[00:00:09.380] - Gordon
Hello.
[00:00:09.920] - Taylor
Hello.
[00:00:10.400] - Gordon
My name's Gordon from Drayson Design.
[00:00:12.200] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.
[00:00:14.450] - Gordon
And welcome to "This Week With Taylor and Gordon," a weekly podcast and vidcast where we look at things that we've been doing over the last seven days as business owners and topics that we want to talk about. So Taylor, what have we been doing for the last seven days?
[00:00:31.160] - Taylor
So this week we've been working on a new project called "lasermarketplace.com."
[00:00:37.910] - Gordon
That's right.
[00:00:38.720] - Taylor
And it is basically a place for people that make things for laser cutters. So whether that be SVGs or they 3D print stuff that can be used for laser cutters, and they can sell them to other people that use lasers. And it's just going to be a marketplace for people, like vendors, to be able to post their creations and sell them. And then people that are laser enthusiasts can then go ahead and buy them and use them in their projects.
[00:01:11.450] - Gordon
That's right. And it's a bit like "Etsy," if you've ever looked at that website, where people put up designs for other people to then buy and use. This is a bit more specialised though. And it's being put together by a long term friend and, entrepreneur of ours, a guy called Mark. And he's, he came to us and he said he wanted to get it up within ten days. So, I mean, this is an enormous project. It's, there's so many different elements to it, isn't there?
[00:01:51.740] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:01:52.100] - Gordon
So, we've got the directory of products, the e-commerce store of products. We've got the management of vendors, so people who are selling. We've got management of buyers, people who are buying. You've then got all of the merchant account things to implement. What have I missed?
[00:02:17.360] - Taylor
Fees and transactions.
[00:02:18.980] - Gordon
So fees and transactions have to be set and they're different for different categories. And then all of that has to then be designed into a site. I mean, that's a phenomenal amount of work for 10 days. And that's why on this occasion, because time was of the essence, Mark decided, in fact, didn't he? That we should go and find a theme for WordPress that already had a lot of this functionality built in. So instead of writing and building a website from scratch, we were actually taking one that was already existing with some of the functionality we needed and building on that.
[00:03:03.050] - Taylor
Yeah. So, um...
[00:03:05.720] - Gordon
What's been the hardest bit for you, do you think?
[00:03:07.970] - Taylor
I think realising how difficult and confined standard WordPress themes that you buy from the internet and stuff are. Because of the way I now build my sites and I don't use a theme, I build everything from scratch pretty much, from a design that I've created, it's, I have all the freedom. I can do whatever I want, wherever I want something I can put it. Even if it looked horrible, I can make it look horrible or I can make it look really nice. And that's all down to me. Whereas with these themes you're kind of locked into a particular style. Obviously, there are customisations that the people that create the theme have given you, but there's only so much customisation you can do without then getting into a lot of hard coded stuff like values and things like that, which you then have to overwrite. And then that's when it becomes really messy.
[00:04:06.560] - Gordon
[sneezing] Pardon me. I do apologise.
[00:04:07.070] - Taylor
So, yeah, that's the one thing that I found, that it's very limiting in terms of if you wanted to move something it's not as easy as it would be if you built it yourself, because obviously you can then go and change it, whereas this is more, this has been designed and built like that, so to then change it, you're having to overwrite a lot of stuff which is where it becomes really messy because you have to remember, "ok, what did I overwrite?" And when you come back to it later you need to go "oh, I overwrote that, so I need to edit that here, which is different to the rest of the site."
[00:04:40.130] - Gordon
Yeah. I mean, so one of the problems we had was there was an image, like a banner image on the sidebar, which when you moused over it, it came up with some text and a button to press. And just the way that it had been built was not easy to understand. So they're using a theme builder called "wpbakery."
[00:05:10.160] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:05:11.090] - Gordon
Which is not one that I am 100% familiar with, I used to know it as visual...
[00:05:18.200] - Taylor
Composer.
[00:05:18.860] - Gordon
Composer, thank you, Taylor. A long time ago and it's changed its name since then. And it's one of the first builders that ever came out, and it, you know, it's sort of stuck in its past really, it hasn't really been brought up to date with all the other builders that now do you know, 'what you see is what you get' type editing. It's more of a builder and an editor. And what, and getting this banner, and just finding the banner for a start was difficult. It's on the home page, it's on the left hand side bar. How do we get to it? We eventually found it, and then we found that it was just a shortcode. And shortcode is WordPress' way of adding content to a particular area that you pre worked out.
[00:06:06.830] - Taylor
So, these builders that you see all around the place, or using WordPress. The way that they work is they're built on a shortcode system. So, you know, you've added this section with a nice text and image background. However, the way that the builder interprets that into WordPress is it will generate a random, it'll look to you, a random lettered string of characters, which is a shortcode which the builder can then interpret into and build it on the front end as a website page.
[00:06:42.060] - Gordon
When people view it. And so when we found this and it made no sense, it's like, "oh, what's going on here?" So you then had to take that code, put it into a brand new page, change it to 'classic view,' so you could actually see the text; paste your text in; change it back to the visual side of it; which would then give you your options of the background and the text and the button and so on; change all that. Once you're happy with it, you've then got to reverse the process. So you've then got to change it back into classic view. You've then got to copy the new shortcode that's been created; put that where you want it to be; save it; view the page, and then if anything's wrong, like the margins, for example, you've then got to do the whole process again just to change it. And it's not dynamic, it's just using that one image. So it's a bit of a long way round to do that. However, the reason we chose this particular theme is because we had a time constraint.
[00:07:45.470] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:07:45.800] - Gordon
And it just would not have been possible to build a brand new site with this much complexity in the time we had available.
[00:07:53.540] - Taylor
Definitely.
[00:07:54.350] - Gordon
And the site is very nearly ready. So, I mean, you know, have a look. If you have a laser cutter and this is the sort of thing that would be of interest to you, please go and have a look: lasermarketplace.com.
[00:08:09.920] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:08:10.830] - Gordon
It hasn't been launched yet, I should point out. There's still finishing touches to do, but it's online and you can see it at the moment and it is working. There's just a few things, we've got a few days left in our ten days just to finish off all the last little bits.
[00:08:26.240] - Taylor
Wonderful.
[00:08:26.990] - Gordon
Yeah.
[00:08:27.590] - Taylor
So what's your topic for this week?
[00:08:29.090] - Gordon
My topic is "lumpy mail." Do you know what that is?
[00:08:33.950] - Taylor
Mail that's lumpy?
[00:08:35.060] - Gordon
Yes! Now, lumpy mail is a very, very good way of getting people to view and look at your message. OK? So, let me give you a good example. There is a pen company that will inscribe pens with your name and telephone number. I think pretty much everybody who's set up a business will at some point have received at least one package from these people, this company. And in fact, it works because I've actually purchased two sets of pens from them, for two different companies.
[00:09:16.520] - Gordon
Have you received anything yet?
[00:09:18.320] - Taylor
I received a glass, kind of ornament desk thing, which had my logo etched into it.
[00:09:29.060] - Gordon
Yeah, but that wasn't a promo, was it? That was a gift.
[00:09:32.600] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:09:33.110] - Gordon
Yeah, ok. So this is for promos. So, the reason people use lumpy mail and lumpy mail is a very odd term, but it basically means mail that has something in it rather than just paper. So it's got a shape or form, and when you feel it, you know there's something in there and it sparks this intrigue in your mind and you're thinking, "what is it? What is it?" And it makes you want to open it. And this pen company do really well out of it. They actually personalise this pen to your company or to the people they're sending it to, so it's unique to you. And you can then see their product, which is a great way of selling. But using lumpy mail is a good way to get you to open the mail. Now, if you are going to be doing any sort of mailing to people, then think about how you can use lumpy mail. If you can put something in there that is either a gimmick or is out of the ordinary, then you have a much higher chance of your post being opened. I mean, that's the big thing, getting the post being opened. Because most people receive junk mail and they can see it's junk mail; they can see that it's been franked; they can see that it's been typed. It's got a little bit at the bottom saying where it's come from and people can see exactly what it is without having to open it. And most of that mail goes straight in the bin, doesn't even get opened. So my top tips, if you want to get mail opened: number one, think about lumpy mail. That's a really good way of getting your post opened. Number two, handwrite the address and the name of the person that you're sending this to on an envelope, which means don't type it, don't have it printed. I mean, if you've got an enormous campaign that you're sending out, it may not be possible to do that, in which case use a handwritten, handwriting typeface, so it looks like it's been handwritten. Make it sort of dark grey rather than black, just to make it look like it's been written by a pen. Number three, put a stamp on it, instead of franking it. If it's got a stamp on, it looks like it might have been sent from, you know, your favourite auntie rather than a company. Number four, use a coloured envelope. So I have several people who send me mail in coloured envelopes. There's one in particular, I get a newsletter which is like an A4 booklet, and it comes every month and it comes every month in a black, solid black envelope with silver handwriting on it. And it, you know, I know exactly what it is when it arrives. I look forward to seeing it in the post. And if I received a black envelope with silver writing on it and I didn't know what it is, I mean, the curiosity is just going to get the better of me. I'm going to open it and find out what it is. So that's the four, that's it I think, that's the four. They are pretty much to the four... Did I include lumpy mail in those four? Possibly. But they are the ways that you will get your mail opened, and it's going to make it stand out from all the other mail that comes in a white envelope with a little window in it and typewritten text on the letter inside. It's going to make it exciting to open. If you receive mail like that, you'd open it, right?
[00:13:11.660] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:13:12.170] - Gordon
Yeah, you have to. And then when you open it and you see it's junk, then you might still throw it away. But you, at least you've seen it. And we'll talk about, another time, doing the same sort of thing for emails, get emails opened.
[00:13:31.020] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:13:31.760] - Gordon
So we'll talk about that next time. So that is, that's how you get mail, physical mail, post opened, and your message will be received by the recipient. Taylor, what would you like to talk about?
[00:13:46.250] - Taylor
So this week, I want to talk about the right place and the right time. So I was recommended by one of my networking friends and they recommended me and they were looking for a new website. They wanted to redo their website.
[00:14:06.140] - Gordon
So you were recommended to someone who was looking for a new site?
[00:14:09.650] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:14:09.650] - Gordon
Ok, got it.
[00:14:09.650] - Taylor
And they were kind of looking around, trying to find a quote for kind of a website. And when they came back, he kind of realised that it was a lot more than he was expecting or he was able to pay. And...
[00:14:26.330] - Gordon
Just on that point, it's quite interesting because a lot of companies have no idea what this is going to cost them. So you can't budget for it. So when people, it's the same when you as a business owner go out and say, "right, I need new carpets." I don't know how much carpets cost. Obviously there's different amounts that you can pay. But yeah, a lot of people have no idea. So once they get a quote, it could be way higher than they were expecting, and it could be that they just want to save up for it and then spend the money.
[00:14:54.470] - Gordon
Yeah.
[00:14:54.890] - Gordon
To get the site, however...
[00:14:56.510] - Taylor
So I kind of, I went back to him and I said to him, you know, "would you be interested in kind of splitting the cost up?" Because that's a couple of things I've done for a couple of clients.
[00:15:08.760] - Gordon
Like a payment plan.
[00:15:09.550] - Taylor
Yeah, so Cash-Flow hasn't been the best, so I've said, you know, "do you want to split it up over a couple of months?" And they've been very thankful for that because it helps them. And I'm in no rush for it, as long as I get it in the end, then, you know, I'm in no rush to get it. And I just want to help my clients, really. However, he decided he would go and buy a theme from kind of "theme forest," which we've been talking about.
[00:15:32.790] - Gordon
Yeah.
[00:15:33.690] - Taylor
Which there's nothing wrong with. He was happy with the way that it looked. It ticked all the boxes that he was looking for. And he then installed it onto his website and it didn't look the way that the demo looked. And so he was a bit like, "oh, hang on, I wanted that, but I got this." So he came to me and kind of said, you know, "would you be able to build the site, how the demo looks?" And I kind of I had like a ten minute call with him and said, "normally these types of themes come with a demo import, so you can just import the demo that you've seen, that's what you wanted...
[00:16:08.820] - Gordon
Yeah, to make it look like the sales site.
[00:16:09.960] - Taylor
Yeah. And he went to do that, and when he clicked 'import,' it completely crashed his website and broke, and the database was all screwed up and everything. And unfortunately had to go off and I had some other calls to make. So he was then talking to his hosting company and trying to fix it and get it. And he probably spent from the time that I left him, which I think was about midday or so, till about seven o'clock when I got back from what I was doing and I had a chance to look at it. And he kept on messaging me kind of like, you know, "we're not really getting anywhere. I am so frustrated," and stuff. And I said to him, "look, I'll be home about seven-ish, kind of I can have a look then if it's not too late for you." And I took a look and we went, they managed to get the database back and they reinstalled it fresh, basically. And then when he went to import again, it failed.
[00:17:05.610] - Gordon
So exactly the same thing happened again.
[00:17:07.530] - Taylor
No. So before it crashed his site.
[00:17:10.110] - Gordon
OK.
[00:17:10.410] - Taylor
This time the demo data just wouldn't import. It would give him an error saying, "can't import the demo." So I was like, "OK, that's a bit odd. It shouldn't say that." And I kind of thought this is maybe a timeout issue. So when you go to upload it because of how big the file was, it was timing out and not being able to upload fully. So I said to him, you know, "put this one bit of code into one of your files," and then when we imported it again, voila, everything was there. And he was over the moon about it, and he actually he was like, "I'm going to have to put you on mute for a second because I need to scream!" Because he was just that happy, because he'd been banging his head against a wall all afternoon, pretty much trying to get this sorted. And yeah, he said to me, you know, "what do you want for it?" And I said, "look, I don't want anything. I hadn't done anything." For me, I feel like I haven't really done anything. I've you know, I've guided you and given you a bit of advice.
[00:18:03.690] - Gordon
But that's not true is it? You're using your experience.
[00:18:06.630] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:18:06.870] - Gordon
On this thing to be able to guide this person. And it's taken you a long time to get this experience.
[00:18:12.580] - Taylor
Yeah, I mean, we were talking about it at lunch time when I first had his call and I said, "it's similar to how someone called an electrician out and said, 'there's something wrong with my electrics.' So they came out and he flipped a switch and he said, 'that'll be sixty five pounds, please.' And he goes, 'What! I'm not paying you for that. All you did was flick a switch.' And he said, 'it's not about how long it took me. It's the experience and knowledge that I have to know which switch to flick, which is what you're paying for.'
[00:18:43.200] - Gordon
It's true.
[00:18:43.200] - Taylor
And he was adamant to pay me. And I just said to him, you know, "pay what you feel is, what value I've brought to you." And so I've been talking to him, you know, just helping him with a couple of other things. And he put a recommendation out on LinkedIn saying, you know, "absolutely fantastic guy, Taylor's helped me fix an issue with my website. He was, you know, really responsive, great communication. If you need a website, go to him and he'll sort you out." And he has four and a half thousand quality contacts that he's shared that with. So, you know...
[00:19:25.350] - Gordon
So, you've got the potential of being very, very busy.
[00:19:27.780] - Taylor
Yeah, but it's the fact that I did this little thing for him. And, you know, I wasn't going out, I was trying to say, "yeah, that'll be £1000," you know.
[00:19:36.060] - Gordon
Yeah.
[00:19:36.270] - Taylor
I was just genuinely trying to help him. And from that I could potentially get a lot of work that could lead to more than what I got from this work.
[00:19:45.090] - Gordon
And one of the things that's interesting there, is that he had seven hours in which to talk to his hosting company to tell them that he was having this problem and see what they could do. Now, you know, we have a hosting company that we have, basically we've been, I've used a lot of hosting companies in my time. And they have varying amounts of customer service, basically.
[00:20:14.730] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:20:15.090] - Gordon
And the company that we are with at the moment is fantastic. We specifically sought them out, because if you have a problem like this, it's not in their remit to come in and fix a problem with your website. Because all they're doing is they're offering you hosting.
[00:20:33.780] - Taylor
So a good example is "Siteground." So I have a couple of clients who use Siteground, which is a perfectly fine host. However, because of how mainstream and how big they are, they don't, they can't solve your, "I have a problem with my my website. Can you have a look at it?" Because that is not within their contract technically.
[00:20:55.800] - Gordon
No, they're just hosting the website.
[00:20:57.450] - Taylor
It's not their obligation. However, with our host, even though it's not an obligation, they do offer help and they give us advice.
[00:21:05.670] - Gordon
So the reason for that is, that as a company gets bigger and bigger and bigger, they have to bring on more and more customer support service agents. And they don't necessarily have the amount of knowledge that maybe the people at the beginning did, because they were enthusiasts at the beginning and they've got a lot of knowledge. And the bigger you get, the more customers you get. And therefore it gets to the point when you are so big. I mean, "GoDaddy" is a perfect example. GoDaddy used to be really good. I would not like to host with them now, though, because they've got so big that the people you talk to, if you can get through to them, they just don't have the knowledge to be able to help you unless it's something that they've got on their screen that they've been trained to do because it's to do with just the hosting.
[00:21:58.270] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:21:58.890] - Gordon
So a host has to make sure that they have your website online and they have the space available on a computer that's attached to the internet. That's basically all a host has to do, unless, of course, they've sold you extras. And, you know, coming in and fixing a problem with the website just is not part of what they have to do. So if you find a host that does it, I mean, they are worth their weight in gold as this person found out. And the other thing is, if you're using a company like "The Creative Tinker" or "Drayson Design" where we host them for you, it's down to us. We are the customer service. If you've got a problem with your website, you come to us. Now, if we're just hosting and we didn't build the site, we may not be able to help you, but we will, as Taylor has just shown you, do whatever we can to help if possible.
[00:22:52.640] - Taylor
Yeah, it's more, for me it's more about making sure that I give quality and the best advice, and find the best solution for the client rather than the money, in terms of I'm not trying to make a quick, you know, quick buck as they say. I'd rather give my advice and my knowledge and actually just genuinely try to help someone rather than other people, which I know some people, I've heard horror stories that they have taken the money in advance of a website; and then because they've got the money, they don't really do a great job because there's no incentive for them to do a good job. And yeah, I feel, they paint a bad picture for the rest of us.
[00:23:35.100] - Gordon
Yeah. And we are very much customer focussed, both of us. It's something I've always done and it's something when Taylor started up, I was sort of making sure that he was very customer focussed, because the customer in the end has to be happy.
[00:23:49.860] - Taylor
My whole business is based around customer satisfaction. If I don't do a good job, people will tell other people and I just won't get any more work because, you know, if I'm rude, if I'm not helpful, if I'm very pushy.
[00:24:03.300] - Gordon
And that's a really good point. Because you started summer of last year.
[00:24:08.070] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:24:08.790] - Gordon
And what advertising have you done? What have you, what advertising have you paid for?
[00:24:13.920] - Taylor
My BNI membership. That's the only...
[00:24:16.410] - Gordon
So a networking...
[00:24:17.170] - Taylor
Marketing I guess, and promotional that I've done.
[00:24:19.590] - Gordon
And a business card.
[00:24:20.400] - Taylor
And a business card.
[00:24:21.300] - Gordon
And all of your work comes through word of mouth.
[00:24:24.210] - Taylor
Pretty much, yeah.
[00:24:25.140] - Gordon
And I'm the same. I don't advertise Drayson Design anywhere. I have a website and it's on the search engine results. I have a business card, but that's it.
[00:24:34.410] - Taylor
Yeah.
[00:24:34.770] - Gordon
It's all word of mouth.
[00:24:35.850] - Taylor
I don't spend much time on trying to get myself onto the high ranks of Google. I don't see a need. My website is purely there for people to go and look at if they've been recommended or they've heard about me, which is a lot of my clients actually, a lot of my clients go, yeah, we've got... We get great recommendations. We're not short of work. However, we want a website that reflects the quality of work that we produce. And, you know, we've got, we're getting to the point where we get enough referrals and recommendations from people that we just want a website where people can go to, to prove, to show that we're professional. Because a lot of people don't think that your professional or exist.
[00:25:17.140] - Gordon
[dog barking] I think we have someone at our front door.
[00:25:20.690] - Taylor
So yeah.
[00:25:20.930] - Gordon
I think that's it, isn't it? I can go and answer the door in just a moment. Thank you very much for joining us. As always, we can be found on YouTube and on Facebook. You can join us live at 1pm on Friday.
[00:25:34.820] - Taylor
We also have our website, which has all of our past episodes in a nice organised way to view and easily find anything that you're looking for.
[00:25:44.870] - Gordon
And you can subscribe to our podcast if you prefer to listen to it rather than watch it.
[00:25:50.870] - Taylor
One thing is I am hopefully going to be adding a search bar onto our website so that if you kind of watch an episode and you thought, "oh, I wanted to remember, or re-watch something" and you know the topic, we put all of our topics and what we talk about in the show notes. So if I can add a search functionality, it means you can then search and find the relevant podcasts that have your search term in it.
[00:26:15.260] - Gordon
And because these shows are live, we go back and put the show notes on after the show. So we basically re-watch them and then type them up and add them to it. So if you ever watch it live, you'll see there's no show notes but sort of maybe an hour or so afterwards, we've put the show notes up for you. So, thank you for watching. My name's Gordon from Drayson Design. You can contact me on the website shown on the screen.
[00:26:40.640] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.
[00:26:43.490] - Gordon
We'll see you next week on "This Week With."
[00:26:46.940] - Taylor
Goodbye.
[00:26:47.420] - Gordon
Goodbye.
