A Contest and a Farewell

Thinking Spring Dangle Earrings

Who doesn't love a good contest? I know I do! Well I just wanted to remind you guys that I'm doing a comment contest on this blog! I'll be doing this each month, and whoever has the most comments for the month, will win a prize! The prize will be approximately $10 in value and I have a few different options that I will present the winner with...because I know different people like different things! I will tell you that one of the options is a $10 gift certificate to my jewelry shops! But I have some other ideas in mind too since I know the guys may not be interested in jewerly.

Stats so far (cuz I'm a geek):

~ Top Commentator so far has 6 comments.

~  26 Commentators total.

~ 47 comments total.

I look forward to seeing what the numbers look like at the end of the month!

Now for some sad news - I'll be deleting my entrecard account soon. It's just eating up too much of my time with too few results. My computer loads the blogs pretty slowly, and I really want more time in my day to focus on my jewelry business and to write. 

Having said that - I love reading other blogs! So before I delete my account I'm going to try to make sure I'm following all the blogs I do actually read. Please book mark mine if you enjoy it so you don't miss out on it! 

Giving Credit Where Credit is Due

I appreciate all the visitors who come by my blog - so I'd like to say a special thanks to all my entrecard droppers! Also...I'm going to start tracking my commenters this next month...and the top commentator will get a surprise!

Click on any of the pics to go check out these blogs :)

March's Top Droppers!

I want to send out a big shout out of thanks to my top droppers for March! Don't know what I'm talking about? Check it out at www.entrecard.com :) Click on the pictures to be redirected to their blogs.

Looking back at February

This month was frustrating for me on many levels, with the migraines and all, but I did accomplish some things! For instance, this month saw the opening of my first ever serial story! Woohoo! If you missed any of it - here are some links to go back and check it out :)

Aria's Quest - Running Late

Aria's Quest - The Counsel's Decision
Aria's Quest - The Gem

And if your anxiously awaiting the next segment - don't worry! I was too out of it to work on it this weekend, but I've spent some time on the story today and plan to publish it tomorrow :)

One of the things I've tried to work on, especially the second half of the month, was improving the quality of my book reviews. I still have a long ways to go, but hopefully you agree there's been some improvement! One thing that made me feel all warm and tingly inside this month was to hear that one of my readers went out and bought one of the books I reviewed! Yippee! Here's the reviews for this month:

Incarnations of Immortality by Piers Anthony
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
Ogre, Ogre by Piers Anthony
Forests of the Heart by Charles de Lint
Soul of the Fire by Terry Goodkind
The Little Country by Charles de Lint
The Lightening Thief by Rick Riordan
The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan

The only good thing about all the migraines this last month is that it's given me tons of time to read! I actually have several reviews written and waiting to be posted, and a stack of books I need to write reviews on! It's a nice problem to have. My husband thinks I'm crazy, but then again he hates writing while I love it!

Oh and did I mention I also have a pile of books waiting for me to read? What could make a girl happier?

Last thing to wrap up this month - I'd like to say a big thank you to all my entrecard droppers - here's the list of the top droppers for the month!

Stroll Through Story Land
Rocket Scientist
Rants, Thoughts, and Other Things
Spicybugz World
BeadedTail
Rose Works Jewelry Blog
The Way I See It
wallpaper
Spotted Cow Soaps
Cheese and Chocolate

And yes, for those of you awesome people who read both my blogs, my other blog did make my top dropper list for this blog! Silly yet fun huh?

I seem to be getting some better migraine-wise, I'll update you guys in a few days when I've figured out if this really is a solution, or if I'm just having a fluke couple of good days :P

A Blogger on Blogging

I mentioned in an earlier post that one of my goals for this year is to make money with this blog. This brought the question from from one of my readers, "How do you make money with a blog?" I think that's an excellent question, and to be honest, one that I'm still exploring myself! I was already considering sharing my journey with you guys, and this question has made my decision for me! So, as I work on bringing traffic into my blog, and earning money from it, I will be sharing with you what I learn! And, when possible, I'll be giving the credit to those that I've learned from, because I'm certainly not doing this entirely on my own!

One of the first things I'm doing to build traffic to my blog is signing up for Entrecard. Entrecard is a social networking site designed to take the old concept of passing out business cards, and bringing it into the internet world. Now don't get me wrong, I still consider business cards valuable, I just consider this a valuable option as well

Entrecard enables your blog to be found by a world of other blogs, and it also allows you to advertise your blog through a system of "points." These points are not something you have to pay for, it's something you earn as you "drop" by other blogs and as other blogs advertise on your blog! That's right folks, free advertising. How great is that?

I've been using entrecard on my other blog for some time, and I just finally got a chance to sign up for it on this blog! As I've used it through my jewelry blog I've met quite a few new people, new friends, and I've learned a lot through the blogs I've visited! I'm hoping to continue that process through this blog. Be on the look out for the avatar on the left if your interested in advertising on this blog through EC!

The biggest disadvantage I see for Entrecard (EC) is that it can be time consuming if you don't have a really good internet connection. When I first started using EC it took me a lot less time to go through visiting all the blogs I wanted to visit each day. Of course, I also had a much faster internet connection at the time! Now, with a slower internet connection, it takes some dedication to get a large number of drops. It's something I'm committed to, but I have the time right now too.

Entrecard has a limit of 300 "drops" (and therefore credits) you can make a day, I usually reach 200 on my Jewelry blog and my current goal is 50 drops for this blog. Don't be intimidated though, it took me a long time to reach the 200 drops on my Jewelry blog and, in reality, the number of drops isn't really the most important thing. Consistancy is the key. Try to visit the same blogs (especially the one's who drop in on you) on a daily basis. Comment when you can and build relationships.

When using Entrecard I recommend browsing the blogs through Firefox. It is much more secure from viruses than Internet Explorer, but don't count on that alone to protect you. Having a good virus protection system on your computer is still important because any time your spending that much time browsing the computer you can be opening yourself up to viruses!

Another advantage that Firefox has over other internet browsers is that it allows you to utilize the Entrecard toolbar. This enables you to easily mark your favorite blogs, see how many credits you have, and "buy" advertising on other blogs. I know using this tool has greatly assisted my success in using Entrecard!

Good luck :)