What reply should I give to this email?

My instinct is that it's a bit too overt not to be a scam. Even if he's right about the potential, my estimation is that he isn't the best means into that market.

I'd just mentally (or physically if you prefer) file it under; "to be followed up possibly - depending". If it's useful there's a chance you may hear of it from another quarter. I'd ignore him

My policy is to NEVER do business with spammers.

Here's another follow-up:

Seems phishy now?

Another follow-up:

It seems to me that he needs a mentor.

You can try him out but send no money and make sure you don't give out your passwords.

Doesn't sound like a scam to me.

Well, as of now, I am asking a lot of questions to him so as to make sure that I am not caught in any scam.

when in doubt "ask." you did it. but now "stay cautious."

Hi Karan,

Like the guy said, the China Market is huge without doubt, but doing business there or with them is not as simple as it seems.

I am from Singapore, but had been residing in Taiwan for like almost 8 years now. Due to the nature of my work, I need to travel several times to Hong Kong and other parts of China, like shenzhen, shanghai and qingdao.

To start with, the written form of Chinese on Taiwan and China is different, Taiwan maintain using the "traditional style" while China uses the "simplified style, not to mentioned the different terms they use to the same thing in everyday living. As for the spoken language, is like what Al-Leyson said, they differs from different areas , ethic groups of China.


The guys also mentioned he is a account executive (or rather sales person, Chinese like to use the term AE like the advertising company, even though they are only working for the media) of a company which directly from the CNNIC( China Internet Network Information Center). What I believe is that his company is an "agency" who also sells Chinese domain names.

Quite often, I received spams from such company trying to trick my company to register a "Chinese character" domain, claiming that someone had registered it, but they want to check with us, whether we want it 1st or not. At times, they even have sales people making IDD call to us with bs sales pitch (thanks to VOIP technology.)

I don't use the word scam here cause they are legitimate business, just the sales practice that I have problem with. Maybe you can ask him more about what he do now in his JOB?


I think what Edk advised is good... "to be followed up possibly - depending"


The truth is, Gizmoko.com..... is Gold!

What I advise you to do is to continue to focus on positioning yourself and continue to build your traffic and value on your site. I can see that you are building your site with adverting as one of your monetary model, which I think you can stick with it for a little longer. Trust me, there will be times when there will be more such offer(consider this is not a scam of any kind) coming up.

You can email this guy and tell him that you really appreciate his support, but would want to focus on what you do now and will definitely keep him inform for any future plans. From there, if you choose to, you can continue your contact with him, find out more about him, his friends and see how this "friendship", if any, will lead you to.

I kind of have the same gut feeling like Edk that this guy isn't the best means into that market or at least he isn't yet.

Gizmoko is a very very good name and have the potential to become a "profitable brand" if you can nurtured it the proper way. You do not want it to fell into wrong hands. For it deserve to be nurtured by the right person with the right resources to live out it's full potential.

So don't rush into things.

What do you think?

Cheers
Jason Ser

Hey Jason,

That was quite an advice.

When he sent me a reply, I understood what he wants.

He wants to develop Gizmoko.cn/.hk (Chinese version of my site) with all me content and theme and build Chinese traffic to it. But, when I asked that how would it benefit Gizmoko.com, he says:

What should I do now. He says that I should redirect traffic. But, he also says that Chinese people love Chinese language and won't read english content. Then how can I build a long-term readership?

See his reply:

He says that I will build a chinese version of Gizmoko.com, redirect Gizmoko.cn to that chinese version.

Is it profitable?

The main problem with the chinese market is a LOT of the traffic will come from mainland China, obviously.

As far as ad serving goes - good luck.

If you're trying to sell a product there are VERY VERY limited options for accepting payment from mainland China.

The main processor is China UnionPay but you're going to have a very hard time getting something set up.

Hi Karan,

It really depends on what you want for Gizmoko?

Since at the moment, Gizmoko is not a "company entity" yet, rather is filled with Karan's personality and style all over it, it won't be feasible to follow a "business like" or "off line magazine" model.

It's better to treat it like a Book you wrote, and you are contemplating on the possibility of translating your book into different languages to promote to different parts of the world, what would you do?

You will look for a translation company or translator who is proficient in the subject you wrote and the language of that market to do that.


What requirement would you look for to find that translator? Is this guy qualified? How would you find out? What would you ask from him?


There is a lot of aspect that we need to consider regarding what he proposed, here are just a few of the many I can think of...


-Who will be the owner of the .cn and .hk site?

-How will the authorship of the content on those 2 site be claimed?

-Does he positioned himself as a translator, co-writer or something else?

-Are you willing to let him to be any of the 3 above mentioned?


I can understand where your struggle comes from.
Is from that voice behind your head that says "What if?"

"What if this is that unique opportunity that I have been waiting for?"


Yet you already felt something not so comfortable when you said....

"What should I do now. He says that I should redirect traffic. But, he also says that Chinese people love Chinese language and won't read English content. Then how can I build a long-term readership?"



My advise, Karan, is to go back to the very basic, stick to the plan you had in mind when you started this blog.


There is great value in your Gizmoko for the REST of the world other than China. Believe me, you will know the right person or party who can fulfill your dreams when they arrive. It will be an offer that you can feel a strange sensation of peaceful excitement; there won't be much struggle in your heart like now.

It may come from someone that you can trust or someone with a clear and concise written plan and direction that help you make your decision way easier than what happened now, from a unsolicited mail.


I mentioned before that this guy don't seems to be your best mean to enter China Market, but I also added "at least he isn't yet?", because I think he should do better for his proposal.

I had made enough "Bad Decisions" in my life to offer this advise to you....

Never Make Any Important Decision when you are hungry & tired, when you are angry or in a hurry or felt being pushed from the outside.

SO WHAT CAN YOU DO NOW?

Other than telling him what I said in my previous post, the part on thanking him for the support,...

-Tell him that you are going to discuss with some of your Chinese friends about his proposal? This will let him know that you are not alone,in case he has other "motives"?

-And since this is a very important decision, it would be made carefully and because you are in the mid of restructuring your site, it won't happen so soon.

-If you choose to, you can tell him to have the liberty to choose some of your post with your permission for his own blog, if he have any or at least he need to start one if he ever want to "partner with you" , but he must have the courtesy to quote your name with a link to Gizmoko site, this may help to find out how sincere as a person he is.

-Ask him to mail you some sample of his written material to help you to decide. I am sure me and many other Chinese Literate Warriors here are more than willing to check them out for you.


MOST IMPORTANT OF ALL....Don't stressed over this. Relax!

You are doing a great job for Gizmoko. Most important things is to continue building value like you did now. There are still quite a few challenges you need to overcome before expanding it to other language.


Cheers
Jason Ser

Hi, Goel the only thing i can say is ignore it that the best thing you can ever give for spammers...

Thanks "FrqHuss"

@mrjasonser:

I think you are right. I will wait for someone known to me to help me out in the blog.

Thanks a lot.

The prospect of dominating anything in china is the most dauunting thing I could possibly imagine, not being funny if it could happen it already would have been. I'd say leave it alone mate it sounds like a waste of time.

-J-

I would never answer or do business with anyone who sent out an unsolicited email to me. You have to be nuts to do that.

what does it matter since you steal most if not all of your content from other websites anyway.

at least he asked and didn't just scrape the content like you do.

I have to say at this point it isn't spam.

You all keep saying its spam but a blog that makes money is a business, and a business that puts its email up as a contact can expect to be emailed in regard to the business of their blog.

As for whether this is a good opportunity I have no idea, but he isn't contacting a tech blog and asking if they want a new type of weight loss product.

Remember that people often seem scammy if they use bad grammar in their email, but in this case that seems to be his point. Chinese readers are peering at your blog equally confused.

I would say this could be the deal of the century orsomebody trying to get your passwords. Its impossible to tell at this point, so proceed with caution.

Don't send him any money under any circumstances, though from what I have read above he hasn't asked for any....Yet!

Good luck

How could anyone ever make contacts within the business world if every new email that hasn't been requested is considered unsolicited spam.

The initial letter granting email permission would also be technically unsolicited spam under those terms.

Ok.

I will proceed with caution

I found this thread interesting so I had to reply here.

I am from Hong Kong - born and raised but I'm not Chinese. It seems that there is usually an impression that HK/China offers for business or what not have a higher inclination to be scams.

In this case, it seems that the guy is probably a newbie or someone that has a basic idea of what goes on in the world of internet marketing. But yes, it appears that he may be trying to get/ bounce ideas off of you in order to succeed in his venture.

I don't think he's out trying to scam you unless he starts asking for money for start ups and he's trying to steal your ideas or something.

As mrjasonser mentioned, proceed with caution. I see no harm in "picking his brains" but I think that's as far as you should go.

I have to agree though that the China market is a great, untapped source of internet marketing and advertising as well.

I wish you the best but again, it's always good to proceed with caution.