Itty Bitty Hooves

How To Think About Promotions

Besides doing things like the page below, my websites, my blogs, and other online promotion I have a lot of offline types of promotional items that I use too. They really do work. Everything from t-shirts to pens and calendars help to brand you in your customer’s minds. You do not have to spend a fortune to do it either. One of my rules of thumb when it comes to buying promotional things is to only get stuff I would use myself, that way I can have some fun with it too and use some of the products. If you think that’s counter productive think again. Other people see them when you use them, and how often have you ‘lost’ a pen to someone who borrowed it? Hey, lost pens are a marketing gain in my book.

Squidoo Page!

Have you ever heard of Squidoo? Or Squid Who? it’s sort of a who’s who type of Wikipedia. I have a page on there now. Pretty cool huh? I really like it. It looks fantastic and was easy to build too. It incorporates a lot of my outside sites such as my writer’s blog, my books on Amazon, and my videos on YouTube automatically which is really kind of neat. This is the link to my Squidoo page: http://www.squidoo.com/tamiparrington

Check it out just to see how cool it is. You can build one for yourself too! Everyone can be a ‘famous person’ on Squidoo.

Be An Expert

I was just on one of my favorite sites (This Writing Life ) where there was a really good discussion on whether you needed to be an ‘expert’ in a particular field in order to write about it. I think there is much confusion about what makes an ‘expert’. In some cases AGE makes you an expert.

What I mean by that is having experience with something can give you all the background you need to write and be published on certain subjects. My guess is anyone over the age of 40 easily has plenty of things they could be considered an expert in. For me the list would include:

Animals of any type, but especially dogs, cats, chickens, birds, rabbits, goats, and horses
Children — have two, and plenty of trials and tribulations from raising them (not to mention gray hair) and grandchildren to boot — double bonus
Home repair–Old house–need I say more?
Entertainment–It counts being an avid fan and follower of music, movies, and other medias
Publishing/writing–Having held jobs in various aspects of this field as well as being a published author automatically makes me an expert regardless of having no formal training, or degree in English.
Marriage–Been there, still doing that. Have a successful 25 year track record
SEO and Internet Marketing–10 years of working online has produced a veritable font of marketing info storage in my head.

I could go on, and there are other fields such as religion and spirituality, and others that I could easily write pages upon pages on without much research. In some cases I might still have to do some research, or interview other people in those fields but that still allows me the ability to write about them successfully.

What kinds of lists could you create covering the subjects you are qualified to write about even without a formal degree? I bet it’s fairly long.

Bad Me

I forgot to post some really exciting news. Last week Bowie had her babies! Bowie is the fullblood boer doe that I bought late this spring that was ‘exposed’ to the red fullblood buck Diablo. Of course, when you buy a doe ‘exposed’ you don’t count on them actually having been bred, and usually they are not, lol, but I hoped. What I REALLY hoped for was a little buckling out of the deal because that would give me a new fullblood buckling unrelated to my current buck and all his daughters that I have.

BOWIE DELIVERED! (In more ways than one). She not only was bred and delievered but provided me with a GORGEOUS little red paint buck. He’s solid red with a splashof white on the sides and two big socks on his front legs, and a little white on one rear ankle… just gorgeous.

Now for the bonus–in the past Bowie has only had 2 breedings prior to my buying her, and she had a single and a set of twins the twins she lost, but the single was just weaned when I got her… so I wasn’t expecting her to be bred since it was so soon after her just weaning her last kid, and if she was I didn’t expect more than a single—SURPRISE… TWINS.

For a real bonus the twin to my gorgious new buckling is A DOELING. A TRADITIONAL doeling (I prefer traditional although I’m pleased as punch with the paint buckling since that’s a popular color in the ring and sales arena). So now I have an additional fullblood doeling unrelated to my first buck and a new buckling.

I am so bad. I never remember to take my camera out with me, they are active and playing and so much fun to watch. I’ll try to remember later on today to take some pictures.

For those of you that don’t know Cletus Judd is country music’s answer to Weird Al Yankovic. I’ve always loved Cletus Judd’s songs but ‘How Do You Milk A Cow’ is my all time favorite. Here is the video, my favorite parts are the sillhouettes on the barn of the Tennesee Walking Horses, and when the line in the song says ‘the horses need shoein’ they have a hilarious alternative for that I wish I’d thought of years ago, lol. So much about this song is funny though, and very appropriate when you think of any friends and relatives that come to visit you on the farm from the city:

Farming not just for rural folks anymore

Who can blame anyone for wanting to beat the high food prices and grow some of their own food. Twenty years ago it was holistic and natural food desires that spurred even city folks to plant tomatoes and lettuce in their backyards instead of petunias. Ten years ago it was Y2K. Now it’s inflation… recession… and fears of depression.

Here’s a good video on some suburban ‘farmers’.

Clean and New and In Style

Growing up I used to tease my grandmother for her constant use of plastic slipcovers
. I think that most people of my generation think of them as ‘old lady’ furniture covers. Now though, dealing with my own family and trying to keep furniture clean and in good shape they make more sense. Thank God they come in more than just clear sticky plastic now. I love the fact that I can get a beautiful fabric to cover the old easy chair that is worn out and threadbare but I can’t stand the thought of getting rid of because it is so comfortable. I love the fact that I can get a tie on cover to fit my extra long couch perfectly. Slipcovers aren’t just for old ladies anymore. They fit any room and any style.

Viva Las Vegas

With all of the work I’ve been doing lately I find myself dreaming more and more of taking a vacation. Not just any vacation, but one like my husband often gets in conjunction with his work. He gets to go on Vegas vacations that I envy and can never seem to go on because of the timing. They always offer them in the spring during foaling or kidding seasons. That’s okay though, the time I would chose is winter and this winter I’m going to Vegas!

Good Marketing Ideas

There are times when I wonder if some of the little things I like to do for advertising pay off. It’s not unreasonable to think about that at times becuase we don’t always see, or hear about the affects our marketing may have. One thing I love to do for any of my businesses (and most of you know I have a couple) is to make company logo shirts. Many times I think I do it just for my own gratification and no one else ever notices, but just the other day I was wearing my ‘Boer Goats’ shirt with my ranch name on it and the physical therapist that comes by twice a week to see my mother-in-law commented on it and said it was a really ‘cool’ shirt.

It was a little comment but it made me feel great for two reasons, one that it was a ‘good’ impression, but even more that it made an impression at all… people do pay attention to those things. It’s a good marketing idea.

A Couple of Reasons to Put a Halt to Thinking

While I think often of moving, and would actually really like to relocate since there are a few things about this area, and even this particular spot of ground that I wouldn’t have wanted if I’d known about it when we moved here, one thing stops me from being active in trying to find someplace else: Moving.

I’ve only had to move a couple of times in my life. Only once before I was married, and only twice since then, so you can see I’m not exactly experienced at it. I pity those who spend a lot of time moving from place to place every couple of years. At the same time, I’m experienced enough to know that from now on if I do move I’m hiring movers. Every area of the country has experts who can do the job much better, and with much less stress to the individiual. There are New York movers and movers in any other state so why deal with the pressures of trying to pack everything up, shove it in a little car and make a million trips? Who can afford that anyway with gas prices the way they are now? It’s much simpler to let someone else do it.

Then the only problem is having to unpack all those boxes once you get to where you are going. Another reason I put off moving. I still have unpacked boxes in my basement from 13 years ago when we moved here.