Ever have trouble cutting and pasting from a document into your HTML editor? Or paste text in WordPress only to have problems styling it?

This little tool saved my sanity!

Text Fixer

This free online word converter tool will take the contents of a doc or docx file and convert the word text into HTML code. It produces a much cleaner html code than word normally produces. This doc converter strips as many unnecessary styles and extra mark-up code as it can. It does not preserve images but it does preserve html links and other basic html formatting tags like bolding in the conversion process.

This week’s featured website is Digg.

Digg is a place for people to discover and share content from anywhere on the web. From the biggest online destinations to the most obscure blog, Digg surfaces the best stuff as voted on by our community.

This week’s featured website is Viralheat

Viralheat is Social Media Analytics. It covers every corner of the social web from Google Buzz, Facebook, Twitter, Real-time web, to YouTube and provides insights for your social media campaigns that allow you to deliver a higher ROI.

Great tool!

This week’s featured website is Foller.me

Foller.me is a web application based on the Twitter API, used to gather Twitter analytics from any profile – in seconds! Foller.me scans your Twitter profile, parses your latest tweets and followers. Tweets are separated into topics, mentions and hashtags. Followers are mapped out on a Google Map.

I know, I know, you’re thinking I’m a little crazy with all the Twitter-centric Websites of the Week. But truthfully, there are a ton of GREAT Twitter tools and I want to share them!

This week is Formulists. It’s a great Twitter list tool (great for a social media campaign or launch!). With Formulists you can generate a broad range of Twitter lists that will continuously self-update and can be used from any Twitter client! Use it to organize your network, expand your network, track followers, strengthen social ties, and customize existing lists!

When you build a new website it is important to think about what your visitors will encounter whenever they reach an error. Whether they type in an extension incorrectly, the site directs to a non-existent page or you’re yet to build the extra content it’s a good idea to think about what you want people to see.

Most websites just feature a plain Error 404 Page Not Found. This can be surprising and frustrating for visitors because they may not realize they have made an error and if they have followed one of your links, then they may click off your website completely. It can sometimes feel very unprofessional to have links up that go nowhere and it is a very quick way to turn off your guests. This can lose you a lot of potential custom, so creating a customized 404 page is a great way to avoid this.

There are two main things you can do. Firstly, personalize it. Change the wording and directions that are listed away from the standard. By doing this you can tell your customers that the page may be under construction, links may be broken, and give email contact info to report or that there may be some other problem. By directing them to hit the back button you’ll keep them on your website.

Another great option is to have all of your 404 pages automatically redirect. If there is one page of content that you want all visitors to see above all else, then redirecting any 404 errors means that they will arrive there if they make a mistake. Usually redirected pages will come up with a message that says page not found – and will redirect within 10 seconds. You can make the most of this and also include text here to say that the page is not found but the user is being directed to important or interesting information instead.

Here’s a link to some really cool examples of 404 or error pages You’ll get a good laugh!

Find the best username with Namechk. On Namechk you can check to see if your desired username or vanity URL is still available at dozens of popular Social Bookmarking websites. Promote your brand consistently by registering a username that is available on the majority of the most popular sites.

Myths arise from lack of information and in the case of blogging, often from inexperience. Some of the common myths related to blogging in general and business blogging in particular are:

Myth #1: Blogging is Not Appropriate for Business

Says who? It’s easy to see the reasons and benefits of having a business blog, and these are covered in detail in other articles in the SEO Training Club. A blog enhances a business. Having a website is no longer enough. You can increase sales, establish excellent PR, reach your target market and become known for your knowledge and expertise, all by having a blog.

Myth #2: Your Business Income Will Increase Immediately After Starting a Blog

Let’s get real. A newly established business doesn’t show a profit for years! Starting a blog with the expectation it will earn money is a mistake. Like any business, a blog takes time to establish itself. Some may taste success faster than others, but it?s a similar story in running a business. Give your blog time, tend to it properly and don’t give up. Your business blog may not ever earn you money directly, but the indirect increase in your income through it will definitely be there.

Not convinced? Consider this: all those contacts you made through blogging that led to more business. Sure it’s not your blog making money directly, but it is your business increasing through contacts you made via your company’s blog.

Myth #3: Blogging Doesn’t Require Much Time

I’ll be honest, I thought this too. Just one week into blogging and I realized I was mistaken. Blogging doesn’t require much time only if your blog is so established that you’ve worked out all the kinks and it now runs like a well oiled machine.

Since not many of us have reached that stage, blogging requires a lot of time and dedication. The minute a post is published we start worrying about the next one. We’re thinking two weeks ahead and panicking how we don’t have ideas for blog posts after that.

On a minimum, a blog needs an hour or so daily.

Myth #4: Maintaining a Blog is Easy

Maintaining a blog is as tough as keep a business afloat. There is nothing easy about keeping a blog going successfully. From having content issues to traffic woes, nothing comes easy in blogging. To get results you have to work hard at your blog and exercise patience.

Myth #5: A Blog has to be Updated Everyday

While it is true that a blog has better chances of becoming popular if it is updated daily, there is not hard and fast rule. What works for some blogs may not necessarily work for others. To get results you have to work hard at your blog and be patient. It also depends on your niche and topic of your blog. If most of your blogging requires feature length blog posts then blogging daily is not realistic. The posts would need time to sink in and register with your readers as well as get the proper attention and comments.

It also depends on your niche and topic of your blog. To find out what frequency of posts works best for your blog, you will have to experiment with different schedules.

Myth #6: You Must be an Excellent Writer

That’s a bit like saying you must be great at holding meetings to have a successful business. You don’t have to be an excellent writer to get your point across in a blog post. Spellings and typos (occasional) are all overlooked if the basic idea is intriguing. To write a blog, all you have to be able to do is string two grammatically correct sentences together and know your mind well enough to convey your message.

Broken Link Checker

This WordPress plugin locates broken links, missing images, deleted YouTube videos and more on your blog. It periodically checks older content and always checks new or edited content. It also gives you a list of all your links that you can search and filter.

See how to do it here

About.Me is this week’s Website of the Week. About.me is a custom profile and personal analytics dashboard. You sign up to quickly build your personal profile page that points users to your content from around the web

If you have a website that is regularly updated, whether it be with new product information or events or even using a blog then looking into RSS feeds is important. This will let you stay connected to visitors to the site because they can choose to have all future updates sent directly through to their program or browser. Consumers will not be expected to remember to visit again later, and all of your new information is delivered to targeted readers.

It might seem difficult at first but if you’re using some of the pre-designed blog websites they often have the option built in. It’s worth checking for this because it’s very handy for your customers to get information as soon as it’s listed.

One of the easiest ways to add an RSS feed to your website is to look at third parties who have options available or list instructions. The RSS feeder website suggests it may take you only a few minutes to add a feature that could connect you to consumers with real interest in your brand.

RSS basically stands for really simple syndication which is fairly self explanatory. Generally those who subscribe to your RSS feed will receive in their browser or program a title and first paragraph from the new information. If you post to blogs this means people can choose to click through based on what it seems the content includes and every single post is delivered. Other programs allow users to view the full details of every update meaning they don’t need to come to the website to get your information – this is a great way for consumers to stay in touch and gives you individual contact with many users.

Adding an RSS feed to your website makes total sense as it is a very simple set up and once arranged you are able to fire off feeds to numerous consumers.

This week’s Website of the Week is Quora. Quora is a continually improving collection of questions and answers created, edited, and organized by everyone who uses it. The most important thing is to have each question page become the best possible resource for someone who wants to know about the question.

One way you can think of it is as a cache for the research that people do looking things up on the web and asking other people. Eventually, when you see a link to a question page on Quora, your feeling should be: “Oh, great! That’s going to have all the information I want about that.” It’s also a place where new stuff–that no one has written about yet–can get pulled onto the web.

Contact Form 7

This WordPress plugin allows you to create multiple forms with customization.  Want to learn more?

I’ll show you how to do it here

Article Marketing Resources

Articles can be a useful source of extra traffic to your website. The first and most obvious results will be traffic from incoming links from article directories. There will also be some traffic from those sites have reprinted your article because of the bio or “resource” box you include which has a link back to your website.

The article marketing process can be boiled
down to just a few key points:

• Write your article
  (and “resource box”)
• Distribute your article
• Link to your article

EzineArticles and my EzineArticles bio.

Go Articles

ArticleDashboard

ArticleAlley

Isnare

Example of one of my Resource boxes: ” Grab your free onlinemarketing ezine which explains how to DIY your websiteoptimization with my compliments ”

Articleghostwriting services also check out Elance.

Automated article distribution to bloggers and to Article directories.

Datafeedr Random Ads V2

This WordPress plugin allows you to place and easily rotate ads on your site. You can add different ad groups and then place them through the use of widgets.
I’ll show you how to install it here

This week’s Website of the Week is Untweeps.

Unfollow Twitter users who don’t tweet often enough.
UnTweeps uses the Twitter API to unfollow selected people you are following. Logging into UnTweeps is safe because they use Twitter’s login system which then allows UnTweeps to do its thing on your behalf.
After logging in, enter the number of days in the past you want to check. If you enter 30, then anyone who hasn’t updated their Twitter status (tweeted) in the past 30 days will be shown on a list. Then, just select who you want to “unfollow”!

Google Alerts should be a key part of monitoring the success of your search engine optimization. It’s very simple to set up and gives you important real time information about your website.

Cool Reason # 1

Tracking Backlinks Google Alerts enables you to track whenever a backlink is connected to your website. By using this method as soon as your site gets a new backlink you’ll be informed. The solution is at http://www.google.com/alerts Go to that URL and enter this Search Term: link:www.yourdomain.com Type: Web How often: as it happens Deliver to: Now as soon as your site gets a new backlink Google will send you email to let you know.

Cool Reason # 2

Finding Out When Your Web pages Are Indexed. You can use Google Alerts to discover when new pages from your website are indexed. This time you use the search term site:www.yourdomain.com

Cool Reason # 3

Discovering Where Your Competitors Get Their Backlinks From A smidge sneaky but you can use Cool Reason # 1 to track your competitor’s backlinks. Everytime their site gets a new backlink you’ll receive a notification from Google. This means that you can monitor their linkbuilding campaigns. You can then also get your backlinks from the same sites.

Many businesses like to use the information gained from market research to improve products and services or create new ones that their customers will be interested in. You can also manipulate this process to use market research as a marketing tool, giving you access not only to customers but to getting feedback at the same time.

One of the easiest ways to do this is with surveys. There are a few ways you can use them to promote yourself. For example, many businesses offer gifts or discounts as a thank you for completing the survey – this is a good way to get samples of products or discount vouchers out into the public for use and recognition of your brand.

You can also post surveys on your website, and then link to the survey elsewhere. Using this online format means that people will see your company when they click through to do the survey and be able to explore your website at the end, as an answer to their survey responses.

Offline, you can easily set up a single person or team to head out and solicit survey responses from the public. If this is your preferred method it is best to make it short, and perhaps offer leaflets or samples to anyone who completes it. As an example you could try undertaking face to face research at Mother and Toddler groups if you have a baby or family related product or service. Again this will get your brand recognition off the ground and is a very popular way for businesses to access customers that may otherwise not know the company exists.

The public are much more likely to respond positively your brand if they are not approached by sellers and cold callers. Doing surveys allows them to feel like they are not being given the hard sell. If you use telemarketing, then telling a caller first that it is not a sales call will allow you to gather information and then request the chance to mail samples and information to them. The success rate of surveys over selling is much higher.

This week is all about image sharing online so I thought I’d share with you a website all about using images and designs effectively. http://www.smashingmagazine.com/

Smashing Magazine is a goldmine for everything online design related. Here you can pick up freebie graphics, find out the coolest website themes and admire logos. I use it a lot for web design inspiration – whatever guidance or “wow factor” you are looking for, Smashing Magazine delivers.

So you’ve got a Facebook business page (Fan Page)? That’s a great step in the right direction. A lot of other small businesses don’t both to create their own page and they’re missing a trick.

After all:

• • Facebook has more than 500 million active users
• • 50% of active users log on to Facebook in any given day
• • The average user has 130 friends
• • People spend over 700 billion minutes per month on Facebook

So how can you make the most of your Facebook Fan Page ?

Firstly check you have the basics covered:

Have you added content to your page – press releases, links, blog posts, photos, discussions and videos?

Let’s tick these off, one by one…

• Press releases – link to your press releases or add them as content to your page
• Links – you can link to your own site, but you can also share other links which may be useful to your readers such as articles, stuff in the news etc
• Blog – add links to your blog posts or use an importer application such as “networked blogs” (Just search the applications centre on Facebook to find this)
• Videos – not as hard as you might think – see my recent article
• Photos – add product photos and images – don’t forget to add a picture of yourself there too…
• Discussions – ask a question, start the discussion off

Everything above is part of the key to Facebook success – getting people to “like” your page. When someone clicks the “like” button, an update will appear in their newsfeed saying they’ve “liked” your page and linking back to it.

What’s more, it means that whenever you add a new piece of content to your Facebook page, it will also be posted to into the newsfeed of everyone who has hit “like” on your page in the past. Remember, it’s not just the person who liked your page who will see the update, but all their Facebook friends too.

Growing your “Likers” should be the priority in your Facebook marketing strategy. The reason this is so important is that it’s an easy way to stay connected to potential customers who might not be ready to buy your products or services at the moment, but may do at some point in the future. These people are less likely to sign up for your monthly newsletter or ezine or to visit your website regularly, but if you post interesting enough content to your Facebook page, they will keep you in their Facebook news feeds and reading updates about your business will become part of their daily online routines. Looking after your Likers, by sharing interesting content, running exclusive competitions and having conversations will keep you and your business front of mind.

This week I’ve written about creating video for your website simply and cheaply, so I’ll share with you one of my favorite sites – http://www.animoto.com. Animoto enables you to create a simple video, ready for use on your website, on videosharing websites such as youTube.com or even on your blog. It creates the video from your own images (such as photos), videos you may already have and music clips. There’s a basic version which creates 30 second videos for free, or you can upgrade to a version at $30 a year or pro $249. Well worth taking a look at as a quick start option for video creation.

What if I told you that you could create a 5 minute video in less than an hour of work with no video editing skills and have it seen by hundreds or thousands of customers who’re interested in learning more about your product? It’s not only possible — It’s easy.

Here’s how.

Creating a Video is Easier Than You Think

When most people think of creating a video, they usually think of complex camera equipment and an editing process that takes years of study to understand. Nothing could be further from the truth. Hiring a student to both film and edit from a local college is one option. The quality will be great and many students need practical experience for their portfolio.

Don’t want to pay for your video at all? There are plenty of services that you could use to create your video for little to no cost. Most of these are text or image slideshows that you can record and just add your voice on top. Try animoto.com which I’ve used myself. Instead of going through a costly recording process, you can deliver the content through image, text and your voice. The content, not the delivery, is what your customers really actually care about. Creating your entire video could take less than a week if you’re shooting a short informational video, or as little as an hour if you’re doing voice over a slideshow.

Distributing Your Video to Hundreds of Customers

Imagine now taking your video and having that distributed to hundreds of customers — With just one click of the mouse. It is as easy as it sounds.

There are two ways to do this: You could do it automatically for free, or you could have people do it for you for a fee. To do it for free, try a website called TubeMogul to distribute the videos. You need to create an account on each of the services you want to upload your video to. The software will then automatically upload your video to each of the sites at a click of a button. Alternatively, you could pay a monthly rate of about $70 to have people distribute the videos for you. The service is called TrafficGeyser. They’ll automatically submit to over 40 sites for you.

Why Distribute Your Videos?

There are two reasons to distribute your videos to a multitude of websites: The first is raw traffic. Sure, big sites like YouTube do get the most traffic. That said, other smaller video sites have a loyal following as well. The second reason is backlinks. If you want to rank well in search engines, backlinks are crucial. For every video you release, you could easily get 30 to 100 backlinks by submitting to a multitude of video websites. The setup takes a bit of time, but once you’re setup the distribution process will literally take less than 15 minutes. You could very realistically do one video a day, getting 50 links a day pointed back to your website — That’s 1,500 backlinks to your website every month!

The Process

Just to reiterate how simple and powerful this process is: Creating a video for online distribution can take as little as an hour. Setting up distribution could take a couple hours, but once you’re setup it should take you less than 15 minutes per video to distribute it. Your video will be seen by hundreds, if not thousands, of customers. You’ll get a ton of backlinks. In short, you’ll skyrocket both your traffic and your search engine rankings!

One of my favorite design websites is COLOURlovers is a creative community where people from around the world create and share colors, palettes and patterns, discuss the latest trends and explore colorful articles… It’s a great site to use if (like me!) you aren’t too hot on dreaming up exciting color combinations – or the ones you pick always clash! Using a site like colourlovers.com comes in very handy when you need to make colour selections for branding such as logos and graphics, and also if you need to choose colors for a website. You can search the free online database in a number of different ways including by color or keyword

If you are building a website that has important information for potential customers on pages other than the main homepage you’ll want to ensure that you have adequately named your pages. This is also important when it comes to adding pages to directories and search engines. It’s much easier for the user to understand you if your pages are named accurately.

Ideally you’d be able to use the name page in the website address. For example, rather than having a random list of numbers or letters after the domain name directing to a frequently asked questions page, you could have www.mywebsite.com/faq which is obvious when listed in search directories. It’s also going to make the information much easier to find. It’s also a key part of website optimisation. As customers get a feel for your website and realize pages have been named logically they can simply type this in to find your questions page rather than having to find the right links and clicks to make to get there.

To do this you need to look into using permalinks. These become permanent locations of certain files or pages on your website and you can use these to access a page directly, without needing to click through from another location on the site. It’s a great way to get people directly to a shopping cart or similar pages.

Setting up permalinks will depend largely on your website host and software that you use to build your site. If you are hiring a designer who is also going to take your website live rather than send you each page as a file for you to upload, then you’ll need to talk to them about making effective permalinks a component to your sites’ design. It’s a much more professional look overall, but it will depend on the programs and host used. Some will automatically use the title of your page, so work on naming the page in the way you want it in the website address.

In today’s interview series, we talk with Laura Morris of RentABuggy…

My name is Laura Morris and I am a single mother to my beautiful daughter, Ashleigh, who is 4 years old. I founded my business www.rentabuggy.co.uk in 2008 and I am just coming into my second year. Rentabuggy allows families to ease cash flow and rent top selling pushchairs on a monthly basis. We also provide holiday rentals Nationwide including travel cots, highchairs, sterilisers and much more. I am also Co-Founder of www.networkingmummies.com that was started in February 2009 with my business partner Joanne Dewberry of www.charliemoos.co.uk. We provide free events with no membership fees for women in Business. We also do further events throughout the year including exhibitions, workshops and much more.

Why I started selling online…

As soon as I had the idea for Rentabuggy, I knew it was an online business. I didn’t even contemplate having premises as I knew where my target market was.

What has been my biggest online marketing challenge…

The way that the world is moving is all about Social Networking and to the massive extent of using this for your business. It is a new way of ‘word of mouth’ advertising and it took me a while to get my head around how it would work for me and my businesses. However, only this week I actually held a Networking Mummies workshop for 17 people on how to use Social Networking to market their businesses!

What do I like best about my website…

I like that it is sleek and simple and I like my logo.

My top online marketing tip…

Use a blog. I have only recently within the past six months started using a blog but it is great to let my customers know of any news, competitions and offers and not only that but by using correct keywords etc, I can increase my Google rankings.

www.rentabuggy.co.uk

www.networkingmummies.com

www.mumtomumpreneur.co.uk

In today’s interview series, we talk with Liza O’Donnell with Dress Ups

My name is Liza O’Donnell.  I am the mother to 2 fantastic little boys, Max (6yrs) and Paddy (4yrs), and wife to the Ramollescence Ryan.  I adore being a part of my wee family …so much so that I couldn’t bear to go out to work … so I bought work to us!

Dress Ups epitomizes innocence and all the lovely sweet and grand things of being a child.  In case you don’t know who we are (Shame!) Dress Ups is a niche, online children’s boutique, retailing wholesome and handcrafted children’s dressing up costumes.  Dress ups do not even attempt to compete with the large, mass produced costume companies and our customers are always very happy to find us.

“Dress Ups, Dress Ups, and Make Believe…  Take me to the place where I can dream.  Take me to this place where young minds are the pot of gold, and play our never-ending rainbow!”

Why did you start selling online ?

Because we couldn’t keep Dress Ups a secret …we just had to share with the world!

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

In one word …budget!  Advertising is very expensive.

What do you like best about your website?

Our products … and our images … and all our little quotes are real!

Your top online marketing tip?

If you are on a budget … social marketing.  It is time consuming but free.  You must be very disciplined, though.  It is not too much about being personal and it is not all a sales pitch either.

I like blog advertising as well … it is generally priced well and fits into that slightly more personal category that sets Dress Ups apart.

Twitter Counter is a really useful tool for measuring your Twitter stats – and, of course, there’s no charge to use the standard options. Twittercounter enables you to see your Twitter Followers, those you are Following and also your Tweets in a graph format. There’s a useful free profile checker and a widget you can download for your blog. If you fancy giving your Follower numbers a boost, then you can pay to be a Featured User. There are further paid evaluation options available too from $15 a month.

When running an online business, the way you showcase your products is very important. Keep in mind that your guests and potential customers cannot physically view the product. If your product is available in retail stores offline then you’re going to need to step up the photography so that potential customers don’t head to the shops to find the same item in a tangible format, and possibly purchase it there.

One of the easiest ways to ensure good quality photographs is to hire a professional photographer. This can be quite expensive, although you can look for new or emerging product/catalog photographers who may need photos for their portfolio. They may do a swap with you – they give you their time and images and you allow the use of them so the photographer can showcase their talent. This is a common method used by fashion models and photographers so its always worth checking the option out to see if you can save some money this way.

If you cannot find a new photographer and professional shots are outside of your budget, then the goal is to make your photography look as good as possible. Scour other websites and see what techniques they seem to use to get the best presentation of their product – and note the best sites include more than one picture, from various angles.

If you have a digital SLR camera you can use this along with some simple online tutorials to capture the best product images that your skill allows. By following instructions carefully you will be able to get adequate representation for your goods. Another option is to ask around and perhaps a friend or family m ember will help out for photographic credit somewhere on your website.

It isn’t just the camera quality that counts – the background, color realism and feature details will all be important in giving potential customers the best view of your products that is possible.

In today’s interview we catch up with Victoria Dixon of Enhance Me

My name is Victoria Dixon and I live in the beautiful Orkney Islands. I have two young children. Milly who is 5 years old and Robbie who is 2 years old. I offer a range of personalized Magical portraits that make a very unique keepsake or a wonderful gift. Having had over ten years experience using a variety of different computer programs and effects I am able to take everyday photos and transform them into fantastic, enchanting works of art. I am providing a unique and beautiful way to add something completely different to a photograph. I am able to add a little bit of magic to make a beautiful personal gift for a friend or family member. I work to achieve an as photo realistic effect as possible – Sometimes photographs just don’t capture the magic you feel they should. I just pulled a lot of my skills together – web design, creativity and photography and www.enhance-me.com was born.

Why did you start selling online?

For me being able to sell online was the most cost effective way of running my business. I have a worldwide customer base…many opportunities to be able to market my products and services and a huge network of like minded business contacts right at my fingertips!

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

My biggest online marketing challenge would have to be SEO and tying this in with promoting my services to potential buyers. It’s tricky to get it right and make sure I have the correct keywords and information. Keeping track of competitors and making sure I stay high in the search listings can become quite time consuming.

What do you like best about your website?

I am easily bored with my website – I want to keep changing it – making it fresh. When I first launched ‘Enhance-Me’ my website was far too busy – way too much information packed into each page which I feel can be quite off putting for some people so I always aim to keep my website simple and clear. I like that I have the knowledge and am equipped with a husband who is a web designer to make any changes I feel are necessary to keep my website ‘current and up to date’ I get really lovely feedback from my customers who say my website is easy to navigate and clear though I am feeling that it is time for a change!

Your top online marketing tip?

Social media is a great way to market a business online. I use it in a number of ways and find that it has been invaluable for my business. It’s like an online word-of-mouth and allows me to connect with people and other businesses that I may never have had the opportunity to before. I use Facebook, Twitter, Squidoo and a variety of other networking sites to promote by services.

I use Twitter to announce news, competitions, new products and to connect with businesses and bloggers. This has resulted in a number of marketing opportunities and very beneficial business contacts. I also feel that twitter allows my customers to see the person behind the business to an extent and adds a new level of personalized care. I also have a blog which I update as often as possible – I think the great thing about social media is that you can connect everything together – when I update my blog a tweet is automatically sent out announcing the update as well as a post on Facebook which saves valuable time!

For today’s interview series, we hear from Anna Seager of Little Crab Designs…

My name is Anna Seager and I run Little Crab Designs (www.littlecrab.co.uk).   I create and sell nursery pictures and wall art for children.

Why did you start selling online?

Initially I started selling through craft fairs, school fairs, house sales etc – but soon realized that the best way to make the business work for me – round my children and based at home – was to get the online sales going, so I set up my own website.  I chose a Mr Site website working on the basis that for the £25 it was at the time – if it didn’t work – I hadn’t lost a huge investment.  Three years later I still have that Mr Site website and it is working wonders for me!

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

My biggest challenge was working out and learning how to turn a pretty looking website that couldn’t be found, into one that was.  At my first business review, I remember the adviser saying to me – “it’s a lovely shop window – but that is all it will remain if you don’t start getting some passers by!!”  I have trawled the net, watched loads of seminars online on SEO – been to various events on SEO and worked my way through two books.  After a lot of trial and error, hard work and patience – my site is now listed on the first page of Google, yahoo and bing for most of my keywords and I even hold position one for some of them.  Not bad for a “package” deal website at £25 that a lot of people told me would never work!!

What do you like best about your website?

My website is very simple – I guess I am lucky because the artwork provides all the colour and interest it needs.  As I don’t want to detract from that, as after all, that is what I am selling – I keep it very simple and plain – and I like that about it.

Your top online marketing tip?

My top online marketing tip would be to keep chipping away at it a little every day – trawl the internet, forums etc for advice – and do a little bit each day and get a book called ‘Search Engine Optimization An Hour Day’.  It has done wonders for me!

If your business is in a particular industry or you offer services to a specific field then you should consider your personal reputation. This means YOU! The professional behind the business, not your home life. While your business may be well regarded, if you can demonstrate that you are someone considered an expert in your field, then you’ll find that your customers are much more likely to trust your business choices and believe the information within your sales and website details.

There are a few ways to do this, but the best is to actually know your area inside out. Learn everything you can about the procedures that are in place, both common and unusual and make sure you gain the knowledge that will support you against any questions you may be asked by potential customers.

If you can, try to write articles about your products or industry and publish them on your blog or website or through a third party article site such as Ezine Articles. If you offer your knowledge without the hard sell people are more likely to respect and believe that you know exactly what you’re talking about. You can also look at gaining professional memberships and showing all of this information on your website, for example, the FSB.

Another way to increase your reputation as an expert is to create a website or blog all about you! This can contain your history in the industry, qualifications information and link to every article you publish elsewhere. You can use this website as a way to encourage consumers to read more about you and hear what you have to say. You could create a blog to do this using your own name e.g. http://www.alisonrothwell.com/ or a third-party platform perhaps like about.me. Don’t forget, you can also create your own sites on squidoo.com or tumblr.com.

One way to do promote your “expert site” is to have it featured prominently on your business website. Giving people access to this business related info immediately brings a level of trust to your customers, especially if they don’t actually know you personally.

In the latest in our interview series, we catch up with Diane Hurford and her online company, Brolly Sheets , a company selling waterproof bedding that is attractive and easy to change.

My name is Diane Hurford and I live in Auckland’s North Shore with hubby Glenn, and children Mia (8) and Lewis (6).

I came up with the idea of a Brolly Sheet when Mia was sleeping in a bottom bunk bed and we just started night time toilet training. Every night when I had to change her bed I would hit my head on the top bunk.  I don’t know about you but the sooner I can get back to sleep, the more reasonable I am the next day. There had to be a better way to get her bed changed.

I couldn’t find anything on the market that made it easier for me to get back to bed as soon as possible.  The few options available were either too expensive, too complicated for a 2:00 am bed-change or looked too sterile.

So I went to Spotlight and bought some PVC and some pink fabric and made a very basic “Brolly Sheet”.  After an accident, it was quick to pull off and replace with another in seconds rather than minutes.  Gone were the days of completely stripping and remaking the whole bed, gone were the bruises from the top bunk!  After I made the first couple of sheets, friends at Playcentre wanted one, then it just grew.

The reason I decided to sell online was mostly due to my husband.  He has extremely “itchy feet” and we have lived in Washington DC, Hamilton, Auckland and Sydney.  I wanted a business I could “take with me” if we moved again.  The funny thing is – now the children are older his itchy feet have past and we are happily settled into “domesticity”.  (In fact he has left corporate banking and is now full time with Brolly Sheets).

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

The biggest marketing challenge would be finding the right publications to advertise in to drive customers to our site.  It is all very well having a web based business – but if people don’t know you are there you won’t be in business for long.   This has been an even bigger challenge since we launched in the UK last year.  Trying to take our message to the Brits has been tricky.

What do you like best about your website?

The best thing about our website is how easy it is for our warehouse to pack orders directly off the back end.  It is simple and quick for them which in turn means less errors and time spent.  The best thing about Brolly Sheets is simply having Glenn working with me from our home office.  He is able to spend more time with the kids, makes the school lunches – we are just having an amazing time.  Life is good.

Your top online marketing tip?

Make your site easy to navigate around.  I have checked out hundreds of sites over the past few years.  Some look amazing but you can’t find what products are available.  The worse thing I hate is not knowing the shipping fee till I get to the check out.  Everything has to be visible and easy to find.  If you are putting together a web based business – check out other sites.  Look at their “about us” pages, “customer service” pages etc.  Look at what you think works and doesn’t work.

Today’s interview series is with Claire Willis of Snugbaby.

I am Claire Willis, and I live in Cumbria with my husband, Lee, and our two sons, Ben, 5, and Josh, 3. In 2008 I began SnugBaby, selling my brand of soft baby carriers, through my website, www.snugbaby.co.uk

In 2009, I also set up another website, www.getyourhandsback.co.uk to raise the awareness of babywearing, and promote the use of baby slings to a wider audience in the UK. Through Get Your Hands Back I publish reviews, news, special loffers and updates about slings and baby carriers from UK sling companies.

Why did you start selling online ?

I started SnugBaby after being unable to find a carrier for myself and Josh, when he was a baby. I made a sling, and got lots of comments about it from strangers in the street. Friends asked me to make them one, and I thought there may be a business to be built, although it took me until he was over a year old before I was able to put my plans into action.

I wanted to sell online as it is easier to appeal to a wider customer base – my local market would not have sustained a shop selling baby slings, but I knew I could make an impact if I was to sell nationally.

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

To start with it was quite hard to encourage people to visit my website. Although Lee has good technical knowledge, SEO is very difficult. I invest a little in advertising, but I am constantly working to improve the quality of my links to raise the visibility of SnugBaby in search engines.

What do you like best about your website?

I like the overall style of my websites. SnugBaby is very much a shop, with a blog attached, whereas Get Your Hands Back is basically a blog, with a lot of information and internal links. They look very different, although the writing style is similar, as you would expect. I think the colour schemes and the fonts used reflect the different purposes and the different messages tat I am trying to get across.

Your top online marketing tip?

The majority of my new customers come to me from personal recommendations, so getting myself known is really important to me. I use social media marketing  effectively, and have gained lots of new customers that way. I give a mix of personal and business news – I think people like to feel they know the people behind a company too. I also think it’s really important to keep in touch with existing customers, so I send out regular newsletters and updates to all my customers to remind them of what I can offer them, so I get a lot of repeat business too.

At my first LIVE training event http://www.seoworkoutworkshop.co.uk/ I’ll be covering SEO and websites – it’s the first step in my online marketing success system. In the meantime, here’s some more info on website design and why it’s so important

It’s important that your website layout is logical and easy to navigate. Internet users who land on your website can get easily frustrated if it is difficult to find information they need, and with fast internet speeds and search engines offering many alternatives, it can be easier for them to simply close your site and go somewhere else.

One of the easiest ways to organize your website is to look at your menus. Having clearly defined menu choices will make finding pages much easier. It’s also best to have links to all pages, and not lead users into a maze, clicking through to find the right link to their ultimate destination. Have a specific purpose for each page that you add, rather than flooding the site with many pages that could have been condensed into one or that are irrelevant to what you’re selling, or your business overall.

It’s also important that you name your pages clearly and accurately so that people can visit a page and see within seconds exactly what information is located there. This saves users wasting time reading through information only to discover that what they are looking for is not on the page. They are much less likely to keep searching if they feel that other pages are going to be designed the same way.

It is also important to tag your pages correctly. This will lead users to the page they need more often, rather than to homepages or unrelated information. They can easily land on your website on exactly the page they were looking for.

Finally, keep all of your content easily recognizable. Clearly mark changes in content or topic and where it makes sense, use bullet points instead of full sentences. This allows a quick glance at each point when looking for relevant details rather than a potential customer being turned away by having to read an essay to find a single sentence of detail applicable to them.

When you initially start your business and launch your online presence it’s almost instinctive to want tooffer personal responses to everyone who gets in touch. However as your business grows this can become more difficult but there is an easy way to avoid any back up or delays in contact.

Another thing to keep in mind is that you could have a potentially global audience. While you may be sleeping it could be 9.00 am elsewhere, and a potential customer may find that waiting until your business hours is just too long to hear back. Because of these reasons an automatic responder (an auto responder) is a great idea.

Using an auto responder means that you can have contact with the sender of all emails immediately. As soon as you receive the message, a return email is sent letting them know information you have pre-filled. Often this involves mentioning business hours and time zones, so that they know when to expect a personal response. It is also a great way to let the person contacting you that the website is current and email addresses are being read, even if it takes a number of hours to respond.

It’s also a great option to add any detail on length of time they can expect to wait. The generic response is usually within 24 hours; giving you time to access answers and give a considered response to any queries. It is also a really easy way to explain your products or services a little more. You can add a paragraph about what you do, and who your business is aimed at within this auto responder which will provide the potential customer with some new information and feel like a justified response.

Setting up auto responders is quite simple and can be set up easily using a web based email address program as well as desktop email.

The more people I work with, the more difficult I find keeping files together in one place, particularly if they are very large. Another issue is sharing files – it can get really difficult to keep track of file changes and amendments if you’re having to email the same document back and forth, especially when you get more than two people working on the same item. A great – and free – solution is http://www.dropbox.com. The basic storage option is pretty powerful, but storage size upgrades are reasonable for the Gigabyte players amongst you. Sharing folders is a simple matter of emailing an invite to colleagues. Recommended!

In the latest of our interview series, we talk with Sarah of PhotoFairytales

My name is Sarah, and I run an online business called www.PhotoFairytales.co.uk. I’m a married mum to Amy who is now 7, and I run my business from our home in Norfolk. I specialize in creating unique personalized gifts, keepsakes and portraits for my customers – my aim is to offer something really unusual and individual. After studying art and design, my career took a turn into marketing. From time to time I’ve returned to working in graphics and design however, and this is where my passion lies. I love the fact that I have now found a great way to combine my creative and artistic side, with my marketing experience. I’m passionate about PhotoFairytales in a way that is unlike any other job I’ve ever done – I’m constantly striving to add new products and increase the range of items on sale, and I work hard to ensure my customers are delighted with their purchases.

Why did you start selling online?
I started an online business as it seemed the perfect way to achieve a good work/life balance with my family after we had Amy. The internet provides a fast, effective and low-cost way of joining the retail market. I wanted to find a career that I could adapt and work around being a mother, and wife to someone who runs his own business too (and therefore works weird and wonderful hours most weeks!). Flexibility was high on the list of requirements, and working for myself running an online business seemed to be the obvious direction. Although I work full-time, my hours and the style of work I do are flexible enough to enable me to adapt to the things being a mum throws at you: school holidays, sick days, etc.

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?
I was determined when I started PhotoFairytales that it would be on a shoestring. It was important to me that this would be a low-risk venture. I think this was mainly due to two things: having a partner who is also self-employed made me want to be especially cautious, as did being a parent. In the past, my husband and I had sold everything we had to buy a business – we were happy to take that risk in those days as it was just the two of us. Being a parent does tend to focus things a little more though! I guess my biggest challenge is always how to raise the profile of the business, and promote it, on a minimal spend. Having said that, this is where an online business can really come into its own – the internet provides the ability to reach customers in a low cost way. However, I’ve had to learn from the ground up and although I had experience in marketing in the past, I had never applied it online so I had a lot to learn (and still do!). It can be very time-consuming if you’re working on a strict budget. Whilst it is easy to pay for advertising online, it is much harder work to achieve results with little or no outlay.

What do you like best about your website?
I think I’ve now managed to organize my site in a much more user-friendly way. As new lines and products have been added over the last year, PhotoFairytales has grown into a large site. I took time recently to take a step back and try to review it as a customer would – I’ve now arranged it in such a way that it is much easier (I hope) to navigate around and ultimately easier for customers to find items they love and wish to order! Although I’m only a small business, I always work hard to make sure the site is professional and gives a good impression. I hope I’ve achieved that…

Your top online marketing tip?
Without doubt, when you don’t have much to spend, social networking is by far the most effective online marketing I have so far found. Link building, SEO, etc, is all extremely important of course, but getting involved with sites such as Facebook, Twitter, forum/networking sites, etc. is the most effective of all for me. Not only are they great for meeting potential customers and telling them about your product, but they are great avenues for running competitions, discounts and giveaways. Plus you make some invaluable contacts and friends, particularly on business networking sites that can give you the inspiration you sometimes need. I’ve found a huge amount of my customers come to me on the recommendation of others too, and social networking is a great way of spreading the word.

Continuing our interview series, we are talking today with Jessie Pengelly

My name is Jessie Pengelly, I am a working mom to my 3 year old amazing daughter Alexandria.  I suffer from Endometriosis, Postnatal Depression and Narcolepsy.  I find working full time and balancing that with the needs of my daughter a constant battle.  I felt that I needed to look for another alternative to generate an income and started my nutritional products business.  The company I work through has always been direct to customers in order to keep the costs low and be available to anyone, anytime and anywhere.

The biggest online marketing challenge aside from costs that it attracts is to figure out who you want to target and how you are going to do it.  You want to ensure the site is functional and easy to look at but draws in the customers your are looking for.  It’s the balance of too much info can put people off where too little makes them feel you are not genuine.  Its also trying to get the important facts across like our products is Pharmaceutical grade and Doctor recommend without coming off boring.

What I like best about my website is that the company that I work through supports me in it and has linked its online shopping cart to it! So customers can purchase online without any hassle!  It’s such a blessing!

My top online marketing tip is to talk to as many people you can before going with a web designer and web hosting company. Some of the charges are ridiculous! And prevent home based business from getting started. This is what drove my husband to start his web design and hosting company!  Good service and support at an affordable cost! Also its important to look at what is already out there and find a point of difference to make you stand out!

The other week I attended a workshop for Nick-James.com members, and internet entrepreneur, Nick James, managed to twist my arm into holding a dedicated one-off workshop where I’m going to explain exactly how you can “beat Google” and get YOUR website to the top of the search engine results, (using just my 7 really simple “website workout exercises”).

Nothing difficult to understand, in fact, nothing too technical at all. So even the complete beginner could master the exercises in just a few hours.

I HIGHLY recommend you take a look and then decide to come along to this “behind closed doors workshop”. This is a real “nuts and bolts” information workshop, delivered in an ‘easy to understand’ style.

So if you are free in a few weeks time, on the 13th of November, there is no better place to be than learning how to beat Google at my one-off workshop.

More details are on the website at: http://www.SEOWorkoutWorkshop.co.uk

When you create a business website you want to be able to show your customers not only your products or services, but also why they should consider a business relationship with you. One such way to do this involves showcasing all the press you receive. It legitimizes you as a company and it allows you to list positive information by third parties regarding what you do.

By keeping this information online it also means that other websites who may wish to link to you can do so. If you keep files in this section such as banners and logos and invite other businesses or personal internet users to spread the word, they can do so using your official images and branding.

This goes a long way in helping to create brand recognition. Simply seeing a logo may entice them to check out your site and see what you’re offering. It may also become a secondary source of introduction to your website, so any targeted advertising that same customer may see will be instantly recognizable as your brand.

By allowing people easy access to your logos you can also create linkage partnerships with other websites. They simply copy the image or code and place it with a link straight onto your page. Often these set ups involve you also placing a link in return which can be a great way to capitalize on someone else’s success.

If you have a product that a reviewer enjoys and they wish to post information or a review on their own website, you might find that they will create their own links using your banners and logos if they are freely available to them. It’ll also give people an idea of your value as a company  you’ve got a professional brand image and the press information creates the feeling of being well known – even if it contains no more than your own press releases.

One of the niftiest Twitter tools I’ve used in a long time can be found over at http://nutshellmail.com/ . Nutshell Mail gives you a regular update of what’s happening on your social networks. It makes following the comings and goings on Twitter a breeze, sending you an email at specified times with the latest conversations, including those from lists you follow. But what makes it indispensible is the “Show Me Quitters” action – yes, when some one you follow dumps you, you get to know and can quit them right back!

In the latest of our interview series, we hear from Tracie Heasman and her home-based business generating 2D & 3D floor plans.

Hi, I’m Tracie.  And I generate 2D and 3D floor plans for or real estate agents, builders & private home sellers. It’s useful for people wanting to see their prospective home in 3D before the building has even started, as a lot of people have trouble visualizing a home in a 2D floor plan.

Why did you start selling online ?

I started selling online because it’s the easiest and cheapest way to market my product while looking after my one year old son.  I consider it similar to a brochure, for a fraction of the cost. I can let clients know about my product by referring them to my website, as all the information they need is there.  This also cuts out any bulk printing and posting costs.

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

This would certainly be getting a decent number of visitors to my website.  I get most of my business through self promotion by phoning businesses.  I only average about 4 unique visitors to my website a day.  I’ve submitted to all major search engines, as well as NZ online directories, and have even tried link reciprocation, but my numbers don’t seem to be increasing.

What do you like best about your website?

I’m quite proud of my website because I designed and produced it myself using a helpful site builder website.  I think it has a good amount of graphics as well as information.

Your top online marketing tip?

I think an immediate reply to queries from your website is vital.  The one downfall the web has is how impersonal it is, and when you buy something online, or ask somebody a question it never feels like you are dealing with a real person, which can be a little unnerving.  So I think to reply to somebody’s query in a fast, friendly and informal yet professional way can make all the difference to a sale.

Alison Pinney

In the latest of our interview series, we hear from Alison Pinney, mum of 4, and wife of 8 months. She runs Teeny Munchkins and Mums Business Club (Cambridge) and is also a full-time childminder!

Teeny Munchkins was set up in August 2008 and is going from strength to strength. It has recently has a site makeover and this has seen the comany’s sales figures increase dramatically. Teeny Munchkins has just launched a dropship service of its party bag fillers and Manhattan Toys range and within 4 weeks they have had over 30 resellers sign up.

Why did you start selling online ?

It was more to make a bit of pocket money so I could give those little extras to the children.  Before Teeny Munchkins I worked in party plan but left due to being crippled with a bout of arthritis.  This eased with medication and I decided that, rather than line somebody elses pockets with the money I made from sales, I could run my own business and line my own pockets.  I do not intend to go down the party-plan route though!

What has been your biggest online marketing challenge?

Getting our name out there and ranking well with Google.  Many of my customers tend to know what they are looking for when it comes to the Manhattan Toy range and I am starting to rank very well with some of our top sellers on Google.

What do you like best about your website?

It has recently been re-vamped which I am absolutely delighted with.  I have had many comments from customers and visitors saying how much improved it is and just looking at my stats tells me that most visitors are now bookmarking my site ready to come back to later.

Your top online marketing tip?

I use Facebook a lot!!  I also use Twitter but not as much.  I would say to use both these tools as much as you can to attract potential customers to your site.  They are very powerful and can quickly get your brand name known.

I’ve had a Facebook account for a couple of years now.

About 9 months ago I did a kind of “cull” – I decided that I wanted to keep my Facebook account for peeps I felt that I knew and would recognize IRL IYSWIM. So I spent a couple of hours “de-friending” and felt comfortable with it – so far so good…

Then a couple of months back, an odd thing started to happen – a considerable increase in friend requests hit my inbox. I’d like to think this was because I’d become the most popular gal on the Interweb, but a closer inspection told me not. It was just as though a whole new bunch of peeps had been on some “Facebook For Business” course (not a great one) and had decided to launch themselves in social media land with a frenzy.

So here’s my Public Service Announcement:

1. Don’t send me a Friend Request using your business name and no other clue as to who you are, why I’d know you or why you’d like to connect with me. Sheesh! It’s a 5 second job – JUST TELL ME YOUR REAL NAME! Otherwise, I haven’t got frackin* clue who you are! I’m open to meeting new peeps, so just introduce yourself!
2. Don’t send me a Friend Request just to “access” my friend list, my fan pages or my Bejewelled Blitz tournament table. I might not notice what you’ve done immediately, but I will do eventually. And then you just look like some weird cyberstalker as whereever I go, I find you there too…
3. Don’t send me a Friend Request just because I’m friends with a friend of yours with no other reason than to try and flog your bizz. The most bizarre request like this I got was from a children’s play centre in the South West, just because I was friends with someone who has a nearby maternity shop. I don’t live in the South West. I’m not likely to be visiting a play center there anytime soon…
4. Don’t send me Friend Requests if we were at high school together and you’ve had no contact with me over the last 30 years. Hey, I’m not being mean but if we weren’t in touch before, then maybe that’s because we weren’t actually friends? Most likely you didn’t associate with nerds like me back then? The exception is if you didn’t bully me in the playground and we’ve lost touch for some unfathomable reason and you’d like to get to know me again The other exception is my FB pal Mark, who I never spoke to at school because he was cool and I was a Geek, and we’ve been friends now for about 6 years thanks to the wonderfulness of social media

Whoah, I feel better now. Is this happening to anyone else, or is it just me?

* Slipped in for Battlestar Galactica fans

In the latest of our interview series, we catch up with Karen of Chloe’s Mummy.

Continuing the series of interviews with online business owners we meet Sarah Williams, owner of slogan baby wear company, Bibble Dribble.

Why I started a website

I decided to set up my own website because I wanted to show off the many designs my partner and I were constantly coming up with for baby clothing. It was one day when we were talking about setting up a business that I knew we had to go for it – what’s there to lose? Starting any new business seemed a bit daunting but I was pretty determined and before I knew it we were up and running. I used the Mr Site package in the hope to build on my fairly limited SEO and website design skills and also because it was reasonably priced. I wanted to learn the ropes first and do the majority of the work myself. We wanted a funky, vibrant theme for the website so its was pleasing to the eye and fun to use. The majority of our products are light-hearted and so we wanted to portray this in the design of the website.

Toughest SEO challenge

Although, I am fairly IT competent, I was still a beginner in terms of SEO and networking. I was actually probably quite naive to start with in that I thought that by simply having a website would guarantee a place on Google. It then dawned on me that I would be spending a large chunk of my time on SEO optimization. I decided to research this area and although I am not by any means an expert I am gaining knowledge all the time. I also underestimated the power of social networking and now allocate a lot of my time to this. Not only do I network with lots of other WAHM’s, but I have also made a lot of online friends after joining forums and discussion boards. Probably, the toughest challenge so far has been the steep learning curve of getting that sought after position on the search engines. I’ve spent so many hours reading posts on forums and can safely say we are getting there!

What I like best about my website

In terms of my website, I am really pleased with the look of it. My partner and I have spent so much time tweaking it and we now have over 60 designs which are all our own work. Hard work but definitely worth it. Its nice to know that an idea which we had so much confidence in, is now in motion and we will have no regrets in the future.

My top seo tip

My top SEO tip would have to be, to research the topic of SEO. Get to grips with concepts of it don’t expect instant results. The more work you put into it the more you will get out of it. I registered for Alison’s e-mail information service and can honestly say it has helped me no end. I am now a confident user of Twitter for personal and business purposes amongst much more!

Introduction to the SEO Training Club

Spot the Arm Candy

I’m a sucker for a handbag, and as regular readers know, I’m always on the hunt for the perfect but durable work bag to store my ever increasing array of must-have tech gadgets.

Last month I spoke at the Mumpreneur 10 Conference about my Seven Steps to Online Business Success System. The Conference also hosted the Mumpreneur Awards and I was thrilled to accept the Gold Award for Most Unique Product on behalf of Jac Waggett at baby changing bags business Pacapod. Jac sadly couldn’t make her moment of glory in person as she was actually showing Pacapod in Europe at Kind und Jugend to an admiring audience.

It was my absolute pleasure to pick up the award – and to my delight, kind hearted Jac offered me the pick of her prizes. Not having a bag to house my Macbook (as it was bought originally for my husband, who doesn’t “do” that kinda thang), I was more than happy to take collection of the fabulous laptop sleeve from Knomo you can see clutched to my side in the photo opposite.

What can I say ? I’m a complete handbag freak – and this is one classy accessory.

The laptop sleeve has a purple nylon quilted exterior with leather trim, giving great protection for your notebook against bangs and knocks. The interior is a contrasting silver silky fabric, there’s an outside flap to stash cabiles and the like, complete with the same silver lining. A strong, detachable shoulder strap and retractable leather handle completes the design.

Have wheels, must travel

I wish I hadn’t stepped online though to check out the rest of the collection.

I’ve now spotted the perfect wheeled laptop and overnight case combi which would be perfect for my upcoming US conference.

It has the same nylon quilting as the sleeves, and leather handles and trim – but a black exterior opens to reveal a flashy hot pink interior.

And it only weighs 6 lbs!

It’s £195 and available in black, brown and tomato red.

Just wondering if I can get a discount at the Airport. Sigh.

Knomo Laptop Sleeves – from £50.00.

Last week I made a mistake. Of the technical error variety. Regular readers of my blog will have noticed that I have moved back to this domain recently. It was during the “house move” from blog to blog that the error occurred.

Due to an unexpected connection (read completely undetected connection by myself) between my mailing list software and the blog, I managed to email a couple of hundred people with an email that didn’t make sense. Eleven times.

First I knew of it was when I got a very kind email from an ezine subscriber letting me know of said email and its frequency. I rushed over to my mailing list website to look at the damage. Yes, the email had been sent, with the frequency the kind ezine reader had suggested. It was head in hands time.

You see, there’s nothing more galling than when you put yourself out there as someone who “understands geeky stuff” for an embarrassing incident of the geeky type to occur on your watch.

Thankfully, just a small list had been emailed – not everyone – the group of peeps who have been “with me” for the longest time. Still, I braced myself for the complaints – and the unsubscribes.

What the Frack were “they” going to think? Having got used to a weekly ezine with free stuff about online marketing, they were now the unwilling recipients of eleven – count ‘em – plain text emails containing an elderly blog post?

Truth was, only six people left the list. And then only three people emailed me to complain about the email itself – all three seemingly not spotting it was a mistake rather than my usual ezine. One even said she had to unsubscribe because I was emailing her too often (!)

Everyone else seemed to have had a good spirited chuckle at my calamity and had moved on.

So, although it seemed like a disaster of epic proportions to me, it didn’t seem to upset those that mattered the most, my regular ezine members. And after thinking about it for a little while, I kind of realized why this might be:

The readers had been with me for a long time. They were used to what my communications looked like (the free tips ezine) and how often they got them (weekly, on a Friday). Anything else didn’t seem right to them, so they put it down to a mistake and ignored it.

So, thanks to my “technical error” I’ve learnt that there’s another bonus to having a regular, consistent approach to my online communications. A more forgiving audience when you screw things up

photo credit: tony_the_bald_eagle

I’m a sucker for a special offer, especially if it’s one connect with a bizz book!

Here’s one that will be helpful if you’re a mum and are looking for a new business idea

Over to you, gals!

If you want find a family friendly way to work, an empowering and hands-on book by flexible working experts Antonia Chitty and Helen Lindop can help. Antonia and Helen are on a mission to get 1000+ mums
launching their own business, and have put together some bonus material to help.

Buy Start A Family Friendly Business: 129 Brilliant Business Ideas forMums today and you also get an amazing pack of bonuses to help your business get off to a brilliant start! If you have your own business already TELL YOUR FRIENDS today!

Running your own business from home is a dream shared by millions of British mums. “Start a Family-Friendly Business: 129 brilliant business ideas for mums” can help you:

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• Create a plan that will put you on the first step to success.

Buy the book today and you’ll also get

• An exclusive podcast of Antonia Chitty and Helen Lindop’s tips and experience to help you create a successful business
• The Mumpreneur Success report: A factsheet of tips to back up the podcast
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How to enter:

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This offer is for Friday 8^th October ONLY and ends at midnight.

Don’t forget to tell your friends as you could really help them make a new start as an entrepreneur!

photo credit: Generationbass.com

I have a new social media addiction: Foursquare.

Those of you who follow me on Twitter (@alisonrothwell) or are facebook friends, may have spotted some little announcements from me, saying where I am. These are all generated by an interesting social media app, Foursquare.

The idea behind Foursquare is that you use your ‘phone to log your wherabouts or as Foursquare put it:

“Foursquare is a mobile application that makes cities easier to use and more interesting to explore. It is a friend-finder, a social city guide and a game that challenges users to experience new things, and rewards them for doing so. Foursquare lets users “check in” to a place when they’re there, tell friends where they are and track the history of where they’ve been and who they’ve been there with.”

So it works on a few different levels – a kind of diary (where you record where you go), a guide book (which tells you about interesting places near to your location), a game (where you collect profile “badges” for various places you check in and actions you take) and a “friend finder” (presumably this is when you spot all your pals are the local coffeee shop without you and you dash out to be with them, like in an episode of Friends).

Interestingly though, there are a few ways that a business can use Foursquare for some promotion.

“Check in” to a place enough times and you earn the status of “Mayor” an icon which can be viewed on your profile. Canny restaurants and coffee shops are rewarding Mayors with freebies, such as a free lattes for the duration of their Mayorship. As every time someone checks in to a venue, their friends are alerted, it’s a great opportunity for some viral marketing, and if you are offering a prize to the person who checks in the most…

Other businesses are offering a special offer as a “tip” which can be viewed when Foursquare users check in to their venue or are nearby.

If you’d like to connect with me, my profile is here: Foursquare

One of the marketing blogs I love to read is IttyBiz from uber-marketeer Naomi Dunford.

This week Naomi challenged her readers to answer a very scary question.
“What do you actually do?”

Since I am not a scaredy-cat, I thought I’d try and give it a shot. Here goes.

What’s your game? What do you do?

I help small businesses and solopreneurs who struggle to market their business online effectively and need to make more sales online quickly and consistently

Why do you do it? Do you love it, or do you just have one of those creepy knacks?

I love it – and I have a creepy knack!

Who are your customers? What kind of people would need or want what you offer?

They’re peeps who are just so busy doing their online sales thang that they need simple steps to follow that are proven to work that they can do themselves. Or, they can be part of the small gang who hire me exclusively to do it all for them .

What’s your marketing USP? Why should I buy from you instead of the other losers?

Well, I’ve walked the walk. I’ve set up two online bizz – and I learnt internet marketing from scratch myself. There’s not many peeps out there who understand how hard it is to run your own bizz and sell products online… I genuinely enjoy helping people to crack internet marketing and get the online success they deserve

What’s next for you? What’s the big plan?

Hee hee. I have plans. lots of them. Stay tuned…

So, there you have it Naomi! Makes change from those super soppy “what’s your favorite kitten” type of memes

Last weekend I finally managed to get round to my first experience of geocaching.

Wendy (baby friendly holiday guru) introduced me to the concept of geocaching a couple of months back, but I hadn’t found the time before now (or really “got it” if I’m being honest!).

The concept is not as hard as I thought it was. It’s simply a worldwide treasure hunt coordinated by a website and the treasure or “cache” is located via a GPS (in my case, my Iphone).

I just signed up to the website and did a search online for my nearest buried treasure (the “cache”). Then, I downloaded an app to help me locate the cache via GPS and off we set, on our first ever geocache expedition.

We managed to locate two caches on the usual walking route we take – one of the caches had been hidden for two years, so we had spent two years wandering past it without knowing it was there.

Both caches were small tupperware containers with some “goodies” inside for the girls (we exchanged with some keyrings and erasers I’d brought along) and a list on which we wrote our names and dated to say we’d found and opened the cache.

Back at base, I went online (http://www.geocaching.com/) and recorded that we’d located the caches which were then stored in my online profile.

M (nearly 12) loved the experience – a good way to get kids out in the fresh air? – R is maybe a  bit young at nearly 4 to appreciate the hunting around part, but liked the “treasure.” Me? I liked being able to combine two of my favorite hobbies – country walks and my macbook!

I was amazed to discover that there are probably 30-40 caches within easy reach of my postcode, with more caches being hidden every day. Can’t wait for our next adventure!

Sign up for yours at http://www.geocaching.com/

photo credit: Rhys Alton

This week I discovered that trade shows are not the only place you can bag a decent bizz freebie.

Let me introduce you to my latest hobby – collecting wisdom from the Gurus.

The hobby is not hard to manage. It work like this:

1. Find a Guru
2. Visit Guru’s website/blog
3. Download freebie

In the never-ending rush to list build, you’d be surprised at what people are willing to give away – MP3 training, Audio recordings of teleseminars, workbooks, CDs, worksheets, organisational tools…

All in return for my email address. As I’m genuinely interested in what the peeps have to offer, being on their mailing list is no hardship – I may even become a customer – and in return I have a mountain of audio and PDFs to enjoy. All of it is fab stuff as I’ve been careful to only connect with Gurus I’m interested in.

My top tips are as follows:

Identify a guru whose thang you love – via facebook, twitter, word of mouth, whatever

Once you’ve downloaded their freebies, take a look at who they’re linking to and check out those sites

Try US/Canada sites for some of the most desperate generous freebies

Only download stuff you will find useful – no point clogging up your inbox with rubbish

Enjoy!

photo credit: •°°• ?? baghi ?? •°°•

Just a quick drive by ad for a free webinar I’m hosting next week over at my bizz, the SEO Training Club.

I have managed to persuade Natalie, my other half here at Self Employed Mum, to spill her secrets about authority blogging – I can’t wait to ask her all about being a pro blogger and why her blogs have been such a rip roaring success!

If you’re nosy too, then head on over to the SEO Training Club to read more or sign up here – it’s free!

photo credit: ctaloi

Friday afternoon again, and if you’re in the mood for a shirking session, I have just the online delight to share with you.

Last year I raved to you all to Samorost, now from the same Amanita Design stable comes their latest masterpiece: Machinarium.

It’s a simply stunningly rendered point and click adventure game in the same style, but replacing Samorost, we have a robot who needs our help.

The puzzles are still frustratingly tricky at times, but there’s both a help forum, plus in-game hints if you get really, really stuck (which I did do at times!).

Machinarium combines beautiful graphics with spookily atmospheric music and a complex storyline which you uncover bit by bit as you progress through the game. The fantasy world is a delight to move through and the attention to detail is exquisite. Characterization is strong and you find yourself rooting for a happy ending for the little robot. It’s also mind-bogglingly addictive – time and again I promised myself the current level would be my last but then had to carry on, just to see what would happen next.

The first few levels are free to play, then if you fancy stretching your brain muscle a little more, you can download the remainder for $14.99 (PC and Mac versions). Be warned, it’s as horribly addictive as their previous adventures!

Last week I got an email from a virtual contact of mine. Someone who lives in my village but (to my shame) all our previous communication has been online via various business forums.

I rang her for a chat and she suggested that I tried out a local breakfast meeting as her guest. Now, although I’ve now been self employed for a few years now, I confess that most of my networking tends to be online, in the virtual world that many geek type peeps inhabit these days.

The fact is that unless it’s a women’s event, almost every get together in “the real business world” is entirely geared around those without children – after all, how many parents can make a 7.00 am meeting unless it’s with Peppa Pig in their own front room?

So, thanks to my DH being able to get both children up, dressed and off to where they should be, I found myself off to try out my first ever breakfast network meeting.

The group was informal (thank goodness) and also much younger than I expected. There was the usual smattering of service types (accountant, solicitor) plus some other more diverse business types such as a lighting specialist. The format was pretty simple – introductions, news, a 10 minute talk from a member and then a very civilised English breakfast!

One rule I set myself is that I don’t do anything that takes up my time without taking some action for a positive benefit to the business. So I don’t lurk on forums for example. From this meeting I got a great contact that I’m hoping I can use to sort out some of my organisational needs, plus a meeting with a business coach, to access 3 months free coaching courtesy of Business Link.

And I was back by 9.15 a.m.!

I’ll keep you posted as to whether this group becomes a regular part of my working life. I’m certainly interested enough to go back next week. In the meantime, if any of you are in the Central Lancashire area and are interested in networking, you can contact Shout Network.

photo credit: arvindgrover

In the previous posts in this series we have looked at starting out with an initial idea, researching your idea and analyzing your competitors. Now it’s time to think about putting all that hard work together in the form of an action plan.

I read a lot of debate online about whether you should write a business plan when you set your new bizz up. After all, isn’t it a whole load of faff?! Isn’t it just something you do when you want to grovel for some money from the bank?

Well, the truth is, if you’ve followed some of the things I’ve written about in the earlier posts then you are already well on the way to having a plan good and ready. If it helps, call it an action plan rather than a business plan too.

Think of it this way, you wouldn’t set out on a long journey to somewhere you’ve never been before with out a map, would you? So don’t make your journey into your new online retail business any more difficult. Write an action plan so you know where you’re going and how to get there!

I’m not going to go through everything you need to write in your action plan – hell no, there are whole books out there you can grab from Amazon or your local library which show you in great detail what you can put in a business plan.

Instead, I recommend opening up a file on your computer and writing down everything you’ve done so far under these headings:

• Customers: your target customer, your marketplace,
• Sales/Marketing: How will you promote your business? Your pricing?
• Competitors: (the results from your competitor analysis)
• Suppliers: Who will you buy your stock from? Their terms and conditions
• Resources: What do you need to set up your business?
• Management: Who will be running your business?

After you’ve jotted notes down all your notes, put it away for a couple of days, as it can feel a bit overwhelming to get down every bit of detail you have in your head.

I’ll be coming back to this post shortly with some more details and some parts that you’ll need to add, but for the time being, pat yourself on the back. By writing down a plan, you’re already on your way to running a successful online retail business.

Doesn’t it feel better to have written down the results of your planning and research?

I’ve blogged previously about the usefulness of trade shows and how to get the best out of your visit.

It’s not easy to decide which you’ll opt for, but new start ups should take the time out to attend all they can and make a note of their usefulness  for the future when you may be more time-poor.

So here are some of my recommendations for six of the best UK trade fairs.

Don’t forget, even if you’re not sure you’ll make it, it’s still worth signing up for the mailing list, particularly Spring Fair which gives regular industry news updates throughout the year.

Always make sure you register in advance as sometimes you have to pay otherwise (and get stuck in a long queue when you’re itching to get started “walking the floor”).

1. Business Startups – general start up advice – worth attending more for the seminars and the training sessions. Some of the government exhibitors such as the IPO have useful 1-2-1 sessions.
2. Bubble - after the demise of Premier Kids this is now the best (only?) event to get the most leads for the children’s fashion industry. Originally a US import it’s now hosted at the cool setting of the Business Exhibition Centre, Islington. Not as quirky as before, but here in the UK, beggars can’t be choosers.
3. Spring Fair – hall after hall of types of gift related goods including toys, jewellery, household goods… Worth a two day visit if you are seriously seeking established brands. There’s also a smaller “Autumn Fair.”
4. Harrogate Nursery Fair – Great trade fair for picking up nursery suppliers and one of the very few to take place outside the the twin centres of the NEC (Birmingham) or the London Excel/Olympia circuit. Includes furniture and other nursery accessories as well as prams. Joining up with BPA Baby Show for a new event this October (2010).
5. Pulse – leading edge interior and living suppliers here with a contemporary twist. Pulse London offers the only Summer trade event focusing on the gift sector.
6. Top Drawer – Two fairs a year (January and September, London). Top Drawer covers the design-led gift, children’s, stationary and greeting, home and fashion sectors.

Have I missed any must-sees ?

photo credit: kevindooley

I love these quirky fossils of the future, according to their creator, KB Sculptures, this is how our ancestors will remember us!

This one is a mouse fossil (the computer kind) and it’s set with lots of ” fossils” in a lump of rock. A great talking point for your office desk and the perfect present for the computer geek.

It’s cast in Herculite and makes an ideal paperweight too.

Approximate  size 14 x 9 x 6cm

Price: £11.50 plus  £2.50 postage.

Welcome to my web site.

You can find info here on (nearly) everything I’m involved in -  online marketing, SEO training and my seo consultancy.

This week my Macbook has become painfully slow. In fact, it would be easier if I got out and pushed.

To combat this unexpected turn of events, I did what I usually do and googled my problem. I was presented with a gazillion different things to do from modifying firefox (and add-ons) to cleaning up my desktop (admittedly the desk top is as cluttered as my actual desk!)

When all this failed to fire up the Quatro, I fell back onto the “download a bit of software from the net – that’ll do the trick” option and used a recommended programme, cutely called “Macaroni.”

Macaroni seems to do the usual sorting out of hard drives stuff, with the ability to schedule daily, weekly and monthly clean ups. It also had one addition I’d never thought of before: the “foreign language clean up.”

Yep, it removes all those files in other languages on your Mac. To be honest, I’d never given much thought to the uselessness of having Albanian versions of Read Me text files before. Or how much hard drive space they were taking up. However, with the click of a button all was revealed. rather a lot, as it turns out.

Voila, Macbook now souped up and running at top speed again. Thanks Macaroni

Macaroni – FREE 35 day trial and then $9.99 to buy.

photo credit: Pink Sherbet Photography

Even geeks can grow office plants!

This planter from the Science Museum puts NASA’s proven technology to good use, helping even the most green-challenged gardener grow plants.

The planter defines soil-less gardening, and provides an ideal growing environment for herbs, flowers and fruit. All you need to do is seed it, feed it and leave your plants to grow. With no soil to mess up your desk, it’s the perfect home-office solution!

Power Plant £35.00 plus delivery from £4.95 (UK only).

If paperweights make you swoon then feast your eyes on this simply gorgeous paperweight from UK designer, Panic Tuesday. “Vintage Time” is a resin paper weight with watch parts, beads, a vintage button and a fabric rose, plus natural inclusions.
The width of the domed paper weight is about 3 inches and the base is covered with black felt to protect your office desk (my desk needs protection from myself!) This would make an unusual present and is also gift-wrapped free of charge.

£22.00 plus £2.00 postage.

I’m a sucker for notebooks despite having a macbook nailed to my knees. They’re great for jotting down notes and inspiration – and if they have a cool cover, more so the better.

I’m loving these vintage library notebooks from Present and Correct. They measure 4.25″ x 5.75″ and have a handprinted wrap around cover. Each notebook also has a library pocket and ticket which you can stick into your book and tuck in stuff like receipts, tickets and other papery things!

Two titles to choose from:

• Basic Robotic Engineering by Anne Droid (silver, gold & white) (my fave) or
• An Encyclopaedia of Poisons by R.C. Nick (black, grey & silver)

£6.50 from Present and Correct. Postage at cost. Worldwide shipping available.

Regular readers will know of my eternal quest (encouraged by Nat) to develop ultra-organisational abilities. As a geek, I’m also a sucker for anything online and techy. Often, I get as far as a road test before giving up, but one online tool I am still using every day, months after signing up, is project management software, Huddle.

UK based, Huddle is an online workspace that you can use to work together with people. I use it to manage my virtual assistant, work with a couple of business partners and liaise with my internet marketing clients. It is this type of flexibility that makes Huddle such a good solution for those organisationally challenged peeps like myself.

Huddle gives you a range of communication options including sharing and storing files online and creating and editing documents online. Discussions can be managed through unlimited discussion forums and whiteboards (like Wikis). You’re able to notify group members immediately of any changes to the workspace, ask for approvals for documents or let peeps know you’ve uploaded files.

Add into the mix a task management facility which links to an online calender (which can also be synced with iCal) and you have a pretty nifty way to keep projects on track. Oh, and there’s also an app for your iphone

My only criticism is that if you have several projects running it can get pricey for the small business to add extra workspaces to their account, but you can take advantage of one free workspace to try Huddle out and see whether it suits.

Firstly, this post is not a free pass for sneaky tactics! But nor should you miss this step out from your planning because it feels a bit, well, grubby…

If you’re going into buisness then you need to understand your competition. You need to know what their strengths are and you need to be laser targeting their weaknesses. The only way you will be able to do this is if you have done some competitor research.

You need to do competitor research to understand:

• What markets or market segments your competitors serve
• What benefits your competition offers
• Why their customers buy from them

And as much as possible about their products or services, their pricing, and promotion (or marketing) tactics.

An easy way to start is go online and research the top 10-15 companies listed on google for your top keyword.

• Note down what products the websites sell,
• Which stockists do they use?
• Their pricing strategy – are they aimed at the luxury market or the lower end?
• Make notes on their website’s usability – can you move around easily or is their website confusing?
• Place some orders and see what their customer service is like.
• Look for any online articles or press releases (google for more information)

If they are Limited Companies you can actually have a good old nosy of their accounts which are downloadable for a a few quid over at the Companies House website. This may give you an idea of what a realistic turnover may be. Also make a note of what trade shows (if any) they attend or exhibit at during the year.

Make sure you are noting all this information down – I use a notebook for research as well as a spreadsheet. Sometimes I’ll have a thought and need to quickly note it down before I forget. A mind map is another useful research tool.

From your competitor research you should try to identify your own market niche and your competitive advantage. Something that your competitors aren’t doing that you can do or some way to improve (and better) what your competitors currently offer. For example, for children’s parties, I might notice that few businesses offer “all-in-one parties in-a-box” type of services. I would note that down and do further research to discover whether this is a product that customers may wish to buy.

Competitor research is a vital part of planning your new business. Always think “What can I do better?” and “what can I offer that the competition don’t?”

photo credit: foxypar4

We were tagged by Antonia over at Family Friendly Working, to say seven things you didn’t know about us, so here goes!

Ali’s 7 Things…

1. I love handbags with a passion. You will know I’ve made it when I sport a Chanel black 2.55 as my arm candy.

2. The last time I sang in public was when I was 18 and played Mrs Peachum in The Threepenny Opera.

3. I’ve had a crush on Harrison Ford for 33 years…

4. I suffered from secondary infertility.

5. I’m a big Sci-fi fan.

6. I have all of Nigel Slater’s recipe books and I hold him responsible for my current punishing diet.

7. I was once a very political animal.

Natalie’s 7 Things…

1. I was brought up in Dublin so I have a mixed accent. When I started blogging and was anonymous, people assumed I was fair skinned with red hair…

2. I’ve been doing acupuncture for 4 years as it helped me to recover from an immune system disease, Sarcoidosis.

3. I have about 100 pairs of shoes although most have been neglected since I had kids…

4. I was asked by a very famous rapper to go back to his hotel room with him and his entourage but I declined telling him that ‘group activities’ aren’t my thang…

5. I watch at least one episode of Sex and the City each week.

6. I have an early baby picture of me being held by Bob Marley (as shown).

7. I’ve lost a Mulberry handbag in my attic. I keep meaning to do a clearout…

We’re really pleased Self Employed Mum is hosting this month’s business mum’s carnival. We’ve got a whole stack of posts ready for you for your delight and delectation.

As usual, if you like what you read, then don’t forget to add a comment to the blog!

First up is Helen Lindop over at Business plus Baby. She has the thought provoking post Why Mumpreneurs Should Make a Decent Profit…

A blog post to make you smile is over at More 4 Mums, where Lynn Hogg explains how she managed to influence the Government through a few tweets!

Becky Goddard Hill shares How to Plan the Best Party on Earth over at Baby Budgeting.

Over at Mumazing, Sam Thewlis is asking how we find the Measure of Success ?

Time Management Mum, Nadine Hill, has a few pointers for industry on her wish list Tips for Companies Who Market To Mums.

Rachel, who’s currently Girl Friday at her local church, shares a typical working day with us over at Tales from Lewis Lodge.

Over at Support 4 Women, T-J is Taking Stock… While Elaine at Little Sheep Learning is Setting Targets.

Mums The Boss share a post by Susan Odev inspiring you to stop asking and start listening to your inner voice in I’ll Go Where The Muse It Takes Me.

Finally, Antonia over at Family Friendly Working gives some insight into herself by sharing seven things we don’t know about her.

Enjoy!

photo credit: Vince Alongi

In my last post I decide to use the example of starting up an online business connected with children’s parties to illustrate the “First Steps… In Online Retail” series.

This post looks in more detail at imho one of the most important business building blocks – market research.

My definition of market research probably won’t pass muster with any “proper” researchers, but here are some ways which have worked for me…

Business Libraries: The Mecca of business libraries is probably the City library in London. When setting up one of my businesses I actually made the journey from ‘Up North” to “Down South” three times to use the facilities here. I’ve also used the Manchester Business Library too which is v good. There is usually a business library in most big cities and often at Universities which you may be able to access. Use the information in a business library to research the sector and the market. Start by asking the Librarians – they’ll know where all the info is…

Research reports to look out for: Keynote, Mori and NOP… Also ask the librarians if they know of any BOPs (Business Opportunity Profiles) which might be related. Don’t discount any research that isn’t bang on as you may uncover related nuggets of info that adds to your knowledge.

Trade Magazines: Business libraries usually carry these, including the more obscure ones. If not, then it’s quite easy to sign up (often free) for ones which can give you new and up to date perspectives on the marketplace. Not sure on any for the children’s party sector, so think laterally – gift sector ? (Gifts Today), toys? (Toys and Playthings)…

Online Newspaper Collections: Use these to search for related news stories – I picked up an item on the cost of children’s parties for example and how much parent’s will spend… Also see if any of your competitors have had coverage in the press and what it was for.

Local Business Link - they may have information you can access for free – for related research concerned with business topics then the business link website is worth a good rummage.

Trade Shows - these can be great sources of both information and inspiration!

The Long List…

From all of this research, make a long list of any potential business ideas you could look further into:
Eg for the children’s party sector

• General retail of party items
• Party Invitations
• Partyware
• Fancy Dress
• Party Bags – cheap, green, luxury, fairtrade ?
• Bouncy castle hire

Based on this research you should now have started to identify possible business opportunities and know if the sector is growing, the size of the market and who the main competitors are…?

Asy yourself, “Is this a viable business sector for me?”

If the answer is “yes” then the next step is to analyse the competition!

photo credit: adactio

In the first of an occasional series, I’ll be sharing some of things I’ve learnt since becoming an online entrepreneur and answering the big question I see asked on forums and online noticeboards…

“I want to start an online business “selling stuff” – but I don’t know where to start!”

Firstly, you need to decide what you will sell and to whom.

I know that sounds obvious, but often peeps get a bit carried away with the idea of selling online and don’t stop to think about what exactly they will sell and who they will sell it to.

My advice would be to find a niche and target a specific market.

If you seriously want to make money online then finding a niche is not about selling something so unique only a few people will want to buy, it’s about selling things people want in sufficient numbers but offering a new spin or targeting a group of potential customers (your unique selling point – USP).

A word of warning too – don’t let “mummy vision” cloud your business ideas. Many new mums start great businesses when inspiration strikes after they give birth and discover a must-have baby product or invent something new and practical as a result of their experiences. However, some become one of the many sling makers/sellers, real nappy makers/sellers, etc etc and realise that once their child has outgrown that stage they’ve outgrown their enthusiasm for the product!

Think carefully about what your big idea is – is it something that motivates you, you feel enthusiastic about because of what it is rather than what stage you are in your life. Remember success doesn’t happen overnight. If you thought you may not make any money from your business to pay yourself a wage for a year, or even two! Would you still have the hots for it?

As an example for this series, let’s look at selling something connected to children’s parties.

The party business is fairly steady, parents do spend on their children’s parties when they may cut back elsewhere. If I was starting a business in this area I would gather some research to back this up (from a business library, Business Link etc), and find out as much information to test this idea before I committed myself.

In my next post I’ll be looking at how you can research your children’s party business idea quickly and painlessly…

photo credit: macieklew

We hope that you manage to have a few hours off today to relax and enjoy Mother’s Day.

If you’ve got a few minutes spare then you might like to take a look at the latest Mummo Mag, edited by the fabulous Jo Rheam of Mummo to help spread the word about the Million Mums appeal.

There’s lots of interesting stuff inside, mind and body, home and family issues, articles on home schooling, travel and a dollop of business stuff too (including an interview with Ali).

Enjoy!

Mummo Mag

Is this the ultimate in office relaxation?
The USB Aromatherapy Oil Burner delights your nose and clears your mind with just one drop.
Simply add one drop of the included aromatherapy oil onto the little X on the USB stick (see above). Step two, pop the stick into a USB drive (horizontal drives preferred to prevent drips – boo – not good for my Office Mac).

Are you one of those peeps who spend a lot of time looking for colors to use online?

Do you ever look at a site and think – “ooh! that looks lovely? I wonder what those colors are?”

Then let me introduce to one of my favorite online tools, Colorzilla.

ColorZilla is a plug-in extension for Mozilla Firefox browser and the Mozilla Suite.

Although it’s aimed at web developers and graphic designers with color related tasks, like choosing website colors, it’s a very handy tool which I use more than I thought I ever would.

Once you have installed Colorzilla you are able to get an instant reading of the colors any website is using with just a quick click of the mouse. There’s also a built-in palette browser which lets you choose colors from pre-defined color sets and  you can save the colors in custom palettes available online.

To give you just one example, I’m working on a website for a client at the moment – it’s a second site but needs to have the same look and feel as the original. Getting a list of the colors from the original site would be a tedious job, involving contacting her previous designers, noting them all down, checking for typos etc.. Using Colorzilla I was able to grab the colors from the site immediately and give the new techies an online link to the color palette – problem solved in nano-seconds!

Download Colorzilla and have a more colorful life online…

photo credit: Jimmy_Joe

Some of you may have caught some of my tweets on Saturday (from @selfemployedmum and @alisonrothwell) and been a bit mystified as to why I was promoting a product for you to buy, as I don’t normally do this.

On Saturday I was a guest speaker at an Internet Marketing seminar, organised by Nick James. Nick is a mentor of mine and an information product guru. For those of you unfamiliar with the phrase “information product” these are literally the products you see for sale on the net solving a problem someone has with the aid of books, audio CDs, software, DVDs etc, on all kinds of subjects from puppy training to crochet. I’ve bought quite a few information products and have always been interested in how they are put together.

On Saturday, in front of a live audience, Nick showed how easy it was to create your own quality information product, and, just like Jack Bauer, did it in “real time.” The product research was done in advance – Nick put together a package for people to learn how to make their own information products (!) The 24 hour Product Formula for a very reasonable price of £15.00. On Saturday he put together the webpage, blog and ran live direct marketing campaigns. The tweets you saw from me, were part of this.

The webpage went up, with minutes to spare, at the planned time of 11.00 a.m. (just as in real life there were a couple of technical glitches!). At 11.17, the first order came through. Every hour after that, the sales were announced and the Paypal account figure shown on the screen. I have to say it was amazing to see that whenever some action was taken (like launching the blog), you were able to see the effect on the sales figures.

My presentation focused on using SEO to promote your product, and I shared some SEO tips for quick returns. Other speakers explained how the graphics were put together for the product, how to use video marketing, set up a blog etc.

And the best thing?

Not only did Nick show how easy it was to create and market a quality information product (to an audience of Newbies), every penny of the money raised from each sale of the 24 Hour Product Formula is being donated to Oxfam, for their Haiti appeal.

By 5pm, Nick had reached his target of 100 online sales. By 2300, just 12 hours after launch, this had doubled to just over 200  orders. Yesterday, the total was 260 online sales and he’s hoping to make $10,000 within 48 hours of the product launch.

What I learnt:

• That putting together an information product is so much easier than you think
• You have to “take action”, make things happen and not dither about
• That creating an information product could work really well for lots of businesses e.g. PR, accountancy, VA services, for both marketing and making money. For example, one delegate at the seminar had created products to help the self employed put together a SA tax return quickly.
• If you create a quality product, for an audience which has a reason to buy, and market it properly, then you will make money.

Could you create an information product to help your customers?

You can check out the sales page here and also the blog.

photo credit: John Griffiths

OK, I’m waiting for Godot, sorry Google, and Man is it getting tedious…

I built a site on Sunday – nothing fancy – just a self-hosted wordpress blog skinned with a magazine theme. It’s a test site for me to do some experimenting on, in particular, some marketing stuff.

I set it all up, wrote ten pages of content, and then sat back smugly expecting Mr Google Bot to come calling and pay his respects.

Except he hasn’t.

Last night I logged back into Webmaster Tools (http://www.google.com/webmastertools/) to find that Google hasn’t been able to access my site map beacuse of an error with a plug-in. So I’ve removed that and submitted a rss feed instead.

Woke up this morning. Nada.

I’ll let you know when I finally get indexed, but in the meantime, here’s some ideas about how you get google to notice your new site:

• Bookmark it using a social bookmarking site such as Delicious
• Write an article for the site and submit it to an article directory, remembering to add a link back to your new site
• Leave your new URL in any forum sigs you have
• Add the new site to online directories (but make sure they’re ones with a good rep, not spammy)

And not forgetting, a manual submission here: http://www.google.co.uk/addurl/

photo credit: Yodel Anecdotal

On Tuesday 12 January, I’ll be kicking off a new FREE webinar – the Beginner’s Guide to Search Engine Optimization.

A webinar covering everything you want to know about search engine optimization (SEO) but were afraid to ask.

Join me as I explain

• What meta tags are and why they are important
• How to build the best backlinks and avoid the ones that are worthless
• What Web 2.0 is and how it can benefit your business

And much, much more…

The webinar dates are below. If you can’t make next week’s then do sign up for the February or March dates.

Tue, Jan 12, 2010 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM GMT
Registration Web Link: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/127695905

Tue, Feb 9, 2010 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM GMT
Registration Web Link: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/327353297

Tue, Mar 9, 2010 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM GMT
Registration Web Link: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/675296305

I have one of the most untidy desks around – but I’m sure it would be a different story if I had one of these cool Campervan Desk Tidies.

Some self assembly is needed but the neat trick is that it is fully customisable with a range of fun stickers.

£5.99 from Gadgets.co.uk.

Launching this new bizz has been a different kettle of fish to my other businesses.

For a start, I’ve had to get to grips with a whole new type of website software to help me deliver the customer experience I wanted. One of the biggest changes though has been on the testing side.

When you launch a new site it’s best practice to test out various areas before you unleash it onto the interweb e.g. payment processing…

However, my new business, the SEO Training Club, is a membership site. Customers pay a subscription to receive training and information available exclusively through my website. And having members means more opportunities for kinks and creases and people not using the site quite in the way I expected them to…

So, to make the launch process as smooth as possible, I decided to take a two tier approach to testing:

1. I invited a small group of mixed ability internet users to join the site as “beta-testers.” The advance party were people I knew and trusted to give an honest opinion (although kindly spoken!) Their advice was key when I formed my branding – one beta-tester, for example, not only disliked the original color scheme, but gave me such compelling reasons to change it based on his professional expertise, that I did have a turn around – even though it set me back about 3 weeks. This kind of feedback is gold dust for a new business.

2. I decided to do a “soft-launch” with a charter membership. A soft-launch is a way to gently unleash your business to potential customers giving you time to evaluate what works and what doesn’t work before you roll out the red carpet and blow up the balloons. By now, the beta-testers have uncovered any major issues – charter members are more about learning how members interact with the site. In return for being early-adopters, the charter members pay a much lower membership subscription.

If you’re putting together a new website then pre-testing is a helpful way to make the launch process easier. Here are a few tips:

• Test out any branding, logos etc preferably with people unconnected with your business – business forums are a good place to recruit a helping hand.
• Recruit some testers to navigate your site – in particular ensure the payment processing side works correctly.
• Use analytics software such as “google analytics” to keep an eye on visitor browsing patterns. Are there any weak areas?

So now, the testing period is almost complete, and the next step is to think carefully about launching the new business to the rest of the interweb… Watch this space…

photo credit: ATKR

Word has it that there’s soon to be a new search engine in town…

The mighty behemoth Google has been undergoing a face-lift since the Summer, code-named “caffeine”.

Google is rumoured to be rolling out this new search engine in the New Year. There has been some research so far into the suspected changes to the algorithm and how this may affect websites and I will be sharing this with you in this special FREE webinar:

“All the News on Google Caffeine and What it Means for Your Website.”

If you’re so hard-core for your morning coffee you stand by the kettle yelling “hurry!” then this might be the ideal piece of office candy for you.

This coffee and espresso maker uses sophisticated technology to brew your coffee to perfection, giving you the ultimate-full flavour experience. And an added bonus, the brewing takes just one minute from start to finish..

Price: £35.00 plus £4.95 delivery from the Science Museum Online Store.

I find it hard to resist anything sparkly, and when it combines glamour with geekdon, I say bring it on!

These cute mini optical pc mice (meeces?) are hand rocked to order with your choice of Swarovski crystal colours – citrine, topaz, clear, fuschia, jet, rose, light rose, sapphire, light sapphire, peridot or siam – so lots of choice there then!

It has all the functions of a regular optical mouse and is sized to fit a notebook, computer or laptop. The optical sensor means it can be used any any surfaceand it is complete with a retractable cord that can be locked to 3 different lengths.

If you’re ever tempted to try “Bejewelled Blitz” - a game on Facebook – then my advice is not to!

A deceptively easy concept – it’s one of those flash games you just have to line up the “jewels” to score points in just one minute. This cunningly conceals the fact that it’s the online equivalent of crack cocaine.

When I first started I found it hard to score into double figures – Facebook handily puts you onto a team scoreboard to play against the rest of your Facebook Friends – I now get the odd 100,000 + score but not very often.

Some of my “friends” though seem to score upwards of 200,000 and I only just manage not to call them out as black magic voodoo dabblers, as I can see no way that these scores are legit.

Must go, off to see if I can beat my last score… You have been warned…

Tribute office mug to 70′s weatherman icon, Micheal Fish.

It’s magic – all you do is make a hot drink and watch the clouds disappear.

What more relaxing way could there be to spend a tea-break than turning grey skies to blue?

Price £10.00 plus £4.95 delivery from the Science Museum online shop.

Once you’ve collected your business cards from conferences, networking events etc. you’re left with a problem – just what do you do to keep them all together?

Don’t buy one of those little books with the pockets in – that’s way too corporate! And don’t follow my lead by having little piles stashed around the office.

Try this instead. This little file cabinet looks like a shrunken version of the real thing, but holds up to eight hundred business cards. Two drawers pull out, letting you shuffle through your entire collection. There’s even lettered-tabs to help keep everything organized.

$12.99 from Think Geek. International shipping.

I once worked with someone who had one of these on her desk.

Galileo first dreamed up this invention over 400 years old, but it will never go out of fashion. The ornamental glass thermometer has five precisely-weighted coloured balls which rise and fall according to the temperature.

Beautiful and useful, too. £15.00 plus £4.95 delivery from the Science Museum online shop.

At the internet marketing seminar I attended last weekend I discovered a new time management technique which I thought I’d share with you all.

It’s called the Pomodoro Technique (a name close to my heart as I love tomatoes!). It was invented by an Italian student, Francesco Cirillo, who used one of those “tomato kitchen timers” to measure chunks of his time. It enables the user to focus on the task in hand they need to accomplish and to use time as an ally instead of a source of anxiety!

To get started, all you need is:

• A kitchen timer
  You can use either a real timer or a software timer. Set it to 25 minutes.
• A sheet of paper
• A pencil

The Pomodoro Technique then works like this:

1. Choose a task to be accomplished
2. Set the timer to 25 minutes
   
3. Work on the task until the timer rings, then put a check on your sheet of paper
4. Take a short break (5 minutes is OK)
5. Every 4 Pomodoros take a longer break

So the idea is that you break down that impossible task into smaller chunks which are do-able. Apparently, you’ll be able spot improvements within a couple of days and master the technique after a week or so.

So, I’m going to give it a go and see whether it improves my time management

The Pomodoro Technique website has a free e-book to download plus a cute “starter kit.”

Rosetta Stone Mouse Mat

One for history buffs, here’s  a uniquely shaped mousemat based on the Rosetta Stone, one of the key exhibits in the British Museum.

Apparently it’s made from a wipe clean polycarbonate surface with non-slip base.

We think it’s just too cool for school but will look great in our office!

£8.99 from the British Museum shop online – FREE Delivery!

There comes a time that you have to think about managing growth, and that often starts with the addition of other pairs of hands to help you run your business. Let’s face it, when you’re working all day and packing all night, then it’s time to think about getting some help!

This is a subject dear to my heart at the moment. I have several clients I work with that are at the stage of recruiting one or two members of staff. I’ve also been faced with the realisation that in order to grow my seo consultancy I need to consider a way to expand.

Traditionally the way to grow your business was to recruit part/full-time members of staff who you would employ yourself. However, there are some advantages to thinking outside the box before you take this step:

Outsource – are there parts of your job that you could hive off to someone else to do, freeing up more of your time? PR, marketing, seo, bookkeeping and admin are all areas where it is easy to outsource. Ask around for recommendations. The advantage of outsourcing is that it enables you to “try out” employing staff in a way in which you avoid the direct management responsibilities. If it’s not working out, subject to contract, you can simply “move on.”

Students – if you have a business where you need say packing duties, then consider hiring a local student for a couple of hours a day to simply process and pack orders. Beats pulling pints….

Placement Students – Many university courses, particularly business degrees, require students to spend a year working full-time to gain work experience. You usually have to pay a salary but you have the chance of a super-keen person to work for you with a lot less hassle. It’s not just undergraduates too – many colleges have postgraduate courses with a work placement component too. The careers department is a good place to begin enquiries.

So, do any of you have any experiences of outsourcing, working with students or other ideas to share?

photo credit: joiseyshowaa

The other day I totted up my working hours and discovered that I could probably put a Junior Doctor to shame!

Running my businesses has become literally a 14 hour day – with six hours each on Saturday and Sunday. And that’s just to keep still. All my development work is happening at night with the lap top and a very forgiving husband.

But tomorrow, I’m playing hooky from the Office!

I’m attending an internet marketing seminar – it’s actually Friday-Sunday. As this takes out time I’d be working in the office I’m determined to a) Get the best bang for my buck b) Use the time as efficiently as possible.

To get the most out of the day, I’ve already arranged to meet up with someone who I collaborate with on and off-line – I’ve loads of geeky stuff to chat with him about and it will be great to be able to have a face-to-face. I’ve also got a couple of others attending I’ve not met IRL and am looking forward to meeting.

I’ll make great use of my time by mind mapping some plans during my journey time (I’m traveling by train).

I think my best reason for escaping the office though has to be to bring back some new thinking and ideas. If you’re self-employed, it’s really easy to become bogged down with the day to day and when you’re working hard you can lose sight of the reasons why it’s a good idea to break up your working life and get out and about. It’s also nice to meet people in the flesh rather than just online

Do any of you also play hooky from the office environment, and if so, how do you spend your time? Do you attend courses or training events? Or do you belong to networking groups? What are your tips for getting the most out of playing Office hooky?

photo credit: _sarchi

Am I the only person who gets so engrossed in the ‘puter that my coffee is either drunk lukewarm (yuk) or banged back in the microwave for a heat up?

Well, today I seem to have stumbled on a solution.

May I introduce to you the USB Mugwarmer? – a kind of hotplate for your coffee mug powered by your ‘puter!

Simply plug this little gadget into your USB port, pop your cuppa on the hot plate, and it’ll extend your drinking time by up to 30 mins – problem solved!

£9.99 plus £4.99 from inwantoneofthose.com.

I’ve just come off the ‘phone from having a conversation with someone about the organic baby clothes I manufacture.

The caller was actually on behalf of members of his family who want to start an online business retailing ethical children’s clothes. I’m assuming that he must be quite new to the business as he first wanted to visit me in person (until he discovered I don’t live in London anymore!) So far so good.

But then the conversation turned to “checking the quality” and he asked for a sample. Now, over the last couple of years I’ve had some requests (most peeps I have to say don’t ask for samples). But those that do are happy to pay trade prices for items.

When I was starting out I did give free samples – but you know what? No potential retailer who asked for a free sample ever placed an order! However, those that paid for samples always did.

In fact, I’m sad to report that there’s one self-employed mum at least out there who has asked others for freebies for her kids and then doesn’t place orders – I know this because it happened to me and some one else I know from the same online business network. There’s probably more out there who’ve encountered this too.

But what’s the answer?

As a manufacturer, the quality of my clothing, I believe, is proven in my certification and the fact that I am stocked across the UK and export internationally. I’m a small business and can’t afford to give away free items to people who haven’t actually even got a business set up yet!

As a retailer, in my other business, I don’t ask my suppliers for free items to “check the quality” – instead I visit them at trade shows if I’ve any concerns, but on the whole I retail items from established businesses (like my own!) And don’t have any quality issues.

So, am I missing something here? Do you send out free samples to potential customers?

Be interested to hear your feedback!

Blogging for Profit Web Seminar
Join us for a Webinar on November 24 9-10.00 p.m.

Space is limited.

Reserve your Webinar seat now at:

https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/249549833

There are lots of questions in the blogosphere, particularly on the ‘mummy blogging’ scene about online advertising – from how to get it, who to get it from, technical aspects, getting money from empty wells like PR peeps, ad networks, and even just the act of contemplating running advertising.

We’ve decided to run our first web seminar and it’s going to be Blogging for Profit – The Quick Guide to Online Advertising.

This one hour web seminar is aimed at demystifying online advertising in the context of blogging. From understanding key terms and why they are important to you and to the person asking about them, to working out what to charge, ad types and positioning, and how to make yourself advertising friendly for prospects by giving off a professional front, even if you consider yourself to be ‘just little ‘old me writing a blog’ or ‘just a mum’. From selling advertising direct, to getting the lowdown on affiliate stuff, to basically getting an idea of your options, be prepared to be armed with the key information you need. More importantly, we’ll help you ensure that you don’t get taken advantage of.

Title: Blogging for Profit Web Seminar
Date: Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Time: 9:00 PM – 10:00 PM GMT

After registering you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the Webinar.

System Requirements
PC-based attendees
Required: Windows® 2000, XP Home, XP Pro, 2003 Server, Vista
Macintosh®-based attendees
Required: Mac OS® X 10.4 (Tiger®) or newer

“See” you tonight!

Mouse Rug from the British Museum online store.

Bored of the usual mouse mats?

Then why not treat yourself to your very own “mouse rug” ?

Based on designs from small Safavid silk rugs which are “united by their clarity of design, delicate patterns, precise craftsmanship, weave structure, and size.”

This piece of Office Candy is available from the British Museum Online Shop for £14.99 with FREE Delivery !

Woo! It’s Friday afternoon and we have another time wasting yet mind bending distraction to share with you

This week we’re introducing you to Vision, by Japanese designer, neutral. Vision is a beautifully rendered point and click “escape the room” game.

I love all of neutral’s games (they’re published by Gotmail) because of the soft lighting and clean lines of the images. The actual puzzles have some head-banging moments but nothing too taxing for a Friday afternoon…. there’s a useful “save” function though.

Vison is free to play and available from here.

Have you got an idea for an online business but don’t know where to start? Then, join me as I write about my new bizz “journey” from start up idea to launch…

So far I’ve talked about why it’s important to do some market research and delivering your business. Now I’m moving on to building my business brand.

A brief shufty round different bizz websites tells me that this is often the subject that some peeps START with! Like “I want a logo for my new business” or “I need a name for my new service.” A quick probe and it appears that they haven’t really got much further than thinking about their branding.

Now, if you’re ready to embark on the “fun bit” then this post is for you, but if not, then do yourself a favour by doing some business research – as this will help you when you develop your branding and corporate identity.

These are the elements I included in my branding strategy:

Corporate Colors: This was my starting point. I needed to have colors ready for the website design. Believe it or not, colors can influence customers and it makes sense to consider not only the visual aspects of color coordination e.g. which colors to choose which don’t clash, but also which colors suggest particular emotions or feelings on a subconscious level. If this is an area you’re interested in then have a google to learn more.

I was lucky enough to have a friend who’d actually studied this as part of his design qualifications and he was a great help in making sensible suggestioins (and showing great tact over my first color choices!). If you’re stuck for ideas then check out Colour Lovers for inspiration. Make sure you choose “web safe” colors which look good on and off-line.

Choose 3-4 colors which complement each other and promise yourself you’ll stick to these for everything to do with your new bizz

Typography: Now this can seem a bit weird but the typeface you choose for your business is also part of your visual identity. What do you mean? You just use the nearest font?!

Like colors, fonts can be used creatively and it makes sense to restrict the fonts you use and have a primary font as the brand identity. Ensure it’s a common font, which is easy to read on and off-line and make sure that you have alternatives in your web site style sheet for online visitors who may not have your particular font on their ‘puter. No wingdings please.

Logo: Now, fonts and color choices may well be suggested to you by a designer (if you’re using one for your logo). I’m going to assume you are using a designer but are giving them a design brief based on your brand reserach above.

Here are some suggestions of what to include in the design brief:

• Tell the designer what the logo will be used for e.g. website, business cards
• Give examples of the kinds of logos you like (the designer will use these for inspiration – but not for copying!)
• Suggest phrases to describe the logo e.g. “authoratitive” “friendly”
• Suggest the color palette and fonts if you have made a choice. If not, ask them to suggest some ideas to you
• Give a full explanation of both your business and your target customer

If you’re working with a designer, it’s really helpful to give them as much information as you can so they’re not left to guess and get it wrong. Be clear about what you want.

photo credit: gfpeck

Although we can all now listen to the radio (and indeed watch TV) online, nothing beats a top-notch radio with a dial to twiddle, especially when it is as gorgeous as this latest offering from Roberts Radio. I have a rather plain Navy Roberts in the kitchen (hubby’s choice) but I’d give my eye teeth for this Piano Gloss Black limited edition for my office.

This gorgeous thang features all the benefits of a DAB radio as well as rotary tuning and volume controls, RDS station name display, a stereo line in socket for iPod / MP3 playback, headphone socket and portability thanks to its carry handle.

RRP £199.00 (please Santa? please!)

Woo! It’s Friday afternoon and we have another downtime dirty secret to share with you

This week we’re introducing you to Samorost.

Samorost is an adventure game created by Czech game designer Jakub Dvorsky and published by Amanita Designs. It’s a point and click flash game where the game’s main charecter, a gnome-like creature, battles to save his planet from collision with a spaceship. In the sequel, Samorost 2, the gnome’s task is to rescue his dog, which has been kidnapped by aliens.

The music and sound effects are superb and the music can be downloaded from Itunes.

Samorost can be downloaded for FREE while the first part of Samorost 2 can be played online for free with a full edition with five more levels costing just $5.00