Big Ideas for Little Companies:

So I attended Pandora’s Berkeley Meetup last week and left more impressed than I already had been. I am not new to Pandora. My friend Lucia works there and I moderated a panel at last year’s SXSW featuring Pandora founder Tim Westergren (video here). But as I become increasingly interested in business (inspired by other writer entrepeneurs like Steven Johnson, Elizabeth Spiers and Douglass Rushkoff), I’m studying up on how to run a small business that serves your pocket, your employees and your values.

For the following reasons, I think Pandora is doing this beautifully. I’m calling it 5 Big Ideas for Little Companies.

1. Big Goals: Doesn’t matter if your business is music, bauxite mining or sharable spreedsheets. You must talk about with a passion that speaks to the ordinary schmo. What gets you out of bed every morning? I promise you the answer is not “to improve workflow and datamining in medium sized enterprises in the consumer creation space.” Or if it is, don’t say it that way. How about that same message phrased that “We help people do their jobs easier, more efficiency, make more money so they can spend more quality time with their friends and family?” That conveys passion. I as the user can’t be passionate about what you’re doing unless I can tell you are.

2. Plain English: Pandora, I’m sure, has an algorithm under the hood that could power a space station. Nobody cares. Or the ones who do are not 99% of your customers. So when talking to customers, skip any phrasing or terminology that would make your mother shrug. Confusion not only breeds apathy but the image your business is only for people in the know. Which is only fine if you are running Bungalow 8 and buying drinks for Paris Hilton.

Tim and Co. get this. I left understanding implicitly how Pandora works and why. Better yet, I was even more excited messing around with it again.

A clear message engages users. A jargon-filled mess sends them away.

3. Big Windows: Unless you’re handing contracts for the Department of Defense, no one does business behind closed doors anymore. The Internet lets people monitor your every move and there are way way more of them than there are of you. Not engaging in conversation with them means at best, you are passing up a giant publicity opportunity and at worst, asking your users to regard you with suspicion and distrust.

But wait, I can’t just give away the store, right? Of course not. Be clear about what you can tell your customers and what you can’t. Pandora says outright that they can’t disclose the attributes they rate songs by just yet. Fine. That’s called being honest with your customers. It’s a lot easier to do that when you’re working off a cultural of respect and openess. By saying “not just yet” Pandora is saying “trust us.” They can do that because they’ve earned it by being straight with the people who support them.

4. Big Commitments: Pandora responds to every customer email within 48 hours. No exceptions. They knew they were building a consumer application, a new way of listening to music which is something very personal and subjective. They knew without consumer trust, they were sunk.

What is your company about? Who is it for? By going into business, you are entering into a very long relationship with a group of people you may never meet but will know you as well as your lover does. The level of you commitment to that relationship must be part of everything your company does, in both word and deed. Saying “our customers are our best resource” and then screwing them out of a rebate, keeping them on hold for 45 minutes, implanting false data on their harddrive or charging a load of money for a so-so product is the same as lying. And who wants to be in bed with a liar?

5. Big Possibilities: I left the Pandora meetup with not only renewed appreciation for Pandora itself but for music. This is what a great company does. It inspires you beyond itself. And it speaks to you as if you are worth inspiring.

• Category: Our Web, Ourselves.