So the past few weeks have been non stop and I really need a vacation from life. I have a travel size notebook where I literally write down all my to-dos. To-dos mainly for Fur My Pet, and some to-dos for myself personally. This helps me tremendously to maintain the website and stay on top of things that I need. So one of my to-dos was to check up on my Google ad words campaign for a number of reasons. One of them was because I hadn't had any sales in a 2 week period and that seemed strange. I went online and I noticed that I had no Fur My Pet ads showing in a month or longer. Not understanding what the problem was, I contacted a customer service person and all they had to say was that after my previous campaign optimization, I had to reset my minimum cost per clicks for the campaign. OMG WHAT A PAIN! I had already done this before the optimization and Google had to click it OFF for the optimization. You would think that they could just turn it back on or let me know to how to turn it back on. Not the case. Because setting up cost per clicks was something I had already done a while back, I had to search Google Help and figure out how to manually go in and type in a minimum cost per click for my ad word campaigns.
So that was the reason I had no sales - my text ads were not being shown online. Google prides itself on ease of the program and on alerts. Well I was never alerted that my ads were not being shown. If my ads are not being shown, that means on one is clicking on them. If no one is clicking on them, that means that Google is not getting paid. This alone should have raised some red flags for them to send me an alert.
Now my ads are back on line and it will now take a few weeks for the ads to be rotated so that searchers will see them. I'll keep you posted on that progress!
Sunday, June 14, 2009
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Dogs and Water
So, two weekends ago, my family went to Berkeley to celebrate my younger brother's graduation from Cal! Exciting times! Since he's the baby of the brood, it was very emotional for our mom and dad. Well on the way there, we decided to take the nice scenic route up the 1 fwy. We stopped in Big Sur at The River Inn. What a great place to enjoy yourself! The outdoor eating area was beautiful and lush with tall trees. You really felt like you were in a wondorous forest. The birds were out, the trees were tall and green and the sun was shining! I really do love California! A bit beyond the eating area was a creak or river. It was not very deep because from our view, there were two wooden lounge chairs in the middle of it. We've never ever seen that! We decided after lunch we would go and relax in the chairs.
Anyways, back to the food. Did I say it was fantassssssstic! The waiter really gave us the story behind their famous apple pie and my favorite: their barrel stored root beer. It was a pleasant blend of sweet, fresh and spicy. I never thought I would use fresh and spicy when describing root beer - ever!
We ordered:
- Sweet Potato Fries
- Fresh Monterey Bay Calamari
- Crab and Avocado Timbale (salad) - A tower of fresh crab and avocado lightly tossed with a basil aioli, served with crostini
- Spaghetti Bolognese
- Portobello Brioche - Toasted brioche topped with grilled portobello mushroom, fresh goat cheese, crispy shallots, finished with a balsamic reduction and white truffle oil
WOW! It must have been the air or the happy sun, but everything was delightful. I guess it could have been the food too hahaha. We were stuffed like little satisfied piggies. Oh by the way, they charged us like $4.00/refill for the root beer and I was a little disappointed that no one bothered to tell us when they refilled our glasses without us asking. Other than that, I would absolutely recommend that place.
So after our great food experience, my older brother and I mosied on down to the creek/river. We took off our shoes and entered the ice cold water, walking carefully over small and medium sized rocks. We could see to the bottom so there was no worry of insects or fish or anything. It was beautiful. The water didn't care what you were doing, it went on its merry way regardless. It was flowing at a melodious tone that drowned out as soon as you closed your eyes to take a deep breath.
As we are in the middle of this river, not knowing what to do next but enjoying ourselves, we see this couple come walking up the river with their light colored dog. They are IN the water. Their dog is prancing, running, walking, smelling and playing. As they get closer there is another dog and they start playing with eachother. They are both soaking wet and loving every minute of it. The couple stops where we all are and sits in one of the chairs close to me. Their dog is romping around and dragging tree bark and wanting to play fetch with his tennis ball. Funny enough I was trying to take pictures of their dog and all of the sudden it shook to dry off and got me wet! Ah, dogs and water!
It was such a great day! (and the graduation was great too. Ha!)
Anyways, back to the food. Did I say it was fantassssssstic! The waiter really gave us the story behind their famous apple pie and my favorite: their barrel stored root beer. It was a pleasant blend of sweet, fresh and spicy. I never thought I would use fresh and spicy when describing root beer - ever!
We ordered:
- Sweet Potato Fries
- Fresh Monterey Bay Calamari
- Crab and Avocado Timbale (salad) - A tower of fresh crab and avocado lightly tossed with a basil aioli, served with crostini
- Spaghetti Bolognese
- Portobello Brioche - Toasted brioche topped with grilled portobello mushroom, fresh goat cheese, crispy shallots, finished with a balsamic reduction and white truffle oil
WOW! It must have been the air or the happy sun, but everything was delightful. I guess it could have been the food too hahaha. We were stuffed like little satisfied piggies. Oh by the way, they charged us like $4.00/refill for the root beer and I was a little disappointed that no one bothered to tell us when they refilled our glasses without us asking. Other than that, I would absolutely recommend that place.
So after our great food experience, my older brother and I mosied on down to the creek/river. We took off our shoes and entered the ice cold water, walking carefully over small and medium sized rocks. We could see to the bottom so there was no worry of insects or fish or anything. It was beautiful. The water didn't care what you were doing, it went on its merry way regardless. It was flowing at a melodious tone that drowned out as soon as you closed your eyes to take a deep breath.
As we are in the middle of this river, not knowing what to do next but enjoying ourselves, we see this couple come walking up the river with their light colored dog. They are IN the water. Their dog is prancing, running, walking, smelling and playing. As they get closer there is another dog and they start playing with eachother. They are both soaking wet and loving every minute of it. The couple stops where we all are and sits in one of the chairs close to me. Their dog is romping around and dragging tree bark and wanting to play fetch with his tennis ball. Funny enough I was trying to take pictures of their dog and all of the sudden it shook to dry off and got me wet! Ah, dogs and water!
It was such a great day! (and the graduation was great too. Ha!)
Thursday, May 21, 2009
It's a dog eat dog world, or is it?
This is the first time ever blogging about anything. Why would someone want to read about anything I have to say. So for those that do find this, thanks for taking the time. This blog is about starting and running an online pet boutique for pet lovers who treat their little ones, as kids!
My name is Julie Sterk and I started Fur My Pet in July of 2007 with my mom. We didn't get the website up and running until about Christmas of that year. That was fun! What a learning curve to building your own website! wow! But I did it and I'm very proud of myself. We had to purchase all my inventory before we had the permission to put any pictures online, so talk about an investment. But what were my goals? I don't think I really had any at that time! I was just excited to say I had a company - success or fail!
So the pet clothing and accessories started to pour in and OMG how cute! They are like little baby clothes hahahaha. On a personal concession, I was not one to dress up my dog, but, now, if I had my own little one, I totally would. Okay, so now you are thinking, wait, you didn't like dressing your dog, you don't even have your own pet, then why on earth would I start a pet site? Well the answer to that question is simple. It definitely wasn't about making any kind of money, in fact, we don't even plan to break even for another 5 or more years!!! It is only about one thing. I love animals. My older brother is allergic to animals and we never had any dogs or cats growing up! I wanted to have a pet so badly, I had hamsters, birds and fish. Anything that didn't shed. Finally my brother went off to college and my mom let us (my younger brother and I) have a cocker spaniel. So cute! And until I got married and moved out of my mom's house, the "family" dog was all of ours. Moose is our cocker spaniel and he has the sweetest face! He was the inspiration behind it all. Now that I'm married, we don't have the space for a pet and I don't have the proper time to dedicate to one and it wouldn't be fair to any pet to do that. So until then, I wait!
But in the mean time, I get my kicks with connecting to fellow animal lovers who spoil their "kids". It's amazing how passionate this pet loving community is. We get emails and thank you notes all the time about how much they love what they received and most importantly, how much they appreciated the customer experience. I don't hesitate to call people or email them if I feel something seems wrong on their order. Did so-and-so really want 6 of the same item? Was it a typo or a glitch? The clothing they ordered seems to fit a specific size animal, but one item was way bigger - was that a mistake? Our customers love that! And frankly I don't do it because they love that I do, I do it so they feel they have someone who really cares about their connection with Fur My Pet and their own pet. I am like their personal shopper and it's a nice relationship.
Until next time...
My name is Julie Sterk and I started Fur My Pet in July of 2007 with my mom. We didn't get the website up and running until about Christmas of that year. That was fun! What a learning curve to building your own website! wow! But I did it and I'm very proud of myself. We had to purchase all my inventory before we had the permission to put any pictures online, so talk about an investment. But what were my goals? I don't think I really had any at that time! I was just excited to say I had a company - success or fail!
So the pet clothing and accessories started to pour in and OMG how cute! They are like little baby clothes hahahaha. On a personal concession, I was not one to dress up my dog, but, now, if I had my own little one, I totally would. Okay, so now you are thinking, wait, you didn't like dressing your dog, you don't even have your own pet, then why on earth would I start a pet site? Well the answer to that question is simple. It definitely wasn't about making any kind of money, in fact, we don't even plan to break even for another 5 or more years!!! It is only about one thing. I love animals. My older brother is allergic to animals and we never had any dogs or cats growing up! I wanted to have a pet so badly, I had hamsters, birds and fish. Anything that didn't shed. Finally my brother went off to college and my mom let us (my younger brother and I) have a cocker spaniel. So cute! And until I got married and moved out of my mom's house, the "family" dog was all of ours. Moose is our cocker spaniel and he has the sweetest face! He was the inspiration behind it all. Now that I'm married, we don't have the space for a pet and I don't have the proper time to dedicate to one and it wouldn't be fair to any pet to do that. So until then, I wait!
But in the mean time, I get my kicks with connecting to fellow animal lovers who spoil their "kids". It's amazing how passionate this pet loving community is. We get emails and thank you notes all the time about how much they love what they received and most importantly, how much they appreciated the customer experience. I don't hesitate to call people or email them if I feel something seems wrong on their order. Did so-and-so really want 6 of the same item? Was it a typo or a glitch? The clothing they ordered seems to fit a specific size animal, but one item was way bigger - was that a mistake? Our customers love that! And frankly I don't do it because they love that I do, I do it so they feel they have someone who really cares about their connection with Fur My Pet and their own pet. I am like their personal shopper and it's a nice relationship.
Until next time...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
