Postcards From Myself

The big three automakers are in trouble and it is there own fault. Interestingly I have talked to friends both liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican. We all agree that the government should not bail out GM, Chrysler or Ford because they got in the bind they are in by their own self-centered mismanagement. They all thought they could do whatever they liked and that the customers would follow them. Sorry, your customers aren’t sheep and to think they are is just conceited stupidity.

There used to be an old saying that “what is good for GM is good for the country.” That tells you exactly where the problem lies. As anyone who is in tune with the marketplace can tell you, it should have been “what is good for the country is good for GM.” Basically, if you concentrate on your customer your business will succeed.

If you do what is right for your customers you will succeed on two fronts. First, even in the unlikely event that you do fail financially, you will have done some good for the world. And secondly, if you are doing right by your customers they will support you and stand behind you. They will want you to succeed. And that alone is more than half the battle.

Truthfully, I am not sure if it is too late for the big auto makers. I am sure it is already too late for their executives though. The guys at the top are too selfish to do what is right by their customers, their companies, or their countries. They have proven that by their attitudes and action. The best thing they could do is step down, and if they won’t step down they should be removed.

The only way the big three can be fixed is if they, and the labor unions who work for them, quit focusing on themselves and turn their attention to giving the customers what is wanted. How in the world does flying a corporate jet aid the customer? It doesn’t. How does haggling at the dealership until utter frustration sets in help the customer? It doesn’t. How does making too large gas guzzling old technology help the customer? It doesn’t. See how simple the test is? Just cut out all the junk that isn’t good for the customer out. Focus on your customer and you can’t lose.

I have been looking at a number of sites recently for design and visual hints. While doing this I have also been keeping an eye on financial sites – due of course to the recent financial unpleasantness. Along this journey I came upon a site named eToro which bills itself as a “forex” or foreign exchange.

Now, while not my normal thing, this site on forex trading is quite interesting -not only because I had not seen such a thing before, but because it is designed quite well. According to the site, and to my observations, the “eToro platform has a remarkably intuitive interface that enables you to forget about fumbling with bulky forex software and focus exclusively on your trades.”

Again, I have no experience with forex exchange, but if you look at this site you will see clear explanations of what you can do on the site and what it is there for. Additionally I found tools for social bookmarking, support, security, and community building. In other words, they are trying to make it as easy as possible to learn about this business and what it can do for you. Seeing this is causing me to go back and look at my own sites because I have some major holes on them. What do I offer? How do you ask questions or get support? How can you talk to my other customers?

All of these things are important but either absent from some of my sites or so hidden that they might as well be absent. So, while foreign exchange is not my thing, the lessons that I can learn from the eToro site are still quite valuable.