How Do You Fix it When You Utterly Screw Up Your Business and Lose Customers?

| Published 2 May, 2011 | Leave a comment

This week I’m going to be answering another question from an anonymous reader. I think the question says it all, so here it is:

“I was wondering what your thoughts might be on my particular story. I started selling my artwork online last summer, using a venue in which I bid on requests for custom artwork. I had a modest success rate, and won a lot of the bids I placed. I also spent a lot of time bidding on more projects so that I would always have jobs lined up. Well, in addition to a number of personal circumstances that prevented me from working to full capacity, I took on too much work, neglected to communicate properly with a number of clients, and found myself working, sometimes, for about $3 an hour by the time I finished a project (drafts, revisions,etc etc). And in the meantime, a number of customers were understandably fed up with me. Quite a few went elsewhere, I’m sorry to say. The stress was incredible. I am a case study for what NOT to do.

“I want to learn from this mistake but now I have this terrible fear of putting myself out there again and making claims that promise prompt attention and fast work. I know I can keep the promise if I pace myself better, but I am rather humiliated by the way I ran everything before. Do you think I should change the name of my business and start over? Should I place a public apology with a brief explanation in my online shop? Open a different shop? I feel so paralyzed with indecision, with the overwhelming stress of dealing with my husband’s condition, the need to make some real money (not …

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Posted in Business Essentials, Happy Living | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

How Much of Your Personality Should You Show, and How Will it Affect Business?

| Published 25 April, 2011 | 4 Comments

What's more important, the outfit or customer satisfaction?

I love Ye Olde Readers here at Ignite. And I love you because you ask me questions and give me stuff to write about, which means I don’t have to spend 60 hours trying to decide on a topic. Which is good news, ‘cause this week my topic was gonna be “101 uses for the dog turds you find on your lawn.”

The latest question comes from Kristina, and I can’t write her last name here because she’s currently on the run to avoid arrest for many counts of arson. Just kidding. It was actually bank robbery.

Here’s what Kristina asked me:

“I’m having trouble balancing my professional self with my actual self. Meaning, I don’t know just how much to expose via twitter, Facebook (FB), etc. I make and sell girls’ accessories. I have a FB fan page and I’m on twitter. Lately, I find myself torn when it comes to posting comments that really sound like something I would say vs. bullshit happy “look what I made” posts. My customers tend to be southern women and I’m pretty sure swearing would be out of line although, in my daily life, I depend on it a great deal. I have several customers as friends on FB now and more and more of them are starting to follow on twitter. I love working from home and having the autonomy, but I’m starting to feel a little… well, G-rated and extremely unfunny. Should I just stick to that which I feel is safe? I don’t want to offend my customers.”

Thanks for the question, Kristina.

The way I see it, and the way I’ll approach answering the question, is:

How Much of Myself Should I Show and …

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Posted in Business Essentials | Tagged , | 4 Comments

Homelessness Part 2 – Conversations with the Homeless

| Published 18 April, 2011 | 7 Comments

Last week I took it upon myself to offend everyone by saying why it is I don’t usually give money to homeless folks. Well, I thought it would be offensive, but was surprised to find a fairly unanimous chorus of similar-minded people. Read the comments from last week and you’ll see what I mean.

And today, we’re going forward with part 2 because I think it’s an eye-opener.

It’s pretty easy to categorize and stigmatize the homeless. I’ve done it myself in the past. However, that’s a prejudice, and I’m not happy with those in my personal life or my attitude. But it’s also sort of hard to be objective with it at the same time. You can’t really know what it’s like to be homeless without becoming homeless yourself, and frankly I’m not willing to research the subject that closely.

Next best thing? Ignore the prejudice and get to know some homeless people. And that’s what this post is about.

If you’ve ever thought of homeless people as just grimy folks, people with bad luck, idiots, ne’er-do-wells, subhuman…all those wonderful sentiments we humans are capable of, I think you might like what you’re about to read.

What follows are real conversations I’ve had with real homeless people. Enjoy…

The Unicycle Guy

If you’ve spent any time downtown Portland, you may know this particular homeless guy. You can’t miss him, as he’s a jazzy fellow who wears checkered pants and rides a unicycle around. And he does this Jackie Chan thing where he’ll run at a wall, run up it a couple steps and then do a back flip off it.

I spoke to him a few times in the years I lived in Portland, and in one of …

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Posted in Happy Living | Tagged | 7 Comments

Homelessness Part I – Why I Don’t Give Money to Homeless Folks

| Published 11 April, 2011 | 12 Comments

A couple weeks ago I listened to a podcast from a fellow who mentioned that he always gives money to homeless people when he has money to give them. It got me thinking, because I’m the opposite and rarely ever give to the homeless.

This turned out to be a humongous post that goes in a couple different directions. For that reason, I’ve decided to split it up. For this week, I’m gonna tell you why I usually don’t give money to homeless people. It will probably offend you, but hopefully not so much that you don’t come back next week. Because next week’s post is going to blow you away.

Next week, I’m going to tell you about three different homeless people with whom I’ve spoken over the past years. You might be very surprised, as I was, by what they have to say.

But first, this week’s post, which I don’t think is going to make me many friends amongst the bleeding hearts out there, but fuck it. This is how I roll.

Why I don’t give money to homeless people

1. I don’t know what they’re going to do with it.

What someone does with their money is their business. If they work 40 hours a week and want to buy a bunch of shovels every payday, cool. If they want to buy alcohol and drink themselves silly, that’s their right as well. America, baby.

But when I give others my money, it then sort of becomes my business, and I don’t know where my “donated” money is going. I don’t do drugs. I hardly ever drink alcohol and when I do, it is not to the point where I am walking through plate glass windows. I don’t support intolerant alcohol abuse or …

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Posted in Happy Living | Tagged , , , | 12 Comments

The one where brains leaked from my head

| Published 28 March, 2011 | 2 Comments

If you woke up today wondering what busting your head open has to do with making money, you’re in luck. I’ve got just the story for you.

Me, minus the brain

I knew something was terribly wrong. Mostly because there was blood coming out of my head.

When it had happened I’d been spying on my sister. Again. Who spies on their own sister, you ask? Every brother in the history of the universe, that’s who.

And why? Well, she was out in the forest beside our house, and therefore obviously up to no good. Maybe I’d catch her making out with someone or find where she buried her victims. Or did I forget to mention she was an axe murderer?

Well she was. She was also a punching bag, my guardian angel, an enemy samurai, my best friend, a linebacker, a beanbag, and the most patient person ever, depending on my mood.

Instead of finding decomposing corpses, I got hit by Instant KarmaTM, tripped on my gangly adolescent size-eighty-billion feet, and went forehead-first into the only rock within a twelve-mile radius.

When I stood up, my bell was rung and I was wobbly, but overall I figured I’d make it.

That’s when my sister discovered me. She stopped in her tracks, went utterly pale, pointed at my head and shrieked like the abominable snowman fighting with a banshee inside a jet engine. It terrified me to my core.

I put my hand to my forehead, saw blood on it and experienced the longest half-second of my life as my synapses zapped and I reasoned out the following:

It’s just blood. But my sister’s a tough cookie, blood alone wouldn’t elicit a reaction like that. There must be brain matter. Oh shit there’s brain lobe on …

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Posted in The Lighter Side | 2 Comments