These guys are my old bosses and I just wanted to thank them. Why would I do that here on the blog? Let me explain...
I was on a train riding back from Affiliate Summit East to Philly, and passed the Bridgeport train station on the Amtrak and was hit with a nostalgic moment. Bear with me on this one it is not a VERY SEO post...
I don't ride the train past NYC anymore - so in 7 years I haven't seen the Bridgeport station as it is north of Penn Station. It reminded me of my first SEO job with a great company run by great visionaries. The company was NetMarketing.com and the owners were Ettore Rossetti & Angelo Rossetti, Internet marketing visionaries.
While people in 1997 were still building websites as the hot thing, these guys KNEW that traffic would be the key and built a PURE web marketing agency.
How did I get the job? I just knocked on the door at NetMarketing in a borrowed suit and asked to be their first full time employee and they actually HIRED me, amazing. The next day I was putting my cube together with a mallet.
Within about 6 months of being exposed to the business (I went to school to be a teacher) I asked them if they could bring our SEO service in house with a team of interns and programmers around me, and they did. Even with a client roster that included the likes of Barnes & Noble, Mercedes Benz USA, and even DoubleClick (yes I did SEO for DoubleClick in the late 90's).
THEY BELIEVED IN ME, A 22 YEAR OLD BUSSHY TAILED KID WHO WANTED TO BE A PART OF BUILDING SOMETHING GREAT. Sure I slept on the cheap black leather sofa in the office a few nights, and will never forget the allnighter we pulled to land the Harman Kardon account â and even the girlfriend who wasn't happy about it.
This blog post is a nostalgic THANK YOU to those guys.
Without their faith in me I don't know if I would have discovered SEO or had a group of people who supported me and believed in me enough to take such a huge risk at that time. They didn't box me in, the believed that if I said I would do something well that I would give it my all.
They were GOOD people, people who would give you the coat off of your back, and put people before business. A lot of how I operate SEER Interactive is directly related to the lessons in pitching and setting expectations I learned from Angelo and the lessons in working with employees and caring about them from Ettore.
My life is great, my stress level is low, the company is growing and we have a great team. Riding past this train station reminds me that while I had ambition I still needed someone to give me a shot, today I say thank you to Ettore & Angelo and encourage all of you who read this blog to think about that person that gave YOU a break, and write a blog post shouting them out, I'd love to read them. Whether they read your post or not, you should post it!
FYI both guys are still heavily involved in web marketing still: Angelo is now here: Ettore is now here: Save the Children
Thanks for giving me a shot guys!
