How does a small business really advertise? In most cases by word of mouth. For instance, who would you go to on PEI to repair or renew a piece of fine furniture? Well I could tell you to go to Witold, but you would not even know to ask me. Witold would have to spend a fortune to advertise conventionally to get his name around. If he lived in Toronto with more demand, he might be able to afford this. But as he lives here, he has a probem as do all who run small businesses that are outside the conventional such as plumbing.
Weblogs change everything for reputation based small businesses. Here is Witold's blogg
See how you can get a sense of who he is and what he does? He intends to write regularly on the techniques of furniture maintenance so that you can go to his site for tips. His wife is an accomplished portrait painter. You can see her work.
Hugh has been a big supporter of his tailor friend, Thomas Mahon who just does not make a pitch but talks about his love of tailoring and what it means to him.
It is easy to see Weblogs will give small business as much power in word of mouth as a major corporation. It is not hard to imagine that small business like this will adopt much more quickly than the big business and take back a large part of the market as a result.
Jon writes more deeply than I on this topic in the context of his brother, a designer.
If you have read Christenson, it is clear that the revolution starts at the bottom. This, in my mind is the way. Let's get small business going!
