I started a business. It made me want to drink copious quantities, smoke myself into oblivion and hit my head against a brick wall. Instead I wrote a blog.
Site Launch Day: 1
User Count: 33
Going right: It's Saturday, officially don't have to work.
Going wrong: Users reflects people I would like to try it out. No guarantee they will. Badly scheduled tweets in hootsuite for weekend when no-one would read them.
Comment: Last minute rescheduling actually took 3 hours.
I offered this blog to the FT. Of course, I didn't expect them to pay me for the privilege of featuring it, but there is a minute possibility that they would have hedged their bets on something that just might go viral. Just so you can annoy her by offering your blogs the FT Blog editor's name is Sarah Laitner. She obviously didn't reply (but if we do make it big at least I'll have the satisfaction of knowing it'll be like those sods that refused J.K. Rowling's books).
This wordpress site used to hold the pilot site for Investment Impact. My web designer and I set it up in April 2011 after it became clear that the guy we had entrusted with the Drupal site development had walked out on us. I can't give you his name because he might kill me, but am sure if you look up www.americangitinprague.com, you will find him.
"I'll design you a holding page in wordpress" my web designer said. "At least you'll have something to show round while we try and find another developer."
Me. "Will it have a shop? Will I be able to showcase any of the products?"
Him. "Well that's nothing like a holding page, but I'll look into the plug-ins and we'll try to get it as close as possible to the real thing."
Of course it was nothing like the real thing. But for a time, I loved it. Because it was a big fat SOMETHING which was far better than NOTHING. (Lesson today: something is always better than nothing, it reassures people that you can deliver). Somehow, somewhere I convinced myself that doing a pilot was a wonderful thing because I could introduce the concept to the masses. Actually, the best thing about doing a pilot was that I could practice my copy-writing - again, and again, and again. Especially when my first reviewer said:
"All you've said is 'We are an amorphous collective of clever dicks and we sell 'some things' that you may never understand. We also like games and think we are cool and funny.' Happiness, sensitivity, curve modelers? Sounds like etcha-sketch at a tantric sex workshop."
He's a very good friend (and of course, even though he ironically proved what a clever dick he was, he still is - I didn't ditch him for the review. On the contrary I thanked him). But he taught me - know who your audience is and speak to them in one - ONE voice. And if your site is targeted to several like mine is, make bloody sure you state up front who you're talking to.
PS. Kev, what does Amorphous mean anyway?