22/04/2024
Never be this person.
Running a small business is hard work. There are no paid sick days. No paid holidays. There’s little job security. If it rains and you can’t run classes for a week, that’s a week’s groceries you can’t afford.
We don’t get paid for the hours of travel, we don’t get our fuel subsidized. We have to pay venue hire, even if nobody turns up. We go home after a long day at work and instead of switching off, it’s time to do admin, advertising and lesson prep for the next day into the early hours. It quite literally is non-stop.
If somebody who is running their own small business doesn’t answer an email, there’s probably a reason. Maybe they’re totally snowed under. Maybe they’re sick. Maybe they (god forbid) have taken a bit of time off to relax. Maybe they didn’t see it. Maybe it went into the junk box. Maybe they accidentally overlooked it. Maybe, and with my lack of object permanence I do this a lot, they fully formulated a response and forgot to press send.
A one star review, for a small business, is the difference between a 5 star reputation and a 4.8 star reputation. What justifies a one star review? If I took your money and never showed up. If I did a really shoddy job and made your dog worse. If I was rude or unprofessional. If I promised something and put no effort in to deliver. One star is the lowest review you can give. Receiving this review from somebody I’ve never met is appalling.
Because to them, it’s faceless. It’s ’this will show her for ignoring my email!’ For a small business owner, it might be the difference between getting more work or being overlooked. It’s reputation. Because if someone is willing to give the lowest possible review, surely that must be justified?
Realistically, I would never want to work with someone like this, who is willing to drag a business through the mud at the slightest inconvenience. I’ve saved myself the stress of likely working with someone rude and entitled, probably somebody unwilling to wait for results and instead wants a quick fix- something that just doesn’t work in my business. And if this person needed instant responses, it’s probably a good thing we didn’t work together anyway, because I can’t possibly deliver on that.
This was 11 months ago. It’s fine. But next time you’re considering leaving a one star review, just put yourself in their shoes. Have a bit of compassion. Do you really want to attack a business that, in this current climate, is probably just trying to stay afloat? Do you want to potentially destroy the reputation of someone you’ve never actually met? What good can come from leaving this review, because I promise all it will do is ensure I send any subsequent emails from them straight into the deleted folder.
Just try to be the kindest version of yourself. Something minor like this, which they probably forgot they did a few days later, can leave a lasting impact on others.
