Small businesses and self-representing artisans are always looking for and researching new and existing sources and venues for marketing, promotion, and advertising.  Getting your name and products ”out there” on the world wide web is an important step to your business success.  The old “build it and they will come” adage needs some additional steps for internet businesses and online promotion.  After you build your website, you have to tell people where you are, what you have to offer, and provide links to lead them back to your site.   How do you learn the when, what, and where to accomplish these tasks?  One of the best resources I have found is sharing information and ideas through online forums.  In this post I will share some of my best resources with you.

I am a participating member of the Jewelry Collectibles Small Business Forum.   I would like to invite you to visit and join this forum.  The purpose of this forum is to give small business owners a place to network, share ideas, brainstorm, ask questions, get answers, & promote their small businesses.  This is a new forum that replaced another forum with resources for small businesses that I participated in for over a year.  Most of the main topics from the original forum were migrated to the new forum which is now hosted on an owner’s server with a totally new updated format. 

This forum contains valuable small business tips and resources for SEO (search engine optimization), discussions about eBay stores and other selling venues, information and shared wisdom on selling at shows and festivals, antiques and vintage collectibles, promoting your store or website, and as one of the members says, “work smarter, not harder” to grow your online business. 

I can say personally that my own business and website has grown and benefited from information and ideas shared by people participating in this forum and I would like to pass this on to other small business owners, store owners, artisans and collectors.  The current forum members are actively working to increase membership and invite new participants to visit and join Jewelry Collectibles Small Business Forum.  Click my link and register to join today!  I think you will benefit by participating in the forum and your knowledge and ideas will be welcome.

Along with the Jewelry Collectibles Small Business Forum, another resource available for promotion of your store or website is The Marketplace, A gathering of the small business community, provided and maintained by Jewelry Collectibles.  This is a blog-site where you can post articles about your business, your products, promote your business/goods and create your own business page if you want.  Even if you already have your own blog, posting here on The Marketplace  gives you another link out to the web.

The last promotion resource I will write about today is Jewelry Collectibles Top 100 Shopping Site List.  Sign up and join this list/directory today to promote your store, website, or blog.  When you sign up you will be given a code to place on your site for people to click on and a vote will be registered for your site’s position on the list.  The more votes you get, the higher your site appears on the list. 

You are invited to browse and shop in my store: KC Bead Designs anytime – 24/7. I hope you subscribe to “Reflections . . .” and enjoy sharing my passion for artisan jewelry.

’till next time!

Cheryl Skeens,
Jewelry Artist/Designer

KC Bead Designs Website
KC Bead Designs Squidoo Lens
KC Bead Designs MySpace Page
Jewelry Artist Direct Gallery