Advertising on the internet or as I like to still call it...the world wide web

What a week! Heck, what a friggin month!!
I have been abused by customers, had a tantrum like one of the preschoolers I care for and yelled "I'm done! If you can't play nice then I'm not going to play...daycare CLOSED!". Then decided I have done this too long..I ammm Ms. Erika.  I need to put on my big girl panties and figure some things out.

I have then in the last 72 hours had supporters come out of the woodwork and compliment me on review sites; had a local tv news choose my childcare as representative of a quality program that accepts childcare subsidy; had a real nice provider call me today to tell me that she spoke with me a year ago and made big changes in her program & marketing thanks to my suggestions ... she is now full, successful and happy; this same provider was prompted to call me because while browsing Living Social she saw that my childcare was the only one listed on their list of 365 things to do in Omaha and I'm #160! (for that I have to plug Living Social..it's like Groupon's sister).  I don't know how I got on there but I'm thrilled I did!

The sudden kindness of so many, many who barely know me and some who didn't know that I was so horribly burned out, has been almost overwhelming.  I am sitting here wobbling between having a big head and feeling not quite worthy.  I think it would be best for me right now to go with the big head.  We all should bask in the shade that our own noggin provides sometimes.  Lawd knows that we get enough negative shade thrown our way at times and I have certainly sat in other's negative shadows for the last month or so.

So I'm sitting here with my big head bobbing to some good old fashioned hustle music (you know Busta Rhymes , womanopoly, Rick Ross ,Dolly Parton ) and questioning if so many think that I'm good how come I only have two children enrolled?
I know part of my problem is that I tend to tell the truth, "Little Johnny isn't crying when you leave because he's having separation anxiety.  Little Johnny is crying because as soon as you leave he won't have an adult around that he can manipulate. I said out loud, hunh?"  I'm working on my edit button as well as my patience.  This has been a lifelong struggle for me but I won't give up.
Now in order for me to practice my own self-control I need to have clients to practice on.  The world wide web has done wonders with my Scentsy business so I've decided to explore Google and find other avenues to advertise for free instead of just Craigslist .

This is the little bit that I've learned and if anyone is interested, I will continue to post more as I go...
When a person enters a service that they are looking for in Google...because trust me, LOTS of people do...you want to make sure that your business pops up on the first page under as many different ways to search for your business as possible.  For example, if a person enters "Omaha Daycare" I show up on that first page.  If they enter "Omaha Home Childcare" I pop up.  I think I pop up under "Omaha preschool", too.  The reason I pop up on all of those searches is because I am a world wide web junkie.  I am all over this thing.  Mainly because I have so many friends that live in the monitor and I'm chatting with them all the time.  Whenever I chat I am identified as either Ms. Erika or The Kids' Spot.  I'm kinda a brand now..and that's a good thing!  I NEEED to be a brand.  If you have a business, you NEEED to be a brand!!  When you tell your kid to grab some mac-n-cheese from the store, do you tell them grab some Kraft or do they just automatically grab it?  They just grab it because "generic store name" hasn't put in the work to be at the front of their brain.  I need to put in work and flood their brain with The Kids' Spot.  When a wife tells her husband, "we really need to put little johnny in childcare because now that he talks I really have no clue" or when a husband tells his wife, "we really need to find a childcare for Little Johnny because I have decided that that I really should get a job instead of just fantasy football."  I want them to know to call The Kids' Spot because I am the spot for kids!!
So I'm on the front page, and a lot of other people are, too.  How do I stand out from the crowd?  For starters go to Google Places and claim your business! It's FREE. Free is my friend :)  There you can put in all of your business info and add pictures and even a coupon if you want.  After, you can sweat it every day like you do the mailman when expecting a refund check.  It has an analytic thingy that shows you how many people saw it, how many clicked on it, etcetera. What claiming your space will do is put your listing in with the search results that have that little red bulb next to them and are placed on the map in the Google results.  Now I have learned the hard way that if you have a potential client that is pissed at you then they can blast negative reviews all over the net and Google Places does add reviews from other sites.  That being said, I have had my Place on there for a few years and have only had this problem once.  And since so many amazing people have left positive reviews, I'm thinking he's not a factor so much.
Okay, so you have your Google Place but there are a lot of businesses similar to yours that have theirs, too.  How do you get up in the list?  Well, the more positive reviews on your Google Place the better BUT also the more times Google sees you on the world wide web the more important they think you are. So I am searching now for free advertising spots.  One that I am doing right now is thumbtack.com.  I am currently creating an ad for Family Child Care with All Day Preschool
This will be just one more place that I show up on the web and hopefully, will help to  bump me up to the number one spot in the listings.
Of course, I already have a website for The Kids' Spot so that helps a lot and believe it or not, even my Facebook page shows up in Google.  Which is so cool! Anyone who knows me knows that if I can rationalize being on Facebook to be beneficial in any way...oooh I feel all tingly!

Well, that is the extent of my knowledge at this point.  My knowledge on internet marketing that is .... always a donkey with jokes in the crowd.  I'm going to see if that whole html mess I entered up there worked and finish off the thumbtack.com to see if it helps like I believe it will.

Before I go, I'd really appreciate it if tonight, everyone that is reading this, if tonight when you see a toy that hasn't been put away or realize that you are low on toilet paper or just generally wish for an extra 15 minutes of complete solitude in your day....that you think of me, look up and ask the Daycare Fairy to please send me some sane families with funny kids.
I thank you :)

Day Two of Shakeology Cleanse~cleansing not just my body but trying to get my mind around no coffee!

So today is the second day of this Shakeology cleanse.

I'm really pretty amazed..partially at the Shakeology and a lot at me!

I've done the lemonade cleanse (that's not lemonade, it's yellow, demon... welll it's just nasty!) and lasted almost a day!

I've done juice cleanses and while I felt pretty healthy, I gained 7lbs in just 3 days UGH!

I've done the little pills that come in colon cleanse "kits"..I won't tell you what all happened with that other than to say it made me realize that I really should think about decorating my bathroom more since there is so much potential to spend time in there :/

All of these cleanses left me starved, evil and in need of more air freshener..not to mention the weird sounds Thatman said my stomache made all night.

I've recently become a Beachbody Coach.  That means that among a lot of things I'm happy about, I'm thrilled that I get 25% discount on their products, I have accountability to really stay on my health goals and ever so often I might get a commission lol I know I shouldn't say it like that because my Diamond Coach above me makes over $1000 a week..I just started so I'm happy to lose a thousand calories a week!

I mention all that to say that one of the products I'm authorized to sell is Shakeology.  It's a nutritional drink that can be used as a supplement or complete meal replacement.  With only 140 calories it holds over 70 ingredients, 17 grams of protein, 17 grams of total carbohydrates (which is a good number when it comes to me offering it to Taz, my 15yr old who has Juvenile Diabetes), probiotics , amino acids, I can go on a LOT.  The only thing it boasts which I'm having a real hard time with is NO CAFFEINE.  I'll complain more about that later lol

My feeling is that I can't sell anything that I'm not 100% into..heck that's why I asked about selling Scentsy, I LOVE them!  So I decided I'd take a crash test with Shakeology and do the Three Day Cleanse.  This cleanse wasn't created or endorsed by Beachbody (the company behind Shakeology) but after reading a lot about it, it does seem like a great idea. Heck, nothing can be worse than lemons, cayenne and pancake syrup :)

Today I am on day two and I am really impressed!

It does not taste chalky, like a slimfast or protein powder.  It is thick and pretty rich.  It's not Godiva chocolate flavor but it's better than a Hershey bar in flavor as far as I'm concerned (not better than a dark Hershey, just the milk chocolate Hersheys lol).

What's crazy is that I am actually FULL!  The only problem I have had is the first night I went to get my 4yr old some BK (Yep I'm an amazing mother) and he kept asking why I didn't order the ciabatta chicken. He finally gave up and said that Jimmy John's was better for me anyway.  You should've heard the psychotic conversations that were running in my head!! I managed to get home and keep a sane looking smile on my face while I headed to the kitchen to take 1 cup of cold water, 2 ice cubes and a pack of Shakeology, pour them into a shaker cup and shake out ALL of my aggression!

I did go to bed last night with a headache.  I believe it was from not having my daily cup of Medaglia D'Oro coffee (or some say my daily mud).  I have had a cup of  coffee with one tsp of sugar or one pack of Splenda and enough milk to look late'ish since 1984.  Haven't missed a day willingly.  I woke up with a headache as well but now it's gone!  It didn't turn into a migraine either which is CRAZY.

It is now 10pm and I'm drinking my second Shakeology.  It should be my 3rd but I've been too full to even imagine drinking another until now. *insert confused as heck look*

I should've done the whole before pics, measurement and weighing ..I procrastinated because I really don't want to face it.  I will say that I know I weighed  183 yesterday morning and the scale said I was 44% fat WTH?! So I'm almost half fat.  And this is where I admit how vain I am...Thatman knows nothing of this blog.   Being almost HALF fat sounds so anti-sexy to me smh

Well, you can tell I'm brand new to this blogging thing.

I'm even longer winded in print!

If you've gotten this far I thank you :)  Tomorrow I will suck it up and post my measurements...maybe a picture if I can figure out how to get each of you to submit confidentiality forms.