13 CENTS ON THE DOLLAR

By Joe Ingino Editor/Publisher ACCOMPLISHED WRITER/AUTHOR OF OVER 800,000 Published Columns in Canada and The United States “I live a dream in a nightmare world” Always Remember That The cosmic blueprint of your life was written in code across the sky at the moment you were born. Decode Your Life By Living It Without Regret or Sorrow. - ONE DAY AT A TIME - As a small local business owner. I see first hand the importance of people shopping local. A recent classic example. A Toronto based company with offices in Oshawa went bankrupt. Leaving many without a job and without any pay. Yes, I mean Metroland. In its proposal to creditors, released, the company said it has a total of $15.5 million in assets alongside debts of over $78.2, Rummors have it that the debt is more like $160 million. Metroland Media Group, the sister company to the Toronto Star that filed for protection from creditors last month, has said it intends to pay unsecured creditors — including more than 600 employees laid off last month — at least 13 cents on the dollar for what they’re owed. The company says it intends to pay former employees an amount equal to which they would receive under the Wage Earner Protection Program (WEPP), a federal program that covers a portion of wages, vacation pay and severance owed to employees in a bankruptcy or receivership, to a maximum of $8,278, which they refer to as the “employee basket.” What a great company... I wonder how many advertisers they still owe money to. I heard that Metroland Media still attempting to push it’s online version. How much of a fool do people have to be in order to fall for their online offerings? Well, the internet has become quite the public toilet. So much so that we as amedia company have stopped relying on it as a means to present the news. The Central newspaper was one of the original companies to bring internet to the area. The Central knows the technology inside and out. Social media was great 10 years ago. Today it has become nothing short of a public toilet. A place that scammer, frauds and general malae arena. It is a suckers game. Companies from the U.S. have hit Canadian small business hard in the past with the fake representation of being GOOGLE and promising to optimize local businesses. Normally charging from $200 - $600/mth. To practically do nothing but make it look like the clients particular company has all of a sudden risen to the top of google listing. In reality it has not moved. All they do is create an environment that simulates the main page with surrounding competitors to give the optical of being higher ranked. When I hear clients tell me they are doing social media. 1. They have no budget. 2. They are doing it themselves. A good social media campaign is a living organism that take expertise and at the least four hour a day commitment.