Do you currently include testimonials in your marketing? On your website, in your newsletters and emails, or printed material? This simple third party validation gives potential customers the chance to first see others are buying, and second that they are enjoying your advertised product/service.

Not all testimonials are created equal, so it’s important to follow the 3 traits of strong testimonials to make sure your testimonials don’t hurt you.

There are many techniques to collecting testimonials. We found a great article on How To Collect Testimonials that covers using your Inbox, Facebook, Twitter, Blogs, Google Alerts, and how to ask for them.

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We received a lot of feedback to our Facebook post about a new book for children with loved ones(s) in the Military. The original post (below) was an afterthought to the reaction to an emotional video we shared in August (Grab a tissue at 1:46).

“What do you think about a personalized story for children with a Mother, Father, Aunt, Uncle, cousin, etc. in the Military? The story could promote the Honor and Bravery carried out by their loved one?”

This is a great idea on many levels. The storyline would be unique and the emotional connection is very relevant to military families worldwide.  It would be a great book used as an educational gift, and as a cherished keepsake that will never be forgotten. Plus the book could be used as a fundraiser for a variety of charities who help military families in need.

Create-A-Book is also looking to test a new creative process.  Our dealer network has a substantial (more…)

Create-A-Book is currently working on a new twist to the Singing Plush Animal that will be like no other. We’re looking at several suppliers, all with quality as good or better than the current Plush Animals on the market.

Many dealers currently offering plush animals have complained their current suppliers were either too expensive or non-dependable.

We’re trying to find out if we could help temporarily by stocking the Plush Animals to give you a lower price and dependable supply.

Please email Dave@CreateABook.com and let us know…

1. Which of the animals you would order
2. Quantity you expect to order for each, from now till January
3. The current price you pay for the same animal (at what quantity)

• Teddy Bear
• Bunny
• Cow
• Puppy
• Lion
• Giraffe
• Lamb
• Tiger
• Monkey
• Frog

* NOTE: This would not include music modules. This applies to dealers currently offering music, that had modules, and needed the plush animals and the stuffing.

(The following post is from SaviSites…)

At the beginning of 2010 we realized we’d outgrown the current BakeSale framework that runs your online stores. BakeSale is an open-source framework that enabled us to build a great solution, but it doesn’t have the flexibility we need for all the new features we have planned. So this Spring, we began writing code for Savi2.0, a custom solution we’re building from the ground up. This means we’re throwing away the current code, rebuilding your current features, and adding many more.

We’ll post a complete list of the new features towards the end of September. For now, we’re giving a sneak peak of whats to come….

A Sneak Peak at new features with Savi2:

Templates/Designs

• New Home Page layouts (product/category focused)
• Ability to add/manage banner graphics (sales/promotions)
• New templates, storefront designs
• Flexible Templates (logo sizes, headers, footers, etc…)
• Customizable template background images, patterns, colors.
• New streamlined admin to manage your sites
• Ability to order custom or premium template designs

Storefront

• Ability for storefront to show products as horizontal rows
• Ability for customers to choose how they view products (sizes, sort)
• New “Customers Who Ordered ‘x’ also enjoyed…” suggestions
• New “Add to Wish List” and ability to manage wish lists
• Customizable product thumbnail sizes

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This is a heartwarming and educational story from the fine folks from All Facebook. Gaining 16,000 fans is a magnificent accomplishment, but doing it in 96 hours is mind blowing.

A 13 yr old boy with no programming experience was able to do both, and this article goes into great depth explaining why this page, and it’s posts, are so effective and engaging.

Click the link below to learn how

How a 13 year old gained 16,000 fans in 96 hours

We created these banners for you to use in your Back-To-School marketing.  Place them into your your emails, website, or print material.  To download, right click on the image and save it to your computer, or visit the Back to School gallery.

What is it about the Fall Season the fills the air with excitement? Is it the changing of the leaves, the family Holidays, or maybe the anticipation of Christmas? One thing is for sure; it’s the season when many of you will achieve your highest grossing sales for the year. To help out we’ve created a quick summary to get you through it successfully.

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There was an interesting question posted to the discussion board on our Facebook page that set the stage for what we hope to be an educational journey for both Create-A-Book, and you.

We’re all faced with a daily challenge to do what we can within a 24 hour day. For you the challenges may be finding time to build your business while juggling a full-time job, raising a family, or both. For us, the challenge is overseeing a multitude of tasks to improve the Create-A-Book opportunity, and doing our best to prioritize them based on the outcomes they’ll bring you. And that’s just the planned ones, as  you can’t predict what life will throw your way.

One of our tasks is growing the Create-A-Book brand, using Social Marketing, to generate new business and to create an active online community of dealers who share ideas and work together. In January we created a 12-month blueprint, and listed the steps to make this happen. Before we could begin, we also started two more projects that will improve the profitability for our dealers, and the decision was made to postpone the social marketing. Sound like a familiar ‘postponement’ process?

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