I’d like to proudly announce that Snip trial-signer-uppers now get a welcome email when they sign up! That took forever.

I believe I implemented that feature on Monday. Since then I’ve added two more lifecycle emails: one to encourage you to add some appointments and another to encourage you to add some stylists.

A sufficient level of lifecycle emails was one of my two prerequisites for pointing an AdWords campaign at the site. My plan as of the last time I posted it was:

1. Move trial sign-up form to home page
2. Set up autoresponders throughout 30-day trial
3. Redesign website
4. AdWords
5. Get as prominent as possible on Capterra (Capterra is the #1 result when you search for “salon software” or “hair salon software”)

I now think it makes more sense to combine steps 1 and 3, so the plan is now this:

1. Set up autoresponders throughout 30-day trial
2. Redesign website
3. AdWords
4. Get as prominent as possible on Capterra (Capterra is the #1 result when you search for “salon software” or “hair salon software”)

And now that I have a few lifecycle emails ready to go, I’m ready to call #1 good enough to start the campaign. So that would make the plan:

1. Redesign website
2. AdWords
3. Get as prominent as possible on Capterra (Capterra is the #1 result when you search for “salon software” or “hair salon software”)

But before I can do the website redesign I have to wait to receive a certain large payment I’m waiting for. So I’ll work on the lifecycle emails until then.

I also got a message last night from one of my customers that some of her clients aren’t receiving their text reminders. I checked my logs and didn’t see anything unusual, so I’m a little frustrated that the customer sees a bug but I can’t see it. This isn’t the first time customers have complained about texts not being delivered. I don’t know if the issue is a real one or just a perceived one, but either way I think I probably need to create a text log the customers can see themselves for peace of mind. I’m frustrated that that is becoming a necessity because I don’t fucking want to work on the product right now! It’s already taking me long enough to get the website ready for an AdWords campaign. I guess maybe I can just get to a good stopping point with the lifecycle emails, then work on the text stuff while I’m waiting for the money for the website.

I’ve been thinking that in general it would probably be good to have a system for allocating for product work vs. marketing work. Both areas are in always in dire need of attention and I always feel guilty for not working on one when I’m working on the other. Maybe I do every other week or every other month or something like that.

I’m frankly getting really sick of trying to make Snip work for so long and having not much success. Is it possible I just wasn’t born with whatever it takes to be successful at this kind of thing?

I also haven’t gotten any Olark chats in forever, which is like what the fuck? I used to get about one a week and I’ve gotten like two in 2015 so far, period. What the fuck changed?? It’s not broken. I keep checking. My traffic hasn’t gone down. Nothing has fucking changed. Success is a mystery to me and I’m fucking pissed about it.

But anyway, I haven’t yet run out of things to try. I can’t give up before I have lifecycle emails in place, because it’s retarded not to. It’s also retarded to have a shitty website, so I can’t give up before I have a not-shitty website. I’ve always said that I won’t give up until I’ve run out of things to try, and I have plenty more to try. I expect to eventually be successful rather than to have to give up. But at this particular moment in time I’m pretty fucking frustrated.