After months of planning and making and fussing, I am proud to introduce to you my new website (and new business) Candy Bownes Hair Bows & Accessories.  I had been feeling lost for a while not having a little crafty project to keep me occupied.  As much as I love to scrape book, I have been rather slack in taking new photos of late – and even slacker in added them to our album.  But our scrap book is just that – ours.  I don’t do it for profit or to please anyone else other than myself and my chicken.  I needed something I could just put out there, for others to enjoy.

I have always been a bit of a big kid when it comes to my hair.  I always have to be changing it, whether it be a cut or colour, or wearing a funky accessory.  But being fussy, I never found it easy to find something unique – until I wondered into a new shop that had opened up down the road.  There, I found the cutest paid of hair bows – white ribbon covered in red blood splatters, with a small bloodied butchers cleaver in the center of each.  Ok, so they may not sound like the cutest bows in the world to everyone else, but to me, they were perfect – and I paid the price for that perfection.

Upon getting them home, I examined them closer, thinking that I could make these, I could make my own hairs bows – and so I did.  I came up with my business name, registered my domain and got my web hosting, and found a fantasitc e-Commerce Plugin for Wordpress.  While my site and business are still young, I hope to grow it into something that is more than just a hobby.

You can visit my new site, Candy Bownes Hair Bows & Accessories HERE – Please be sure to subscribe as well for updates on all my newest products.

You can also find us on Facebook and on Twitter

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At the moment I am in the planning phase for my own, small craft based business.  Ever since I was a small child, I was not only good at creating things, but I was also very entrepreneurial.  I remember having family garage sales where I would go across the road to pick flowers, then try to sell them to everybody who walked in for 20 cents each.  When I was in primary school, I started making beaded jewelry to sell to my friends and by the time I was 13, I was selling my designs to local businesses.  As much as I enjoyed making each piece, it was time consuming and the profit didn’t really cover the cost or the love I gave each creation.

When it comes to setting up a small business, it is not just about the product it’s self, but the planning behind it.  Do you know how much it will cost to make your product?  What about the time spent making it?  And what about packaging and promotion?  How will people know it exists?  And then there is building an inventory, maintaining it and keeping records of sales… You can start to see how many people can easily get overwhelmed.

Here are a few tips that I am using myself while in my pre-planning phase:

1. Plan your Product: How much will is cost to make your product and how long will each item take to make?  What materials will you use and where will you get them from?  Depending on where you live, buying your materials locally may actually cost you more than you think.  Try searching online for wholesalers, or even browse through eBay – every cent you can save in production means more in your pocket later on.
2. Come up with a Price: We would all love to create something and sell it for a fortune, but unfortunately that isn’t always the way it works.  Take a look around at other products similar to yours and see what they are priced at.  Is it a price you would be willing to pay?  Do they sell a lot at that price and are they worth the price?  Not only that, you need to take into consideration how much it has cost you to make.  My personal rule of thumb is to take the production cost and multiply that by 300% before I make a firm pricing decision.  Keep in mind as well that if you are selling on your items to other businesses for resale, that they too will be putting their own price on your product, usually around 100%.
3. Product Packaging & Presentation: How you present your product can make a big impact on it’s success.  Packaging can either draw the potential customers attention, or make them cringe.  Try to come up with something that not only compliments your product and looks professional, but also does not cost you a fortune.  There are many sites online that provide cheap, or even FREE business card or postcard printing which you can utilise in your product presentation.  It also gives you the chance to add other details, such as a website where customers can view and order more goods.  Alternately, you could always print your own.
4. Marketing you Product: Getting people to know about your product is ofter the hardest part of a business, but thanks to the Internet, there are many options for you to get yourself known.  Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are are great examples.  Creating your own website is also a fantastic way of show casing your items and also allows customers to purchase goods from you, no matter where they are in the World.

These are only a few starting points to keep in mind while planning.  Over the next few weeks I will be posting a couple more articles that will be useful, from setting up a web page to traffic and promotion.  So if you are not already subscribed to my blog, be sure to do so.

Thanks for subscribing to my blog, The Shadows of my Mind. To get your FREE MP3 download, "Deep Sleep Meditation", CLICK HERE

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We bloggers work hard.  Some of us blog for a living while others do it for fun, all of us spending hours typing out our thoughts into cyber-space, hoping that someone will read them, subscribe, then come back for more.  But unlike a published authors’ printed paper masterpiece, we don’t get paid in a traditional sense.  Instead, we rely on a variety of Internet programs to bring in the dollars.  You can use affiliate marketing programs, genereate revenue for your blog with ads, or you can get paid to do sponsor posts.  One of my personal favourite sites for this is Pay Per Post.

Pay Per Post allows you to make money by writing sponsored posts for your blog.  It is free to sign up and submit your blog to the directory and you get to choose which advertisers you write for.  Once your blog has been approved, you are contacted by the advertisers via the site with their offer that will include the topic, website link and the price they are willing to pay, which you can negotiate.  If you decide to accept the offer, all you need to do is write a post meeting the advertisers requirements, submit the URL, then sit back and wait to be paid.  You can also set your own price per post, from link costing to amount per word.  Once you have earned a minimum of $50, you are able to cash out either by PayPal or cheque.  Having a huge variety of advertisers on board, there are endless topics available to write about to either fit your niche blog, or to break that spell of writers block.

It can take a bit of time to get your first offer, particularly if your blog is only new.  But once you start bringing in some more traffic and boost your Google Ranking, you should receive at least one offer per week.  I have found that it is also best to log into the site every now and then to view your “Leads” as these will often convert to more paid offers.

Overall, I would give Pay Per Post 4 out of 5 Stars.

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If you enjoy a bit of online gambling, then you need to visit Best Online Casinos – Play Highest Paying Online Casino Games. Best Online Casinos have taken the hard work out of finding a good online gaming establishment.  Their site contains detailed reviews of over a dozen high quality and well trusted online casinos sites, inluding information on cash bonuses, rate of payouts and how many different games each site offers, along with their own personal rating.  So forget packing your bags and taking a road trip to Vegas.  Instead, you can snuggle up with Lady Luck in the comfort of your own home.

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After a long week at work, today I finally had a day off.  I am the sort of person that has a thousand ideas a day and looks forward to “Me Time” where I can make the most of them.  But the busy week has taken it’s toll on me and I have barley ventured from the couch, doing little more than flicking through random websites, avoiding actually doing anything to benefit myself.  I have fallen into a lazy slump where my mind tells me, “It’s ok, you’ll have time tomorrow” – but who really does have time tomorrow?

Laziness would have to be on the the most common human traits, whether it be by choice or circumstance.  Laziness is a curse which can be hard to break, but not impossible.  So how can one break it?  We all have hopes, dreams and goals which we spend endless hours fantasising over, thinking, “If only.”  But when we play out these scenarios in our heads, it is almost always the end result and not the path that leads to it.  This is a big problem I constantly find I have as I seem to dream so grand that when I try, I fail because I tend to miss out the details, those important steps I must take to reach my goals.  Disappointment sets in, then the laziness becomes the excuse.  If only I could motivate myself just enough to start planning, to figure out those first baby steps to reach my destination.

When we motivate ourselves, we achieve much more.  Even on days like today where I feel pysically and mentally drained, even the smallest amount of motivation can go a long way – but it is that first push that is often the hardest.  How can we give ourselves that little shove?  We need to change our state of mind.

There are hundred of ways that this can be done from motivational eBooks, meditation and even alcohol & drugs.  But the simplest way is through music.  Music has the ability to calm and sooth, lift the spirits, release the anger and transport us to magical places within out hearts and minds.  We have all experiences that long and dreary day that seems to go on forever until that one song comes on the radio, that one song that lifts us up and takes us away from it all.  Music can transform us and our minds.

After sitting here in silence for about two hours, trying unsuccessfully to write a blog post on anything, I decided to put on the iPod and let the shuffle function do it’s magic.  Within no time (and having the house to myself) I was dancing badly around the living room doing thrash air guitar and singing like a lunatic.  I was having fun, I was getting motivated to actually DO something.  And while none of my goals and dream are likely to come true today, I can do something to work towards them.  I am going to start with a list of everything I would like to achieve by the end of the year, both big and small, realistic and fantastical.  Because once I have my list, I will have the backbones to start planning out all the little steps to get there.  Every journey needs to start somewhere and today, I am starting one of my own.

Thanks for subscribing to my blog, The Shadows of my Mind. To get your FREE MP3 download, "Deep Sleep Meditation", CLICK HERE

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We were driving home last night when we saw this on the back of a car – “Proudly Sponsored By Centrelink.”  For those Non-Australians who aren’t in fits of laughter thinking, WTF?  Centrelink is Australia’s welfare agency which financially supports many of our citizens using tax payers money, from pensioners to parents, from students to the disabled and from those genuinely unable to work to the lazy bogans who just can’t be bothered.  Don’t get me wrong, Centrelink provides much needed assistance to millions of Australian’s, but us Aussie always like to have the odd joke about the Centrelink bludger – hence the hilarity of this car sticker.

The last few days I have added a couple of new pages to my blog.  The first page is offering affordable advertising oppertunities.  A 125 x 125 image link ad will only cost you $1.00 for one week or $3.00 for a month.  For more information on Advertising, CLICK HERE.

The second is a Link Exchange where you can have a link to your blog / website displayed on my blog, for free.  For more information on the Link Exchange, CLICK HERE.

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I have to admit it – I am addicted to Twitter, and have been on a bit of a quest to find more ways in which to boost my Twitter Following. While I may not have hundred of thousands of followers (yet), I was still pretty happy to finally reach 1000. I have stumbled upon numerous sites, some of course better than others, that seem to work rather well. My favourite at the moment would have to be Twiends. Twiends is a free to use credit based system where you gain credits by following other users. Credits in your account are then used so that you too gain followers. You may also purchase credits in order to save you time, but it is not necessary to do so in oder to use the site. Another two features that I like is that there is no auto-tweeting to your account and you can also choose to receive an email when your credits run out. I myself have been using this site for about 4 – 5 days per week for the last fortnight and have so far received 630 followers. It may not be thousand like I said, but it has given me an easy Twitter-Spam-Free boost to my following.

You can find and follow me on Twitter HERE

If you are still looking for more ways to increase your Twitter following, then be sure to read my other blog posts:

How to get MORE Twitter Followers – Part 1

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I’ve been trying to find various ways in which to increase my Twitter following. There are so many blogs and websites out there that have their own ideas, mainly using the whole “Follow me and I’ll Follow you” concept, which is good but rather tiresome and borring for your already existing followers to read over and over again. I did find this site which seems to work rather well. It is a Twitter Train. Basically, you enter your details and it automatically adds you to the list after adding the existing users to the people you are following. From there, all you need to do is get a few friends to do the same and that is it. It’s simple to use and no fuss. CLICK HERE to give it a go.

Thanks for subscribing to my blog, The Shadows of my Mind. To get your FREE MP3 download, "Deep Sleep Meditation", CLICK HERE

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I have been a YouTube partner now for about a year and even though each month my video views and revenue increases, I thought I would do a little bit of net surfing to see if there were any websites out there that could help boost my views even further. Of course there are many social networking sites which can help, such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter – along with a heap of software programs as well.  But I did stumble upon this site today which seems rather good and simple to use.

View Tube Train works by you copy and pasting the link to the video you wish to promote into their website.  You then earn points for your link by watching other videos.  1 point is awarded and added to your video for every second of video footage you watch.  I just set my computer to mute and have been running it in the background while doing all my other bits and pieces.  It hasn’t produced massive results, but it has up’d my views on some of my newer videos.

To give it a go, CLICK HERE

Thanks for subscribing to my blog, The Shadows of my Mind. To get your FREE MP3 download, "Deep Sleep Meditation", CLICK HERE

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