Category Archives: Local Reviews
Search your FPF archive for past recommendations…
#VT – Hinesburg resident John Eastman just completed an electrical project for us and did an excellent job! I found his name in the archives of our Front Porch Forum.
He was affordable, always showed up on time, handled my many questions with patience and the end result is exactly what we had in mind.
If you are looking for an electrician, I highly recommend him.
Posted by Brigitte today on the Hinesburg FPF.
“Trashaway, Trashaway, Trashaway All”
#VT – The truth is that I love all of the people in my world who help me keep this life humming, and yesterday was just another reminder of how very delightful it is to be living here in this brave little corner of the Universe.
In 2006, Michael and Valerie Wood-Lewis, newly relocated to Burlington, launched, out of necessity, a neat little on-line service called the Front Porch Forum, where Vermont neighbors can connect and share information. E-mail from the Forum arrives twice a day, and it’s there where you find out where the robberies are happening, who needs to borrow a canoe, who’s looking for a handyman. To date, I’ve used the Forum to find a mechanic for my dad’s vintage outboard motor, bales of straw, someone to do bodywork on my ’65 Ford pickup, a whole pig (butchered) and a web designer. Currently there’s a thread running on the Forum about trash removal services, and for days now my neighbors have been singing the praises of my garbageman, Gordy, who owns a business he calls Trashaway. Gordy is one of the nicest men I’ve ever met. He’ll take virtually anything and he doesn’t require that you haul your cans to the end of the driveway. He’s always in a good mood and never in a rush. I love “my” garbageman, and hold him in the very same esteem as “our” pediatrician. They are miracle workers to me–always there when I need them and very, very good at what they do.
That’s from a delightful blog posting by Melissa O’Brien published today. I recommend that you read the whole thing. She describes why many folks live in Vermont.
Ask neighbors for farmers’ market finds
#BTV #VT – Folks in Vermont use Front Porch Forum is lots of ways. Here’s one from today’s FPF in Burlington’s Old North End by a local newspaper reporter…
Dear neighbors: I’ll be sampling breakfast, lunch and snacks at the Burlington Farmers Market this Saturday… Would love recommendations from ONE East about which temptations I shouldn’t miss, which prices are most reasonable. Any and all suggestions welcome.
How do you find a contractor?
Indeed, how does a person find a home improvement contractor? From Greg Sterling today, a recent survey found that asking a friend is the top approach. This jibes with our experience.
“Seeking plumber/mechanic/roofer/electrician/etc./contractor recommendations” is one of the most common postings on Front Porch Forum.
Seeking ophthalmologist recommendations near Burlington
#BTV #VT – Posted by David on his FPF today…
I asked on the Shelburne Front Porch Forum if anyone had experience with ophthalmologists and cataract surgery in the Burlington area and quickly got eight responses, all of them extremely helpful. What a good resource…
Duping by the crowd vs. building community among neighbors
Greg Sterling blogged today (in part)…
The Sunday Times in the UK writes that Yell employees wrote 6,700 reviews for the site (TrustedPlaces) in a month for an internal contest. According to secondary reports:
Staff at the firm’s Reading HQ were encouraged to write reviews for the company’s website Trusted Places – a site boasting user-generated recommendations of places to visit – by the offer of prizes such as an iPad and Amazon vouchers, according to the Sunday Times.
The article and information are presented as something of an expose or scandal. However I don’t necessarily agree. If the reviews are real and authentic they’re not illegitimate in my mind. But it’s a close call…
Well… I’m not sure how 6,700 reviews written by paid staff for some kind of internal contest could be considered “real and authentic.” More importantly, this fuels a not uncommon suspicion that many online reviews are B.S. It’s just too easy to stack the deck with reviews from people who have a stake in the business being reviewed or in the host site itself.
We often hear from people who place a high value on reviews read on Front Porch Forum. They use terms like “real” and “authentic” because that’s what they are… postings from clearly identified nearby neighbors typically offered in response to a request from a neighbor… “can anyone recommend a good plumber?”
Also, each recommendation is seen by everyone in the neighborhood, not just those few who happen to be searching for a plumber. This leads to conversation among neighbors… sometimes on FPF, often via email, and even more commonly face-to-face.
So… a huge database of potentially bogus reviews from strangers… vs. a few reviews from clearly identified nearby neighbors that lead to conversations among neighbors on the sidewalk. Two different propositions.
Angie’s List: “We’re direct marketers at heart”
Among its many uses, people use Front Porch Forum to find and recommend plumbers and dentists and all sorts of services in between. This leads others to ask… “oh, so FPF is like Angie’s List?” Well, yes and no. Yes, in that both FPF (in our one pilot city) and Angie’s List (in its 250 cities) will help you find a roofer. And, no, in that we have different missions.
Front Porch Forum’s mission is to help neighbors connect and build community… and we do that by facilitating conversation among clearly identified nearby neighbors about all sorts of topics.
I don’t know Angie’s List’s mission, but here’s a quote from The Local Onliner today…
Angie Hicks, the co-founder and namesake of Angie’s List, said she thinks of her company as a direct marketing machine. Speaking at ClickZ’s Online Marketing Summit in San Diego this morning, Hicks noted that “we’re direct marketers at heart. If it doesn’t perform, it’s out.”
About Blog
Ghost of Midnight is an online journal about fostering community within neighborhoods, with a special focus on Front Porch Forum (FPF). My wife, Valerie, and I founded FPF in 2006... read more
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