Tag: Customer

The Brilliant Buyer’s Guide to Leaving Product Reviews

You are not an idiot.  I know this.  You know this.  But sometimes, trying to find your way around the finer areas of a website sure can make you feel like one, can’t it?  Even with my own site, I try to make it do certain things, often accompanied by the thought, This is my blasted website! Why does it have to be so hard?  I’ve had a couple of inquiries from customers asking how they can leave reviews on products.  When I tested out my site, that’s the one thing I never thought about doing.  (After all, I think all of my products are the most amazing thing ever!)  So, I went through the steps of leaving a review so I could share them with you.

  1. Sign in to your account.  This is in the upper right corner of your screen.  Once you login, you’ll be redirected to your personal account page.
    Sign in to your account. This is in the upper right corner.

    2.  Find the product(s) on the site you wish to review.  Unfortunately, the “my account” section doesn’t list individual items purchased, just quantity spent, order date, etc.  I chose Christmas Spice Body Creme.  The listing goes Product Name -> Quantity in Stock -> Price -> Add to cart, followed by the Paypal button and social share buttons.  Under that is the “Write a Review” box.

“Write a Review” box is right under the Paypal button and the social share icons.

3.  Submit your review.  A notification will pop up on my end to let me know I have a review I need to moderate, and once I do that, your review will show up on the website.

This is what it looks like on my end.

I absolutely promise you…  I will not delete negative product reviews.  (If you’re blasting my company or me, I will not approve those and strongly encourage you to contact me via my website, email, phone, Facebook messenger, snail mail, or carrier pigeon so we can discuss any problems you may have.)  Fragrance love is highly subjective, and how soaps treat different customers’ skin has a great deal of variance.  What doesn’t work for one person might be exactly what another customer is looking for.  Real life example here…  I had a supplier who never approved negative reviews.  Let’s say, for example, I’d bought a duplicated scent from that company.  It smelled marvelous, dead-on dupe for the original, but it was awful in cold-processed soap.  The scent itself morphed in ugly ways (means it stank), it turned my soap the color of spinach after it comes out of a baby, and it was just a disappointment for what I wanted to use it for.  If I left that as a review, the site’s owner would never have approved it.  However, that’s a warning to others who might want to use it in soap, while those who are shopping for it to use in other applications need to know how true it smells and that they’ll likely be pleased with it.

With my own site, I’ll take the same “it may help someone else” approach.  After all, that’s the reason I ask customers to leave reviews, right?  So your 2-star, “Dried out my skin” soap may be just what that customer with excessively oily skin is looking for.

If you have purchased something from me and have not yet reviewed it, I invite you again to cruise over to the website and do that.  It won’t take but a few minutes.  If you submit your review in the form of a poem – it can be freestyle, rhyming, haiku, sonnet, or whatever – I will find some way to reward both your creativity and your bravery.  It’ll either be as free shipping, something off your total purchase, or SOMETHING.  (This idea just came to me as I was typing this, so stay tuned for what I decide to do.)

 

Striking the Work-Life Balance as an Entrepreneur

You just know it would work out this way.  Three weeks of fall break, three weeks of fun, canning, movie watching, and not a peep out of my large order customers.  We’re talking crickets, folks.  Crick-ets!  Days before it ended, orders started rolling in right and left.  What???  Now?!  And it’s not just that orders started rolling in, but they came in with announcements of preorders.  Three weeks of “Oh my gosh, I’m so bored!” now has given way to some serious hustle, right as we’re resuming our second term of school.

This past weekend was especially busy as I worked to fulfill last week’s orders.  The biggest thing is, though, I wanted to clean off the dinette table.  Two batches of soap, lotion bars, and lip balms, and there wasn’t room for a dirty thought on that table, let alone room for a person or four to sit and dine.  In the midst of all this, I really want to put forward with the great cleaning-before-decorating thrust, as well as begin our holiday cooking.  My girls like helping me cook, but the younger one, especially, just wants to sit down with me and watch a movie, read, or snuggle.  It’s so hard finding the time to do everything while still attending to the family as they need, but over the years, I’ve developed my own tricks for making this work for us.

Lists.  Lists help me visualize what tasks I need to accomplish in what order.  I’m a bit obsessive in my list making, thinking always in a linear fashion:  A then B then C then D…  And D can’t happen until C happens.  Lists are a great way for anybody to square up their work priorities, but it seals the deal when I’m trying to balance work and family life.

Lists are a great way for anybody to square up their work priorities.

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Working ahead.  When it’s at all possible, I take an hour or two at a time to knock out something ahead of time.  Maybe it’s a batch of soap that’s that customer’s standard order.  Or perhaps it’s 100 tubes of lip balm for this customer.  Those tasks don’t take a huge amount of time, but doing them sooner rather than later can free up a huge amount of pressure and stress later.

Prioritizing my day.  When it comes to my day, what’s most important to me?  Usually it’s breakfast, shower, exercise, and the girls’ education.  Then what comes next?  Production, newsletters, blog posts, marketing, website work.  Somewhere in the midst of this comes a huge pair of brown eyes and a sweet voice saying, “Mom, can we _____?”  No, not right now… Wait.  What.  Is.  Important.  To.  Me?  Is it crucially, vitally necessary that I change my slider on my website right now, or can it wait til tonight after the girls are in bed?  The point at which I start making my business more important than my family is the point where I need to give up the business.  The business will be around a while, but my daughters won’t be little girls forever.

The pnt at which I start making my biz more impt than my fam is the point where I need to give up the biz.

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Taking time away from the business.  This was probably the hardest decision for me to make.  Once upon a time, I was all about doing everything possible for my business and my customers, regardless of the sacrifices I had to make.  I started last Christmas when I shut down my business for two weeks.  I still received large orders from customers, but all that was required of me at those times was a quick email assuring them I’ll process their orders when we reopen.  Once I made this decision, I realized it was the best one I could have made for my stress level and my family.

No.  Such a small word with such great power!  Actually, I say “no” by saying “yes.”  To the last-minute request to add soaps to an order…  “Sure, and I will add two days to your order processing time.”  “I’ll happily take care of that after my vacation.”  “I’ll process your order when we reopen early in January.”  These boundaries are my way of saying, “No, I won’t let you make further demands on my time.”  Work Me ends here, and Family Me begins here, and Family Me wants to savor this time.

Family Me is now in high demand, so Work Me has to clock out for a while.

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