Thursday, August 23, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - XIX

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

This week I'd like to address two topics that are closely related. The first is an update on the redesign of the Original New England Enterprises website/s. As stated earlier my main website, although filled with a lot of good information, wasn't very focused. There was just too much information about too many subjects on this one site. So the main site was divided into three sites, with each focused on a specific ecommerce business area. This leads me to my second topic, the release of these new sites online. I apologize for the delay in releasing these new sites. Believe me when I say I am probably much more anxious to see them released than you are, with me being like a proud new parent. The holdup is that I am still working on the interface between the PHP code and MySQL database. I have been promised that this will be completed shortly. (A drumrole please for the developer!)

Coinciding with the release of the new websites I will be sending out a special edition of our newsletter with a FREE ebook download on "New England Wholesale Product Sourcing".

In the meantime, one of the companies that I represent is currently running a fantastic special focused on "WHY BUILD JUST A WEBSITE? BUILD A WEBSITE THAT WORKS! This special runs through August 28th. For more information go to this link: BUILD A WEBSITE THAT WORKS

That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - XVIII

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

This week I believe I am going to talk about putting things in perspective. By this I mean when you begin a new hobby, etc. it is only natural to put all of your energy and time into it, especially if it is something that you are really into. It's only natural to do this! A word of warning, even though it's great to learn new things, it is also important to learn how to keep things in balance. Be careful when you start something new that you don't stop paying attention to the other things that are important in your life, be it work, friendships or your family. All are equally important and need to be nurtured and maintained to keep them going.

I'm not trying to sound profound or to preach to anyone, just a little advice that if taken, I believe, will go a long way in helping you to be successful in both business and in your personal life.


That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Monday, May 14, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - XVII

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

My apologies for not posting last week. The database creation is still a work in progress. It seems that in addition to the MySQL database creation, that in order to take the next step, which is for the database to display, you need to use another programming language, PHP. From what I have learned PHP is a server side HTML embedded scripting language. Huh? What does this mean? I really don't have a clue what this means. All I know is that this means there is one more step needed to make all of this work.

I'm also working on uploading all of the files for the companies that will be part of this database. This is also taking quite a bit of time to do. The good thing is that this keeps me out of trouble and I am constantly learning new things concerning programming, etc. The online education continues!

The new anticipated release of the database together with the new websites has now been moved to June 1st. This way I will be sure to have it completed by then and will not have to keep changing the completion date each week.

That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Friday, April 27, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - XVI

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

As I mentioned last week the wholesale products database is still under construction, but I have been promised that it will be completed within a few days. That should allow me to input all of the information that I need to into it. The next step will be to go live with the revamped sites. I can't wait to do this!

In the meantime I focused on the creation of my ebook this past week. I am proud to say that it is complete and ready to be published. It ended up being what I would call more of a guide than a book. It is 32 pages in length and provides information on the following:
  • A Real Business with Real Business Requirements
  • Finding Products to Sell for Your Niche Business
  • New England Wholesale Product Shows
  • New England Fairs
  • Creative Product Sourcing
  • Appendix of Helpful Business Links

Once I completed this my next step was to convert this to PDF format so that it could not be altered. An additional requirement was to make sure that all of the hyperlinks contained in the book would be clickable. This is where I ran into some problems. Long story short, if you don't own Adobe Acrobat Professional 8.0, ($499) which is more than adequate for this task, there are much less expensive alternatives available.

After doing some research I found out that Adobe has an online service that they charge for, $9.99/month or $99/year that will allow you to convert your word documents into PDF format, and will make it so that your hyperlinks are clickable in your new PDF formatted document. It is a personal decision, based on cost and need. If you think you will need this service full time on a continuous basis then maybe you should buy the full Adobe program. If you only need to use this service occasionally then I think the online option is much more economical. This is the route I chose and it works like a charm. You upload your file, it is converted and a link is sent to your email notifying you that it is complete. Next you click on the link to open the file. If it is ok then you can save it to your desktop, folder, etc. The link to access this is: http://createpdf.adobe.com/

PS You will at least need to have Adobe Reader if you use the online method. Adobe Reader is a free download. Click on this link to access the free download: http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html

That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Friday, April 20, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - XV

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

Well I spent quite a bit of time working on the "Best New England Made" website during this past week. This site is going to be all about wholesale product sourcing. This site presented the biggest obstacles to me in respect to the home page. There is so much information available. I lost count of the number of revisions that I went through before I felt that it looked and conveyed the information the way I wanted it to.

I have one major step left to complete on this site. That would be the New England Made Wholesale Products Directory database. This was just a little too techie for me, so I contracted someone that knows all about MySQL database creation to put this together. Once it is complete I will input all of the wholesale supplier information, test it out and then the site should be ready to go.

The other item I had done was to have a new logo created to differentiate this site from the other Original New England sites. Here's the new logo:








I was really happy with the way this came out. What do you think?

Together with completing the wholesale directory I have a list of other things to do to complete the revamping of Original New England. So, while I am waiting on a couple of things I have started to work on my next project - the creation of an ebook on sourcing unique, quality, New England Made wholesale products. This ebook will be a complete guide to sourcing wholesale products in New England and everyone will be able to get it for FREE! The only requirement needed to obtain this e-book will be to sign up for the Original New England Home Business Solutions Newsletter! Now that's what I call a good deal!

That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!
We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!
Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Thursday, April 12, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - Part XIV

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

The redesign continues! I am learning more and more concerning web design - new terms like MySQL database, I-Frame, how to make a page password protected with javascript and more! All of this can get confusing, but, in reality, I am enjoying all of the learning that is taking place as part of this process.

We are still on schedule for our May 1st new release date. (lots of work and hours to go - if you know what I mean) What started this process was the realization that there was just too much information on the main website: original new england enterprises

After analyzing just what our goals are and how we want to convey this message to our customers, we decided to take the original site and to break it up into three unique sites, in addition to our other two existing web presences. The plan is for it to end up like this:
  • Main Corporate Site w/ links to all other sites
  • Ecommerce Site
  • Wholesale Products Site
  • Online Opportunities Site
  • eBay Site
By segmenting this way we believe we will be able to present a much clearer and well focused message for each of these sites vs. the cluttered and unfocused message currently being conveyed. As they say: "Change is inevitable - so embrace it!" Our hope is that these changes will meet everyone's expectations and that we will all be able to become more successful because of them.

That's all for this week!

As always, I wish you the best in your success!
We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!
Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com

Monday, March 26, 2007

Ecommerce Beginnings - Part XIII

Welcome to this weeks' Ecommerce Beginnings article.

If you remember, in my posting two weeks ago I discussed some upcoming changes that I am working on to improve the “Original New England Enterprises” website and also announced that we are working on a new website “Best New England Made” that will showcase the “Made in New England” Wholesale Product Theme that will provide a free, comprehensive database of New England manufacturers. The goal is to be able to provide a complete set of services on our sites that will allow one to:

  • build a complete ecommerce business
  • have access to a unique, focused and in-demand product supply
  • have the complete tools required to effectively market this business online
  • allow a person to be one of the top 1% of the people who know how to sell online

Well, our plans have changed somewhat from what was originally stated. You know how people always refer to Spring as a time of rebirth, for new things, etc. Well, we decided to get some outside opinions and to personally re-review the entire content of and the message that was being sent by each of our online entities. We are asking ourselves if they make sense, how we can improve the message, the overall design, the content, etc. to help our customers to become successful with their online business. The good thing, while this review is still underway, is that we have decided on some major changes. The one unfortunate part is that the expected release of the new “Best New England Made” site has been pushed back. Our present goal, if all goes according to plan, is to release our revamped business websites at one time (May 1st is our goal!)

We’re really excited about all of these changes. We’ll keep you updated with the progress of these changes during the next few weeks as the target release date of May 1st approaches.

As always, I wish you the best in your success!
We hope you found this weeks' article helpful. Make sure you stop back each week for our latest installment. Take care and have a great week!
Mark@original-new-england-enterprises.com