Monthly Archives: February 2010

ProPhotoBlogs: A Love Story

Once upon a time, I was utterly alone and blog-less. I knew that if I wanted to take my photography to the next level, I’d need a solid web presence. I also knew that I didn’t want to shell out $3,000 to $5,000 for a custom designed blog. So, naturally, I resorted to what I thought was my only option: a cookie-cutter blog template, complete with a vanity URL, next to no space, and very small image dimensions. And then one day, a day like none other (cue the dramatic music), I stumbled across ProPhotoBlogs, and fell head over heels in love.

This video will explain why waaay better than I can! Give ‘er a look!

If you’re a photographer in need of a blog do-over, I would strongly recommend teaming with ProPhotoBlogs. They have been an absolute dream to work with!! And get this! If you use the discount code ALYFRE288 when purchasing your fabulous new blog, you’ll get $10 off of your purchase! Now, how could you say no to that?!

Happy Thursday!

You found me HOW?!

Google Analytics is one of my dearest friends. We hang out just about every day. We french braid each other’s hair, paint each other’s toenails candy apple red, and write really corny analogies so we can post it on my blog!

All jokes aside, GA is one flipping incredible tool that those of us with a web presence can use to pinpoint how people find our sites AND how they explore them. My GA account allows me to see visits to both my blog and website, as well as individual pageviews, how many pages are looked at per visit, the average time spent on my site(s), what percentage of visitors are on my site(s) for the first time, and on and on and on. GA also provides a map overlay that pinpoints down to the town any given visitor’s location. I’m not gonna lie, it makes me feel pretty special to see that somewhere in NouméaNew Caledonia, someone is taking a look-see at my work! (P.S. Am I the only one who didn’t know New Caledonia existed?)

But my favorite aspect of GA is that it provides a traffic sources overview, where you can see what percentages of visitors find you through referring sites as opposed to direct traffic as opposed to search engines. Besides the obvious benefits this knowledge can provide for adjusting your SEO rankings, it also just makes me laugh! Get ready for some of the most recent, CRAZY keyword searches through which people have found my blog. SO weird. :)

I’m pretty sure this one is due to this post.

A mix of this post and this post, perhaps? :)

This one just makes me smile. :)

I know I’m pretty open about my age on my blog.. But this is a little creepy! Haha!! Psst, I’m 22. :)

And I’ll leave you with the most interesting keyword search. I know I’ve written about bulldogs, but butterflies?

Happy Wednesday!

February 19, 2010 - 11:06 AM

Alyse - @Nicole – thank you so much for being so stinking sweet!! Just perused your site myself, and LOVE it. :)

February 18, 2010 - 6:58 PM

Nicole - I found you through the Wix website and I am so happy that I did. I find your blog to be utter delightful ;)

Plus as someone who is trying to break into photography I love your talent and the tutorials are so helpful.

February 17, 2010 - 5:38 PM

Nina - All my nieces and nephews just ADORE my bread balls

Tidbit Tuesday #14

Tuesday’s come and go so fast these days! Here we go, Internet!

My sleeping patterns have been pretty nuts lately. Actually, I’ve been pretty good at getting to bed at a decent, consistent time this semester. But I’ve been waking up a handful of times every night. Do you want to know the strangest part, though? I actually love it. Seriously, if you think about it, why do we all like sleep so much? It’s not like we’re laying there, unconscious, and then consciously thinking, “Man, I LOVE THIS!!” Maybe we don’t like sleep as much as the promise of sleep. (Woah, was that deep or what?!) Waking up in the middle of the night brings me great happiness, as I know I’ll be able to fall asleep a handful of times more. Sometimes I even contemplate setting alarms to go off throughout the night. Am I odd?

Speaking of sleep, WEIRDEST thing happened Sunday night. I woke up (of course) and couldn’t see straight at all! Everything was double. I panicked. “CRAP! My eyes are permanently crossed now!” (Which is seriously one of my greatest fears and has been for forever.) I paced around for a little, looked into two different mirrors, and then splashed water in my eyes, and finally things felt normal again. Not a fun experience, but definitely funny looking back!

Oh, and one more thing… Why do my teeth ALWAYS fall out in my dreams? (Another one of my greatest fears.)

I’m getting so antsy for wedding season, I can’t even tell you! And I don’t just mean my own. :) My upcoming brides are absolutely GORGEOUS, I kid you not. And some pretty different weddings are in store for this summer. LOVE the way my shoot sched is looking!

Artist of the week: Swell Season. Strict Joy is the album. And Low Rising is the song. Check it. And fall in love.

Yesterday was my dad’s 49th birthday! Happy birthday to him! (And not that this has ANY correlation whatsoever.. ;) But when I was little, I used to cry myself to sleep thinking of how my parents would get old and wrinkly one day. My mom eventually figured out that if she gave me a quarter, I’d forget all about it and go to bed already.)

The Facebook fan page has reached some massive proportions lately (for me anyway!). Become a fan by going HERE.

So I recently (as of last week) revamped my website to match the branding of my blog! (Looong overdue!) But now it is complete. I’ve also switched some pages and images up a bit, so be sure to check it out if you’d like!

I use exclamation points too much!!

Now for a little Olympic nostalgia. Ya’ll remember Nagano? And Tara Lipinski? Yeah, she was pretty much my favorite human on the planet when I was 10 years old. I used to pretend to skate backwards and do triple salchows in my bedroom, which was pretty hard considering I had a really thick rug. Sure, the spins would burn the soles of my bare feet, but I was a star, skating along to Celine Dion playing on my mini boom-box, with just one lamp spotlighting me in all my glory! (Come on, I’m a girl. I watch the Olympics for the figure skating!)

I’ll end Tidbit Tuesday with a small peek from Melissa and Dan‘s album design, simply because I failed to blog it before, and it’s pretty. :) If you’re interested in having a custom album assembled, head to the contact tab!

Happy Tuesday!! :)

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