Just found out I was chosen as this month’s Applause Award winner at WAHM-Articles.com

The Applause Award was created in 2009 to recognize the significant contributions our wonderful authors make to the members of the online work-at-home-mom (WAHM) community. (more details here)

Denise shared some really nice comments:

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Do you track which pages/posts/products on your website are the most visited?  You can learn a lot by watching your statistics.

For example, by watching what my visitors are most interested in I can see the topics trend and consider whether to write more about the popular topics, introduce my own information product or tutorial about the topic, or find an affiliate product to promote.

It also works the other way.  I can see what topics weren’t of interest.  I can avoid topics that my readers don’t want help with and instead focus on giving them more content about what they want to learn.

Curious what others are reading?  Here’s a quick list of the top 15 posts from my site in 2009.

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Just finished installing the CommentLuv plugin.  So if you leave a comment and use your blog’s URL in the URL box, your most recent post will show up with a link, below your comment!  8-)

Another note on comments, if you’d like your picture to show up next to yours, go setup a gravatar.  Takes just a minute.  Go to www.gravatar.com and then we can “see” you.

I’ve had a really big, very busy week! Thought I’d share it in a Monday reflection sort of post.

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Are you subscribed to my newsletter?  If not, now’s a great time to sign up!  I’ve decided to borrow an idea from the ever-brilliant Alicia Forest and do a 12 Days of Christmas giveaway for my readers.  During the month of December I’ll send out  short email each day for 12 days with a gift for you.  I’ll post notes here on the blog but the only way to get the goodies will be if you’re subscribed to my list.  Grab your spot so you don’t miss out!  Sign up in the box on the top right area of any page.
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I’m sitting in the LA airport waiting on a flight to Seattle, then on home to Anchorage.  Decided it’d be a good time to review what I implemented at ACLC.  Why am I sharing this?  First, because I’m just so darn excited about it all.  Second, because I want you to know that if I can do this so can you.

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Woo! My blog has a new look.  I’ve updated the layout a bit and reworked the sidebars.  My favorite update is the cool new Lifestream widget (bottom right corner of every page).  Get yours at http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/lifestream/ It’s the same plugin I used a few weeks ago to set up Lisa’s #SendLove stream.

I’ve also moved all my content from The Muses Guide site over here to The Small Business Muse to streamline and make it easier to keep everything up to date.

Another bit of news is that I’m going to actually be “blogging” soon and not just posting my newsletter articles online.  Exciting.

Leave me a comment and let me know what you think of the new look.

First, let’s start with a definition.  What is Marketing?  Marketing is the process of defining, understanding, and then systematically promoting yourself and your products to your target market in a way that converts into sales of your products or services.

Um… yeah… in English?  :)  Marketing is how you reach the people that you can help, then share with them how you can help them and give them the opportunity to allow you to help.  See, that’s not scary at all.  When you define it this way it actually sounds good, right?  You want to help people by providing products or services that solve their problems!

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On November 27th, the United States celebrates Thanksgiving.

The core focus of this holiday is gratitude. It’s about connecting with family and friends, and it’s about giving thanks for everything wonderful in life.

My friends Jenn Givler and Teresa Morrow were inspired to put together a really neat project in honor of this holiday.

As business owners, we are thankful that we not only get to do what we love for a living, but that we get to connect with other wonderful business owners every day.

Teresa and Jenn asked 10 amazing business women to come together and help them create an inspirational screen saver. The screen saver consists of original, inspirational quotes set on beautiful nature pictures.

The purpose of the screen saver is to help inspire you throughout your day as you work toward your goals. We’re also hoping you’ll feel connected and among like-minds as you read through our quotes. And, we’d love it for you to meet some new people and make new connections as well!

The screen saver is available to you as my gift. To download your copy, simply log on to this web site: http://www.MindfulBusinessesPartner.com

While you’re on the site, be sure and check out the other great women who are part of this project!

The screen saver will only be available until December 12th, so be sure and get your copy! Go to www.MindfulBusinessesPartner.com to download.

Here’s my quote:

If you’re subscribed to my newsletter, or have talked with me much, you already know I’m a big fan of article marketing.  It works.  So when Denise Willms followed up with me a few weeks ago I was happy to share with her some stats I had from tracking my article marketing efforts.  With her permission I’m posting a copy of the press release she mentioned me in.

Calgary, AB (October 10, 2008) WAHM Articles challenges small business owners to jumpstart their holiday marketing this year.

Uncertain economic times mean small business owners need to work even harder to earn holiday shopping dollars. WAHM Articles, a popular article directory for women and an active writing community, is helping small business owners expand their reach by giving prizes for writing articles targeted at mothers.

Owner Denise Willms, a Virtual Assistant who helps her clients reap the benefits of article marketing, launched the Holiday Article Marketing Challenge early this month. Home and small business owners can win one of nearly $300 in prizes by writing articles to promote their products for the holiday season. Prizes include advertising space, Tupperware products, ghostwriting services, and personalized article coaching sessions with Willms.

“I’ve been thrilled with the response,” says Willms. “It’s great to see online business owners discover how to write articles that increase their visibility and their sales.”

Article writers gain exposure for their businesses by creating articles that solve their readers’ problems, and including a link to their website at the end of the article. The author’s resource box invites the reader to visit the writer’s website for more information.

To date, WAHM Articles has published nearly 2000 articles by 500 authors, each written with mothers in mind. Article topics range from parenting to business issues and from crafting to personal relationships.

Willms took inspiration for this challenge from the 30 Day Article Challenge, created by Carrie Lauth of CarrieLauth.com. In the 30-day challenge, participants put their marketing endurance to the test by writing 30 articles in 30 days.

Lauth says, “Article marketing has proven to be a consistently effective traffic generation method for me. I launched this challenge to give myself  some public accountability but also to motivate others – it’s not as  hard as you think to write articles, especially since all of us internet marketers are already writing so much for our blogs and websites.” Others are invited to join the ongoing challenge at any time.

For those who don’t know how to promote their business by writing articles, WAHM Articles offers a free forum, where members can ask questions, and get answers from article marketing professionals, experienced article writers and article publishers.

Writing and submitting articles has proved to be an effective tool to gain targeted traffic and increase conversions. Michelle Shaeffer, The Small Business Muse™, recently conducted an experiment to track conversions from writing and submitting articles. She found the traffic she received from her articles came with more average page views per visit and a higher subscription rate to her newsletter. From general website traffic, Shaeffer noted a 20% subscription rate to her newsletter. However, 40% of visitors who read one of her articles then clicked through to her website signed up for her newsletter.

To learn more about writing articles to promote small business, submit articles for moms to read, or to participate in the holiday article marketing challenge, please visit http://www.WAHM-Articles.com