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Originally Posted by Jaska /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Thank you for the very thoughtful reply.
I still won't mention the specific MOTs I had in mind when I finally decided to write something about this subject, but I did actually already know about the at least occasional involvement of others in some of the businesses you cited.
Really, my point is more that these MOTs are artisans with very fine skills, and when all the work in the business is truly conducted by a single person, due credit should be taken. I didn't mean that this practice had any connection with "sales puffing." Actually, I think it could potentially have a negative effect on customers' perception. For example, I have a very good friend who's a violin maker, and a very good one. I have spent a lot of time reading the fascinating contents of his web site, and he is unwaveringly consistent in the use of the 1st. person singular when writing about his creations, and even his restoration services for that matter. He indeed works independently, and I believe if he made the mistake of suggesting otherwise through a poor choice of words, potential customers might easily be led to the misconception that he has apprentices or inexperienced trainees carrying out the work.
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I see what you're getting at now. I suppose, more than anything, it's just a reflection of the state of the world in which we live. Not everyone these days (or probably ever, but I haven't lived forever so I can't say for sure) is a wordsmith, or even intellectually curious for that matter. So the choice of "I" or "we" is probably about as important to many otherwise successful, happy, and well balanced people, as the choice of whether to wear black or blue socks when they're getting dressed in the morning.
This is not to suggest either that, 1) they don't care much about how they come across in their advertisements or on their website, or that 2) you or I or anyone else who might notice this sort of thing and wonder what might be driving it, are in any sense "wrong" or "strange" to be concerning ourselves with things that are apparently not of great concern to them.
This has the potential of being a rather interesting topic, actually. At least for me. Don't know if many other people really think about these sorts of things.
What it suggests, instead (and just in my opinion), is that different people concern themselves with different things. I've known some extremely bright folks who could edit a website like you can't believe, and keep the inside of their cars looking completely spotless, but yet cannot decide what to do with their lives. They're bright, highly educated, personable, neat and clean and orderly, and have all of the outward appearances of being truly happy, and yet they don't know the first thing about what they really want in life.
I also know some of the sloppiest, ill mannered, rude, and uneducated people who have become enormously successful in life and are as happy as can be, no matter how many people they make miserable around them! They're focused and set in their ways and will stop at nothing to achieve whatever it is that they've set out to achieve with no concern whatsoever of doing things "right" and no real satisfaction out of being socially acceptable.
I suspect that the types of people who go into business for themselves in this kind of hobby are likely to fall somewhere in between the above two paragraphs of people. In other words, they are most likely neat, tidy, and detail oriented and thus are likely to take tremendous pride in getting the job done right in terms of the products they're producing or services they're offering. But their primary focus is likely to be on these technical aspects of their business. It might be difficult to find the time to get all of the details of their website and advertisements nailed down precisely.
Either that, or it's outside their realm of knowledge, experience, or even care. This is where is slips into the arena of the second paragraph above. In other words, their focus is on getting products out the door or providing the best possible service from a technical point of view. Having a singular focus is what has brought them the level of success they're now enjoying, and their inattention to "I" versus "we" (and by extension, a whole pile of other similar details) has not hindered them at all.
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Off topic and completely non-audio, but I think it illustrates the point:
I've recently encountered an interesting example of this when searching for the right company to buy my first motorhome from. I have no doubt at all that I've made the right choice in Powerhouse Coach, which is largely a one man operation (although he employs about 15 people including some of his family members). But it's a "one man" operation in the sense that the idea was his, and his alone, and he started out by building one coach at a time as best he knew how. Today, 10 years later, his company is highly respected as one of the premier, boutique, custom builders in the motorhome industry.
But he still deals with all of his customers one on one, by phone, fax and email, and although he's the most honest, hard working, sincere and decent guy you'll ever come across, the written word is certainly not his forte' (but that's Ok, because it doesn't seem to hurt his business in any significant way).
Here's a link to the company website:
Luxury Motor Coaches by PowerHouse Coach
As you'll see it's hard to find any serious fault with the company's products! They're built like tanks (over built, really) and are a completely different animal than you'll find in the more "cookie cutter" types of big brand name motorhomes. They're also priced right relative to the competition such that you can end up with a "serious" truck that look fantastic inside and out and is much more reliable (service-wise) and fuel efficient than anything twice its price!
So the company is bound to be successful because they're doing everything right and creating new value where it didn't exist before. They offer gizmos that no other company in the industry can even dream of offering like the self drive mechanism for their custom trailers or the lateral drive system for their custom coaches:
http://www.powerhousecoach.com/vdt1drive.wmv
http://www.powerhousecoach.com/vdd4latdrive.wmv
The customer is left with doubt about product quality or reliability or honesty and integrity of the company's founder. He's involved in everything and is completely committed to customer service. You can see that it's a labor of love for him and his family, and it's exactly the kind of company that you want to do business with.
But here's the catch: read through the material on the website and you'll see that it is filled with typos (mostly words that are 'sounded out' and spelled accordingly). For a new customer who just happens to stumble upon this website, that might be enough of a distraction to cause him/her to scratch this company off of his/her list, or to hesitate before picking up the phone to make that initial contact.
Do the typos on the website hurt the company? Hard saying. They're as busy as they want to be, and maybe even busier! They don't have any real intention of becoming much larger than they are now, even years down the road. So it's something that could be improved and it would be a relatively simple task to deal with, it's just that this isn't where the company's priorities lie.
Good, bad, or indifferent, that's the way it is, and this small "failure" in the communications process really isn't causing anyone to lose sleep at night. At times, I've wanted to print out every page and make hand corrections on each page myself, then hand them to the company's owner the next time I see him (to pick up my coach in a couple of weeks). But then again, that may be over stepping my bounds, and there is also something sort of quaint about it and I'd kind of miss the typos!
