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Using Your Shopping Cart

I've been listening to the tapes from Christina Hills about how to use 1ShoppingCart.  I have to tell you, this is the best training I've ever seen for this product (this is the same as Marketers Choice, 1 Automation Wiz, Kick Start Cart, and a few other names).  She gives clear and concise instruction for a program that is very complex and not at all easy to learn without her assistance. 

Yes, this is a blatant sales letter but if you've been reading my blog for any length of time at all, you know I never recommend anything I haven't used myself and would never suggest you buy anything that wasn't worth well over the cost.  This is definitely the case with Christina's Shopping Cart Secrets.

The best thing I did, though, was to join her membership club.  She has special calls just for us and lots of free content that no one else gets.  She even has information on how to start your own membership club.  It's not as tough as it looks!

Until next time...

Are We Losing a Free Internet?

Have you heard the bit about how the telco/cable companies want Congress to give them the keys to the Internet so they can decide who gets top billing on which sites load fastest? 

OK, this might not be what it's about at all.  I couldn't begin to tell you because I don't have the hours and hours it would take to study the issue and figure out just exactly what's going on. 

What I DO know is that I really don't want the telephone or cable companies having any more of a hand in what happens to MY Internet than they already have and that may actually be more than I want them to have.  There may be tons of good reasons for them to have control.  There may be tons of good reasons for them not to have control.  In the final analysis, I don't care about how many good reasons there are one way or the other.  I care that the Internet is supposed to be a place where I get to have as much of a chance to be noticed as anyone else and that the playing field is totally level. 

Sure the big companies can have very flashy sites and mine is pretty basic but no one gets to tell me what I can put on my site.  Oh, I can feel the cranky comments coming already--do I really like porn?  do I really want children to be able to access instructions on bomb building? do I really like sites promoting sexual exploitation?  No, of course I don't.  What I DO like is the right to boycott those sites for myself rather than have someone else choose which sites I can and can't see. 

Might I feel differently about this if I had a teenager living in my house?  Maybe but I still think I'd rather figure out ways to monitor and/or discuss Internet content with a teen rather than have big business dictate what I see or when I see it.

Now that I've gone on and on (as I am wont to do), check out this post and then the whole blog letting us know what is going on so that if we really do want to spend hours and hours figuring out what's up we can.  Personally, I would just rather go for the broad brush strokes and tell Congress to keep big business out of MY Internet. 

Until next time...

WordPress vs TypePad

I find myself getting more and more intrigued with WordPress.  I see a lot of blogs every day and I'm finding I really like the WordPress blogs best.  They seem to have the most bells and whistles and I'm all about the bells and whistles.  I may have to learn how to use it one of these days, especially since helping clients build their blogs is part of what I do for a living.

If you have any feedback on how it works or how to learn it quickly and easily, I'd love to hear about it. 

Until next time...

Graphic Design Artist

I've been working with a graphics design artist for the past month or so.  She's been putting together a logo for me (at an incredibly low price).  I've gotten nothing but the highest quality of technical expertise from my team.  Over and above that, however, I've gotten care, concern, hand-holding, and generally fabulous care.

Oh, who did this fabulous work for me?  It's bci creative.  I worked directly with Kim Boston, the owner of the company, and she couldn't possibly be nicer to work with.  I have to share that I didn't have a clue what I wanted--not just a symbol, but colors, look, feel, nothing.  Not only that but Virtual Assistants don't even have a symbol that speaks to our profession.  If I were a secretary, I could use a typewriter or computer.  But I'm not.  Virtual Assistants do so much more than I did as a secretary or even when I was an administrative assistant that there's no way to iconize what I do.

To make a long story short, Kim and her team made the most perfect logo for me so I can be branded.  Right now the logo works for the business web site and all my collateral material but it's not appropriate for my blog.  Once I get a little more firmly established I'll probably have Kim do another design for this site but right now I'm just going to have to refer you to VirtualCynthia so you can see how it looks. 

Don't blame Kim for the site.  She just designed the logo.  Getting the site spiffed up is in my future plans, too, but for now, my talents are all you get.  I'm great at tons of things but web design isn't one of them.  If you need a web designer, though, Kim and her team do a fabulous job of that, too.

Until next time...