Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Keeping my office clean?

Yuck, if I'm honest, it's a mess!

... however, my office "grew" before it was planned out properly. When I do get round to it, hopefully in the New Year, it's going to be reorganised physically so that I have this lovely clear space round my desk, some dedicated shelf space (with sliding doors) so that I can put away all stationery and my filing cabinet will be integrated into this space as well.

Then it will be easy to put everything away each night before I shut up shop and, in theory at least, it will be lovely in the morning.

Now that I've written this down, it still seems like a good plan Shocked

Margaret

ps - I will also redecorate the room as it's grotty!

pps - there's a lot to be said for thinking "I'm worth it!" - I do work hard in my office and I deserve a nice working environment! So do my clients who might come to give me web design work; there's another incentive for keeping the office in order!

M

Tuesday, November 28, 2006

A Brilliant Spoof! - check it out before it disappears!

Sometimes someone does a brilliant spoof site - check it out here before it's taken down!

http://www.msfirefox.com

Best
Margaret

Tales of the Unexpected!

Did I say we had a holiday? OK, we stayed near Girvan in Ayrshire. It's close to the famous golf course, Turnberry.

Our accommodation was not far from the main road which runs east from Ayr to Castle-Douglas and Dumfries. In other words, near to where I grew up.

In the days when my father had his farm, a local beekeeper kept several beehives in the fields. Although the farm (and Dad) are long since gone, the beekeeper (Mr Turnbull) still has honey for sale - and we now sell it in our shop.

Sandy and I thought it would be a nice idea to call in and collect our next order while we were on holiday. More than that, the last time we received an order of the honey, I had been treated to lunch by the Turnbulls and we invited them to join us for lunch somewhere close to home.

Arrangements were duly made, we set off in good time for our lunch appointment at 12.30 pm at the Kenbridge Hotel in New Galloway (http://www.thekenbridge.co.uk) - and so we parked in the car park about 30 seconds ahead of the Turnbulls' arrival. They drew in beside us and we walked across to the hotel and into the restaurant.

Lunch was fantastic. The main courses we ordered were delicious. Looking out of the dining room window, the River Ken was in full spate, partly because the weather had been rather wet and partly because the dams which generate electricity have to run off excess water when the season becomes wet. We commented that the day was becoming cloudy and, shortly afterwards, the rain started to fall.

Dessert arrived and we were all tucking into them when we heard a loud bang and the dining room lights went out.

In our rural area, it isn't out of the ordinary for there to be power cuts; we did notice that there were other lights still working, but sort of assumed they were on an emergency backup supply. The waitress returned, gave us coffee, stoked up the open fire and lit some candles.

Some time passed. Then we were slightly startled to be told that there had been an accident on the main road outside; whatever had occurred had caused a vehicle to demolish the electricity pole carrying the power to the hotel. More than that, the cable which had come down was live and was lying between our cars and the exit to the car park. We were assured that the power company engineers had been summoned and, until the power was switched off, we should just stay there.

More time passed. The roaring fire, darkening day and candle light was atmospheric - and we started reminiscing about the good old days. The company was most enjoyable and we were all resigned to our fate. Let's face it, we were safe, dry and warm.

Around 4.45pm, the engineers seemed to be making headway with the power and just after 5.15pm, we were told that it was safe to go. We walked across the car park with the Turnbulls, transferred the honey order to our van, and set off back to Girvan. (We were pleased that the Turnbulls only had 6 miles to go as they're senior citizens.) Our journey back was uneventful and we had a light supper before starting to pack up our things for our departure on Saturday morning.

When we were checking out, we got talking to a couple of members of staff. I started to say, "You'll never guess what happened to us at the Kenbridge Hotel!" when someone walked over to Sandy and said to him "Hey - were you all ok after the accident yesterday? We were turning to come into the hotel car park, a truck travelling behind us didn't notice that we were stopping and braked hard to avoid a collision. He knocked out the power line and the live wire was sparking round our car!"

Spooky, or what!

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

Conquer your niche!

What a brilliant (and simple concept) - and it has achieved record growth in a really short time-frame.

The Conqueryourniche discusson forum has acquired 11897 (and rising) new members in the space of a few days.

What was the thinking behind the site? Well, naturally I don't have access to Russell Brunson's plans, but here is my best guess -

Interesting question ....

well, let's see -

    We all want the opportunity to promote our businesses
    Those who have been around on the net for some time have a wide variety of experiences to share
    Those who are new to the net (and I'm sure there are loads of people who are just starting to surf around) are hungry for the information


The tools
    Forum software
    Rotating Ad script
    Web coder who could amalgamate the two into a system capable of handling different subscription levels
    Web designer to set up the web site
    An existing list of gurus who would promote the new forum


... put like that, doesn't it sound easy!

So, we have a forum which allows members to post 1 ad, create signature links and even invite joint ventures - and elite membership gives more benefits, including more ad space and better rewards for posting on the forum. You can feel this forum sucking the life-blood out of other discussion groups; they are going to have to compete hard against this new venture.

Find out about Conqueryourniche for yourself! It's quite cool.

Saturday, November 11, 2006

Great new internet marketing forum

It is no secret that generating targeted traffic is the lifeblood of online business.

Unfortunately, with all the quirky changes that the pay-per-click engines are inflicting on us these days, obtaining targeted traffic can be a challenge.

My friend and excellent marketer Russell Brunson has devised an ingenious forum that can shovel laser-targeted traffic to your website.

Get this: You can earn advertising credits for posting, replying, and even READING threads in his forum.

Further, your credits will virally multiply when you refer people to the forum.

You can read all about it here: http://forum.lamblinks.com

Plus, he has a killer one-time offer where you can earn up to FIVE TIMES the advertising credits. It is literally the BEST investment you can make to advertise your site.

So check it out...I highly recommend it.

Margaret

P.S. - I am already receiving good click-throughs on my ads :)

P.P.S. I just checked out who's subscribed for Russell's forum. It is truly the "who's who" of the internet marketing world. Don't miss out on the chance to mingle with the internet marketing elite...and get rewarded for it!
Sign up today!
http://forum.lamblinks.com

Friday, November 03, 2006

I'm still without my computer

I can't believe that I've had to wait so long. It would seem that the bits for my new pc are coming one at a time on foot! I could have bought a new one from any of the major chains and been up and running by now. So much for wanting a custom-built one that would suit my needs.

NEVER AGAIN!

M