Navigating Perfectionism: How YouTube Artists and Small Businesses Can Thrive

If you are not following my Instagram (@candycapcrochet), then you may not be aware that we just launched a YouTube channel! Our first video, Crocheting Cinnamoroll, premiered yesterday... with some hiccups. Yes, surprising no one, my first venture into video editing did not go smoothly, and all the text I added to the video was missing. But that's to be expected, and hardly anything to panic over. So of course, I panicked.

Mistakes Are Human

I'm a perfectionist, to a fault. This video took me all of January and part of February to film, edit, and release, and I was so excited. I wanted this release to go off without a hitch, just a perfect roll out. That was not what happened, and I won't lie, I freaked out. But now that the video is reuploaded with my text all there and I have a bit of distance, I'm able to look back on this experience without panicking.

Mistakes are human. They happen, especially with a new medium. Expecting perfection is unrealistic, and it sets me up for failure. Normally, I'm fairly good at managing my expectations, which made me wonder, why was I so caught up on this? Why was this video release so important to me to get it right that I started crying over a lack of text?

I think the answer to those questions ties back to something I've been struggling with for a while now, as someone who sells their art. It's the idea that if you sell art, it must be up to the standard of mass-produced stuff. The idea that if you charge what your work is worth, it must be perfect, because it's so expensive. This standard of perfection regarding art is so damaging to me, and many other artists. We aren't machines, so why are we held to the standard of machines?

When I released this video, and it wasn't perfect, it scared me because it showed I was human. It was a weakness, that I didn't feel comfortable showing. Small business owners can't mess up, because we don't have the social, political, or financial standing to weather mistakes. Or at least, that was my thought process.

Small Businesses Aren't Perfect

Why do people shop from small businesses? We tend to be more expensive, as we don't mass produce using machines. If we sell art, then our products aren't going to be perfect. Again, we are only human. So why do we as a society value small businesses, and put pride in shopping from them?

We love small businesses because their owners are everyday people in our community. They aren't lofty billionaires exploiting their employees, they are people just trying to make a better life for themselves. So if the value of small businesses is that they are owned by people in our community, why then do we expect them to be flawless? When Amazon sends you the wrong thing, no one gets too upset. You just mail it back and get the right thing or a refund. It's free and easy.

But when a small business sends the wrong thing, we get angry reviews on our pages. We bend over backward to fix the mistake, but it doesn't seem to be enough. I've seen small businesses making dozens of posts to their socials trying to explain a delay due to health issues they are experiencing, manufacturer delays, or a small error on their website causing a problem. While some are understanding, others seem outraged, often due to the cost of items being so high they expect that things must be perfect. It's this idea of you get what you pay for.

When we buy cheap dolls from the Dollar Store, they can get loose strings or parts without facing repercussions, because we expect that. But if you spend $50 on a doll and it gets a loose end, regardless of how easy it is to fix, you'd probably be upset. It's why I have care cards I send with every purchase that explain what to do in that situation, to try and avoid backlash.

When I released the YouTube video, after hyping it up, only for it to have a problem, it felt like a doll with a loose yarn tail. It felt like people would hold it against me, as a sign I'm incompetent, that I'm liable to make mistakes, and if I make a mistake on a video upload, how could they trust I wouldn't make mistakes with more important stuff? How could I expect them to spend money on my dolls if I can't do something as basic as exporting a video properly?

Changing The Mindset for Youtube Artists and Small Businesses

If your favorite thing about shopping small and youtube artists is the human side, then expecting perfectionism is setting yourself up for disappointment. That's why I felt like I had failed. It's an oxymoron, to love the humanity behind each carefully created and packaged item, but hate the human errors. We need to change our mindsets when it comes to purchasing from small businesses, to allow for human mistakes. Maybe then we will see fewer creators posting responses and explanations for pricing their art at what it's worth. Maybe then, we won't panic over showing our weaknesses.

So now, after the video is properly released, even if it took nine days longer than I intended and a reupload, and still isn't the most perfect video ever released, how do I feel? Human. I feel human. I am not some effortlessly flawless, smiling individual selling my art. I'm a human being, who messes up, but who will always, always put everything into making those mistakes right. You won't get an apology from Bezos, but you will from me.

I'm sorry I messed up. I will likely mess up again. I'm human, and I can't compare myself to Amazon or mass-produced doll companies like American Girl Dolls. It's not a fair comparison. But I don't need to compare myself. I have something that those companies don't, that makes my products better and more meaningful.

I'm human. I'm a real person, spending hours on each item to make it as perfect and special as I can. Each order I get makes a difference in my life, and I remember every single one. Every like or click means the world to me. Every package I send is carefully prepared and full of personal touches. And those companies, those corporations that I am compared to? They are faceless, soulless exploiters.

We can do better than comparing small businesses to them.