When you decide to go into business, and sell either a service or a product (or both), you get the whole host of issues to think over: do I start off with a merchant account, or is Paypal good enough? Do I sell items I buy from somewhere else, items that I make myself, or a mixture? Do I want to have branded packaging and personalized notes for every order, or is plain white tissue, bubble wrap, and a sturdy box going to be sufficient? Who will take over the company, fill the outstanding orders, pay the outstanding bills if I'm incapacitated? And then there's how to conduct yourself when there are problems, how to sell the things you choose to sell, and how to act like a responsible adult…which should be common sense.

If you're running a business, treat it like a business. Register, pay any and all taxes, get the necessary licenses…conduct yourself like a businessperson. You're not just putting together some pretty gift baskets to take to friends, you're providing something to strangers in exchange for money that those strangers have worked hard to get. Treating your business like a business instead of a hobby doesn't just protect you legally. It helps put you into a more deliberate frame of mind - and all actions taken in your business should be fully thought out and deliberate.

Sell a quality product for a fair price. If you're selling us PB&J with the crusts cut off, don't charge us for prime rib. By the same token, make sure the price will indeed cover your costs. If you sell at a huge loss, you'll quickly go out of business. (And if you sell with an extremely narrow profit margin, you'll still go out of business...it'll just take longer.) It can be tempting to create customer loyalty programs, give away lots of prizes, or send out sample blitzes to bloggers and PR outlets to increase exposure and positive buzz. But if you then have to suddenly stop sending out samples, or have to start doing smaller giveaways, or have to reduce the prizes your loyal customers get...any positive buzz will go negative quickly. It's smarter to start small, and then gradually give bigger prizes or discounts. That way, people see that they're getting more instead of less - and you don't have to find out the hard way (empty bank account at month-end, smaller or negative profits at year-end) that you were being more generous than your business could afford.

Sell us an honest product. You can resell something that you buy in bulk from somewhere else, that's not a problem. Just don't try and claim that you created it yourself, if you didn't. And whether or not you created it yourself...test the product and then sell us the product based on how it actually performs, not on how a marketing department might want people to -=believe=- it performs. One company (which I buy from semi-regularly) sells a certain product that lists "statistics" like "93% of women agreed that it does not smudge" and "96% of women were satisfied with overall improvement". Wiggle-words, pseudostatistics, and bullshit: none of those are hard-evidence claims that could be refuted in a court, because they use non-empirical criteria. I personally don't have to know that a given company creates everything it sells from raw materials; but I do want something that doesn't look like it could be a "kiddie" or "toy" version of whatever-it-is. If it is a cheaply made product, price it accordingly...then if I buy it and get upset with the low quality, I've only really got myself to be upset at.

Be competitive. Look around and find others reselling similar or the same items. This goes double for any items you resell from other vendors. If you price your product much higher than your competition without giving a compelling reason for the difference in price, people will simply buy the product from your competitors, and may not be all that thrilled with buying anything else from you if they suspect a huge markup without a corresponding added value. Case in point: Aromaleigh, whose eye shadows and blushes I loved, sold indelible cream shadows and gel liners from Lady Burd. Not a problem. They charged almost double what other vendors were charging for the exact same items, though. THAT was a problem. I did not buy anything else from them that was not an eyeshadow, blush, or (when they carried them) a lip product; because I suspected similar markup disparities and knew that if I wanted a thing, I could probably get either that exact same thing or a more-than-decent substitute elsewhere. I don't know if the cream shadows and liners were priced as high as they were because she bought a smaller lot from Lady Burd, and thus paid a higher per-jar price; or if it was another reason. But I know that as a consumer, I wasn't very compelled to try anything else that Aromaleigh re-sold.

Don't get too close to your customers; but don't distance yourself too far. I don't know whether it's the indie atmosphere, or whether it's a symptom of selling something you personally created or conceived of, but there are lots of indie company owners who seem to want to get very closely involved with their customer base. This can be a good thing, or a bad thing (and some go so far as to set up a sick system that will make customers blindly continue shopping with them no matter what happens). It can be a good thing, because you might get a better idea of what your customers want and why. This can be a bad thing because if a customer is upset at something, and you take their remarks personally and respond in kind, you can make a routine complaint-situation bad...or a bad situation worse. You've taken additional stress on yourself, you've given the customer more stress, and the situation can snowball and suck the life right out of you. If you feel that you can't stay professional when dealing with customer complaints, then step back and have someone else handle them. (And please, in the name of all that is holy and much that is not, make sure that whomever is dealing with customer complaints, knows how to handle themselves professionally. It doesn't help if you step back to let someone else handle the situation, if that person also reacts defensively. That doesn't help the customer, it doesn't help the company, and in the end, it doesn't help you.) You definitely want a procedure in place for handling complaints, whether that's a dedicated customer forum, or a dedicated email address, or both.

Pay attention. When customers are complaining about something, see if you can figure out the actual problem. They may say "I don't like the 3-gram jars because I can't stack them easily," when what they really mean is "I don't like the 3-gram jars because I get less product than in the 5-gram jars." Or they may really mean exactly what they say when they write "When the jars aren't individually sealed, they come open in transit and the product spills." or "There's an ingredient in this particular batch of your product that's causing severe irritation to me." Sometimes you have to do a little detective work. If you get a series of similar complaints from several customers, do NOT just put them off with "You're the only one who has this problem" or "The ingredients haven't changed" - because if that's not the case, they will find out, and you'll lose goodwill and possibly lose customers (and worst case, you'll lose a lawsuit.) Yes, you do have to protect yourself against people who may just be trying to cadge free product or get partial refunds - because sadly, that does happen. There are dishonest people on both sides of the vendor-client fence. But there's a middle ground between "unhelpful brick-wall shopkeeper" and "doormat".

Take responsibility. When you run a business, there's the assumption that you're going to take some responsibility for the product or service that you sell. If you're selling phone service or web hosting, it's going to be continuously accessible - and if it isn't, you're going to find out why and fix it (or start refunding customers for the downtime.) If you're selling makeup or clothing or jewelry, it's going to arrive in good condition and not fall apart the first time it's worn/used - and if it arrives in poor condition and it's because it was packed improperly, you're going to send a replacement or a refund; and if it breaks the first time it's worn/used, again you're going to send a replacement or a refund (or follow your routine for fixing customer problems. You do have one of these in place, don't you?) It's your responsibility to sell people a product that's safe enough, and of sufficient quality, you would have no problem using it yourself...or recommending it to friends and family members. If you're selling children's toys, are they completely safe for children of all ages (or marked as to target age group?) Are there any moving or detachable parts - and if so, are they large enough that they won't present a choking or pinching hazard for very young children? If you're selling beauty products like makeup or perfume, are all the ingredients listed on the packaging? Are all of those ingredients safe for use in cosmetics? If the product is not lip- or eye-safe, is that clearly marked? If you're selling food items, are all the ingredients listed so that people with allergies or food sensitivities will be able to avoid those products that contain this or that? Whatever you're selling, have you actually used it yourself? Can you personally attest to the quality of the product?

Additionally, you're not going to blame the post office if you send a fragile item in flimsy packaging. You're not going to blame your kids or your dog or the person from whom you supposedly bought the item for a poorly-made dress or top. You're not going to pass blame back to the supplier on the ingredients or the quality of a resold item unless it is a significant change from what you yourself honestly expected - and you're not going to try and sell someone something that's obviously shoddy, like a dress hemmed with gaffer tape ("vintage clothing" my pasty-pale geek backside.) You are the person to whom the seller gave their money; and as such, they expect that you'll be providing them any support or answers they require, as well as taking the lead in fixing any egregious problem like contaminated products or shoddy goods. They won't be going to your supplier to get restitution, that's your responsibility. (If you're thinking that business, even reselling, is no place for sissies...you're right. It isn't. "I was just passing along the product I was sold" goes over about as well as "I was just following orders." Sometimes you may have to give refunds for contaminated products even if they went straight from the wholesaler to you with no changes - and then you go to your wholesaler and have them take responsibility for their part in the shenanigans. But take responsibility for the items you sell, and take care of your customers.)

Know your limits. It's better to underpromise and overdeliver, than the reverse. It's better to start out with a small but dedicated product line and expand it, than to start out selling a few of this, a handful of those, and a half-dozen types of these. Don't say that you sell sports cars and sedans if you've got ten items in your store and one of them is a Mustang...and the rest are 4-door family cars. It's also better to stop accepting new orders for a time if you get a huge glut of orders, if a shipment of supplies doesn't arrive and you can't make or package more of a given product, or if some event in your personal life demands your full attention. Sometimes, too, you just need to take a break for a week. Okay, do it. Close down the shop, post an estimated time when it will be open again, make sure to leave contact information. Whatever you do DO NOT BLAME YOUR BUSINESS PROBLEMS ON YOUR CHRONIC CONDITION, A FAMILY TRAGEDY, YOUR SICK CHILD, OR ANYTHING ELSE NOT DIRECTLY RELATED TO YOUR BUSINESS. I know that sometimes things pile up, and you just want to curl up and cry or rant and rail to sympathetic friends...but that is not the kind of information you share with your clients. You aren't their buddy, they aren't your support system, don't put that load on them even obliquely (another way of looking at it: do not put that weapon into their hand unless you are 100% sure that it will never ever be used to cause you any distress.) Find the middle ground between good communication and overcommunication. A message like this, updated and tweaked as needed, is excellent: "I need to attend to personal matters, so to avoid building up a huge backlog of orders, the shop will be closed to new orders until (estimated date). Orders placed by X date have shipped, and the rest are being processed. If you have any questions please email customerservice @ email.com." That gives people all the information they need without making too much detail into public knowledge, lets your customers know that the shop hasn't been abandoned, gives them a way to contact you with questions, and lets them know that their money hasn't simply disappeared.

So much of this comes down to "treat your customers as you'd want other sellers to treat you". Yes, I know there are a lot of companies and vendors who treat their customers shabbily or even outright poorly, and at times it may seem like if they can get away with it, you should be able to as well. But think: do you enjoy buying products from companies that treat you as an afterthought or an imposition? Even if they have a product or service that you can't get elsewhere, do you really look forward to giving companies your cash if you don't feel that they do much to earn it - or worse, if they act like they're doing you a huge favor? You don't have to treat every customer as if they were your best buddy or your number one top customer, but you can - and should - treat them with basic courtesy and respect.

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