Last month, Nike began selling Internet of Things shoes that lace themselves (but apparently require software updates):
The $350 Adapt BB shoes wirelessly connect to a phone to tighten and loosen with an app…
And wouldn’t you know it, fresh out of the box, Nike’s “connected” shoes recommended a software update—which broke some.
A sneaker collector in Virginia, told the Washington Post that his expensive sneakers were suddenly no longer even useful as … wait for it….
Sneakers.
The software update via his phone corrupted the ‘lace engine’ so the sneaker couldn’t tighten—even with manual buttons. So much for Nike calling them “Smart Sneakers”.
And while that might be an embarrassing and expensive glitch for Nike, that incident reveals an even BIGGER lesson for you…
When something, ANYTHING, connects to the internet, you’re really not in control of it.
It probably exposes the vulnerability of a lot of people’s businesses who are reading this.
Earlier this week Facebook and Instagram had an outage for an entire day. If you do all your advertising, marketing or even just communicating on THEIR platform that cost you a lot of money (and time).
I can’t tell you how many “entrepreneurs” put all their eggs in the Facebook basket. What happens when it goes down all day like on Monday? Or when they throttle down your page views, suspend your account, shadow ban or even delete your account for reasons they don’t even have to disclose to you. I’ll tell you…
… you’re screwed.
And it’s your own fault because you didn’t diversify your portfolio so to speak. What do I mean?
Using Facebook or any other social media is fine. I’m not opposed to it. What I AM opposed to is letting someone else’s platform control YOUR business.
It’s why I put WAY more stock in building my business on solid ground, i.e. real estate I own… like my email list, website, membership site, podcast, and low tech things like live events, conferences and even a snail mail list. And I’d advise you to do the same. Sure, I post on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook but if they went away tomorrow or made me go away tomorrow, the train that is my business just keeps rollin’.
You know who understands and embraces this philosophy? The savvy members of my online community Yesterday’s Underdogs.
Why do they excel at this? Because it’s one of the many things I and my guest experts teach every month inside the community.
What’s on the agenda for April? A much deeper dive into everything you just read. And a lot more.
It’s not too late for you to climb on board but I’ll warn you. Once the doors close on March, the train leaves the station with or without you. All aboard…