TheHerbCure.com

I'm finally focused. (I think). I'm going to start a business called The Herb Cure. My main products will be Native Remedies. They drop ship, so that makes it easy for me, although they have wholesale pricing for large orders which I may take advantage of if I get really ambitious. I have my husband's support in this so that will come in handy if we decide to expand.

For now, I am starting as basic as possible. I have a Zen Cart installed and a free template. I'm working about 5 minutes at a time on it. I sometimes wonder if employing someone else to do the design and programming wouldn't be worthwhile, but the truth is, I like this type of thing even though I pull my hair out over it. But it's good experience and someday I'll be glad I learned how to do it.

It's definitely slow, however. The regional sales rep at Megafood will be setting me up as a retailer as soon as I get the website presentable, and I'm so excited but of course the family comes first. It will be great to sell Megafood 100% whole food trace minerals to friends and family at last! We thrive on their products and I can't wait to get started.

After the website launches, we'll be buying sponsored advertising on Google for less than half the normal cost because that's what my husband does for a living now. So many things in our lives seem to be fitting together for the good lately. And I haven't even blogged about Ron Paul yet! I'll have to do that next time.

Feeling Foolish

I'm really feeling like an idiot tonight. I've been reading so many awesome blogs out there, many of which are maintained by magnificently prolific and smart women with children and busy lives like mine. Yet they manage to say so much more in their blogs. I want to read them. I don't want to write mine.

Other bloggers seem to have so much to say -- the more I read the more I confirm to myself why I never started a blog before and why I don't often post.

Hm. Another element is perfectionism. I'd love to delete this blog and start over. Act like I know what I'm talking about. Pretend to be one of those "other" mom/bloggers. After giving myself a pep talk, I'm off to find something interesting to post about!

Online earnings so far...

I still think it's amazing that anybody can make money online with a little know-how. Keep in mind that I have 5 children that I homeschool, so running an online business is definitely more of a hobby, and I haven't devoted time each day to it - or even each week.

But in the last few months, I've been paid 68 cents from Google Adsense (that's just the single ad I have on this blog, which no one reads!) and a whole dollar from Squidoo. (I like Squidoo. I might make more lenses if I ever have time).

I think making dollars and cents online can be kind of an addiction. Obviously what I've done so far has little value and doesn't even pay for the power to run the servers for all those "clicks." But somehow it gives me the same little thrill I got when I was a kid and returned the cans I found on the side of the road to the grocery store for the deposit, bought a Sprite, then twisted off the cap to discover I'd won another Sprite! I felt like I was in a land flowing with milk and honey.

Oh yeah, and I also made a sale at my eCRATER store, which was entirely self-propelled because I hadn't touched it in weeks. So that was pretty awesome.

Let's see, I sold a domain name for $15 that I think actually came free with my hosting package, so that probably was my biggest profit so far. :) Pretty silly, I know. But I still think I'm learning just by watching and dipping my toes in..