Success is in the little details
I am a detail guy – they are important to me. Maybe it’s because I used to restore, build and paint custom cars. People (especially relatives) would see the car that I happened to be working on at the time and ask me how much I would charge them to paint their cars. They were always “surprised” by what seemed to them, to be an exorbitant amount. The reality is that I was probably a little low.
(photo by starmist1)
Your attention to “little” details is revealing
People think that a great paint job is in how well you apply the paint – they are wrong. Don’t misunderstand me, applying the paint is important, but it’s only important if all the preceding steps to having a great paint job have been properly done.
It doesn’t matter how well you apply the paint if:
- all the dents and dings have not been removed
- the underlying primer coats have not been sanded to “baby butt” smoothness
- you have used chemicals that are not compatible
My point is that people judge you by your attention to the details.
Crappy customer service is the result of poor attention to detail
The Rotater is rolling. On February 11, the Birmingham News ran an article entitled “Industrial Mechanic invents tool to improve shoulder mobility, finds niche in athletics”. This article drove massive traffic to the Rotater website and our blog, Shoulder Performance & Rehab and resulted in a huge number of orders for the Rotater.
Great – right? Yes and no! The traffic and orders were great – our blog crashing was not. I wrote about it in “The Good Stuff, the Bad Stuff and the Other Stuff”. Well, guess what? It happened again, twice this week. At least this time, I did not spend two days trying to figure out what the problem was.
I called customer service and waited on hold for about an hour. I didn’t get too worked up, because I put the phone on speaker and spent the time searching for a new host.
When someone finally answered the phone, I told her the problem expecting it to be corrected right away – I was in for a fight. This company’s situation is so bad, that they have resorted to having a “front line” person screen technical support issues. Essentially her job was to find out what I wanted and then she would prioritize and have technical support get back in touch with me.
I told her that this solution was not acceptable.
- She stalled – I didn’t budge.
- I asked to speak to her boss. He/she was not there.
- I asked to speak with technical support – they were busy.
- I asked to speak to “anyone” other than her – she put me on hold.
- I threatened to change hosts – technical support came on the phone.
The Rotater article is picked up on the newswire
The article that I mentioned above, was picked up by the Ann Arbor News and ran this week under a different title – “Rotater Cuff Injuries Inspire Invention”. (I have not been able to find a link to the article, but I have seen a copy of the article.)
The result – more traffic, more orders and more down-time for the blog. My problem is that I don’t want to alert our current hosting service to this third assault on our blog, because they informed me when I had it reset the second time, that if it happened a third time – they would suspend our account. Because we are exclusively a web-based business, this would put us “out of business”.
Solution: Pay attention to the “little” details
I have found a new host and am in the process of moving our website and blog. It is slow, tedious, time-consuming and scary, but hopefully all will be finished by this weekend.
I started this post talking about “attention to detail”. People noticed my paint jobs as a result of my attention to the details. Your success or lack of success is the result of your attention to the details. Let me try to explain.
The Rotater is a marvelous shoulder rehabilitation and stretching device – invented by an industrial mechanic – with a very southern accent. Not exactly where you would expect a revolutionary piece of medical / athletic training equipment to come from. But when people come to our website, they don’t see a bunch of hype.
- We tell them what the Rotater does
- We show a video demonstrating how the Rotater works
- We provide links to exercises that they can down-load and show to their doctors and therapists
- We provide real testimonials of real people, real doctors, real athletes / trainers and real physical therapists
- We include links to publications who are noticing the Rotater ( we’ve been in business since August 2007 and have been published eight times – and more is to come)
People who visit the Rotater website don’t know me or Scott, so we’re very careful to pay attention to the details:
- We answer every email – as quickly as possible
- We return phone calls – every time
- We deal with any issues – right away
- We don’t try to sell to every person – the Rotater won’t help everyone
- If someone is not happy – we refund their money (out of thousands, we have had two Rotaters returned)
People learn about you because of your attention to detail. Here is the take home message – There are no small details, everything counts and someone is paying attention to how you handle every situation.
It’s the small stuff that has the greatest return on you investment. Make it a point to pay attention to the details – Hey it works for Nordstrom (they are legendary for customer service) and it’ll work for you.
soupornuts.com answers questions about the Rotater
I am an entrepreneur involved in several business ventures. One of these projects involves the marketing and development of the Rotater, which I have mentioned several times.
Answering e-mail
After receiving a number of e-mails with questions about the Rotater, I thought it might be beneficial to post the questions and my answers here rather than continuing to answer each query individually.
1. Did I invent the Rotater?
No. The Rotater was invented by my business partner and friend, Scott Kay.
2. Why did Scott invent the Rotater?
Scott is a flat-track motorcycle racer. He’s a no-holds-barred, balls-to-the-wall, wide-open kind of guy. His competitive nature causes him to push himself and his motorcycle to the edge and has resulted in several physically damaging crashes.
His latest crash resulted in his third shoulder surgery. Physicians say that it is extremely difficult to break your shoulder blade (scapula). Scott has managed to break each of his on separate occasions.
Facing another long rehabilitation process, Scott started questioning his physical therapists about obtaining some shoulder equipment that he could use at home to supplement his prescribed physical therapy. They repeatedly told him that he already had everything that was available. This answer did not satisfy Scott, so he designed the Rotater.
3. When did he decide to patent and market the Rotater?
Initially, Scott had no intention of pursuing the opportunity. He had simply done what he needed to do in order to speed up his rehab process.
It was only after continued urging by his physical therapists that Scott decided to share his Rotater with the world.
4. What is the Rotater?
The Rotater can best be described as a personal stretching device for the shoulder.
5. How does the Rotater work?
This simple-looking device positions the arm while at the same time it allows you to control the degree of stretch. It is almost like having a trainer or therapist with you. In fact, it was Scott who said, “I knew it was a good shoulder device when I could feel the same sensations that I felt during my shoulder therapy sessions.” You can see a video demonstration here.
6. Who uses the Rotater?
The Rotater is being used by:
- physical therapists
- occupational therapists
- physicians
- orthopedic surgeons
- athletic trainers
- nurses
- strength and conditioning specialists
- golfers – see what 1StopForGolf.com says about the Rotater
- long drive champion
- pga teaching professionals
- professional baseball player
- volleyball players
- softball players
- swimmers
- competition rodeo roper (header)
- post-operative patients
- former NCAA cyclist
- breast cancer survivors
7. What is “Stretching Shoulders to Stretch Lives”? 
“Stretching Shoulders to Stretch Lives” is the tag line that marks our commitment to help breast cancer survivors by donating ten percent of the revenue of all “Pink Rotater” sales to help fund breast cancer research.
Essentially, when you buy a “Pink Rotater” to “Stretch your Shoulder”, we donate ten percent of the selling price for research “to Stretch Lives”.
Reconstructed site and a new blog
Today is Sunday, July 8 and my partner and I have been working for two days to get the Rotater site up-to-date and functional. Plus, we have created a blog ( Shoulder Performance & Rehab ) to help us spread the word about our revolutionary shoulder rehabilitation device. Click over and let me know what you think.
We were very encouraged by the response that we received at the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) conference in Denver last week and hope to continue to get positive responses.
There is a lot of work left ahead of us, but I feel that we can accomplish our dreams. Besides, I just can’t give up. It’s just not in me.
MEDIOCRITY IS NOT ACCEPTABLE!!!
More great stuff from Denver
As I stated yesterday, we met some really great people at the American Physical Therapy Association conference in Denver last week. The number of great products available to help speed the recovery of physical therapy patients is phenominal.
One really great idea from the show is a web based, physical therapy program that works to bring the patient and the physical therapist together over the internet. Go to HOME PROGRAMS.NET to get all the details. This is an idea that is way ahead of it’s time and could quite possibly become an industry standard. Kudos to Kevin Rausch for bringing this unique idea to reality and for providing convience and accessability to the patient.
I was really encouraged by the number of people who took an interest in both our product and in us as people. It is nice to know that there are still people in the world who value people.
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