Becoming an Expert

I read a little article in a horse paper about running a horse related business. It gave a few tips to be successful amongst your competitors. Though it wasn’t about horseshoeing, business is business. One thing the article touched on was developing a field of expertise, like instead of just selling horses, sell quarter horses, and then not just quarter horses, but ranch raised, or yearlings that have been well started on their ground manners, etc. Something where you will stand out and offer a unique type of sale to your customers.
So I have been contemplating how this concept could be applied to my farrier practice. There are many diverse areas in this profession in which you could become an expert. Like doing just Draft horses, or gaited horses, or Reining or Dressage horses. And maybe when I was just starting out I should have centered on one discipline or breed, but I’ve had fun doing the whole gamut: Dude strings, Yellowstone Stagecoach pulling horses, barrel racers, Arabians, Paso Finos, Warmbloods, cutting horses, endurance horses, foals, navicular, laminitic, etc You get the picture. I suppose I feel I have a good handle on how to help horses with laminitis, cracked walls, and horses in the western disciplines. But to say I am an expert…well I doubt it.
I think I will keep striving to be an expert in customer relations and in providing a service second to none. And learn to be an expert in applying what I know for the well-being of the horse and learning what I don’t know that would be relevant to a particular case.
Though I fully understand and agree with what the author of the article was saying, I just need to figure out how I can apply the advise to where I’m at in my business. For now I will keep with the above goal and see how things pan out and if I should center on one aspect in the near future. But then again, often times the so-called Experts in other lines of work (weather forecasters, financial advisors, earthquakes predictors, etc) can be wrong!

Anniversary Blog

It’s been one year since I started this blog. It has been a good place to document my thoughts, stories, and theories enveloping my wonderful trade and life of horseshoeing. I really didn’t know if people interested in the farrier trade would or could easily “find” my blog and I am thinking all these entries just are out in cyberspace tangent to nothing, but my own fancy. But ya never know until ya try.