I'm all over the place lately!

Day299
I’ve spent more time on my blogs lately then my store. It seems to go in cycles like that. Sometimes I’ll be intensely into writing and submitting my stories or coming up on a deadline for my articles and then something will give me an idea to create a new design or rearrange my store and I’ll be off on that for a while. Or a question I sent out to a forum or by email finally was answered and I can go off in that direction!

It’s good to mix it up, but I never feel done!

Long days

Day280
After about 10 hours on the computer today – I’ve done a little bit of everything!

I am determined to get my inboxes on my 4 email accounts down to zero! So much reading! And every 3 or 4 things I read seem to require me to do something suggested.

On one newsletter I get weekly the editor offered mentioning any shops people have in time for Christmas so long as we are both newsletter subscribers and forum members. I’m both, so I sent her a link to my store.

On the CafePress forum I saw an offer from another shop owner to put links on his shop. So I sent him an email too.

I’ve been looking around the Blog Traffic School forum and finally made myself ask the question, “Does my blog really need titles?” I got the answer I was afraid of – yes! It’s good for SEO. So as you can see I am on day 280 and now have to go back and figure out a title for each post!

Then I added another design to my store and cleaned up some sections.

The work of an online shop owner never ends!

I really am learning!

Day256
Wow! I really am learning! I put the little Blog Ranking button on my blog’s sidebar all by myself!

This was a major step for me!

Online businesses are time consuming!

Day229
I’ve been doing online ads for my new Fruits of the Spirit Line. Another tedious chore! Especially since I am trying to follow the charts I set up to track them! It seems that by the time I get all of them sent, the ones that are only up for 7 days need to be replaced again.

For something that is so “instant” as the internet – online businesses take a lot of time!

Revamped my store!

Day227
Whew! I can’t believe I got my section layers done in my store today! It changed the look of the whole front page. I would love comments from anyone about what you think of the new look. http://www.givitup.com

I still have a lot to do including adding lots more Fruits of the Spirit items (I know – who would have thought that would take so long?), “teasers” on the front page and then I want to add to several of my other sections!

One thing at a time!

I reorganize!

Day165
I decided to reorganize my lists again and try to start catching up in a more logical way!

I labeled one piece of paper Site and listed everything I want to do to my store: from new products, new sections, backing the whole thing up (!), promoting the custom section and promoting buttons. Then I labeled a sheet Affiliates and made that list: an online class I want to take, sites I want to look at, etc. My Writing sheet’s list is the longest and I have sadly neglected it! I could spend a year locked up in my office and maybe get to the end of that list! Then I made an Internet sheet. That list includes things like “read everything I’ve been sticking in Favorites, spend time on every forum I’ve joined, read all the email I’ve stuck in the folder titled “Read When Time”, do an online web design class I’ve saved and several dozen other sites and ezines I want to learn from. Next I made a Promotion sheet for all the places I still want to promote and designs I want to promote. Last I made a Work on Continuously sheet, which is basically things I should be checking on, and doing every day.

It helped to divide it out. Then I planned out the next week using a few things from each list on each day. Today I’ve been reading the chats on CafePress and starting to read some of my emails. Got distracted by DarnFineShirts.com and ended up adding two of my t-shirts to his site. I also added a bear to his DarnFineBear site. I wish I knew if anyone besides other storeowners look at those kinds of sites! My daughter also helped me add a scrolling bar of pictures from my site to my MySpace profile and change all the background. It looked so much better I sent some bulletins out to a few of the groups I belong to.

So that’s pretty much my day!