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Donna Maria's Handmade Beauty Connection Newsletter
June 17, 2002
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---> This Week's Sponsor: Your Business!!

If you're looking for a a fun, economical way to promote your business to handmade beauty product enthusiasts all around the world, look no further!!

Your business could be advertised here!

The Handmade Beauty Connection reaches over 3,000 loyal subscribers each week. Our subscribers are lovers of handmade toiletries and a large percentage of them make their own products using the educational information, raw materials and supplies provided by companies like yours!!

For details on how your can get your message heard by loyal HBC readers, click here.

1. HBN Update: Welcome New HBN Members
2. Handmade Beauty Trivia Question: win a Cedar Breeze AirScents mister courtesy of HBN member Aroma Magic!!
3. Create The Life You Love™: Making Yourself Memorable, Part III: Be Internet Savvy
4. New At MakeYourCosmetics.com: Lippy
5. Handmade Beauty Product Review: by Donna Maria

~ Welcome New HBN Members!

Autumn Windz | Barbara Freeman | Missouri
* Handmade soap in bars or logs or retail, wholesale and private label; large selection of molds and base oils, etc.

Earth Dance Soaps | Libby Claridge | California
* Handcrafted soaps made with pure essential oils, exotic butters, pure vegetable oils, organic herbs, exotic butters

Baltimore's Best Bath & Body Products | Sharon Kinnier | Maryland
* Full line of daily use products designed to bring aromatherapy into your everyday life

Luv a Dub Dub Soaps | Patrick Dolan | Illinois
* Cold process handmade soap and glycerin soaps

Skin Essentials | Ulrike B. Ackerman | Georgia
* organic body creams and lotions

The Herbarie at Stonyhill Farm, Inc. | Angie Turner | South Carolina
* Botanicals, surfactants, chemicals, preservatives, emulsifiers and other fun stuff to make your cosmetics with

~ Welcome Renewing Members!

Making-Soap.com | Michelle Rotherham | California

Learn more about our members and their exciting activities by visiting their Web sites through HBN's Online Member Directory!!

Last Week's Question: I do not produce an essential oil, but I am a real plant that a popular fragrance oil is named for. I am hardy and sweet smelling and I grow in abundance in full sun in humid areas. My leaves, which curl up when dried, are braided into beautiful coiled baskets which are made by hand using me, pine needles and pieces of Palmetto leaves, and sold mainly in the low country of Charleston, South Carolina, and the surrounding islands including St. Johns, Fripp, Kiawah and Pawley's.

Last Week's Answer: Sweetgrass

This Week's Question: Recently, a group of school aged children entered a contest to invent new products to solve life's everyday problems. The contest was sponsored by a well-known electronics company and the National Science Teachers Association, and the winners enjoyed several prizes including US savings bonds and trips to Washington, DC. One of the winning inventions causes the bath tub to associate your reflection in a mirror with a particular water level and temperature, thus causing the tub to automatically fill with water at the level and temperature you prefer. To win this week, be the first to provide the name of this fancy bathtub gadget as described above.

This week's winner will receive a Cedar Breeze AirScents mister, courtesy of HBN member Aroma Magic.

Please read the contest rules here before submitting your entry.

While time does not permit me to respond personally to all entrants, the winner will be notified by email and their name posted at HBN's home page.

For the past few weeks, I've been sharing a series of articles on making yourself memorable. If you missed the first two installments, you can read Be An Expert here, and you can read Be Consistent here.

In this third article in the 10-part series, we discuss how being Internet Savvy can help your business be more memorable in the minds of your customers. A popular online dictionary defines "savvy" as well informed and perceptive. These terms are excellent ones to keep in mind when pondering what it means to be savvy as it concerns your business and the Internet. Of course, if you have a business of any size, having a Web site and being Internet savvy is important. But if you have a small business, being Internet savvy includes not only having a Web site, but also mastering the basic techniques associated with using your site and the Internet in general to make your business more cost effective, efficient and enjoyable for you and your customers. Here are a few basic tips.

1. Make Your Web Site Professional. Just this morning, I was talking with a small business owner who knows he needs a Web site to increase sales and generate new business. But he also knows that he cannot afford a large Web site at this time. So rather than find a Web designer "on the cheap," so to speak, he has opted to have a 1 or 2-page site for now that includes a professional photograph of his products and a simple order form. Having viewed dozens of sites he described as "amateurish" and "sub-standard," he decided he would rather than a small site to start which showed off his products in a professional manner, than to have a larger site with fuzzy pictures that made is his site (and his business!) unattractive and uninviting. What a wise decision he made! He can always grow his small Web site slowly as he grows the rest of his business. Your Web site is your store front on the Internet. If you want people to return time and again, make it inviting and professional. Check for broken links and fix them regularly. Make sure your current phone and fax numbers are displayed and easy to locate. Be certain that any photos are clear and well lit and don't unnecessarily slow down your site's loading time. (It's better to have no photos at all than to have photos that are unattractive.) Take pictures that present your product in a professional and attractive way ... make it look like something someone would want to buy.

If doing all of this means hiring a professional to design your site for you and add to it slowly over time, that is always better than just throwing up a hastily designed site that makes you and your products look undesirable. Sometimes, being savvy means simply hiring someone else to do a job for you that you cannot do professionally yourself! I know enough has been said about this over the years, but for goodness sake, don't be tempted to cut costs by allowing pop up ads at your Web site. Nothing is more annoying (well, maybe spam, so don't do that either!!). If you have to cut corners, cut them someplace else ... preferably someplace that's invisible to your customers!!

2. Make It Easy For Your Customers To Contact You Using The Internet. Part of being perceptive as a business owner is understanding the reality that your customer base will increase in proportion to how easy you make it for people to contact and do business with you. I took an informal poll of several business owners, and one of the top ways they say they remain at the forefront of their customers' minds is by remaining in constant communication with them with an "open door" policy. This means that they use technology, including their Web sites and email, to stay in touch with their customers, thereby remaining just a click away from contacting them when they need a particular product or service. A Web site that makes it a chore for people to contact the owner will not be visited often. On the other hand a site that makes it simple for people to contact you via: (1) snail mail; (2) email; (3) phone; and (4) fax is inviting and welcomes people back over and over again. Admittedly, fewer and fewer people need a snail mail address these days, but failing to have one at your Web site can appear unprofessional, especially if a site is lacking overall in other areas. For home based businesses, a post office box is usually better than omitting a mailing address entirely. People will remember you favorably (and your business!) if you make it easy for them to contact you.

Next Week: Be Extraordinary

Lippy is a really easy recipe for lip balm which Shannon Parker (who submitted the recipe) says will make your lips kissably soft without being greasy. Check it out!!

When you visit MakeYourCosmetics.com, it's easy to buy the ingredients you need to make your goodies by clicking on our Partner links:

Essential Wholesale: natural unscented cosmetic bases, pure essential oils, absolutes, carrier oils such as avocado, virgin coconut, sweet almond, jojoba, shea butter and specialty packaging supplies!

Bramble Berry, Inc.: over 80 different, fully tested fragrance oils (including the exclusive "Relaxing" and "Energy" blends), over 250 soap molds, essential oils and unscented bases.

Lynden House International , Canadian supplier of soap and candlemaking supplies such as fixed oils, perfumes, essential oils, molds, powdered milks, colors, pre-made bases, candle wax, wicks, embeds and more!