Marketing yourself is, in my opinion, one of the hardest parts of having a business. Especially when your business is not a brick and mortar storefront. You learn, over time, to embrace opportunities that may come by involvement with organizations and most importantly by the networking available through entrepreneurs you meet. It surprises me, sometimes, to learn that others have the same hang up about promoting what they do. We are all capable, professionals who support each other, and in doing so, we market the heck out of each other whenever we get the chance.
What a place to work! I don’t get to come to this office often, but when I do, it is always memorable. It's a place where writing doesn't necessarily become the priority it should. The desk is not conventional. Some mornings there are distractions. Some mornings just sitting listening, smelling, smiling is all that gets done. Some mornings I write pages and pages. One thing is for certain, I never get tired of working here. It's the kind of office environment I thrive in.
Where is your favourite office?
Almost everyone has a Pinterest account. It’s a place you’ve set up to gather all the things you like, dream about and are interested in. Personal use of Pinterest is staggering. Believe it or not this trendy, sometime bling catcher and recipe hoarder is the perfect social media platform to promote a business. Let’s assume, for this exercise, you already have six or more boards set up in your account. How many of those boards actually pertain, in some way, to the business or product you are trying to promote? Weather you choose three or four, one, or all six is a topic I will discuss in a future post. The idea of using Pinterest to market your business may come as a surprise. Your account doesn't have to have a business name, although having a board named after your company is acceptable and not a bad idea. I will use my Pinterest account as an example. I have forty-one boards. Of those, I can confidently say seven reflect on my business which includes being a published author/writer and photographer. The next three or four are related to these topics; however, their use has now been relegated for gathering research material. That leaves the rest as boards that have been set up because . . . Why? Personal interests, I suppose, along with the fact that I like to have information in a manageable file like environment. All of my boards, at one time, I thought to be important. That was until I discovered I could make my personal account into a Pinterest’s Business Account by following their conversion steps. This is a free option, and comes with some good perks, takes a few minutes to do and worth looking into if you have any kind of business, home based or brick and mortar. The best part, you can use your existing account. There is no need to open a business specific account unless you choose to do so. Through this sign up, I now receive a suggested selection of possible pins. These come by email and are based on the relevancy of topics I pin the most (with a few more thrown in for enticement). These suggestions have quickly shown me the majority of my boards are just there to catch fleeting whims of personal taste and could/should be amalgamated, switched to a private setting or discarded. The thing to remember is you don’t need to spend hours scrolling through the masses of pins to find something, anything, that tweaks your interest or has any baring on your business. Your preferences can be handed to you in an email a few times a week, thus improving time management to do other projects of importance. You don’t need 1000’s and 1000’s of pins to be noticed. You do need to be consistent. Pinning material that showcases you, your product, your business AND, re-pinning pins from other like minded people. Slowly, at first, you will see the number of followers, re-pins and likes increase. As the numbers grow, so does the exposure of your business. Increasing Traffic to your business boards in Pinterest is one of the many topics I will share with you in future posts about Pinterest and Business. Ann Edall-Robson Author, Photographer, Lover of Life If you have found this information helpful or would like to learn more about Pinterest for Business, please let me know.
Interpretation ~ Allowing the creative mind to see and record a vision prompted by written and artistic works. Each telling their own story by way of words and various mediums. Since May 2016, twenty-four people have been part of the inaugural Airdrie Voice and Vision 2016 project. Twelve writers. Twelve artists. Paired randomly to interpret each other’s work. Each creating an additional set of artistic and written impressions. The deadline for completion, Sept 1, yet it was three weeks later that all involved could come together to view and share. An exciting evening for everyone! The volunteers who worked hours to co-ordinate and keep everyone informed also presented the icing for the cake - a mock up Voice and Vision book that will be published. Taking the arts to yet another level. Showcasing interactive pieces from all who participated in the project. This is only the beginning of the end of this journey. On Oct 1, artist and writers will come together for an evening of the arts at the Airdrie Public Library. The months of creating interpretations will be on display. The artisans will be available to discuss their work. After this first public display of Voice and Vision, framed prints and corresponding writings will be on display around the city at various venues yet to be determined. My vision partner for the 2016 Voice and Vision project is Carrie Leigh. Her original piece was un-named and I chose to call it Deer in the Woods. My interpretation of her work is called, Do You See Me?
Ann Edall-Robson Author of Moon Rising: An Eclectic Collection of Works Join Carrie and I on October 1/16 at the Airdrie Public Library (7 pm - 9 pm) for an evening of the arts. Listen to the stories and see the artwork that inspired them. The Voice and Vision 2016 committee has announced that copies of the published book can be ordered at this event. If anyone is interested in purchasing a copy of this collection of arts, please contact me. Ann Edall-Robson
Author, Photographer, Lover of Life
Choosing a platform for your blog or website can be a daunting exercise. There are so many out there to pick from.
It has been over twenty years since social media has become a part of my life. With guidance from a cousin, I learned to write basic html code while she helped me build my first website. Moving on with a vision, of something more than my ability was capable of, we out sourced to build what we call our mother ship site. It was soon into this relationship that we realized we had made a mistake. We were given the ability to change out text and some pictures, but we had no control over the overall look. Each time we needed to add a page or make a change to the presentation of the site, we required their expertise. Why? Because they had written the guts of the program in various forms of coding along with some trial and error of their own. The final straw came when they decided to close up shop. Giving us control over a site that still only gives us access to minimal changes and a definite need to either find someone to decipher their code or re-do the site in its entirety. In my research, I had stumbled across Weebly. It was one of the platforms endorsed by our web host and it looked to be fairly easy to navigate. It was on my radar for upgrades to our websites when the use of the program came to me through another project I was working on. Perhaps our experience will help others to decide a website or blog program.
We have decided to share our Weebly experience with you through a series of blogs over the next few months and beyond using question and answers.
Q. Why did you choose Weebly for your AnnEdallRobson.com website platform?
A. I didn’t. Using the Basic level, it was built for me as part of my publishing package for Moon Rising. The publisher asked me questions about what pages I would like and made suggestions. They did the rest and then turned its complete control over to me. Q. What did you think of the result of the website the publisher had built for you? A. Truthfully, I didn’t like the look at all. But knew I was going to be able to make changes once I got comfortable with the program. Q. Did you find it easy to use? A. Yes. It’s a drag and drop system. Put in what you need/want. Take out what you don’t. Q. Did it do everything you wanted it to? A. That depends on what you mean by everything. There are several levels of the program. Basic is just that, basic. No access to adding videos, audio or store. If these are not important to you, then the Basic is the way to go. Q. Was Weebly easy to learn? A. I think it is. The Basic level is a good opportunity to cut your teeth on website or blog building. Q. Are you still using the Basic level? A. No. I now use the Business level. Q. Why did you change from the Basic to the Business level? A. The Basic level had given me a good training ground for the Weebly program, but I needed to expand on the vision for the website and the Business level was the next choice to fulfill that vision. Q. Would you recommend Weebly to others looking to start a Blog, Website, Business? A. Absolutely! It has all the capabilities needed to sell your product, blog about the things that are important to you and build your dream.
If you have questions about Weebly you would like us to address, please send them to us. We'll do what we can to find your answers or share our experience.
Pricing and information on Weebly.
Whenever I hear mention of a social media Tweet, the song Rockin’ Robin comes to mind. If you are of the generation that recognizes the word play between the two, you probably now have the lyrics bopping around in your head. Modern day Tweets are the things you write on Twitter. Sharing with all who follow you and who have found you through those followers and use of #Hashtags. Getting to know Twitter so it works to your benefit is quite easy. You have up to 140 characters/spaces to get your point across. Become creative in wording can pay off. For example the sentence, Start with steps 1, 2 and 3. Condensed to Strt w/steps123. Offers up more character usage in the overall content of the Tweet. There is an etiquette to follow. One of my favourite lists of so called rules comes from Author/Blogger, Molly Green talking about Tweets You Should Never Send. Yet, some of these Tweets come from the fact that you were raised with manners, and thanking someone is a natural thing for you to do. Get over being overly polite. It’s just not appreciated by the vast majority of the Social Media world. Save it for your emails and private messages to friends. So now you know how many characters you can use. You have read up on the Tweets to never send, and it’s time to review the #Hashtag. How many hashtags (words) should you use? Since Hashtags are incorporated more and more in every social media platform, I found this article by Leanne O’Sullivan to be useful for Twitter as well as those who use Instagram. Her post outlines some of the basic protocol use of #Hashtags: The rule of thumb is generally no more than five. They should not be long-winded or a complete sentence. They should not make up the whole descriptive monologue (one hashtag word, after another hashtag word, after another). Most importantly, they should be relevant to the topic of the Tweet. You don’t want too many #Hashtag words cluttering the view. Making them all the reader sees. The message you are trying to convey is quickly lost and the reader moves on to other Tweets without paying any attention to you. Soon, they gloss over your Tweets and eventually, they either don’t bother at all with what you are Tweeting &/or they quit following you. In summary: 1. Utilize characters/spaces to your advantage; 2. Don’t send out tweets that are not appreciated; And 3. Be smart about your #Hashtag use. What do you think about using Tweets to promote your business?
Owning your own business. Buying a home. Finding Mr. or Mrs. Right. Winning a coveted prize. Our mind gives us the drive to succeed. There’s nothing wrong with that, but letting it take over your every thought leaves no room for anything else.
There is a gift on the other side of your valley. A place to open the gate. To lay back in the grass and watch the clouds float by. Picking out shapes and ideas. Letting your mind follow them out of site. Push some reality out of the way. Look out across the wide stance of land for your dream visions. Relax. Enjoy. Let the dreams race with you to the gate. Leave them there for another day. Push them through the opening to run free. Waiting for you to return to dream again. New to the realm of social network? Do you spend more time trying to figure out the menagerie of alphabet soup letters than you do promoting your business and product. One such acronym is worth knowing about. Learning how to take advantage of its existence to boost your name up the ladder of the search engines. Search Engine Optimizers or SEO as it is fondly referred to in the soup can, is important and not that hard to master. SEO is a modern buzzword for the old fashioned, but still used term, Keyword. Basically making sure your site include words that are recognized by search engines. Wording to improve rankings and send traffic to your site. SEO’s not only use words in your written pages, but also identify with links to and from your pages. If you were to do a search for SEO on the internet, you will receive a result list of over 523,000,000 options to chose from. That in itself can turn you off of finding out about this important marketing tool. One of the better articles I have found to explain SEO in layman’s terms also offered a printable PDF version of The Beginners Guide to SEO. Marketing yourself can be a little easier if you have the use of some good tools and references. Share your SEO and marketing experiences with us. This story gave me a lot of food for thought in sorting the wheat from the chaff.
A local business owner I am acquainted with was looking to increase her staff. They had specific skills that were required and made it clear that they would not take resumes in person. They asked that all resumes be sent by email. They wanted the prospective candidates to place their resumes in the body of the email, and not as an attachment. In the subject line, they asked that the words Resume and the closing date for applying. The date had been listed in their advertisement. They were inundated with emails, and they expected that. When asked how did they cut down to their long list and then their short list, the answer was simple. They are a detail oriented business that requires their staff to read and follow instructions without a lot of supervision. Anyone who sent a resume without the required information in the subject line were deleted. All hand delivered and mail in applications were destroyed. Anyone who sent a resume with an attachment (regardless if the resume was in the body of the email) were deleted. They ended up with a handful of emails that had followed their application instructions to the letter. From these they created their short list and started interviews. What if someone who had the best credentials, work ethics and experience was among those that were delete? How do you not look at every email, just in case? In this case, they would not be included in the process if they didn't follow the rules. Harsh, you say? I commend this company for putting out the needs of their workplace to see who would read and follow the instructions. They had no interest in entertaining anyone’s job application that showed the person incapable of following simple directives. Perhaps a lesson to all of us not to rush into anything without making sure we have all of the facts lined up before taking the plunge. Often, we only read what we think we need to see, and skip over the important parts. What are your thoughts on this hiring process? |
October 2023
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