I Think I Need to Hire a Techie

I'm not making much jewelry these days but I'm working really hard (and out of my comfort zone).

Jansjems as a business needs to move forward. I have an online presence and I have found a few shows that are successful for me. I network a little both with AWM members and other crafters I have met. So what's next. Well, maybe I should set up my own website. Etsy is fine but it could get sold like 1000 Markets did. Or it could turn into something else that I don't want to be a part of. There's lots of speculation on the forums about where Etsy is going. People talk about moving to Cargoh, Big Cartel, Zibbet, Artfire, Bonanza. But none of these have nearly the traffic of Etsy and each one has its own issues. Having my own website would be a little safety net. And another source of exposure, I hope.

So I've purchased a domain name--I now own Jansjems.com. And I've spent hours on the web looking at host sites and asking people for information on them. I got into the forums and found people who have actually tried several. I think I know who I'm going with but I'm hesitant to make the big plunge. I have to play with templates, design pages, etc. Oh yes, everyone tells me it's easy. But it's never really easy.

My computer has crashed on me a couple of times in the last 5 years, and always in November. Every November I start feeling anxious. So I've decided that I need a backup system. I thought about buying an external hard drive but got talked into an online backup program instead. So once again I spent about 4 hours on the computer looking at websites, reading reviews, going through tutorials. And I finally settled on one of the 4 best as reviewed by PC Magazine. Sugarsync isn't terribly expensive, it automatically backs up your work every time you save a change, and it was very simple to install. It also advises you what you actually should back up, in case like me you're not sure. I think it was the 30 day free trial that I noticed about the same time I started to get a headache that finally sold me.

When I worked in the library we had a systems department that made decisions about software, upgrades, changes. They installed, did the trouble shooting, and fixed any problems. I got really spoiled. Now I am not only the designer, I'm the CEO, COO, CFO, AND the systems department. While I'm happy to handle all the other work, I really miss having a Systems Dept.