No accounting for taste

I was talking with a client recently about their website. It was terrible. And this particular client works in the luxury travel industry. Their properties have been named some of the best in Asia by prestigious magazines and their levels of service and food have been praised by the same. So why make a website that doesn't match their other levels of industry standards? Budget I was told.

Here in Vietnam I think many clients are misled by the belief that everything is cheap when the truth of the matter is that cheap things are cheap and good things cost more. I find it positively baffling that this particular client spent more on the bathroom in my hotel room than they did on the website that supports their entire business in country. Foolish, I think.

When an entire business rests on the image of a company it makes positively no sense to look cheap or low tech on the web. Poor writing, poor photography, sites that function clumsily all contribute to a brand's personality and having them contribute negatively just doesn't make any sense. Not even if you think you are saving money, because in reality, you are loosing money - potential sales that might be more successfully made if a quality product is represented from the start with a quality look and feel in all communications.

There's no accounting for taste, but there should be. Call the accounting department and double your budget on that website. It's one of the least expensive elements of your marketing campaign and may provide one of the best returns.

The Therapeutic Benefits of a Proper Fish & Chips

Last week could have gone better. There were Internet problems, wire transfer problems and a more than usual set of small business fires to be extinguished - but throughout the week there were two major issues that helped me to understand my true dyspepsia:


#1) I want to be spending more time with quality, intelligent, dedicated people who are doing their best to be the best at what they do.

#2) I need to be spending more time with people who are being honest with me and in the end, honest with themselves.

And that's what my week boiled down to - two essential problems that I needed to work better through to help me avoid disappointment and associated depression - because when I'm not sleeping well or sleeping too much, I know something is not right.

Issue #1) That I need to be spending more time with passionate, intelligent people who are making a difference in their business - came up in a response to a blog post I did regarding Vietnamese advertising agencies not winning awards. One person actually wrote a response to my post almost defending, and then in the end making excuses for why his agency didn't even bother to enter the industry award shows. "We don't see the point" - he quoted his management as saying. And that made me sad. "Why even try to be better", it said to me. And that I thought was a very sad comment coming from a man who is actually in charge of a creative business here. Other contributors to my feeling along these lines were an old acquaintance in a bar insulting another guy for seemingly no reason, except to maybe make himself feel more superior and another person just chasing small money instead of looking at the bigger picture. Are my standards too high? Or do I just need to be spending more time with people who have similar standards? That seems to be my question.

Issue #2) That I need to be spending more time with people who are honest with me and in the end, honest with themselves - started with a personal relationship last year in which someone had been fabricating almost an entire lifetime for me. The psychological reasons a person would do this are varied and complicated and as of yet, unsolved, but suffice to say it shook my trust - more my trust in myself in being able to feel I could judge people well. A job I was offered recently lasted only two weeks because the people with the business had neglected to write a business plan and obtain the proper licenses to do what they told me they wanted to do. They weren't being honest with themselves and that in-turn caused them to not be honest with me. Should I have seen it? Should I have vetted them better? Yes. But I did my best and gained a new understanding into exactly how unplanned, idealistic and poorly researched people can be when starting a business. Nobody should expect it to be easy, especially if there is a lot of money involved.

So with these two reasons for general unhappiness, I ended a week. But how to solve? Saigon is full of bars but I have found them as of late to be less than inspiring for anything outside of football and girls - so I settled on fish and chips.

Ones favourite foreign meal can take on a special feeling when it comes to hard times and big issues. People call these meals comfort food. And that's exactly what I needed. A meal served as I perceived it, at a proper price and with all the associated accoutrements - this fish & chips, served at Sheridan's Irish Pub in Saigon came with cole slaw and mushy peas, and was plump and fried and exactly what needed - with a Coke to wash it all down. Funny how simple things can wash away larger doubts. Funny how familiarity breeds comfort as opposed to contempt in a foreign land.

The week would end in my meeting Barry - a man who, of all things, builds concrete buildings with a large Vietnamese construction company - not a very creative business at all you might say? But Barry addressed his subject with a passion and professionalism seldom seen in many businesses. He impressed upon me elements of design, engineering, quality and style that only a man at the top of his craft could do. Thank you Barry. I needed to meet a person with that positive attitude at the end of last week.

The following week would bring a truly unprofessional lawyer who would cause me to just scratch my head and say WTF? - but it would also bring an interview with Sandrine Lloquet, a French/Vietnamese visual artist and VJ who brings a more than interesting history and passion to her work. Surrounding ourselves with people who inspire and help us to do better is not always such an easy job. Last week reminded me that it is a job though and one that needs constant tending - something we should never forget.

The road to total enlightenment takes time...

Hi all. For the next few days I'll be working on the business plan for Infinite Wisdom, so I will not be posting quite as regular for a few days.

In my post "How Not to Market in Asia: The importance of time, money, quality and knowing how much of each you need to succeed" I waxed philosophically about the idea that even in the best of circumstances, you are only allowed to have two of those attributes - the third - you must be flexible with. ie: If you want something high quality and fast, you need money. If you want something high quality and cheap, you need time - and so on.

What Infinite Wisdom has in abundance right now is quality, but a distinct lack of start-up cash. So what we need is time. I'm taking that time now, so that we don't have troubles later.

Please take your time to stroll around the site and look at some of the almost 200 older posts we have here. You can search any topic you like in the search bar - you may be surprised!

See you in a few days.

David.