What I learnt today and it sucks

by butters

Posted: 12 years ago 32 replies

INTERNET MARKETING

Here is one of my lessons for 2012 already,

Pick your friends and people you work with carefully…

I’m not going to lie, this is a sucky lesson to learn but I am glad I learnt it now instead of in the future. Recently one of my friends who I have known for a while was watching me do my websites and he was asking me loads of questions about it and so on, which is fair enough, people tend to do these things when they have no idea about what’s happening. From there on it developed and he wanted to give it a go himself, my first thought was ok, I’ll help out a little and see if he has the dedication required to do it himself. He showed some desire to do it around his college work so I decided to help him out more, directed him in the right direction, you know, what a good friend should do. I gave him some pretty basic niches which shouldn’t be hard to compete in and start making an income just to help him through college.

Basically I showed him the basic stuff which took me a few months to learn myself and implement it, gave him hosting etc...

Now here comes the fun part of the story for me, I was talking to one of my other mates tonight and he was telling me how my so called friend was using me. He was also insulting me behind my back calling me all kinds of crap to look big infront of everyone. Obviously I pretty p**sed at the whole thing considering everything which I have done for him (including personal stuff), taught him and worse of all, time wasted on him.

So here is my lesson so far, invest your time in yourself, if you are going to invest in others make sure they are deserving of your time. Make sure they want your time for the right reasons and not their own selfish greed.

In the end they always get caught, just remember that,

Sorry needed that rant, feel free to share what you learnt today.

#learnt #sucks #today

winebuddy 12 years ago

I learned that helping people is always a good thing to do.

You can't be responsible for what they do with the information or what they say about you - all you can do is do your best to help them.

Karma takes care of the rest.
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Lori Kelly 12 years ago

Sorry that happened to you. But your heart was in the right place. You were helping someone and it's too bad this so-called friend is so ungrateful.

I would hate to think you would hesitate to help someone in the future because of this jerk. There could be someone you help in the future who would be forever grateful for your guidance and you could change someone's life.

I hope you know that what you did was very admirable. There's not too many people who take the time to help others these days.
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Paul Myers 12 years ago

Lee,

The first time we run into that, it really sucks. After that, it just reinforces the lessons. Don't let it make you distrustful of people in general, though. That's an easy thing to do, but it doesn't help.

When you run into people like this, just cut them out of your life. Don't engage them at all.

Sort of like a real life "Ignore List."

Think of those folks as the dirt you have to dig through to find the diamonds you call friends. You'll get better at sorting them as you gain more experience.

Paul
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HeySal 12 years ago

It's a good thing to be nice, yeah - but you do have to be careful about it. I've been stolen from by people I knew were really tight on money and had them to dinner. But - you have to keep heart anyway because sometimes you need others to have one.
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wizzard74 12 years ago

Lee,

What you do is take a look at what he's doing, do it 100 times better and blow him out the water
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Heronimus 12 years ago

hello lee.

You have learned a new lesson in friendship today... if there is money to be made they will do anything..

The next time you should charge money for you service.

I do it to... i repair pc's for my friend's but i say it costs you 25 euro's per hour if they dont like it then go back to the shop they bought it .. and wait 2 to 3 week before the pc is back.
When i fix the pc they have it back in 3 to 4 days maybe less.

I hope this helps you..

Greetz.

Heronimus
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TolyZ 12 years ago

I learned that helping people most of the time will bite you in the ass ...
Either they don't appreciate it and tell you to f*ck off after they back on their feet
OR
It's just not enough and they want more ... and more ... and more ... and then when you stop helping them they get pissed off and tell you how sh*tty you are.

Simply, don't mix business and personal relationships. 99% it just not going to work out.
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- Cool Hand Luke 12 years ago
  
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  Lucy Writes 12 years ago
  
  It's always good when you help people, if you're coming at helping them from a pure place in your heart (meaning you really do want to help them and are more interested in their success than your own when you do it). That good deed will be returned to you again and again through the laws of karma and attraction which govern the universe, regardless of what the other person's motive was. They will get out of the universe what they put into it, just as you will.
  
  So never give up on helping people. If your heart is in the right place when you do it, you can never go wrong.
  
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megawarrior 12 years ago

TolyZ, I can't even count how many times either of those things have happened to me in the past. Good advice about not mixing business and personal relationships.
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slcroft 12 years ago

It always feel good to help, that is the beauty of what we do, helping people get a foothold in IM. Todays student might be a very successful jv partner of tomorrow.

Not everyone is ready, or willing, to be taught. It is up to them what they do with the knowledge that you give them.

You seem a very good person, don't let this one incident affect your ideals.

Good luck

Simon
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angiecolee 12 years ago

My thoughts echo a lot of the other warriors' sentiments; keep being a helpful person. That good energy will come back to you (and also eventually position you as an expert in your field - we often learn a great deal by teaching others). If you're worried about someone else taking advantage of you, try not to. You can't know the future and constantly being worried about it will detract from enjoying today.

Enjoy today with friends, and if tomorrow they turn out to be enemies, cut them out and move on. Either that or turn into Liam Neeson in Taken and use your particular skills to take them out.
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DreamWarrior 12 years ago

It's such a shame as this so-called friend of yours could have turned out to be a great JV partner where both of you could have succeeded online. I guess he didn't see the bigger picture.

Don't let this experience stunt your passion to help others. Just learn from it and move on. If it happens again, then you must be choosing the wrong types of friends.

There are some real genuine people out there who will give back to you for helping them.

Otherwise, as the saying goes: 'Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer'.
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Bredfan 12 years ago

Sorry man. That does suck.

But - broken record time........ keep on helping!

Your next big break might just come as a referral from one of the people you helped. Referrals can make your entire career and when you help people and share your knowledge, they will come. That's the practical part.

The spiritual part has already been mentioned too. Yes, we're in this to make money. We ALL share this. But helping people is just the right thing to do.

You're a better person for it.
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stephenwaldo

12 years ago

Look on the bright side, at least now you have more time that you can spend worrying about your own business instead of helping him ungratefully ran his.

I mean think about the alternative… You never find out until he's making good money with it, and then you realize that you helped make some total jerk's life WAY easier than it should be. How would you feel if this total jerk ended up making more money than you in less time?

Probably not very good.

Of course, that's not the reason NOT to help people; I'm just trying to help you find something to be grateful for

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celente

12 years ago

Originally Posted by stephenwaldo

Of course, that's not the reason NOT to help people; I'm just trying to help you find something to be grateful for

Doing this will actually bring in more things in your life to be grateful for, so continue to do it.

They say you can choose your friends but not your family. Which to some might really get them down, :p but you really can choose your friends carefully.

I hang around people that are where I want to be, and alot wealthier than me. You will be surprising how this can bring more business and money into your life as well.

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digichik

12 years ago

Originally Posted by butters

Here is one of my lessons for 2012 already,

Pick your friends and people you work with carefully...

I'm not going to lie, this is a sucky lesson to learn but I am glad I learnt it now instead of in the future. Recently one of my friends who I have known for a while was watching me do my websites and he was asking me loads of questions about it and so on, which is fair enough, people tend to do these things when they have no idea about what's happening. From there on it developed and he wanted to give it a go himself, my first thought was ok, I'll help out a little and see if he has the dedication required to do it himself. He showed some desire to do it around his college work so I decided to help him out more, directed him in the right direction, you know, what a good friend should do. I gave him some pretty basic niches which shouldn't be hard to compete in and start making an income just to help him through college.

Basically I showed him the basic stuff which took me a few months to learn myself and implement it, gave him hosting etc...

Now here comes the fun part of the story for me, I was talking to one of my other mates tonight and he was telling me how my so called friend was using me. He was also insulting me behind my back calling me all kinds of crap to look big infront of everyone. Obviously I pretty p**sed at the whole thing considering everything which I have done for him (including personal stuff), taught him and worse of all, time wasted on him.

So here is my lesson so far, invest your time in yourself, if you are going to invest in others make sure they are deserving of your time. Make sure they want your time for the right reasons and not their own selfish greed.

In the end they always get caught, just remember that,

Sorry needed that rant, feel free to share what you learnt today.

Be grateful for the lesson learned, and move on without an hard heart, just have a more observant cautious heart from now on.

In reading your story the first thing that came to mind was Mark Zuckerberg and the original Facebook. He watched over the shoulders of the original creators and sat back quietly in the background too. He took the idea and ran. Now, they are out and he is celebrated. Hmmmm.

Originally Posted by celente

I hang around people that are where I want to be, and alot wealthier than me. You will be surprising how this can bring more business and money into your life as well.

This is really true.

Thanks

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Tonylee93 12 years ago

I feel that helping people really helps build a relationship and a list in the long run, making friends is a good thing its just when you give them too much information things can get dangerous I am very sorry about that situation as well.
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paul_1 12 years ago

So sorry to hear that... You did the right thing. Helping people is always the good thing to do. I always believe that in every good deed - there is a reward/blessing in store for whoever practices it. So just chill and just move on
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- mjsca07 12 years ago
  
  This is what I would do. Pretend you don't know he's talking crap and keep your smile on (your friends close, your enemies' closer). Take a few days and teach him some black hat stuff to get his site blacklisted from Google. A day or so after you teach him the black hat stuff, you need to get his passwords to his hosting account AND his site. Since he trusts you to help him out, call him on the phone tell him you spotted something you need to fix ASAP. If he wants to come over, tell him you can't so then he'll give you his passwords so you can access the stuff from where you're at. Once he sends you his passwords, sign in and change the passwords. Now, you can either have some fun for a little bit by sabotaging him, or, copy all the content he has on his sites, then delete the site. Don't admit your action, act like you did it on accident. Oopsie, my bad! Now, you'll either piss him off where he won't ask for help anymore, or he'll be the understanding friend and start over, enlisting your help again. If it's the latter, change the passwords back to what he had, then do the same thing again once it's up and he's invested time into it. A second "oops" will probably have him not wanting your "help" ever again. So, what does he do? He starts another site. Try to sign into his hosting account with the passwords you still have (they're in the text message he initially sent you) in a few weeks and hope he didn't change them. If he did, well, you had your fun and since he'll be using the black hat tricks you showed him, his efforts again will be in vain until he does his own research and discovers why his sites are never ranked.
  
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dennis09 12 years ago

Karma is a B-I-T-C-H, so don't worry about it. Sooner or later he'll probably hit the google dance or do something stupid and need some help. Guess who he's gonna run to? Yep, revenge is sweet.

On another note, if you want to get back at him, show him a new secret method full of horrible advice. Like linking out to a bad neighborhood because it's popular, or buying traffic to an adsense site to skyrocket his earnings. I know, just evil. But hey, karma is a...
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Kom 12 years ago

Lee

I know what you feel right now! you not alone, maybe different case ! but still herting us,

Now just do your best, take this as big lesson to you and us when helping people !
and please Becarefull !!! everybody who need help, they are always come and act nice (that just pretending )
what I do and what I did, If someone come to me asking help ! I will take my time and see How his act for moment, then If they really need they will still nice, but if not you can see the change quick ! hope will help !

I love to help but sometime they give bad feedback ! that is suck !
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Black Hat Cat Banned 12 years ago

Here's another lesson for you....don't assume the other friend doesn't have their own agenda in play here.
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paul_1 12 years ago

Helping is always a good thing and the goodness comes back to you later...
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swilliams09 12 years ago

i won't cosign on help and goodness comes back. I say this.

Help but get something out of it. Nobody respects a doormat. A good friend of mine is helping me earn money and getting my buisness off the ground, but you know what? I help him earn money as well. I bring in clients, I just don't stand there with my hand out, I earn it. Make them earn it. One of my friends wants to learn graphic design...she learns by doing my grunt work for me. A buddy wants to learn after effects, he learns by doing the basics for me. This I have learned just as you have, I learned it the hard way by having someone learn from me and then try to steal my clients. If you want to learn you have to earn it. Some people don't respect what is given freely.

Now if a non business related friend says that he needs to borrow some cash or something and I can help, that's different. But this is my livelihood and the game is to be sold not told. You buy it by working for me.
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markowe 12 years ago

I just want to say, off the topic, this is the first time I've seen anyone on the WF from Harlow (Arlow ;-) ), the town where I grew up! Alright there mate!
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Will Edwards

12 years ago

Originally Posted by butters

Now here comes the fun part of the story for me, I was talking to one of my other mates tonight and he was telling me how my so called friend was using me. He was also insulting me behind my back calling me all kinds of crap to look big infront of everyone.

I would just like to add one thing. The person who reported the other person's behaviour to you may not be telling you the truth or the whole truth. He may be interpolating or distorting intentionally or unintentionally.

Of course, the report might be completely accurate, but it may not be. So you should first seek to establish the facts before you react to what has been reported.

Will

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tunity 12 years ago

I have been screwed by friends before myself...and even conned out of my own money without my friend paying me back despite heavily investing in the business.

IT has made me stronger....and yes, it did not stopped me from helping other people.

Don't let someones isolated action stop you from doing good to other people. Its pays off to do good and help people...because the feeling you get is great.....than if you dont.
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Pongo 12 years ago

I have put together a meeting with 2 local business owners that advertise web hosting and design ~ neither want to do design or SEO, they would rather focus on other things. I fully expect them to try to get me to work dirt cheap, or pay me later type of thing. If I don't like what they have to say I will have pages that out rank them in 2 weeks then if I find time we might meet again to "talk".
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Anthony707 12 years ago

Life can just suck sometimes despite our best intentions!

But I believe if we are honest and true to ourselves, and help others when we can, the majority of the time things work out and we will attract other good people. I learned along time back though, to stop helping someone if they are not prepared to make at least some effort and commitment themselves.
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ExpertSEOServices 12 years ago

Sorry to hear your story Lee.
It can be tricky offering freebies. I also had the similar experience with a so called friend. I offered to build him a site for free when he signed up to my SEO service. Bear in mind that if he had sourced a web designer he would have paid much much more.
I designed and built his site. Included a domain, and hosting for a year and finished it to a high standard on wordpress. I also employed a writer to do his homepage and uploaded some videos for it. After that I worked on the monthly SEO for his site and got him ranking on page 1.
He then turned around to me and said he was unhappy with the site and needed more content. I said I could do it for him but he would have to pay me for it as the site was a freebie with the SEO. He refused to pay and we have since fallen out and he cancelled monthly payments with me.
He now has his site for free on the first page of Google getting free traffic after paying for just 1 months SEO.
You have to be careful with giving away free stuff especially to friends.
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- fluffythewondercat 12 years ago
  
  Mark Twain wrote:
  
  "If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you. This is the principal difference between a dog and a man."
  
  Jean-Paul Sartre wrote:
  
  "L'enfer, c'est les autres" (Hell is other people.)
  
  Wisdom of the ages.
  
  fLufF
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MySpaceLyrics 12 years ago

it's ok, take it easy. You've done something good, then what your friend makes is not your responsibility.
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What I learnt today and it sucks

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