If A Tree Falls On Your House, Does Anybody Hear It?

May 14th, 2010

Two nights ago at about 4:15 in the morning, I was awoken by a loud thump and shaking house.  It was almost like the house was getting hit repeatedly by thunder.

Turns out, it practically was.

We have a giant cotton wood tree in the front yard, and it had been snowing a famous Colorado spring snow all night long.

Sure enough, a branch that was bigger than most standalone trees had fallen on the roof and then slid off into the front yard.  It barely missed our two cars.

Once everything had calmed down and I realized that no major damage had been done, I went back to bed to deal with the branches in the daylight.

Lucky for us, our house was built in the 60s – and whoever built this thing definitely knew what they were doing.  It’s a really solid, well built structure.

I haven’t had a chance to fully inspect for damage, but from the looks of it, if there is any it’s going to be minimal.

The timing on this has been pretty coincidental.

Just a few days before this happened I got a phone call from one of my customers who runs a very popular, high profile website.  We’re talking the type of website where he’s pulling in more traffic and more sales than most people make in 10 years.

He called me up and said “check out my blog…something just doesn’t look right”.  And sure enough, his blog had been hacked.

Just like when the tree came crashing down on the house the other night, it was time to spring into action.  Turns out that there have been a rash of hacked blogs recently, and his made the hit list.

So I dropped what I was doing and made sure to get him back up and running within a few hours.

The thing was – even though something challenging happened, his website was built on a solid foundation.  So when something bad happens, which it inevitably does from time to time, it’s a lot easier to fix when you have the right pieces in place already.

Just like the well built house.  Minimal damage, problem fixed in just a few hours.

Having the right relationship is key when you’re dealing with something as important as your primary channel to the world.

Here’s one guy who is really doing it right.

Until next time,

-Wally

P.S. – I’ve been working on a really exciting program the last few weeks that I’m going to tell you about soon.  If you’ve ever wanted to build your own website from scratch, you’re going to love it.

P.P.S. – Here are a bunch of folks who are doing it right.


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