I hate buffets. I hate them because they make me feel so ineffective. The problem is, I want to try everything but there is a physical limit to what I can eat without throwing up. Yet once I have made my choice and am making my way to an empty seat, I will start to wonder if I have made the best choices. Guess what happens after that; I begin to scan everybody else's plate.
This happens all the time to me, and it's not just buffet either. Take for example the internet: Free hosting versus paid hosting; choice of PERL, CGI Script or PHP; to give out products for free or not to give out for free and a hundred other choices to make for just one website? What do I do? Get a professional to do it for me; then again I don't want a lot of stuff on my site. Just text if possible. Still, it would be nice to get something like a comment form. However, I could just put in an email link into my articles which will allow me to automatically filter out spams.
We all want the best, even when it comes to decision. There is this idea that once a decision is made, then we are stuck with it for an indefinite period. For example, choose the less popular web hosting service, and you have failed. That is ridiculous, because this sense of failure is based on the assumption that the people behind the hosting service are stagnant, dead or are not interested in promoting themselves. Most of us forget that with the technological changes and competition out there, nothing is ever indefinite. Our situation never stays the same because time has a tendency to shift things around. You can only know what is best in retrospect, never by forecast.
Then why do we spend so much time choosing. If we actually look at the process we apply to come to our decision, then we will immediately see the madness behind the reason. Most of us rely on two things when we want to get a new product; information from the provider and recommendations from other users. This is largely base on trust. Actually commerce and trade relies heavily on trust. Yet we forget to ask, why do these people recommend the products. Is it because they really like them, or is it because they want to sell or promote them for a fee? On top of that is the "nice" culture most of us are brought up in. Remember what Thumper's mother said to him in Bambi, "If you have nothing nice to say, then say nothing at all." That means that a large majority of users who are not happy with the product will not rate it at all.
For that reason, the best way to decide is to study the technical stuff. Brochures are filled with Benefits and (hopefully) Features. The features are the technical stuff (100GB Email storage) and the Benefits are descriptions of how a feature can enhance your business or experience such as "Get more email space to support your growing business".
Sun Tzu says, "If you know your enemy, and you know yourself then you shall be victorious. " Firstly, check how you use emails. What are your habits? Do you clear your mail periodically? Do you deal mainly with texts or large data files? Do you keep all this information in the email server or do you download the stuff into your PC? Say you are trying to choose between an email service that provides 100GB storage and another that provides 50GB. The price for 50GB is a quarter of 100GB storage. Then if you know what your habits are, you will be less likely to pick the service that is wrong for you because an under 50GB user should look at the price, while an over 50GB user should consider the storage capacity. In other words, don't look outside for how to make your decisions, look at your own situation and know your own needs.
Good luck.
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