The Internet never ceases to amaze me. It makes the concept of “six degrees of separation” (the idea that everybody is connected to everybody else by up to six connections”) sound as outdated as chastity belts. Thanks to blogging, in some cases people are now only one or two degrees away! Take a look…

On April 25th 2006, Joe Balestrino (”Mr SEO”) wrote a blog post about one of Donald Trump’s sites, gotrump.com - with a critique of where he felt the Trump site could improve on their search engine optimization. Said Joe, “The purpose of this article is to teach people that anyone, even Donald Trump, can benefit from the use of SEO.”

About a month later in another post (a post that probably could have been better optimized for search engines!), Joe revealed the motivation behind his original post:

“The purpose behind it was to attract the Donald’s attention. Which it did, after releasing the article, I heard from Donald’s webmaster with in 7 hours of its release… Then, I heard from his staff. Last I heard they were going to have a meeting on what I presented to them.”

This was fascinating by itself, but then I came across another example…

On April 27th 2007, Jack Spirko posted an article, “Why Donald Trump has a Blog That Sucks“, in reference to the Trump University blog. Said Jack: “Donald Trump has a lot of things that you would do well to emulate, but his blog is not one of them.”

The very first comment on this post was from Josef Katz of Trump University. He said:

“…If you would like to discuss the blog in more detail feel free to contact me off line and we can discuss. I would love to win you back as an RSS subscriber.”

The second comment was from Barry Lenson, the Executive Editor of Trump University! Barry said in part,

“…By the way, our readership has grown exponentially in the last year. So we clearly do not “suck.” In fact, not a single person in our organization, from Mr. Trump down, does anything that sucks. I would never go out their and say that anyone else’s content does. But clearly you have no problem doing so.”

Almost a month later, Jack wrote a post, “Why Donald Trump Has a Great Blog that is Getting Even Better“. At first it sounded like a “climbdown”, but after reading this second post a few times I think Jack was genuinely impressed that the people at Trump University had actually listened to him.

What’s more, the outcome was that Josef Katz ended up introducing a new blog on Jack’s site, and was talking with Jack about a podcast!…

“Thanks for your compliment and for posting this follow up to your earlier posts and our conversation. I look forward to continuing our dialog and joining you on a podcast once it is launched…”

To me, these are two amazing examples of the power of blogging. Certainly, Josef Katz and Barry Lenson deserve a round of applause for coming to the defense of the Trump University blog. And I was particularly impressed that Josef Katz wanted to “win you [Jack] back as an RSS subscriber” - how’s that for excellent customer service!

But the more intriguing aspect was… Did it work? Did Joe Balestrino or Jack Spirko get Donald Trump to read their blog? I don’t know the answer to that question, but clearly two well-positioned people in Mr Trump’s empire did read it, and it appears they did discuss some of the issues raised with Mr Trump - all as a result of a couple of blog posts!

Now, by writing this post I’m not trying to get Mr Trump to read it, although that would be great - my titles, dear reader, are to get you to read!

Still, these examples show the awesome power of blogging, and how the world is more connected than ever before.

Of course, there is a right and a wrong way of going about this. Chris Garrett recently wrote a post (”Don’t Fall For It!“) in which he described an attempt by another blogger to get him to link to the other blog (what we call “linkbaiting”):

“Just lately I have been the target of some pretty clumsy linkbait attempts. A couple of readers prompted me to look at one particular blog where the author on three separate occasions (that we know of) has goaded me to react…”

Clearly then, whoever the other blog was, Chris was not impressed. If you’re going to do this kind of “linkbaiting”, it has to be done very carefully and very cautiously.

Jack Spirko was playing what I would consider to be quite a risky game with his provocative post title, “Why Donald Trump has a Blog That Sucks”. I guess it worked, but reading the responses from the two men from Trump University, it appears that Barry Lenson didn’t particularly appreciate the use of the word “sucks” - and, quite frankly, who can blame him?

There are several other reasons I think it “worked” (assuming that Jack was trying to provoke their attention). It appears Jack was ultimately trying to be helpful, although provocative at the same time. And presumably he had some valid points, which it seems Trump University took on board.

All I can say is, if you’re going to write “Why Donald Trump has a Blog That Sucks”, just make darn sure you can back up your claims, and have a follow-up post ready, “Why Donald Trump Has a Great Blog that is Getting Even Better”!

Otherwise, get a very good lawyer, and lot’s of money to throw away.

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