A cautionary business tale about fiddling and getting burned

Eight years ago I took on a startup client, writing copy for his new website. He was developing an online portal for foodies, a place where epicures could crowd-source and review restaurant experiences then get offers and incentives for doing so. It wasn’t a particularly complex job and, frankly, I was so excited by the concept that writing the first draft took me no time at all. What took too long was my client. He hemmed and hawed, asked for inconsequential edits then disappeared for weeks or months, resurfacing to tell me this or that aspect of the business had changed, or that the logo was being redesigned, or the name reevaluated. After a year and half of back and forth interspersed with tapping of worn fingers, I stopped hearing from him. My emails and calls went unanswered and I was never paid in full.

In that time, Yelp exploded into the social media consciousness.

Maybe my client’s idea would have failed eventually. Maybe it could have never competed against Yelp. Or maybe it would have eaten Yelp for lunch. We’ll never know because my client couldn’t get his act together.

Perfect, it’s said, is the enemy of the good. Or to massacre a famous idiom, my client fiddled and got burned while Rome built up all around him.

When I started my first freelance writing business in 2002, I had my website up in less than three weeks. I had never built a website. I didn’t know if everything I was doing was right or whether it would work. (Looking back I notice that my logo bore a striking resemblance to a guillotine. My bad.) But right at that moment I needed a signpost that told people I existed and a billboard that established credibility if someone wanted to see my portfolio. If it needed tweaking, I could fix it later — and I did. It was a website after all, not a tattoo or Mount Rushmore.

Due diligence is smart business, of course. So is getting your product or service out the door. The two aren’t mutually exclusive. If you’re starting a business, particularly a small one that’s service-related and doesn’t require much in the way of overhead or logistics, do your homework, build the tools you think you need, speak to your lawyer and accountant, decide how you’re going to market yourself then get that baby rolling — in weeks, not months or, God help you, years. Unless you’re made of money, you need to start making some and, if possible, build your credibility and network better than your competitors.

Nike’s famous tagline is done to death, I know. But there’s a reason “Just do it.” resonates more than “Just think about it and reflect some more and consider things a little bit longer.”