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I came from a family of seamstress and for us to have a fascination for silk fabric is not surprising at all, my oldest sister loves silk fabric, but I believed she is more familiar with the Thai silk than the Lao silk, I think Lao textiles are no less beautiful than the Thai textiles.
I recently learned about a company that manufactured Lao textiles through the Today Show called Ock Pop Tok, means East meets West. From their website, Lao textiles are still used in many aspects of daily life from ceremonies to the household such as,
- Pha Bieng Scarf for the upper body (used by Buddhists)
- Pha Hom Blanket
- Pha Sabai Healing cloth
- Sihn Skirts
- Pha Phok Long Funeral cloth
- Pha Kaan Head cloth
- Pha Phii Mon Shaman Cloth
- Pha Mong Mosquito net decoration
- Pha Khan Mon A love gift handkerchief
- Pha Tung Prayer Flag
What I find fascinating is their ‘Silkworms & Natural Dyes Workshop, Dye your own Scarf,’ this is on my to-do list if I’m ever in that area and if time permits. Below is the agenda for the workshop, and I found photos by annamatic3000, Anna Lee who took the class during her visit to Laos,
Spend the afternoon in a stunning Mekong riverside garden. Prepare natural dyes and dye your own silk scarf. The workshop looks at silkworms, natural dyes and weaving techniques. The afternoon’s programme is interactive and full of fascinating information; a unique and entertaining opportunity to learn about silk dyeing & weaving.
Meet the silkworms. First there is an explanation about the worms’ lives; where they come from, who makes silk in Laos and a bizarre list of facts regarding sericulture. Guests are invited to prepare mulberry leaves and feed the worms.
Below are the mulberry trees on a misty morning Vangviang Organic Farm, Laos. The mulberry trees provide leaves to feed to the silk worms, plus mulberry tea, mulberry wine, and mulberry shakes.
Dye your own scarf with a natural dye. After a brief introduction to the natural dyes, guests are invited to prepare a dye source. Indigo – green, turmeric – yellow, sappan – pink or purple, lemongrass – light yellow, annatto – monk robe orange, indigo paste – blue. After preparing the dye source white scarves are dyed in the chosen colours.
Below are Turmeric (yellow), Annatto seeds (monk robe orange), Indigo leaves (blue green), and Sappan wood (purple)
This is continuing from my previous post on Considerations for Internet, “E-Business,” Building Customer Relations. Putting a business on the internet can be relatively easy. The hard part, as the history of the Internet has shown, is making money.
To run a financial viable e-business, you not only have to attract a sufficient number of visitors to your website, but then you have to find a way to convert those visitors into buyers, or earn income from them in some other way. And you have to attract and convert them in a manner and a timeframe that allows you to stay in business and make a profit.
As with any business, you’ll need a marketing plan for your Internet-based company. The marketing plan should outline the steps you’ll take to let potential customers know about you. But while a land-based business may only compete with other stores in its neighborhood, on the Internet, it competes with the entire world.
Companies that serve a niche market or provide unique or hard to find products often have greater success than more general e-businesses, with lower marketing costs. In effect, they’ve limited their online world to a small “neighborhood.”
When we developing the marketing plan for your Internet-based business, there are marketing vehicles to consider such as, Search Engines, most people use search engines to locate websites of interest. Search engines such as Google work by using software to “crawl” through millions of sites, looking for certain words, phrases, links, and other indicators of what users can find on a site. Trying to improve your search engine ranking can easily be a full-time job, the important thing to remember is that search engines rank sites based on searches through a site’s web page. So, by doing a few simple things you can improve your rankings.
I came across some good information for those interested in setting up or starting an “e-business,” one that primarily exists and operates on the internet, source, The Successful Business Plan Secretes & strategies by Rhonda Abrams, Fourth Edition.
If yours is a business that exists solely or primarily on the Internet, you have a unique challenge: how do you create a bond with your customers when they do not interact with you in any physical way? There is no human salesperson, no physical building, no voice on the phone. How do you create a welcoming environment for your customers when there is no environment? Moreover, in a situation where relatively little can be discerned about you by the customer, they can’t see your offices, your store, your employees, building a relationship of trust is even more important than in the ‘real’ world.
Of course there are ways to achieve this, and some of the factors that enhance the quality of the user’s experience and increase their trust in you, and therefore, their willingness to do business with you can be achieved by,
Brand name/Strategic Partners. Customers still seek name brands; it gives them confidence in the quality and consistency of the company’s products, services, and reliability. If your company already has a brand name “off-line,” you want to leverage that name to your Internet presence. If you have not yet developed a brand name, you can attempt to become a brand name on the Internet (which takes a great deal of money, as well as time and luck), or you can enter into an alliance with another company or companies with recognizable brand names as a means of increasing a customer’s confidence in you.
Quality of the site. Just as a customer judges a retail store by the location, décor, furnishings, etc., a visitor to an Internet site determines how they feel about you by the quality of their experience. Are the graphics pleasing, the site well designed, and easy –to-use? Does the technology work? Is the content clear, interesting, and well written?
Quality of order fulfillment and customer service. Perhaps the most important factor of all in building customer trust is whether their orders are processed correctly, in a timely fashion, and that complaints or problems are handled well. Since receiving an order may be the customer’s only physical contact with the company, one bad experience may end a relationship with a customer forever.
I think personal satisfaction is the key motivator for most people, whether in blogging or running a successful business. I think some blogs or businesses fail, and others flounder because the persons in charge are uncertain as to what they really want to achieve and somehow it is not satisfying their personal needs and ambitions. It might sound funny when I use the terms blog and business together here, might be that I view a blog as a small business.
I believe that a successful blogger would make a successful entrepreneur, a good blog should have a good concept, offer something new and better to readers, should be readily for change and growth, and ultimately, it’s a responsibility as far as contents in ways that satisfy personal needs and ambitions of a blogger. Therefore it is useful to evaluate and consider your personal goals when deciding upon the theme of your blog, which direction you are going and ultimately it should satisfy you as an individual, if not, then its pointless to continue in what you’re doing, a waste of time in my opinion.
As for business, personal satisfaction might deviate a bit from running a successful blog but not by much; just like a blog, it’s also useful to evaluate and consider your personal goals when deciding upon the nature of your business development. For most entrepreneurs, the Four C’s can sum up these goals, which are control, challenge, creativity, and cash.
As I was reading some of the blogs that I came across, I notice that I’ve been turned off by some of the terms that were used, it came off as if the author is being too arrogant, as if his/her sh*t doesn’t stink, all s/he’d post about is how wonderful and smart s/he is, sort of the impression of Miss Universe beauty pageant (not referring to you K), as for me I figured this out when I was 4 years old, might have been younger and I can’t remember, but I think some are still clueless as adults.
Most people don’t have time to read, if that’s the impression that you’re giving off, then most likely people won’t read and might not ever visit your blog again, I often blog hopping and if I find one that I really like, then I’ll add it to my favorites, but otherwise, I’ll just hopping along.
This is also true in the language that you use for business, whether it’s on your resume, company website, or even a casual business conversation. I’m very skeptical of anyone that is over-reaching self-promotion, and when they use the words such as “best, terrific, wonderful,” I think they reduce their credibility, but what they should be using are factual descriptions and specific information to make positive impressions. The language that you use can give the impression that you’re thoughtful, knowledgeable, and prudent, or, conversely, it can make you seem naïve and inexperienced.
I think being upfront and straightforward, even understated tone can be helpful, and let the information you convey speaks for itself. It’s important that you don’t try to pass as someone else, I recently received a business proposal for me to write a review for a web site and the person claimed that he’s in charged of the online marketing for that company, little did he know that the world is a lot smaller and references can be checked, even if we’re living in different part of the world. This is the type of people that most blogger need to be aware, but if he had been upfront with me and said that he needed help because he wanted to get their account, then I’d have wrote the review for him, no questions asked, and not even checking his references.
Do you find yourself developing a business plan because someone else wants you to do so? Perhaps the bank is requiring it before giving you a loan, or an investor or venture capitalist needs one to decide whether to finance your business, maybe your attorney or accountant said you must have one, or your company president requires a strategic plan for your new division.
I guess these are good reasons enough, but entrepreneurs are self-motivated people, used to setting their own goals and determining their own tasks. They undertake endeavors not merely to please others, but because they understand the importance of an activity in reaching their overall objectives, but creating a business plan only as a response to someone’s request makes the process seem like a burden instead of an opportunity.
Meeting needs is the basis of all business. You can create a wonderful new machine, but if it doesn’t address some real and important need or desire people won’t buy it, and your business will fail. Even Thomas Edison recognized this fact when he said, “Anything that won’t sell, I don’t want to invent.”
Typically, entrepreneurs get their original business inspiration from one of four sources, such as previous work experience; education or training; hobbies, talents, or other personal interests; or recognition of an unanswered need or market opportunity. Occasionally the motivation comes from the business experience of a relative or friends.
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