For all you business owners (And employees. And affiliates.): Welcome to the Nevada County Wiki. We are fortunate here in Nevada County to have such diversity and breadth of businesses, and we're excited for you to get involved as well. As a business owner, you are an expert on your business/field and have a unique point of view to offer the community.
For a little more general information, be sure to check out the Nevada County Wiki Introduction, which covers the goal, purpose and general spirit of this wiki.
A few things to keep in mind:
1. Business pages on this wiki belong to the Nevada County Community, and not to the business: All pages on this wiki are a community effort, and as such, everyone is free to edit and add information. As mentioned in the Nevada County Wiki Introduction, this wiki does not strive to maintain a completely neutral point of view, but, instead, to present the many different points of view in the community. We also strive to keep the wiki balanced. As a business owner, your perspective is very important, but not the only perspective present in the community. All of our voices make up the content of these pages, and business pages are no exception.
2. Business pages should be informational rather than promotional in tone: This is partly due to the Nonprofit restrictions of wikispot (our host), which states: For-profit businesses are always free to contribute, respond, and help maintain pages about their business on a wiki. These pages are maintained by the community as a whole, and the pages should be written in the voice of the community, not in the voice of the business. Pages about businesses should serve to inform and teach the community as a whole, not promote a particular for-profit business. Apparently, this guideline was crafted for IRS purposes. As the goal of the wiki is to be educational, incredibly biased promotional information isn't particularly productive or informative (not to mention, it's against regulation). In action, business pages should be written from the community's point of view (third person), and business pages should be dedicated to documenting information such as history, location, events, recommendations, description/impression, etc. Deleting information is not encouraged unless it is blatantly incorrect.
3. Try to respond constructively to negative comments: There is a comments section on every business page. People may leave reviews in this space and, inevitably, they may not always be positive. This is the nature of business. With the internet, people can already write whatever they want about your business on their blog, or on websites such as Urbanspoon and Yelp. This wiki is a really good way to interact with those customers in a courteous and professional manner and to show off those people's skills. It's also a really good way to sort out misunderstandings or explain confusing business policies that may have left a customer ruffled. You may even learn a thing or two. If somebody leaves a negative comment dont delete them. It won't reflect well on you or your business and it may even appear as though you are trying to cover something up. Remember that the internet gives people a certain amount of anonymity to say things they wouldn't otherwise say. Try to address their problems in a friendly and constructive way.
4. Finally, get involved and have some fun!: The wiki is a great way to get to know your clientele and community better, and an effective way to stay informed on current happenings. The beauty of wiki is how easy it is to share with and learn from your neighbors. It's also a great way to keep people informed on what's new at your establishment (in terms of special events, hour changes and specials/sales). Once you learn the basics in editing and interacting with the wiki community and users, editing and contributing becomes a fun and rewarding way to serve the Nevada County community. Hopefully this will be a positive, interactive experience for you.
(Based on Davis Wiki's Business Owner Introduction. They have very good guidelines and information for business owners who are interested in getting involved in the wiki community.)
