Wow, I haven't used this blog in a while! Somewhere a digital marketing strategist just got their wings! Honestly, there really hasn't been much to say outside of the social media posts that go out. We just had our 3rd Birthday back in August (Lucky 13th) and things are cruising along. I'm very happy with where we are at, expectations exceeded.
The weekly FOC grind is a real thing and after doing it for 3 years with no break I can safely say it will make or break you, if you don't get your shit together. That was directed at me, not you... of course. I had my "shit, or get off the pot" moment a month or so back when I was debating ending pre-orders on the site. Keeping up with constant release date changes was grinding me down. I was feeling massive burn out and my God's honest desire to do right by my customers was the only thing that kept me going.
So, like "The Mechanic" in Iron Man 3 (my personal favorite in the trilogy) I started to build something. For the past couple weeks, in-between fulfilling orders, inventory intake, seeing my family, going to my other job, meals... I've been doing a massive overhaul on the original software that I wrote for Mutation. I won't dare bore you with a single detail, but I am improving our processes in ways I had only hoped in the beginning.
I'm able to keep our products synced with the latest catalog files from our distributors in a much more efficient manner and we can send out email notifications to customers whose orders were impacted by date changes. This may sound like "well duh" kind of stuff, but I assure you it doesn't come "off the shelf" unless you pay a big fee to someone else's system, or you build it yourself. So, it appears I, uh Blue myself, as it were.
Look for more changes coming soon to the Web site in general. I'm working on a complete overhaul to a more modern framework, while retaining the same look and feel as what we have - with some improvements too of course.
Our Medford Mill location continues to grow as more Pull List customers come on board and new issues are flying off our shelves every week. I'm putting a lot of work into importing and analyzing the sales data from there, combined with how we're doing online to make sure we're ordering enough to meet our current need and still have plenty for new customers at both. I'm excited about how all this stuff is shaping up on the back end and no, I won't be repeating the joke again.
I'm off to New York Comic Con's Retailer Day and Professional Thursday in a couple of weeks. I had to miss it last year and was only able to attend on the Sunday. It was too crowded and I am excited to go back for the early show. The stuff they put on for retailers is really good too, I'm looking forward to it.
Anyway, Spooky Season is officially underway. I hope you enjoy it, if that's your thing. It's definitely mine! Thanks for your business, support and reading the ramblings of this old fool.
