So you have a blog and happily post as often as you possibly can. You write about things that are important to you. You share funny stories about your children, spouse, co-workers, neighbors. Maybe you even use your blog as way to let off some steam. Unhappy with the customer service you’ve received at your local superstore? Write about it. Your boss is a jerk? Write about him (leaving out his or her name of course). Your husband constantly leaves the toilet seat up or hogs the remote? Share all the irritating details on your blog. There are literally millions of blogs out there in cyberspace so why shouldn’t you be joining in on the blogging fun?
There are many reasons why you should consider starting a blog. Many free blog sites exist so there’s no financial commitment to make. Register, choose a theme and begin posting. It’s as easy as that. As mentioned above, blogging is a good way to share your life with others. Families set up blogs where each member has a chance to post updates to let relatives near and far know what’s going on in their lives. Include photos and videos and it’s almost like being there with your loved ones. If you’re looking to change careers or are currently out of work you should consider creating a blog. Include a resume page and links to relevant accomplishments and you can advertise yourself via your blog easily with one click. This is definitely an overlooked free marketing strategy for job seekers.
Do you have a business website? If the answer is yes, you should absolutely include a blog on your site. Write articles and how-to’s in your business field and your customers will appreciate the added information. Let’s say you own a tree trimming business and you have a business website. You can write articles about types of trees to plant, when the best time to trim is, known diseases prevalent in certain varieties of trees, how to start a leaf compost bin, and on and on. Inviting readers to leave comments and questions give you the opportunity to put in a good word for your company.
Blogs can be money makers all on their own. Most, if not all, free blogging sites do not allow advertising on blogs. But If you purchase your own domain name you can include money-making ads on your blog. There are numerous pay-per-click and affiliate programs available online. By placing company ads on your blog you make money when a visitor to your site clicks on an ad and/or buys a product from the company. You most likely will not get rich doing this but you get paid for doing very little and that’s a pretty good thing.
In order to make money from advertising on your blog you need to bring visitors to your site. Submitting your blog to search engines is key. An often overlooked method to bring visitors to your site is to write articles. There are many article network sites where you can submit articles on literally any topic. Your information, including your website address, appears with the article and that translates to free advertising for your site. I will go into more detail on this technique in future articles.
Blogging can be fun, an expressive outlet, a marketing tool and a money maker. Once you start blogging you’ll begin to look at things in an entirely different light. News reports, radio programs, even a trip to the grocery store can all be fodder for your blog writing. Keeping a small notebook and pen with you at all times helps you remember little tidbits of everyday life than can be written about later. Happy blogging!
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
How One Foam Hair Color Had Me Fuming
I’m not new to hair coloring. I’ve been coloring my hair since my teen years. When all the girls at school were adding highlights I went hog wild with the peroxide and became an instant blonde. It proved a bit too startling for my liking and I cried until my mom helped me dye it back to my usual dark brown and stuck with it. But when my daughter was playing hair salon on my hair and informed me I had a “big, long white string” stuck in my hair I knew it was time to color those nasty grays. I vowed to make the time to color my hair every six weeks since then and have never looked back.
Hair color has come a long way over the years. Manufacturers have listened to consumers and have made great improvements by making their products more gentle and less smelly. I’ve tried just about every brand and color on the market but always come back to the same crème formula in my own dark brown shade. But when I began seeing the new foam styles I just had to see what all the hype was about. According to commercials, the foam was supposed to be less messy, easier to use and was better at covering the grays. So when my six weeks were up and the grays once more came in
I made my usual trek to the store to select a foam hair color and settled on Clairol’s Nice & Easy Foam, this time in a medium brown shade.
When I returned home I put on my usual ratty hair coloring clothes and read the instructions that came with the box. I mixed the color thoroughly as per the directions and began to apply the mixture to my head. First, I found the foam to be very runny despite shaking the bottle the necessary amount of time. Having to squeeze the bottle from the middle wasn’t the easiest of techniques. In my opinion, Clairol would do well to provide a pump bottle instead.
As I stood at the kitchen sink, the foam went flying everywhere. Plop on my kitchen counter. Plop on the floor. It was a much more tedious process than it had ever been when I used my usual crème color. By the time I got to the ends of my hair the color on my head had dried and caked on my scalp. I waited the required time and was pretty upset about the length of time it took me to rinse the color from my hair. It was pretty hard and crusty. So I decided to get in the shower to do a better rinse. And I rinsed and rinsed some more until I thought it was rinsed pretty thoroughly. Unfortunately all the scrubbing and rubbing had resulted in quite a bit of lost hair from the looks of the hair pile on my shower drain cover.
After taking the towel off my wet hair I saw that my hair was in no way a medium brown shade. It was black. Thinking because it was wet, I dried it. It was still black. Darn it! Was I the only one who had used this foam color and had this experience? A quick online search brought me to several message boards where women who had used Clairol’s foam color had pretty much the same experiences. Honestly if I had read some of the personal reviews prior to coloring I would have steered clear of the foam.
In addition to the above issues, it took three washings before the color was finally thoroughly washed from my hair. For three subsequent days I saw brown, murky water in my shower. And, it stained my scalp. Interestingly, other women on the message boards had this same experience.
Since I’m writing about my own personal experience with Clairol’s Nice & Easy Foam Color that’s all I can attest to. I have not tried any other brand of foam color. However, in Clairol’s defense I must say that, although the color was definitely not true to the “medium brown” description and did indeed result in a black color, it did cover the gray magnificently. And the fact that this was weeks ago and I still see no visible grays I remain impressed with the coverage. In addition, when I emailed Clairol and detailed my experience they immediately responded with their concern and mailed me a coupon for a free product of my choice. So they did get an A+ in customer service from me. Foam hair color is relatively new to the market and hopefully it will be perfected so that manufacturers can get the kinks out of the process. But for now I plan on sticking to my usual crème product.
Hair color has come a long way over the years. Manufacturers have listened to consumers and have made great improvements by making their products more gentle and less smelly. I’ve tried just about every brand and color on the market but always come back to the same crème formula in my own dark brown shade. But when I began seeing the new foam styles I just had to see what all the hype was about. According to commercials, the foam was supposed to be less messy, easier to use and was better at covering the grays. So when my six weeks were up and the grays once more came in
I made my usual trek to the store to select a foam hair color and settled on Clairol’s Nice & Easy Foam, this time in a medium brown shade.
When I returned home I put on my usual ratty hair coloring clothes and read the instructions that came with the box. I mixed the color thoroughly as per the directions and began to apply the mixture to my head. First, I found the foam to be very runny despite shaking the bottle the necessary amount of time. Having to squeeze the bottle from the middle wasn’t the easiest of techniques. In my opinion, Clairol would do well to provide a pump bottle instead.
As I stood at the kitchen sink, the foam went flying everywhere. Plop on my kitchen counter. Plop on the floor. It was a much more tedious process than it had ever been when I used my usual crème color. By the time I got to the ends of my hair the color on my head had dried and caked on my scalp. I waited the required time and was pretty upset about the length of time it took me to rinse the color from my hair. It was pretty hard and crusty. So I decided to get in the shower to do a better rinse. And I rinsed and rinsed some more until I thought it was rinsed pretty thoroughly. Unfortunately all the scrubbing and rubbing had resulted in quite a bit of lost hair from the looks of the hair pile on my shower drain cover.
After taking the towel off my wet hair I saw that my hair was in no way a medium brown shade. It was black. Thinking because it was wet, I dried it. It was still black. Darn it! Was I the only one who had used this foam color and had this experience? A quick online search brought me to several message boards where women who had used Clairol’s foam color had pretty much the same experiences. Honestly if I had read some of the personal reviews prior to coloring I would have steered clear of the foam.
In addition to the above issues, it took three washings before the color was finally thoroughly washed from my hair. For three subsequent days I saw brown, murky water in my shower. And, it stained my scalp. Interestingly, other women on the message boards had this same experience.
Since I’m writing about my own personal experience with Clairol’s Nice & Easy Foam Color that’s all I can attest to. I have not tried any other brand of foam color. However, in Clairol’s defense I must say that, although the color was definitely not true to the “medium brown” description and did indeed result in a black color, it did cover the gray magnificently. And the fact that this was weeks ago and I still see no visible grays I remain impressed with the coverage. In addition, when I emailed Clairol and detailed my experience they immediately responded with their concern and mailed me a coupon for a free product of my choice. So they did get an A+ in customer service from me. Foam hair color is relatively new to the market and hopefully it will be perfected so that manufacturers can get the kinks out of the process. But for now I plan on sticking to my usual crème product.
Skim Scam
I like to paint. I find it to be a lot cheaper than therapy. When I recently relocated I left so many of my beloved belongings behind (long story). Among those many things were my art supplies. So I recently took a trip to a neighborhood Michael’s Craft Store to begin building my art supplies back up. Seventy bucks later, I was well on the road to painting my way to happiness once more. Until I read a Yahoo article about skimming scams.
It seems Michael’s was recently yet another target of a debit card scam. Seems the arts and crafts chain had no idea what had happened, only finding out when they were contacted by “banking and law enforcement authorities” after they in turn had been contacted by customers. Numerous customers had noticed fraudulent charges made to their debit cards which ultimately had been traced back to transactions made at Michael’s stores. As I read further into the article I saw that the skimming scam had been perpetrated at Michael’s stores across the country. Then I came across a quote stating that several customers at my local store had had their debit card information compromised. Eeek!
I immediately checked my balance online and was relieved to see all was well with my account. Still unconvinced I then called the bank and was reassured that my account was uncompromised and they “had taken care of the informational breach”. Whew. To date, Michael’s claims it has removed all pin pads from all stores, but is still suggesting customers continue to monitor their accounts for suspicious behavior. However and obviously, skimming scammers are getting more and more sophisticated. Actual physical tampering of individual pin pads would have been necessary to conduct a scam like this. How did this happen?
These scams have been around for a few years now, but in the past have mostly been limited to gas stations and ATMS, places that aren’t usually monitored regularly. But the scam is obviously growing and getting more and more advanced. As was the case in the Michael’s scam, crooks were able to slip a tiny device into the pin pads that then allowed them to read the magnetic strip on debit cards as customers swiped them. And then a tiny camera was able to record customers as they entered their pin numbers. Some experts say that the average consumer has a one in five chance of being a victim. Unbelievable. So what are we supposed to do? We need to use our debit cards and most of us don’t feel comfortable carrying only cash. Here are some tips to avoid being scammed:
• Closely watch your bank statements and track debits closely. Watch for any unauthorized withdrawals or suspicious activity. Also watch your credit card statements for signs of skimming.
• Use one ATM and one particular gas pump; it will be easier to track which machine has the skimmer if you are scammed. Try to use an ATM that is located in a very public place or is located inside a bank lobby. Scammers are less likely to tamper with machines in those locations.
• When using your bank card, choose the "credit card" option instead of "debit card." It will be more difficult for scammers to make unauthorized purchases without your PIN
It seems Michael’s was recently yet another target of a debit card scam. Seems the arts and crafts chain had no idea what had happened, only finding out when they were contacted by “banking and law enforcement authorities” after they in turn had been contacted by customers. Numerous customers had noticed fraudulent charges made to their debit cards which ultimately had been traced back to transactions made at Michael’s stores. As I read further into the article I saw that the skimming scam had been perpetrated at Michael’s stores across the country. Then I came across a quote stating that several customers at my local store had had their debit card information compromised. Eeek!
I immediately checked my balance online and was relieved to see all was well with my account. Still unconvinced I then called the bank and was reassured that my account was uncompromised and they “had taken care of the informational breach”. Whew. To date, Michael’s claims it has removed all pin pads from all stores, but is still suggesting customers continue to monitor their accounts for suspicious behavior. However and obviously, skimming scammers are getting more and more sophisticated. Actual physical tampering of individual pin pads would have been necessary to conduct a scam like this. How did this happen?
These scams have been around for a few years now, but in the past have mostly been limited to gas stations and ATMS, places that aren’t usually monitored regularly. But the scam is obviously growing and getting more and more advanced. As was the case in the Michael’s scam, crooks were able to slip a tiny device into the pin pads that then allowed them to read the magnetic strip on debit cards as customers swiped them. And then a tiny camera was able to record customers as they entered their pin numbers. Some experts say that the average consumer has a one in five chance of being a victim. Unbelievable. So what are we supposed to do? We need to use our debit cards and most of us don’t feel comfortable carrying only cash. Here are some tips to avoid being scammed:
• Closely watch your bank statements and track debits closely. Watch for any unauthorized withdrawals or suspicious activity. Also watch your credit card statements for signs of skimming.
• Use one ATM and one particular gas pump; it will be easier to track which machine has the skimmer if you are scammed. Try to use an ATM that is located in a very public place or is located inside a bank lobby. Scammers are less likely to tamper with machines in those locations.
• When using your bank card, choose the "credit card" option instead of "debit card." It will be more difficult for scammers to make unauthorized purchases without your PIN
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