your product can find its own profitable village of happy customers.

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feedand email newsletter. Thanks for visiting!

3. The village is your customer

Once upon a time, the bread baker and his village were stuck with one another. If he baked lousy bread, he had to look his neighbors in the eye and face their scorn. The fact that his customers were his neighbors kept him on the straight and narrow. There was no difference between his professional reputation and his personal one.

Huge 20th-century industrialism made that seem irrelevant and quaint. We had no idea what kind of person made the toy or car or loaf of bread we just bought, and we forgot to even wonder.

Now the village is back. If we blow it, customers publicly rap on our window (with social media, blogs or Twitter) and give us a piece of their mind.

Once again, our reputation and our products are one and the same. What we create doesn?t have to be perfect, but it does have to show that we give a damn.

The inconvenient part is that the village isn?t stuck with you. If your baguette isn?t great, your customer can FedEx something from an artisanal bakery in Napa or Madison or Boca Raton.

The cool part, though, is that if you make something handmade (even if it?s delivered in pixels), personal, and/or magnificently useful, your village can and will find you. Whether you make homespun yarn or an interactive course on how to start a dog-walking business, your product can find its own profitable village of happy customers.

via: (Four Old-School Reasons Why You Can Thrive in this Recession ? Copyblogger)


Related Posts:
I am happy...
Happy First-Date-iversary...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.



Leave a Reply

Formatting: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

Other Entries


I am a homemaker, providence roller derby dame, independent consultant, indie crafter, wife and mother of two girls, professional writer, online marketing maven and a bon vivant on a budget.
{more}

Recently said:

Recently Wore:

ShopStyle

RSS Recently Read:

  • Buying Bikes
    Summer and bikes just seem to go hand in hand. This summer, our little guy was ready for an upgrade, trading in his old training-wheeled bike. So this past weekend we did the research on how to pick the right bike for him before heading to the second-hand sports equipment shop. And because we got a good quality bike for a fraction of the price (that will als […]
    Jackie Boucher
  • DIY Kid Wash Instructables
    Or parent wash... or dog wash... whatever you use it for, this nifty instructable is a surefire way to beat the heat. All you need to make it is a garden hose, some PVC pipe, and a few other inexpensive odds and ends from your local hardware store.Read Full Post […]
    Tammy Everts
  • Deconstructing Buildings for Cash
    ShareThisDeconstruction ain't just for English majors no more. With home sales on the downswing and recycling on the upswing, deconstructing is rapidly becoming a hot trend in the building industry. In essence, deconstruction is construction in reverse — turning lemons into lemonade. The increasingly popular process focuses on giving the materials withi […]
    Coupon Sherpa
  • Turn an Old Washing Machine into a Backyard Fire Pit
    I know what's coming next, and yet the title of this post STILL sounds improbable. But with Dr. Qui's Instructable, it's not only probable, it's totally do-able. Here are the materials the maker used: Stainless steel washing machine drum. 1" galvanized tube (scavenged from an old farm gate),  20 x 6mm flat steel could also be used. T […]
    (author unknown)
  • Look for Less: Reese Witherspoon
    Cute, cute, cuuute! I love this outfit, and I especially love it on Reese Witherspoon… it’s such a carefree, all-American look, and, as you know, comfort is a huge plus in my book! On top of all that, I also like that this ensemble incorporates some of the season’s trendiest items: the safari (or some might say military) jacket and the fedora (some might say […]
    Jean

Recently photographed: