Thursday, August 27, 2009

Things I Wish Someone would have told me......


about naming your blog, your on-line etsy store, your Flickr, your Stumble-Upon, your Technorati, and which blog to choose. I am running into problems four years after the fact. The bottom line is, I made some big mistakes. No one told me.

I started out with a completely hand-built web site involving almost a hundred pages, with rolling sizes of pictures of my collages and artwork. This was pain-stakingly done by a dear friend of mine, Nancy, who designed all the templates and instructed me how to upload, change information and fill in the blanks. I had no idea what I was really doing, but managed having a very impressive web-site. I remember the feeling of dragging friends and family over to the computer and watching my then, "dial-up" slowly load the title page. How fun it was to see my artwork on-line!

The problem was, I didn't know enough about writing html to make the needed updates, and change things around occasionally, much like gift shops do, so that the next time you visit, it feels new and wonderful. I am sure that I had this site for at least three years, with a few sales, but it was time for me to come up with my own site that I could manage.

After checking my favorite bloggers, I noticed that the majority of them went with typepad. Typepad had really pretty user friendly templates, but to my surprise, I discovered it wasn't difficult to create your own with their easy tutorials. Typepad gives you thirty day free trial, but, that still isn't enough information. What typepad doesn't tell you is that it is difficult to become one of the community members in quite popular groups because they won't let you link unless you are incredibly computer savvy. Typepad also charges for their services. I always thought that you get what you pay for, but, in my case, I don't feel that way.

Now, I have established my site with Typepad, and changing would be a pain in the "arse". I have my domain located there, etc, etc. When I set up my Technorati, all was well, until I purchased my public domain name, Shebrews, and then something went wonky with the "ping" and I don't have true stats. It doesn't even update my post entries......*argh*.

This week I discovered that I was dropped from the Wist-Etsy group that I joined three years ago, because they couldn't find my Etsy store. My etsy store was named with little thought of linking it to a blog. Etsy name: Ohmy1.

I have a good history of sales there and a "somewhat" following. Do I change my Etsy name now? I lose all that credible history. I need to be trusted, and my previous sales help that, don't they?

I discovered another reason I couldn't find my Wist-Etsy group is because it is listed under my Yahoo group name: Hoursdontcount. Who knew this mattered? I joined the Yahoo group so I could be a member of Flickr and also, join some groups on Etsy. *sigh* Now, how to I link the name Hoursdontcount with Shebrews? They let you link a blogger blog, but not a typepad. Go figure.

I opened a "free" blog account with Google's Blogger because I felt "not connected" with a lot of blogs when I wasn't allowed to open ID to leave comments. I have a blogger blog mostly because I need to leave comments on blogs. That's just what I do. I want to feel a part of the "group".

I loved the idea of Friend Connect. Do you think that typepad supports this? Nooooooooo. I cannot upload the widget for nothing. Blogger seems to be in the know. AND ITS FREE, PEOPLE.

I am telling you now these very important things.
Get your free blog from Google. Get your Friend Connect widget and get some friends. Use the same User Name on all your accounts. That way, when they google your user name, all your stuff appears magically. No confusion. No searching. This is so terribly frustrating. Purchase your domain name at relatively low costs. I went with Go-Daddy, but am not sure that was the smartest, either. I suspect that I am paying for things I don't need. They throw so many options at you, that you get confused and panicky.

My first web page was a clear and simple $4.95 a month. No questions asked, No harrassment with options.

I will continue to try to update this, as it links me to my REAL site, shebrews.
Please go to visit that to see what I am up to in my art/craft world. I would sincerely appreciate that.