Not Your Grandma's Scarf...

This neckwarmer from ::IRREGULAR EXPRESSIONS:: will keep your neck warm and turn heads!!

I love this more than I can even explain.

**click the link above to redirect to Irregular Expressions etsy store for more unique products**

Hell Yes Kitty!!

I'm a dog person (not that I have anything against cats) but if someone presented me a cat wearing a shark sweater, I would instantly become a cat person!!!

Believe me, I've dressed plenty of cats in my life. I'm not sure if you're cat would actually wear this, but if you'd like to give it a try... you can get it on ::etsy from YOUTH DIASPORA::. They have some other great pet clothes. And if you're not into dressing your pet, they have human clothes as well!

Tip 7 l Are You A Fan

by guest blogger, Shirley of ::Wild Blueberry Ink::

I am sure you have been asked at least once this week - Do you have a facebook fan page? If you are new to the social networking world you may wonder why would I want that. If you already have a personal page you might want to know how to set-up a business page and is it really needed. Today I am going to offer you my 2 cents and then show you how to go about setting up a page - because I learned some stuff the hard way.

| IS IT NEEDED |

First, do I think a fan page is worth it? ABSOLUTELY!! One thing I have noticed is that when I post something to my fan page that refers people to my website I immediately see a spike in hits to the website. Is that a coincidence? NOPE!! I believe that people will be more likely to fan your facebook page than they will to subscribe to your newsletter or follow your blog. Our emails have become so important to us. We treat it as scared as the social security number and we are not likely to give up either very easily.

I also love that facebook allows you to connect with your customers and develop a relationship/friendship with them. They get to see your personality (as long as you have one) and they feel like they know you. They then have an invested interest in your business and they WANT to see your business suceed. Let me go on record and say the folks that follow me on facebook make me smile daily. I love getting comments even if it’s a simple LIKES THIS. The network I have developed through facebook amazes me all the time. I will see my fans post about me, I post about them, I tweet about their posts, they tweet about mine. . . .it’s an amazing network of women (and some men)

| HOW TO SET IT UP |

It’s a pretty simple process to set up a fan page but there are 1 or 2 things that I discovered AFTER I had mine set up that you might want to know about.

Tip 1 | If I had it to do all over again I would create a separate fan page. When I created my fan page I followed facebook’s advice and created it as an extension to my personal page. YES, it does allow me to see updates all under one sign in. However no one told me that when I wanted to post to other people’s page it would show up as my personal name and not my business name! This makes me upset because I am sure a lot of folks are like who the heck is this Shirley person and why is she trying to be my friend.

Now to the instructions:

1 | Go to this link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/create.php you should see this screen:

2 | Once you fill this out and hit submit you will see this page:

I circled the above because this is where you will either connect it to your personal page or give your business it’s own page. Again, I suggest give it a page to itself.

3 | Once the page has been create, the first thing you should do is upload a logo: place your mouse cursor in the upper left corner of the screen to be able to select a logo for your brand / blog.

4 | Go to the “Info” tab and include your brand / blog details.

5 | OPTIONAL: If you are making the fan page for a website / blog, select “Note”, then click “Import a blog” and enter your blog RSS feed and click “Start importing”.

6 | OPTIONAL:You can also make a widget (Fan Box) for your website > simply click the “Add Fan Box to your site” on the “Promote your page” section.

7 | Now that your Facebook page is all set up, all that remains to be done is to publicize it to your readers so they can “fan” you. Some methods to get the word out there include :
a | Writing a blog post about your new Facebook page (don’t forget to link to it).
b | Putting a prominent link at the top of your blog or in the sidebar. Just grab a Facebook logo from Google Images and then link it to your page.
c | Sending out an email to all your Facebook friends and telling them about your new fan page. If they were interested enough to become Facebook friends with you, I’m sure they will be interested in your blog too.

d | be sure to list it in your Etsy announcement

e | include it on your business cards or any other cards you send out with your orders.

Now you have the basics and my ever so important opinion. I would love to hear some feedback about how fan pages have helped you or maybe not helped you. Also be sure to leave your link so I can fan you!