Archive for December, 2007:
More new blog banners completed!
I’ve had a busy week!
Here are three more banners I’ve designed:
Sell your creations on your blog with a PayPal storefront
I just took the new PayPal Storefront Widget for a test drive. The PayPal storefront was released today and I was excited to try it.
First, I was asked to sign in to my PayPal account.
There is an orange button to click on that says "Create New Storefront".
You will see a new store created for you on the right sidebar.
Click on your store and you will access an editing tool to customize your store.
Step 1 is to Modify your Storefront
You have a choice of themes and colors. Then you can enter a title and a store logo if you have one. The store logo should be 60×35. For my blog banner customers who’d like to get a matching logo for their PayPal storefront, I can include one in my regular price for no extra charge.
You can also change the color of the text in your storefront.
The next option is to describe your shipping policies, contact information and any additional notes to potential buyers such as "satisfaction guaranteed".
Listing your products is the next step. Enter your product name, price, description, and a photo. There are several options from which you can choose:
- Show all products (great if you only have a few items for sale)
- Show currently selected product (for those with lots of product and would like to highlight one item)
- Rotate product pages (for those who would like a rotating selection of products)
You may show how many of your product is available. Then, when your item sells, you have a choice of showing product as sold out, or hiding the product until inventory is restocked.
There is an option available for opening and closing your store. If you need to close your store temporarily, choose that option and provide a message to your customers if you’d like! You can also indicate that your customers can still shop while your store is closed and leave a note saying that shipping will be delayed.
This widget is easy to use and configure. One drawback is that the widget itself can’t be re-sized to fit in a smaller width blog sidebar. For example, view my test storefront in the right sidebar of this blog. Notice that with a three column blog, I needed to increase the sidebar pixels of the blog so the storefront would fit. Bloggers using a two-column layout should not have this problem.
On another note, I tried editing this widget using older versions of Internet Explorer and FireFox. I was not able to use the editing tool. If you have an older browser, you may need to upgrade to make use of this widget.
Lastly, you will need to "Publish your Storefront". If you are using Typepad, you will have the option of choosing the "Typepad" option and following the instructions. If you are using Blogger, Wordpress or another platform, you may copy/paste the code into your source code where you’d like your store to appear.
Next step: I will need to upload something to sell and test how this widget handles the transaction! That is the subject of another blog post!
Get the facts on RSS Feeds
RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a way to distribute your blog’s content directly to your readers through their email, social media profiles, news aggregators or on other websites via widgets.
When you start a blog, you should make sure a Feed is "burned" for your blog by going to Feedburner. Once you have a Feed for your site, you can add a small icon indicating your blog is Feed friendly. Here are some of the icons you can add to your blog along with a link to your Feed:
You can find these and lots more Feed icons by logging in at Feedburner, clicking on "Publicize" and choosing "Chicklet Chooser". Follow the instructions and copy/paste the appropriate code into your blog.
Using these icons and links, your readers will be able to add your feed to their aggregator of choice with the click of a mouse!
Providing Email subscriptions to your blog is easy. Log in at Feedburner, click on "Publicize" and choose "Email Subscriptions". Choose the "Feedburner" selection at the multiple choice options and click on "Activate" at the bottom of the page.
Follow the instructions. If you are blogging with Typepad or Blogger, select in the "Use as Widget In" drop-down menu. If you are blogging with another platform, you can copy/paste the subscription code directly into your blog code where you’d like it to appear.
Click here for a useful tutorial about Feeds at Feedburner!
Blog what you know – not what you think you know
So often I read blog posts that provide incorrect information to their readers. With regards to stamping and scrapbooking blogs, the most common post topic offering misinformation deals with Copyright. (It is also a word that is frequently misspelled, by the way)
I’m going to get on my soapbox here… as a member of a newspaper staff, I feel I have the authority to speak my mind on this topic.
Recently I read a blog entry about Copyright that "gets it all wrong". It was someone’s rant about stamp artists who watermark their images and get upset if they are copied and used elsewhere. I won’t post a link to the blog entry here because it is irrelevant. The point is that her knowledge (or lack thereof) of Copyright law did a disservice to her readership and the rant insulted potential customers.
My advice for bloggers is to blog what you know. If you are not sure of all the particular details of a topic, it is better to leave it unsaid. Let me add one more piece of advice, and that is please don’t rant. It makes the writer appear unprofessional and amateur.
You will be a much better blogger if you keep the above tips in mind!
