Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Blogging Away!

First, let me tell you that I am computer illiterate! When I sent to college (then known as State College of Iowa or S.C.I. and later as University of Northern Iowa or U.N.I.) my computer programming class consisted of punch cards! Although I have used computers and the internet with great frequency over the years at work and at home I am most happy when the thing works the way it is supposed to! If it doesn't I am usually in trouble.

We built our first website for our wine making equipment and homebrew supplies store in 2005 and all that I learned was that you have to be careful who you choose to build your site! Anyone choosing a web developer out of Clear Lake, Iowa should use extra caution. After building this site we very shortly contacted a second web development company out of Waterloo, Iowa and it has made a huge difference! Andy Mullinex at Impact Marketing built us a great site that is very easy to maintain and update and he is a constant supplier of ideas to promote our winemaking ingredients and homebrew equipment site. The Clear Lake web developer had lots of great ideas to take our money away but did very little to earn it! If anyone tries to sell you on the idea of website optimization just give me an e-mail. It is easy to do yourself and you will probably do a better job, too!

Andy's latest ideas have been linking my blog into Technorati and yesterday he e-mails me about linking my blog into EntreCard. Although I have linked to Technorati I really haven't done anything to take advantage of it yet. I signed into EntreCard yesterday and have been inundated with requests to advertise on our blog. My only goal is to drive as much business as possible to the BlueStem Winery website and ultimately to sell as much wine making supplies, homebrewing equipment, home brew ingredients, WinExpert wine ingredient kits, Cellar Craft kits and our own line of home brewing ingredients kits (known as BlueStems Best) as possible. If doing all of this linking and exchanging helps to promote our blog and ultimately our website then let's do it!

In addition to selling winemaking equipment, winemaking supplies, homebrewing supplies and other products for making wine and beer, BlueStem is also a licensed winery and we are busy with our own wine making endeavors quite a bit of the time. So, if you are into home winemaking or need home brewing supplies we are the ones to see. We can also help you find the right Cellar Craft of WinExpert kits to try when you are looking to expand your wine horizons.

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