An Open Letter to Several Giant Corporations
Amazon? Google? Microsoft? Are you listening? And hey, Paypal, some of this applies to you too.
Yahoo & Ebay, I don’t know you as well, but you might want to pay attention too. It can’t hurt.
So here is the deal, I know you guys are each the 600 pound gorillas of your respective fields. I respect that I need to work WITH you in order to reach the general population that loves and trusts you. And I know, in the grand scheme of things, I will always be second best. And I can live with that.
But there is a tiny little fact that I wanted to bring to your attention. You see if you charge for a service, then the person or company you just took money from is YOUR CUSTOMER. Sure I’m not purely a customer because I’m a retailer not a consumer. But I feel that giving you money so you can provide me with a service makes me JUST as important to you as that guy over there. You know, the one in his living room benefiting from the fact that I paid you to show him the item he just bought. Yeah, the guy who can continue to use your service for free because we gave you money. THAT GUY.
So having established that I am a customer as well as a retailer, let me say that I feel I deserve decent customer service. I know you love “the guy in his living room” best. That’s why you give him stuff for free. That’s totally cool. I get it. But could you stop avoiding me and pretending you don’t need my help? Can you at least pretend every now and then that you give a damn about the quality of the service I pay for?
For instance, if you’re going to lock me out of my account for security reasons, to protect my best interests, could you send me an e-mail? It can be an automated form letter, it doesn’t have to be personalized. But don’t let me spend a week or more thinking everything is cool only to discover my account is frozen and then make me wait 3 to 5 days for billing to call me back just to tell me our credit card expired. I could have fixed that in 5 minutes if you had let me log into my account.
And if you’re going to change the information I submit to you, for the sake of the end user, could you please have someone proofread it? Or even just ask someone to become familiar with the product before making the change, rather than allow a database and a algorithm choose the “optimal information for display”? Or could you just send me another one of those automated messages telling me our content was modified – I’d happily check it over for mistakes. Because when we don’t know that information is wrong we ship it out to a customer who is expecting X, but we only carry Y. And it’s not YOU they call angrily, it’s us. It’s not you they leave nasty feedback for either.
Lastly, if you are going to live and die by the motto “The customer is always right” can you please have that apply to us sometimes? Sometimes that guy in his living room is a cheap jerk, just trying to get something for free. He could also be a nice guy, with a ton on his mind who didn’t read all the information before placing his order. I promise we don’t add information to our listings after the fact just to mess with people. Nor do we purposefully send people the wrong item just to save money. If we make a mistake we’ll fix it, but let us explain our side of the story before issuing a refund. Giving into the cheap jerks of the world just teaches them that it’s easy to get away with it.
There’s more to this, but those are my big beefs with you guys right now. I am going to continue providing the very best customer service I can, even if I never expect it from any of you in return.
- One really annoyed webmaster
Hand Made, Hand Assembled and Not So Much
So in my opinion, if you search the internet or an online marketplace like Etsy, you are bound to find three levels of hand-crafted-ness. This has nothing to do with artistic talent or quality. That is a completely different discussion and is mostly related to someone’s personal taste. It also has nothing to do with originality. Something made from someone else’s instructions / pattern is still hand crafted.
No, these levels are all based on effort and skill.
Level 1: Hand Made
To me, something is made by hand, or hand crafted if many of the materials have been manipulated by the crafter to the point that they no longer resemble their original form. Paper has been cut and folded. Clay has been thrown, painted and fired. Metal has been beaten into shape or melted and pored into a mold.
Level 2: Hand Assembled
Hand assembled is where you buy or take found objects so you can combine them in a way to create something new. The original objects were not made by you, but you glued them or strung them in such a way as to create something that didn’t exist before. Beading is the perfect example of hand assembled and can require just as much effort and time as making something from scratch. If you’re going to call your product hand assembled the component parts should result in creating some new thing. For example: Several individual beads become a necklace. Watch parts attached to ear wires become earrings.
Now, both Level 1 and Level 2 can be done poorly or sloppily and result in something the doesn’t appeal to you. You may even feel the crafter is charging way too much. But again these are matters of opinion, and if you don’t like it just move along.
Level 3: Reselling or Things that don’t fit into Level 1 or Level 2.
As I said above, crafting is all about effort and skill. And if you buy a cute little pendant and put it on a chain you bought, it does not count as hand made OR assembled. Sure technically you assembled it, but if the pendant was made specifically for hanging on something and the chain was made specifically for hanging a pendant did you really create something new? In my opinion, no. You didn’t.
A beader sits down and thinks about which beads they want to use when creating a piece. Different levels of effort and skill come into play depending on the complexity of the piece. Even the simplest string of beads is more “hand assembled” than a pre-made pendant put on a pre-made cord. Buying something and then turning around and selling it without changing it is called reselling. There is nothing wrong with reselling IF you are honest about it.
Those pre-made items may be incredibly cool looking. I own many mass produced pieces that may not have been touched by hands until they came off the assembly line. But I would be incredibly frustrated if I paid for something I thought was hand crafted, only to stumble across it on the discount rack of a mall accessory store. Or worse yet, if I bought it thinking it was a hand made original only to discover that hundreds of sellers carry it and I could have comparison shopped to get a better price.
I can’t review your restaurant if it’s not open.
So I’ve been looking for new eateries in the Pioneer Valley (Western MA) area*. Primarily because new, interesting places have opened near my house, but also to break up the monotony. As a creature of habit I tend to fall back on safe comfortable establishments when I’m so hungry I might eat the dog. Trying new things when I’m at my best is awesome. If I don’t like it, I can trade with a friend, order something new or pick something else up on the way home. But when I’m ravenous… well, I don’t deal with a disappointing meal very maturely.
And last night I decided to swing into one of those new places on my way home. I was a gaming widow** last night and my friends all had plans. So it was going to be an evening with my dog and my Netflix queue. Captain Jack’s Roadside Shack in Easthampton, MA is only slightly out of my way so my plan was to swing in, grab something fried and tasty and bad for me, and then head home to torture the dog by not giving him any.
Except that I got there at 7:07 pm. Jack’s closes at 7pm. ON A FRIDAY. I could almost understand closing early on a Wednesday.. but Friday? Really? Turns out Captain Jack’s is only open 11 am to 7 pm Tuesday through Saturday. I’m sure this is convenient for someone, just not me. When you work 10am to 6 pm and have a 40 minute commute, 7 pm is dinner time.
So I guess there are two lessons to be learned here.
1. I was reminded never to assume anything, including that a restaurant’s open hours will make sense to me. Therefore I should always check before heading to a new place.
2. The more opportunities people have to work with you, the more likely it is that they’ll tell their friends. Who will tell their friends… Who will tell their friends… and so on. Doing business with you should be simple and convenient and accessible. If you have an Etsy shop, make an effort to keep items listed. Custom and made to order items are better than none at all. If you have an office or a store front, try to stay open late occasionally for people with odd hours and long commutes.
Word of mouth is the most cost effective advertising there is. And you want that word to be “AMAZING!” and not “disappointed”…
* I’m planning to write reviews of these places as I try them.
** A gaming widow is a spouse who may as well be single when their significant other’s game is happening. I am a gamer that is occasionally a gaming widow, and my husband and I have different tastes in games.
Attention to Detail… or Let’s Not, and Say We Did
Amazon allows other companies to sell through the Amazon site, which is great for small businesses because it allows them to reach people who normally aren’t comfortable buying from small internet retailers or eBay. But I digress.
The problem was once they did this Amazon got cluttered. Extremely cluttered. If lots of people were all selling the same item a customer could get overwhelmed with the choices. They may not buy at all, or they may buy from a company with horrible ratings for customer service and get treated horribly when there was a problem. Amazon didn’t want this. SO Amazon decided to launch their “One Search One Result” program. The program was intended to combine all the listings for the same thing, and basically provide customers with a quick and easy comparison page for deciding who to buy it from.
Conceptually, I LOVE this idea. However there is just one teeny tiny problem. In order for this to WORK, sellers need to provide all the same details for the product and they actually have to be *gasp* correct. And to make the matters worse, the merging of listings is an automated system and as Amazon isn’t run by an extremely powerful AI*, this doesn’t always happen properly. I’ve seen listings for can openers merged with perfume. No joke. As I work for an seller, who has to deal with error messages caused by submitting accurate information, I can tell you this is a big pain in the butt.
And now, Google Product Search is requiring the same sort of information. And I foresee it going the exact same way. Because there is a human element and because different resellers have different philosophies about writing product copy. You see, in a perfect world, everyone would provide detailed, accurate information all the time. People would confirm information with manufacturers, manufacturers would provide thorough information..etc. Instead we live in a world where the same exact product can be listed with 6 different brand names, and none of them are the actual brand name. (Some companies list their business name as the brand name, others list the reseller they bought it from, others might make up something just to fill the required field and get the product searchable…)
So what does this all mean to you?
If you’re a customer, I recommend you check and double check important product details before buying something on any website. Then check the company’s return policy and their customer service reviews. You may find yourself spending more money occasionally but you’ll be a satisfied customer more often than not.
If you’re a seller of anything, I say it’s always safer to err on the side of too much information. It may take you longer to get your inventory listed, but check and double check your details before putting them up. List everything anyone might ever want to know about the product. Think about what someone might ask you if they were standing in front of you in a store or at a craft fair. Then make sure those answers are in your product description somewhere. The absolute, all time #1 reason to do this is that it will reduce your return rate. In addition, if there is a dispute you’re more likely to win if the customer just didn’t read your details. Don’t provide the information, and it’s more than likely you’ll be found at fault.
In short? Take your time, do your research and don’t be sloppy. You’ll make more money.
* AI thoughts for geeks: I thought about saying Gladys or Wintermute here, but I decided to leave it a generic reference. In part to make the idea easier to understand to people who aren’t geeks, but also because both references would actually make Amazon’s automated merging worse. Gladys would certainly use this to perform experiments on customers and kill all of humaity. Wintermute would slowly manipulate customers into demanding that amazon and eBay merge, creating one gigantic super store. I don’t think it’d be pretty either way.
Zombie Bunnies
ThinkGeek.com is one of my favorite webstores ever and they’re also a great company to use as a role model on “what customer service SHOULD be”.
Every April, the newsletter on the first is chock full o’ products that don’t really exist, but some are so cool they come into existence AFTER people respond to the newsletter. This year it was the zombie chocolate bunny that got the A-ok from the powers that be. UNFORTUNATELY, ThinkGeek was a little too hasty in shipping out the aforementioned undead chocolate treat. And well, it was not a pretty site.
So what does ThinkGeek do? They admit, publicly, that mistakes were made and actually ASK people to contact them for a refund. How awesome is THAT!?!?
I don’t believe in the phrase the customer is always right, but I DO believe that to make money you have to spend a little money. And if “spending” turns out to refunding a butt load of people, well then so be it. Because ThinkGeek’s customers are going to come back again and again because they can be confident they’ll be getting taken care of if something goes awry. (I doubt the IRS agrees, but I’d say all those refunds should count as advertising expenses.)
Side Note: Money is a little tight right now, so I went ahead and made my own zombie chocolate bunnies. They’re not AS awesome as ThinkGeek’s Zombunie, but I’m rather proud of them. I’ll post some pictures soon.
Products First or How Zombies Lead to A Blog Post
So my husband was helping a friend of ours brainstorm for a zombie game* he’s going to be running. And my husband suggested to our friend that it is important to know how and why the zombie outbreak occurred because it would make figuring out other parts of the story make sense. Zombies created by mad science could behave very differently than zombies created by black magic, and making these decisions FIRST can help him figure out which direction the story will go.
And when I was thinking about this today I realized that’s GREAT business advice. Knowing whether your product will be born of mad science or black magic is very important… no, wait. I mean, knowing what your PRODUCT is. Forget the mad science and black magic stuff for a minute.
The first step in setting up your business, whether it’s an Etsy store or a maid service, should be figuring out what your product or service is. You should do this before you set up a website or a Facebook page or a Etsy shop. You should do this before you even decide on a NAME for your business. Because without a product, you’ve got nothing. Once you know what it is you’re offering to people you can start making decisions about how to present that offering to them.
And when I say “figure out what your product is” I don’t mean deciding to make pottery and sell it. No, no, no. Hopefully you’ve already decided to do that. What I mean is:
- What kind of “pottery” are you selling? Little things? Big things? Useful things? Impractical yet pretty things?
- Are you going to make a whole bunch of the same thing and sell them all at once or are you going to wait until someone orders to make it?
- How much are you going to charge? Are you charging enough to cover your time and materials?
- What ARE your materials? Where are you getting them from? How much will you need?
etc…etc…
You can certainly set up a website or on-line store without having product ready to sell. But if you don’t know what the product is going to BE, you might have to go back and redo some of your work. Heck, you could spend hours working on a logo and banner only to realize there is a MUCH cooler shop name and image you could use.**
So once you’ve spent some time thinking about product, THEN start thinking about how you’re going to present it to the world. (Or how you’re going to use it to conquer the world. Whatever floats your boat.)
* A Tabletop RPG called Outbreak Undead. (Translation for non-gamers: A game like Dungeons and Dragons but more like Zombies & More Zombies. You could also call it improvisational theater with dice or group story telling. But that’s a WHOLE other post.)
** This did in fact happen to me. I was cranky. Bright Eyed Creatures was going to be called “Sun Dragons by Jenn” even though I was also making Moon Dragons and Imps. Then I had a V8 moment….
Casual Business Consultation
When I first started thinking of Strange Child Productions as a business, I started researching what exactly that means. I contacted some of the local organizations dedicated to helping start ups and I ran into 2 problems.
1. I contacted a few places via e-mail and got no responses. Not even an automatic “we’ll contact you soon” message. I assumed they only had e-mail addresses because they have a website and someone told them it was important… but they don’t actually use it. Over the years I’ve noticed that lots of small businesses with staff that aren’t computer savvy tend to set these things up and expect their webmaster (usually a contractor) to deal with these inquiries. Except that the contractor is just a web guy and is assuming their client is checking their own e-mails. (Or worse, the contractor tells their client “I’ll take care of all of it” and then doesn’t.)
Needless to say I needed help from an organization that was at least as computer / internet savvy as me. As I am a gamer nerd and I’ve been working for an internet retailer for over 6 years now, my standards are a little high there.
2. Some of the places that did get back to me wanted to meet in person to chat. Which is nice, but the only hours they’re available were while I’m at work. When I asked if I could just pick their brains via e-mail or instant messenger, they basically said “No.”
So I ended up slogging through the laws and whatnot myself. Luckily I know a few small business owners and was able to ask them questions. I also know a few accountants and my father is a tax collector. So in the end I was able to get the help and information I needed, for free on MY schedule. And I’ve been sharing my knowledge with friends and family – so why not share it with people I haven’t met yet?
It took a couple of years of hemming and hawing but the final result is this:
Strange Child Productions is a Small Business and Event Planning Consultation Service for people with limited spare time, limited resources, and whose projects might not always make sense to a traditional business consultant.
I check my e-mail frequently. I’m not going to charge you an arm and a leg. And it is very unlikely your project is going to freak me out. I called it Strange Child Productions for a reason…
So there you have it. This is my plan. This is what the new, improved site is going to be about. It’s also going to be about me -who I am, what I think, and things I think are cool. One part business blog + one part personal blog = Strange Child Productions
What’s Going On?
So, yeah, I’ve created this lovely blog and now I’ve gotta use it. But what the hell IS it?
Strange Child Productions is well, it’s everything I do. I am strange, frequently child-like and I produce stuff. Sometimes that stuff is an event like a party. Sometimes it’s a website. Other times it’s art.
So basically this space here will be a receptacle for all the stuff I do. Unless it’s related to my Bright Eyed Creatures… then the brain dump will happen over there. But all my other thoughts, those will be here.
And that’s all I’ve got for now.
Testing 1..2..3…
I just want to see if the syndicated feed I created on Livejournal works.
Looking for something?
All the links from the main page are now here.
I need to strip out the formatting, but other than that they should all work.
I fully intent to say other stuff here. Really. Maybe. Later?