Today Ashley and I chatted all about using customer feedback in product design, but this episode is so relevant to people in the service-based industry as well.

Ashley and I actually met in person at a VIP Intensive back in February of 2017, so I was so excited to bring her on the show to talk about how she grew her company and how she uses customer feedback to help her design better products while still maintaining the vision she has for her business.

Ashley Staum is owner of She Plans, a little planner company that sells planners, notebooks and printable planners. She is a self-taught designer with a degree in Marketing and an MBA from Virginia Tech. Her products are created with simplicity in mind, in both design and functionality, to allow you to create the space to let life happen - because life doesn't happen on the page. As the daughter of a Navy man, Ashley lived in six homes as a child and is on her sixth home since getting married in 2004. She currently lives just north of Houston, Texas along with her husband and four young girls. 

Topics Discussed:

• How Ashley got started designing planners for herself and turned it into a business
• Why she still creates printables along with her line of bound planners
• Her transition from Etsy to having her own brand
• Why Ashley loves getting customer feedback and how it’s improved her business
• The four ways she receives feedback and how she uses it to make changes in her business
• How Ashley avoids the temptation to stray for her signature style
• Why she thinks of her customers as part of her business
• Why sometimes less is more in product design
• Why she doesn’t feel like other planner companies are competition
• How starting small and not looking at the competition is beneficial
• Her upcoming Fall launch

Connect with Ashley:

• Website
• Etsy
• Instagram