When Things Keep Going Wrong
Do you ever have days when things seem to keep going wrong?
I’ve just had a few weeks of things going wrong.
I launched a rather nice membership product/service recently – that’s going well – and after some of the feedback I got I decided to update the WordPress plugin that runs the service. Adding the couple of extra features that people wanted seemed a good idea.
Well, it would have been if it hadn’t taken over 3 weeks instead of a few days, as I originally anticipated. I made the mistake of promising timescales that just didn’t happen – bad idea. I don’t code WordPress plugins myself so the best I can do is take the word of developers giving me timescales. Unfortunately, they sometimes give you optimistic timescales.
Lesson #1: Until it’s in my hands and working, a new piece of software is not finished and ‘due dates’ are not set in stone. Be honest about that and expect hiccups. Developers are only human and they can’t always know how long something will take.
Lesson #1a: You can’t promise something that isn’t 100% within your own control. I can’t really promise something that somebody else is doing. I can give an estimated date, but unless I’m the one doing the work, I have to build in some hiccup time.
What made it worse is that one developer disappeared on me so I had to find a replacement fast. The replacement made all the right noises and understood my deadline and promised the work was easy enough to complete on time. Then he told me he couldn’t do it at all, the day after it was due….
Lesson #2: Sometimes, people will say anything to get the job – a promise is not the same as the delivery of that promise. Measure by delivery, not the intensity of the promise.
So what to do? Once bitten, twice shy, right? Twice bitten, well that’s really shy! How about employing 2 different developers at the same time to make sure one of them comes through? Sounds like a good safety net to me.
Except if they both deliver the code you have to spend time testing both sets – it takes twice as long. Multiple coders may be a good idea if you’re sending a space shuttle up into space, but for a simple WordPress plugin modification I think it’s overkill.
Lesson #3: Don’t overcomplicate something because it’s gone wrong in the past. Be realistic about why it went wrong instead.
I recently lost internet connection for a couple of days and decided to work at my brother’s house. I’ve now realized that when I bought a desktop machine recently, to replace my dead laptop, it wasn’t exactly something I could drag around with me. It didn’t seem like a big deal since I have a couple of older laptops I could use.
Or I did, until my laptops decided not to play. I’ve had 3 separate laptops die on me – the last one on the day I took it to my brother’s house to use his wifi. In fairness they are all old machines and they were backup to the backup, so they were overdue for retirement.
Lesson #4: My desktop machine is fast and cool, but it relies on my internet connection. If that goes down I can’t work unless I have a reliable machine I can actually take where the wifi is. So I need a new backup laptop now – I’m sure my wife thinks that’s just an excuse to get a cool new toy, but I don’t want to be without the means of doing what I need to do ever again – at least as far as I can avoid it.
Once I had the updated plugin (which now works great) I tested it and that took a fair chunk of time. That’s ok. I then realized that I could speed up the production of the content for my service if I used a slightly different technique. Cue another day of testing.
The new technique I use works and it works really, really well. I estimate it will now save me about a day every month which is pretty cool. Better yet I can use it on other things I have planned so I’ll get extra mileage out of it.
Lesson #5: Sometimes it’s worth a little bit of extra time now to save time repeatedly in the future. I think some people call that “sharpening the saw”.
What’s the end result of this?
- I have a working plugin which is designed in a more flexible way for any future updates.
- I have a method for preparing content that eliminates drudgery and minimizes chances of mistakes
- I know of a couple of developers not to rely on!
- I’m aware of a weakness in my setup that I can now take care of
I can’t pretend it’s been fun – the stress of trying to get what I felt was a simple change done in a timely way for the members is something I’d rather avoid. I don’t like the feeling of letting them down, making them wait for their update.
I have, however, spotted ways to guard against such things in the future. I’m sure other things will crop up, but at least I have some coping strategies for these ones.
So what’s the point of this post? It occurs to me that some of you must hit roadblocks when you’re trying to set up internet income streams. How many of you don’t manage to break through those roadblocks? How many of you could break through those roadblocks if you kept going?
That’s the point, I think. Keep going. If an obstacle comes up then keep going, until you’ve gone round it, or removed it, or ignored it – whatever you need to do to get to the next checkpoint.
Then do the same with the next obstacle. I sometimes think they’re just a way for life to check whether we’re really serious about doing something!
So, do you have any roadblocks you haven’t managed to conquer yet? Add your comment and let me know.
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Hi Amin,
Yes, I know the feeling. I bought a new computer with all the latest and greatest technical features. I felt that I could delay backing it all up for a week or so while I loaded it full of software and files. Little did I know, the next day the hard drive crashed and was totally useless and I had not backed it up. Back to square one! Had to do all over again, but this time I backed it all up every day. Now that same hard drive has ran for 4 years with no problems! Sometimes, I think God is trying to teach me a little patience.
Say your prayers–and also backup your computers often!
PS. A question about the “expire post” WordPress plugin. Is there a reason why I would want to use that on any of my blogs? It seems it would make the “footprint” of the blog smaller with fewer pages and fewer posts? Maybe I am missing the point?
John B.
Hi John
That’s a lesson that you learn once and never forget! It’s funny how when you’re taking care of the housekeeping things seem to keep working. Better safe than sorry, as we say over here.
The expire post plugin is useful for certain circumstances. If you have content on your blog that is time sensitive, for example a special offer that lasts for only a week, you may not want that page to remain online when the week is up. You might get angry complaints from potential customers who still want the deal even though it’s expired, for example. After all, if they can still see the page, they should get the deal – at least that’s what I’ve seen in support tickets before now.
So the expire post can either remove that special offer page, or if you prefer, it can silently redirect visitors the regular price page. That way you don’t lose the visitor – you may still get the sale.
You can also unpublish the post or page so you can use it again, later on. I’m thinking, for example, of seasonal deals. Say you have a very effective page for a weight loss product that sells really, really well in the New Year. You might want to turn the page off during the “off-season”. Or if you have a page tied to a regular sporting event you could turn that off. The point of that is to enforce scarcity. If a product/page/post is only available at certain times your visitors might make a decision sooner when they can visit the page – it’s sort of the equivalent of “limited time offer”.
Another very nice use of the plugin is with blogs that are set up to promote say Amazon products. There are lots of hot deals on Amazon and some of them are time limited. If you regularly publish those deals you might pick up some extra sales, but what to do when the offer is closed? Well, with the expire post plugin you just have the post redirect itself to a regular post/page for the same product – at the regular price. Any visitor interested in that product won’t be confused with offer pricing that’s no longer available. And blogs showcasing Amazon products are a nice way to pick up some affiliate income
Amin
p.s. You probably would never use the plugin on a ‘normal’ blog – this one, for example. I had it made really for sales type blogs. I’ve let it slide a bit because of lack of time, but I started a weekly deal blog where each week a particular product was offered at preferential pricing, but just for that week. I still wanted the product to be available at regular price after that week, so redirecting visitors to the regular price page at least could pick up some extra sales that way.
How true is that. I remember reading, about 20 years ago, that when you start out and as you get closer to your goals life will throw up roadblocks to test your resolve. Give up, slow down you lose.
Recently I have been working on a desktop tool to help me with backlink building. A way of managing to track and return to sites I have links, articles or pages on – there are so many for an active marketer.
The software I wanted to write involved learning a new language but I really don’t have the time to commit. So I attempted several other approaches including a spreadsheet, which works but isn’t scaleable.
Meaning that I have to go back to the software I know and have some skills in. Once I have it working properly then I can give the working tool to a programmer in the language of choice and get them to replicate it.
Slower than I would like but do-able and now I can have a tool that I can use while the programmers do their thing. Roadblocks of my own making to be sure but roadblock just the same.
Incidentally, I removed the last roadblock this afternoon. Now I just have to write the program.
Hi – I don’t know your first name so I’ll have to call you Mr Bearly
It’s very interesting that you say you’ve had some roadblocks of your own making. I have a sneaky feeling that most roadblocks are of our own making. I know some come up from time to time, but I think a lot of them are our internal editors clamoring for attention – wanting us to know that we’re fallible. And of course a roadblock is really just a way to find a better way to do something. That’s my view, anyway.
I remember once a major roadblock when I wiped a rather large portion of my own source code – too broke in those days to have an expensive backup disk! But in being forced to find a way to reconstruct the code as fast as I could, I ended up with a more elegant, clean and simple piece of code that worked better than the original had. So, yes, I think there are some hidden opportunities in roadblocks
I’m a bit intrigued that you’re not having a programmer do the work for you – you’re creating your link tracker first then having someone replicate it. Just a thought – might it be something you should let go of and let a programmer do for you while you move on with other parts of your business? I’m terrible for wanting to do everything myself, but I’m learning that:
a) I can’t
b) I don’t have the time anyway
c) Other people sometimes are (hate to admit this) better than me at certain things
I’m not saying that’s the case for you, but there’s something about the tone of what you say that just makes me wonder whether you might be better served handing over this project of yours.
Amin
G’Day Amin, you can call me Edward, Eddy, Ted or just Mr Bearly
Re handing over the project, I have thought of that but I think it’s about a $500 project on Elance or Rent-a-coder and, while I know what I want it to do and have an algorithm for it I also know that there will be things I want to alter when I start using it.
When I have what I want I can begin using/selling it while the all platform version is being created.
I know there are better programmers than me but I am reluctant to keep paying out for a program that I will want to change. If I had a tame programmer in my pocket, as I did once, I would let them do the job.
Oh Yeah, I’m a stubborn bear. Incidentally, I have the program about 50% done as of today.
Best regards
Mr Bearly
Eddy,
I know what it’s like to keep wanting changes – been there, done that, got the t-shirt
Amin