A little story about business failure

by WebPen
6 replies
When I lived in California, I operated a candy vending machine for about a year and a half before I eventually sold it.

During that time, I had a few machines in various stores on the main road "downtown".

Some of the businesses were doing well- some... not so much.

Well the city government decided to improve the entire area. They wanted to attract new businesses to come in and build new stuff, but to do that they had to start with the road.

So what'd they do?

The city government pretty much destroyed this road for about 6 months.

Think about what that meant for the businesses.

Even though it would help the businesses in the long run, in the short run they might suffer a bit.

Well- here's the funny thing.

Some businesses weren't really affected. Even though customers couldn't park right at the front door anymore, they'd park a few blocks away and walk however far was necessary to go to that business that they knew, liked, and trusted.

Meanwhile, some businesses fell through.

Of course, the failure of these businesses allowed new, possibly better businesses to move in later.

So... the road and area changed for the better, but some businesses failed because of the changes.

The businesses that made it through were the ones that had happy customers, and did what they could to make access to the store easier (back doors, cleared some of the rubble in front of their own store, etc.)

Can you think of a situation online where this can happen? Or has happened multiple times over the last few years?

...here's a hint- Google is a road.

...so is Facebook, Pinterest, or even your favorite affiliate.
#business #failure #story
  • Profile picture of the author Long Beach Nathan
    I think having multiple ways for the public to access your business is a big key. Have a presence on FB, Twitter, G+, Tumblr, and everywhere else you can.
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  • Profile picture of the author WeavingThoughts
    Panda and penguin updates. The quality websites survived, rest went down.
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    • Profile picture of the author brillbranding
      When setting up a business, I believe that diversification is the key. Don't put too many eggs in one basket. You have to ask yourself, "What if the road was being worked on today?" Hopefully, the answer would be "No problem. I'll just take this offramp." and not "Oh crap! I just totaled my car by hitting those construction pylons!"

      Having a great business model is key and that also includes having some backup.
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      Co-Founder of Pain Free Profits with Jason Kanigan
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  • Profile picture of the author seoexperttools
    Business will be forced to open the door to as many channels as possible if they want to exist in the ever competitive market.
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  • Profile picture of the author xiwang
    Banned
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    • Profile picture of the author fin
      There was a guy on Mixergy that had his multi-million dollar business wiped out when Facebook introduced the timeline. I think he sold themes for the old format.

      I'm sure there's been others. Too much people are attracted to techniques, rather than building a solid foundation where any technique can be used.
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  • Profile picture of the author travlinguy
    Good post.

    Google is always going to be in the middle of construction, destruction and change. They don't like the MMO crowd and will continue to deliberately make it hard and harder to rank. There isn't much people can do to clear away the rubble because there will always be more stuff right behind it.

    Facebook, Twitter and all the rest of the social media sites are the answer. They have been the answer for the last couple of years. People need to wake up and stop trying to kiss Google's hiney because it's not worth the trouble.

    Regardless of what method an individual is using to drive traffic it's all about great content. Great content. Great content. Rather than try and second guess the next trick to fool some bot people should concentrate on getting great content to their sites. There are many ways to go about it but a lot of folks refuse to use them because they think they'll be upsetting the Google gods. I find that funny, pathetic and absurd all at the same time. Oh, did I mention that winners always provide great content for their visitors?

    Here's the thing about great content: Google loves it, that is, if you still give a rat's ass what Google loves.
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