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The Bing it On Report

October
26 10
comments

I’ve been participating in a challenge with several other bloggers, in partnership with Alt Summit. It has been a week of searching with Bing instead of Google, and today it’s time for the report. Did you try it out too? I use my browser’s built-in search bar and I installed Bing’s plugin for this challenge, so switching for the week was easy.

So, what was different? Well, I didn’t notice much of a difference a lot of the time. Sometimes I liked it, sometimes I was frustrated, and most of the time I felt pretty neutral about the whole thing. There were lots of little differences that you only notice because of the novelty of having them or the strange feeling of missing something. For instance, I like autofill. Bing does it to a lesser extent, but only on its homepage. You know what I mean; like when you start typing “why” and it gives you a drop-down of queries and suddenly you want to know, yes, “why are manhole covers round?” I missed the serendipity. My productivity improved without the internet rabbit hole though, so there’s that.

I did like the social media integration a lot. I also liked Bing for travel because of its Price Predictor (buy those tickets now, or wait for a drop in price?). Shopping searches were a toss-up, but image search goes to Google. I find Google’s reverse image search is pretty indispensable as a blogger.

Switching was an interesting experiment. I think I’ll probably switch between Bing and Google moving forward, depending on what I need. I figure it’s good to shake up old habits from time to time, right?


 
This post is brought to you by Alt Summit and their partner Bing. I’m taking the Bing It On challenge this week.

link    The Blog  •  10 Comments  •  October 26, 2012

Bing it on

October
22 20
comments

I, along with a bunch of my other Alt Summit blogging friends, am participating in a little challenge. It’s an interwebz challenge that appeals to my nerdy techie tendencies: Bing vs. Google.

Down a Different Road

I’ve installed a browser plugin because that’s where I typically enter my search terms, so I’ll be using Bing as my default search engine all week long (instead of… you know). I’ve also made Bing.com my homepage for the week, and I’ve installed their iPhone app. I’ll be posting an update on Friday, before my usual weekly Honor Roll post to share the results, good or bad. Apparently, people prefer Bing to Google 2:1 in blind tests, so I’m curious to see how the switch will pan out. You can join us too if you’re up for a little experiment, and we’ll discuss next Friday.


 
This post is brought to you by Alt Summit and their partner Bing. I’m taking the Bing It On challenge this week.

link    The Blog  •  20 Comments  •  October 22, 2012

Meeting Martha

October
15 73
comments

I met Martha Stewart last week.

Let’s back up for a minute, because that is something I’ve been wanting to say for a long time. Meeting Martha was on my Lovely Life List. I admire her business acumen, her signature look and brand, and I’m grateful to her for being a pioneer and paving the way for what I and many of my blogging peers are able to do today.

Martha was in Chicago to appear at a Home Depot event. I received a casual email from her PR team, asking if I was interested in meeting with Martha and doing a quick interview. I resisted the urge to pepper my reply with OMGs and excessive exclamation marks (!!!), and instead said “yes, thank you.”

Nicole Balch and Martha Stewart

There were five of us there to interview Martha, but her plane was delayed and that threw her schedule off. Instead of one-on-one time, we went in as a group for twenty minutes. She greeted us with a smile and a grand sweep of her arms as she surveyed the surroundings. “Welcome… to the Home Depot break room.” Martha answered questions about her favorite designers (Kevin Sharkey for home, Vince for fashion) and recounted her biggest entertaining emergency (“It’s hard to have a true emergency when you’re prepared”), and then I was able to ask my question.

I was already familiar with the upcoming American Made Awards honoring creative entrepreneurs, and I wanted to know if Martha ever imagined having a brand with such reach and scope that she could do something like this. Here’s our very brief interview.

Nicole: I have this funny job of being a professional blogger, and I feel like a lot of the opportunities that exist for me today are the result of what people like you have done in leading the way. I loved this quote from Pilar [Guzmán] in her editor’s letter this month.

“We believe we are at a defining cultural moment, when so many people are making a go of their creative passions and, in doing so, fueling a new American economy.”

I know you have the American Made event coming up in New York, but looking back, way back to when you were catering, did you ever imagine that you would have a brand that would touch on so many of these things?”

Martha: I don’t know if I imagined it, but I certainly hoped it. Because I really feel very strongly that there are so many talented people in this country, and we’ve always made a point of introducing them to our audience. Our magazines have always been filled with people who were great growers, great artisans, great party-givers – whatever they do, we like to tell people about them. And this event is really bringing to the fore the importance and the need for Americans to start promoting “American made” again. It makes me very sad to go to North Carolina and not see a cotton mill anywhere. A weaving mill, a sheet factory — they’re all gone. And they shouldn’t be gone. We should still be making sheets and bedding in America. We grew all the cotton, and now we’re outsourcing it.

I just did a big piece on Toyota for American Made. Now Toyota, you think “oh, it’s a Japanese car,” but they have one of the largest car factories in America making half a million cars a year in Kentucky. I went and visited the factory, and we made a whole car. They make thousands of cars every single day, and it’s start to finish. So we showed the whole process and these are going to be a series of short videos that will be on their website and our website. We have the ability to do that. To show people a lot of the processes that go into various products, and it changes their business. It changes a lot of people’s businesses when you really show them to your big audience. And we’ve had a very big audience for a long time.


Thank you, Martha (and team) for taking time out of your schedule to meet with an admiring blogger.

link    Me, My Life, The Blog  •  73 Comments  •  October 15, 2012

Breadwinning

September
25 389
comments

I’m the sole provider for our family now. Officially.

I posted a single political link out of a dozen cute and fluffy links in last Friday’s Honor Roll, and it got people all riled up. One person was so incensed that she tried to insult me personally, calling me out for enjoying my “fancy shopping trips” while Brandon was collecting unemployment. That’s not true, but I hadn’t realized the misconception I may have been fostering by not providing an update sooner. It’s hard stuff to write about and I’d been putting it off, but no longer. Here’s what’s going on with us.

Brandon and I met in 1999, when we each worked full-time at Barbara’s Bookstore in Oak Park (making just over $6/hour in the beginning — go us!). We began dating in 2001, moved in together a while after that, and were married in May of 2004. Just before we were married, Brandon left the bookstore for a job in printing that paid more. He was there until he lost his job in January.

I left the bookstore in late 2004. I had already been working a second job which was to continue for a little longer, and I took a seasonal retail job at the first west elm store. When that was over, I decided to pursue my dream of owning a stationery business and I started Pink Loves Brown. I also took on freelance web design projects as Smart & Lovely while the stationery business took off. I started this blog in 2007, and I realized that the blog would eclipse the stationery shop a couple of years into it. The money I made from advertising was a nice bonus at first, and eventually it became enough to call the blog “a job” with a straight face.

Brandon liked the work that he was doing (managing prepress), but the environment was a bad one. We’d always hoped that he could quit eventually, but it helped support our family and provided health insurance. When he unexpectedly lost his job earlier this year, he was on unemployment for a few months while he looked for work. As I took on more projects though, it became clear that we could make it work if he wanted to be a stay-at-home dad. In July, he stopped collecting unemployment. We got rid of COBRA and bought our own health insurance (which was difficult and expensive). It’s scary to be the sole supporter since I have such a non-traditional job, but it’s working right now. If we need to reevaluate in the future, we will.

I make money in advertising and sponsored posts here on Making it Lovely, and I also write for Babble, Better Homes and Gardens, and Glidden. I’m saying yes to a lot more work than I would have before and I’m working a lot, but we’re doing well. Last year was the first year in which I earned more than my husband. This year I’ve been doing even better, and I hope to eventually be able to replace his lost income.

It wasn’t under ideal circumstances, but it seems I’ve managed to cross another item off of my Lovely Life List. A big one.

Life List Item: Make Enough Money to Support My Family

Thank you, everybody, for all of your support over the years. Especially recently. We wouldn’t be able to do this without you, and I’m humbled by you and grateful.

link    FAQ, Me, My Life, The Blog  •  389 Comments  •  September 25, 2012

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