Hi folks,
I changed the time the email blast goes out every weekday to give myself an extra hour to write more blog posts for you. For some reason, that change lead to the email blast going out super late last night. I apologize for the delay.
You *should* receive my email tips early afternoon from now on.
Thanks,
Julia
aka Bargain Babe
This is a guest post by Alex, BargainBabe.com’s intern.
Recently we asked readers to fill out a short survey about BargainBabe.com. We got dozens of responses and thought you’d be interested to know how your answers matched up to everyone else’s.
- 85.2 percent of readers visit the site three or more times a week, and almost half of all readers visit once or more a day
- 56.3 percent rated the blog posts as Amazing, while another 40 percent said they were Average
- A whopping 83.3 percent come to BargainBabe.com for the coupons and discounts
- 72.6 percent were ‘Very Likely’ to tell your friends and family about BargainBabe.com. Great to hear, we hope they like it too!
On an open-ended question about how we can improve BargainBabe.com, 41 readers left suggestions, including:
If I could access it from work. I followed the babe from the Daily News which I could access from work.
Those pesky work filters. Many workplace networks put a block on all blogs and social media sites. BargainBabe.com doesn’t have a lot of pull with big corporate, but I still have a solution for you. If you use Google Reader, you should be able to read BargainBabe without issue. Just click the ‘Add a Subscription’ button at the top left of the page, and search for Bargain Babe.
Bring back some of the things you used to have when you worked for the daily news… like lincoln lunches and best deals around LA for holiday items (christmas trees, ham, turkeys etc)
Done. Lincoln Lunches have recently resurfaced and are featured on our sister site BargainBabeLa.com. And if you’re looking for the hottest deals in LA, you’ll find plenty while you’re there. New deals are posted daily. As for holiday items, can’t we wait until after Halloween?
I am still getting use to the new site. I had the Daily News one down. If it popped up as easily as the old Daily News, my ADAness would not kick in so quickly and I would stay and search longer.
The thing is, many readers of BargainBabe are just passing through. We want them to have a wealth of content right there and ready, so the front page always loads the last 15 blog posts. That’s a lot of content since they all have pictures. For the returning reader, this is way more than you need. Most of the stuff on the front page you already read in the last week right? For the new reader, we want you to really see the full spectrum of what BargainBabe is all about.
So that’s why BargainBabe.com might run a bit slow for you. As a solution I tried out this plugin for Firefox that blocks the display of images. It does seem to speed things up a little bit, but without images everything tends to lose its luster.
For those of you who missed the quick 5-question survey last week, click the monkey below to leave your two cents!
I’m taking the day off to fly up to Portland for a wedding. See you all Monday!
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
Did you notice BargainBabe.com’s new look? The main column of blog posts is unchanged, but we re-arranged the right hand column to make it more useful and practical.
The search box, which you can use to find deals and information on the blog, is at the very top. Next you’ll see a *NEW* box to sign up for my daily email updates. More than 2,200 people have already subscribed!
Then comes links to my Twitter feed, Facebook page, RSS feed, and YouTube channel. Below that is BargainBabeLA.com and a list of blog posts by topics.
We’ve also changed a few of the pages at the top. The About page has totally new info about my roots as a jazz musician, how covering Sept. 11 solidified my passion for journalism, and how I caught the blogging bug.
The Top Posts page is now updated each week and Testimonials are tucked into the About page.
We created a way for you to mouth off about what you love and hate (but mostly love) about BargainBabe.com. If you’re shy, the five question survey is a totally anonymous. We trust you’ll give us your honest opinion.
The changes come six months after we launched. With your feedback, we can make it another six months!
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
If you haven’t checked out the Bargain buzz tab in a while, don’t miss my interview in Reader’s Digest about sacrificing my dreams of buying a home (skip the welcome screen, go to page 2).
I recently posed seven questions bloggers should ask themselves if they want to make money on the Knight News Leadership blog.
Fidelity Investor’s Quarterly profiled me in their story, Taking America’s Recession Lessons to Heart. I swear, it’s uplifting! (page 13-14)
The Washington Posts’ women’s mag Double X said my spending moratorium was like Lent—a lesson in the importance of sacrifice.
Hi folks,
I’m taking the day off for some much needed R&R that extends beyond a two-day weekend.
I’ll post the reader comment of the week Monday – so you have until Sunday to leave a fabulous, eye-catching comment!
See you Monday.
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
Here’s a deal to make your donation dollars go farther. The Bill and Melinda Gates foundation will match your donation on DonorChoose.org, in effect doubling your dollars.
The caveat is that the projects must help educate kids in rural or high-poverty areas. Projects include buying basic art supplies for a social studies lesson and chipping in toward five digital cameras for a special education class. Browse all the eligible projects here.
Thanks, Hubby!
Yesterday Neal Frankle at Wealth Pilgrim interviewed me on his Blog Talk Radio show about my passion for everyday finance, how I went from journalism to blogging, and how to convince his three daughters to go on a spending moratorium. It was quite lively!
I come in on the second half of the hour-long show. In the first 30 minutes, Neal chats with Matt Jabs, who writes DebtFreeAdventure. com. You can listen to the entire show here.
Visit Blog Talk Radio to join me and Mr. Credit Card for an hour-long chat about personal finance tomorrow, July 7, at 10:30 a.m. PST!
You can also catch me every Tuesday night on Radio Talk One with Marc Germain. He usually has me on about 9:30 or 9:45 p.m. PST to talk about the latest deals.
Hope everyone is enjoying the long weekend. I’m working a half day then heading to the beach so there won’t be any more blog posts today. See you Monday!
If you live in LA and are looking for deals, some exciting stuff is being added to BargainBabeLA.com, including a kids clothing sale in Burbank and a massive 50% off dress sale in Tarzana.
Miss my announcement post about my new site? Read all about BargainBabeLA.com here.
Hi folks,
The site is particularly slooooooooow today. We ran some tests last night and the site hasn’t fully recovered. I’m taking my ace tech guy out to dinner tonight and I’m hopeful that bribing him with food and drink will bring a fix soon. Thanks for your patience.
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
No, I don’t have a brain tumor. But my friend Marla Jo, a fabulous writer at the Orange County Register, does. Or did. She had surgery recently to remove it but I didn’t find out about the whole ordeal until just now.
Marla Jo wrote about dealing with news of her tumor in a way that made me laugh. I bet you will too.
My sister Aicha is spending the summer observing women and children with HIV/AIDS in Africa to improve treatment. She has been in love with Africa ever since she went there as a Peace Corps volunteer ten summers ago. Her specialty back then was agroforestry, which meant she taught farmers in the Fouta region of Guinea basic farming techniques.
My mother bought me a plane ticket to visit Aicha, above, in Guinea for my college graduation present. Three days after leaving New York City we arrived in the remote village of Poredaka and settled in for a four week visit. Roads? Ha! Electricity? Ha! Rice for every meal? Yes! Well water that must be boiled? You betcha!
When I arrived my sister had been living in Guinea for a year already. Two things struck me about her concrete, one-room home. The toilet and shower drain were one in the same. And there was a dog-eared copy of Where There is no Doctor by her bedside.
Aicha, who had no formal medical training then, relied on that book for 28 months. After she introduced me to just about every person in the village, I knew the people of Poredaka didn’t even have a book about doctors. Everyone had a festering wound, missing digit or noticeable scar – things that ibuprofen and Neosporin would do wonders for. And that was just what I saw in four weeks.
During her two years in Guinea Aicha trained many farmers, but she realized she could help a lot more people as a nurse. She has returned many times since leaving the Corps, but this is her first time in Africa as a nurse.
This summer she is working for ICAP, the International Center for AIDS Treatment and Programs, in the Ivory Coast (Cote d’Ivoire). You can read about her adventures on the Africa Nurse blog, which is written by another nurse named Mara, who is working closely with her.
One recent post on Africa Nurse blog tells of six things Mara learned since arriving in Africa, including the art of the bucket bath, the importance of having an African name, and just how little locals know about AIDS. A snipet about going dancing:
Last night, as nostalgic for our friends as for the running water in Abidjan, we decided to suck it up and check out “King Discotheque” next door. It did not disappoint. The music was just as good as it was en ville, and the setup was exactly the same. The culture of going out dancing here has nothing much to do with pairing up—quite the opposite, actually. With my sample size of two dance clubs, I can now conclude that what you’re supposed to do is get dressed to the nines and then go dance by yourself in front of the full-length mirror that will inevitably cover one of the walls, staring at yourself. All night.
Also, the the music will inevitably be interrupted every few minutes by a DJ shouting something or other. Last night’s interruption-shouting theme was “Aaaaaaaaicha!”, and some form of my name, alternately, “Maaaaara!”, “Maaaaaria!”, “Maaaaaariam!” or “Maaaaariama!” It’s the most famous I’ve ever felt.
Check out the Africa Nurse blog!
I’m so pleased to introduce BargainBabe.com’s first intern, Alex! He is a bright young student from UC Davis who is working at BargainBabe.com this summer. He’ll be writing blog posts, creating promotional materials, and in general helping me help you save money!
Please join me in welcoming Alex into the BargainBabe.com community!
~Julia
aka Bargain Babe
Ever wonder what it takes to write a knock out blog? Check out my story on the difference between writing for print and online, published today in Media Bistro. The site requires a paid membership, but I’ll share the intro.
Succeeding as a blogger comes down to three things: creating appealing blog content, choosing a topic that has natural commercial potential, and promoting your blog to no end. The last two don’t matter a whit unless you have mastered the first. Technical hurdles aside, many print journalists struggle to make the transition to blogging. This article aims to ease that pain by outlining…
I hope you find it useful! If you’d like to know more about the transition from print to blog, I’ve lectured many times on the subject. Shoot me an email if you’d like to know more.
