How a Great Kids’ Site Made Me Rethink My Own Small Business

Posted on by Julie Lesage

I own a small local bookshop. I spend most of my time thinking about story time schedules, new inventory, and how to keep the lights on. Last Tuesday, I watched my niece for the afternoon. Tasked with keeping a six-year-old engaged, I did what any modern aunt would do: I looked for a good website. Not just any site, but one that was fun, safe, and wouldn’t have her bouncing off the walls in five minutes. That’s when I found a resource that surprised me. It did more than entertain her; it made me think about my own business in a whole new way.

The site is called parents choice. I expected simple games or cartoons. What I found was a thoughtfully curated hub. It sorted activities by age, by interest, by how much time you had. There were craft ideas you could do with stuff from the recycling bin, reviews of children’s books that weren’t just the bestsellers, and quiet puzzles for winding down. My niece was happily occupied making a paper dinosaur for an hour. I was left sitting there, staring at my laptop screen, having a minor epiphany about my bookstore.

Here was a website that understood its audience in two layers. The immediate user was the child, needing engagement. The ultimate customer was the parent, needing peace of mind, simplicity, and value. My business, I realized, was often only speaking to one layer: the adult buying the book. But what about the child reading it? Was my shop truly serving both? Watching my niece light up at a simple, well-explained idea, I started asking myself some hard questions. When was the last time I thought about the *experience* of the kid who comes into my store, beyond just the section where their parents shop?

The Three Lessons I Carried Back to My Shop

I didn’t just close the browser and go back to my spreadsheets. I took notes. The clarity and focus of that parenting site offered a mirror to my own haphazard way of doing things. My shop had heart, but it lacked a system for delivering its value clearly. Here are the specific shifts I’m implementing, stolen not from a business guru, but from a website designed for crayons and glue sticks.

  • Curation Beats Overwhelm: The site didn’t list every kids’ activity on the internet. It filtered. My shop has hundreds of wonderful books, but to a busy parent, that’s just a wall of spines. Now, I create small, handwritten shelf talkers with themes like “For the Robot-Obsessed 7-Year-Old” or “Read-Alouds That Make You Both Giggle.” It’s a filter. It tells a story within the story.
  • Simplicity is a Service: The best craft instructions on the site used maybe four steps and common materials. They removed friction. I was asking parents to navigate complex genre labels. So, I simplified. A section is now just “Great First Chapter Books.” Another is “Family Stories.” The fancy BISAC codes are still in the computer for ordering, but on the floor, we use human language.
  • Engage Your Co-Customer: This was my biggest insight. For a parent site, the child is the co-customer. For me, it’s reversed. So last Saturday, we had a “Junior Bookseller” hour. Kids could make a “Recommendation Card” for their favorite book to display on the shelf. Suddenly, children were leading their parents around, explaining *their* choices. The dynamic flipped. It was louder, messier, and far more alive.

Why This Thinking Works for Any Business

You might not sell anything to do with kids. Maybe you fix computers or design logos. But every business has layers to its audience. There is always an end-user and a decision-maker, even if they’re the same person at different times. A graphic designer’s client is the business owner (the decision-maker), but the work must function for that business’s customers (the end-user). Are you speaking to both?

The magic of adopting this dual-view mindset isn’t about pandering. It’s about clarity. It forces you to ask: what does my service *feel* like to use? What hidden friction can I sand away? What unspoken need can I anticipate? For that parenting site, the parent’s unspoken need is for an activity that works right now without a trip to the craft store. For my bookshop, it was helping a tired parent quickly find a book that will actually be read, not just bought and shelved.

Who is your hidden co-customer? Is it the employee who will use the software their boss buys from you? Is it the spouse who lives with the kitchen your company is remodeling? If you only talk to the person signing the check, you’re missing half the conversation. Find them. Make their experience part of your pitch. It changes everything.

So, take a look at your own operation. Where can you add a simple filter? Where can you cut a step? Most importantly, who else is in the room when your primary customer says yes? Answering that might be the most productive hour you spend this week.

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Julie Lesage
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