[The following post is reprinted with permission by Fashion Mash. You can read the original post here]
“Fashion Mash Launches Clunky Outfit-Sharing Site”
What do you do when a review is not as awesome as you hoped it would be?
Here’s what I did:
1. I took a deep breath. The manic-style of John Reese (of BlogRush), came to mind. PR is not something you can control, but how you react is under your control.
2. I read the review again & made a list to separate out the constructive criticisms from any misunderstandings.
3. Looking at the feedback, I thought, “How can I learn from this?” This person went to the effort to look at my site and took the time to write about it. I immediately thanked them for their time and I added the valid critiques to our Fashion Mash to do list.
4. Is there anything I can do about the misinformation or misunderstandings? Not directly. They allowed comments on the review, so I put in my two cents. And I started asking myself, “Is there a way to prevent this next time?”
5. That turned into a re-examination of my pitch/cold-call/interaction to see what can be improved to better explain Fashion Mash. Unfortunately, this is just part of learning the pitch process and only practice with good mentors is going to help with this.
6. I looked at the positives. Yes, negative PR does have positives. I learned stuff about pitching and about things we need to change at Fashion Mash. I still got a LOT of traffic to my site. And I can apply my new lessons to the other review and PR fish in the sea.
7. Now its time to figure out how to let go. After thinking about all that, I was still worked up. Excited about traffic and sad about the review. So I called a friend and wrote about it in my blog.
About Fashion Mash
At Fashion Mash, you can upload pictures of your own clothing, arrange them into outfits and get feedback from your friends. It is a great way to organize your wardrobe & discover new combinations.
In addition to clothing images, graphics can be uploaded to use as backdrops or to decorate your outfits. You can comment on each other’s outfits and even experiment with other users’ clothing, backdrops or decorative elements. Outfit images can be shared on blogs or other websites for even more feedback.
The site is currently in beta-testing and the web team is actively seeking community input on the sites features.
Future plans include implementing a designer level account where indie designers can feature outfits and links to their online store. A
facebook application is also under development.
