I've been so busy!

I've been meaning to post pictures of my zazzle buys! I've had them for a while and took pictures, but I've been so busy lately that I forgot to post them. I am going to be scanning my post cards since I'm not that great at photography.



It may look different, but it's an awesome binder. I just love the weird and unique.

I've also ordered 4 mugs, but only going to show one on here since the other 3 have pictures of my children on them. Just not interested in putting my children's pictures online. Will be posting a picture up as soon as I get it. Very excited about getting it. I have so many plans for that mug.

Well I hope to chat more I've got to get busy making lenses. I'll definitely be working more here once I get my goals done before the New Year. Thanks for reading!

A little clarification about Squidoo and Zazzle.

I've been watching a post on Squidoo about the zazzle rating manipulations that are going on. Most people probably don't know that what they are doing is against the TOS of Squidoo. There's quite a few threads at the zazzle forum that are all about getting favorited and rated. This is called rating exchanges. You're not suppose to go around asking people to do this. You can get banned from Squidoo for doing this.

Why are they doing this? Well because it's believed that if you get a added as a favorite or get a rating on your lens then the lens rank will go up. No one knows 100% what makes that rank go up. Asking people to do these things is ratings manipulation and Squidoo doesn't want people doing this. It's unfair to the people who are honest and not breaking the TOS.

Another reason why people are doing this is that the lensmasters are telling the artists that they will sell more items this way. Well that's not true. The lensmaster will be getting paid more while the artists will most likely get nothing. Google is the main breadwinner when it comes to getting people to buy your work. You need it to bring buyers. Google doesn't care what lens rank you have. It only cares about your content. So if you're a lensmaster will a bunch of stuff pasted on your lens then most likely Google will ignore you page. It may not happen right away, but eventually all that hard work will be for nothing.

All I ask is that you read the TOS thoroughly and ask someone at Squidu.com whether or not this is ok before you go risking your account over a few dollars. Keep Squidoo clean and the money will come.

We need to stick together.

I have been thinking about this for a while now. The artists at Zazzle and the Lensmasters at Squidoo should work together more. It does happen, but not enough. This is a great money maker if we put ourselves together. I put my efforts in both places. I promote other people's work. Do I get anything out of it? If I work at it I do. No one pays me to personally do this. This is what I want to do and if I earn something then that's great.

I had an idea after making a purchase at Zazzle. I had found an item that I promised myself I would buy. I wanted it really bad and now I'm just waiting on it to arrive. After I get it and find a use for it then I'll take photos and share them with my readers here and on Squidoo. This is an item that I bought for my own personal use. I didn't buy it to earn anything talking about it.

I bought something I made at Zazzle also. I bought it for my mother. It's a part of something that she loves and I figured it was her Birthday soon so I can get her something unique. I'll be posting pictures of those items that I got also. Yes I can promote myself.

So what I'm planning on doing is spending a portion of the profits I get promoting other sellers and buying items from sellers that have an item that I just have to buy. Then I'll be promoting the items by taking pictures and posting them on here and Squidoo. Think about it this way. People will be more inclined to buy something if the one promoting it feels good enough about the product to buy it. I don't like the idea of showing off products that I know nothing about. This is about trust. Plus I now have a reason to buy some pretty cool items.

So let's work together and promote the sellers on Zazzle and let them help promote us.

Ever have a deer in the headlights moment?

I sat there staring at the loud glow of my computer screen after clicking on my Zazzle earnings. I couldn't believe that I had actually earned money without even being an artist. I couldn't sell my designs if someone paid me. And yes doing Zazzle to sell designs would have paid me if I were any good.

I first started out at Squidoo doing pages featuring Zazzle designs. I had seen a page where a woman had featured alot of them and they looked great on her page. I thought I could do that. Turns out I can. I didn't expect to really make any money doing it since I had no clue what SEO was or how to really make money doing this. Want to see an example or 3 of what I'm talking about? Then keep reading. I'll list them below.

I am seriously into vampires and I wanted something that I could have fun doing. So I made a lens about Vampire Keds. Sounds weird right? Well Zazzle lets the artists create designs that fit on Keds shoes. How cool is that? So I searched through the designs and picked out quite a bit that I liked and created a lens about them.

Another lens I did was Unique Recipe Binders. I was getting the hang of the Zazzle and Squidoo lenses. I had learned to separate them as I got the links ready. This saved me a lot time and hassle. You can't believe how much time I had lost before this.

There is more, but you get the point. I have finally made money from Squidoo. It was a small goal that will eventually lead to bigger ones.

I thought about showcasing an item today.

I was working on a page at Squidoo and I saw something at Zazzle. It was a beautiful Christmas Gift Tag. What is a Gift tag you say? Well you remember when wrapping up a present for Christmas and putting a paper card on it to say who goes to? Well that's what a Christmas Gift Tag is.

I want to share with you this item. I just love looking at it. The person created the image and put it up for sale as a gift tag. Check it out below. Will include a picture also.



Isn't that just beautiful? Stop by her shop and let her know what you think. You can leave a comment in her box.