen Blumberg, founder of Stephen Leigh Jewelers, stated in his lawsuit that he had never met Jacobs and that he was unaware of any bad blood between the two local jewelry shops.

Q: What information did the fake review convey?

Steven Wyer: In the writeup, Jacobs stated that Stephen Leigh Jewelers was “the biggest thief on the South Shore” and cautioned shoppers to go elsewhere.

Q: Was Toodie’s charged with anything?

Steven Wyer: No, the jury vindicated the store, which had originally been named in a 2013 complaint. It appears as though Jacobs acted alone.

Q: What was Jacobs’s punishment?

Steven Wyer: He has been ordered to pay Bloomberg a sum of $34,500 for emotional distress. The review was live online for several months, costing the business an unknown sum of money and greatly upsetting the small business owner.

Q: Are fake reviews a widespread problem across the different review sites?

Steven Wyer: Historically, yes. Thankfully, Yelp, Tripadvisor, the Better Business Bureau and other sites are taking steps to rectify the issue of fake reviews.

Q: Why is it so important to ensure that reviews are legitimate?

Steven Wyer: There are many reasons but it largely falls back to consumer trust and legal issues surrounding blatant lies that can damage a company’s reputation.

Business process management focuses on the design and observation of business processes in an effort to find way to improve them. In today’s world, we have seen a lot of business processes swapped over to digital format. Then we bring in blockchain technology to change the landscape even further! Blockchains offer a truly unique method of executing business processes in a secure manner.

This post is going to look at some of the ways that blockchain technology factors into digital business process management. We’ll look at some of the opportunities that the blockchain brings, as well as the challenges now facing businesses.

Strategic Alignment

The management of connections between business processes is referred to as strategic alignment. The goal of strategic alignment is to provide actionable steps that can be taken to boost overall performance. Blockchain technology allows businesses to flip the traditional “process follows strategy” equation, but this won’t work for all business models. It’s up to you to determine whether or not this is beneficial.

Governance of Data

Governance of data is different with blockchain technology that it is with traditional practices. Let me try to explain. Traditional BPM governance provides accountability for the roles of specific data. For example, some data might be used to help improve marketing while other data is used for making decisions related to stability. Blockchain completely changes data governance.

Within blockchain systems, it’s theoretically impossible any business process to be violated because the network consists on a decentralised network. Algorithms check and verify the history of the public ledger. Since the network consists across different nodes, it’s not possible to violate all of these ledgers. My point is that blockchain enabled contracts would automate much of the overall process.

The Link Between Financial Transactions and Blockchain Technology

We can see that the financial world has started to show a promising level of cooperation between financial services and blockchain technology. That means that it’s going to play a role in many of your financial processes but how big that role is depends on your business. To better understand this, let’s look at the two big reasons why blockchain technology is limited to very specific financial industries:

First, every node within the blockchain must contain complete transparency. Therefore, it’s not suitable for certain sensitive financial processes where security is of paramount importance. Centralized systems offer greater security.

Secondly, each node within the blockchain must record every transaction. This consumes quite a bit of computing power, making it inefficient for certain processes.

The biggest risk for all companies right now is that DAOs are able to compete against many established processes that are currently in place, including human resources and customer service management.

Organisational Implications

Blockchain technology is capable of impacting traditional business and the way they view themselves. As artificial intelligence starts to take over certain business processes, blockchain technology can quicken the birth of networked organisations, reduce overall transaction costs, and require fewer levels within an organisation.

Overall, we will start to see more efficient planning and reporting as blockchain technology takes its rightful place in business process management. Consider the value of having a truly decentralised source to report data, with information being verified across multiple nodes for accuracy.

While we certainly don’t have all of the answers right now, one thing is for certain. Business leaders are going to have to learn how to incorporate this technology into their overall processes as new methods of doing business emerge.

We will start to see many non-core tasks become automated through the use of smart contracts. Blockchain technology creates a new outlook on BPM by providing new methods of automation and new ways to authenticate processes.

There was never a better time on this planet to generate profits so fast. I have never noted a time if you could simply build a lot of business within a couple of years without any huge investments required. But now the SEO online course with Zeqr will totally change the way you think.

Zeqr.com has created access to SEO experts who would like to conduct this course. The class will enable you to learn based on your time and you pick the hours you wish to learn. As the material and training is frequently updated instantly you will be provided with the latest SEO techniques.

The course was created to help online marketers know how to grow companies online. Generating massive traffic, more sales and most significantly gaining a return on investment. It has become a quick and easy approach which is complex in all aspects of growth in this outstanding digital era. The course always update in real time, unlike learning marketing in colleges or universities which might be years outdated, you will be receiving the latest SEO technique.

Small businesses trying to find more traffic and leads online will reap some benefits greatly from this. Even though they choose to outsource the marketing campaign at least they understand whatever thing they are spending money on. The problem now with businesses spending money on SEO companies is they never even realize what they are paying for.

Getting visible on the first page of online search engine pages is extremely important for business owner and also internet marketers. If your sites are not on page one you certainly are taking a loss everyday so do something about it and improve your SEO skills to deal with this issue. The SEO for boosting search engine rankings are dynamic since Google always updates its search algorithms. That is the reason why this SEO online course offers the most updated resources to guarantee you complete a training course which is appropriate in today’s digital marketing strategy.