What's in a Signature? Links, that's what.

The best hiding places are the most obvious ones, right? Or the best weapons? Candlestick on the mantle. I don't have a fireplace, but if I did... We spend so much energy looking for the best places to advertise and socialize, and then we spend some more energy finding out what worked and didn't work for others - what website is the best investment, but what are their demographics, and do you care if you sold or instead got brand awareness.

Enter the email signature. The guaranteed little placement at the bottom of every single email you send out. It's free. It gets delivered. And it goes to people you know and most likely support you, which means they want to know what you're doing. Plus, you form new contacts all the time, so with your email signature, you are passively selling your entrepreneurial self.

Here's mine:
: website : www.katie-james.com
: blog : www.fashionmista.com
: other blog : www.thatitgirl.blogspot.com
: spam prevention blog : www.spammyscammers.blogspot.com
: etsy : www.katiejames.etsy.com
: stylehive : www.stylehive.com/person/fashionmista/grid
: facebook group Global Mistas Inc : http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5791719372
: cell : 555.555.5555

See how easy that was? And you can get creative with the layout, add your logo, etc. etc. But remember, this is not in print! So you can change this every day if you wanted. If you needed votes in a contest, include your pitch: "Vote for me in the Super Great Contest I Entered! It's really easy! Click on this link: www...." I've had website clients see an accessory design contest I'm hoping to score in, and they vote! Did I ask them to? No! It's out of the goodness of their hearts kind of thing. And they liked the idea.

The part where it becomes a chore is when you have a few emails. But really, it's a minor chore. I am email obsessed, so I have three ways of answering email from one email account: my Mac mail on my computer for the pretty "ding", gmail for global access and backup, and my iPhone (also Mac mail). If my signatures are the same, you never know if I'm walking down Broadway, sharing a cafe, or dutifully at my desk.

But don't stop at the email address. Include these links in forums you frequent, if you want your information in a totally public place (unless you're in a private forum). Forum members will click on your links, people coming in from search engines into that forum thread, etc. Warning: I wouldn't do this in blogs. Blogs are generally for Comments only - meaning, your opinion. Not your five zillion things you need to market. Just my opinion, though.

If you do this already, do you have any success stories from it? Has anyone bought one of your products, or become one of your blog junkies? Share with us in the Comments below!

How to create a Flickr widget (or badge)

Log into your Flickr account.

Scroll down and look for the little chunk of links that let you do things. There are 4 rows of them.

In the last row, click Tools (or you could do a search on the page for "tools")

On the right of the page, there is a text link in a paragraph called "build a badge". This is listed under the "Display Flickr Photos on Your Website." Click "build a badge".

Select the little button for the "A Flash badge" if your website or blog can handle Flash. If not, like this blog cannot (thanks Blogger), use the one that says HTML for a static row of pictures.

Below that, click the blue box called Next: choose photos

Choose all of your photos, or photos tagged with something. Or from a set that you have organized.

Click Next: Colors

For the colors, I leave it as the default. It's just white and nice to look at.

Click Next: Preview and get code

Put your curser inside of that box with ugly code in. Copy it, and paste it in an email to me. Or paste it in a word document and send that.

Voila!

Here's my own Flickr badge (they call it badge, but it's also a widget) of the desktop wallpaper I've designed:

www.flickr.com KT Flicker's Desktop Art from Katie James photoset

Address bar disappeared in internet explorer :: How to get it back

This just happened to a friend of mine in Internet Explorer:
Help! I was changing a URL in my address bar, and before I knew it, my address bar dissappeared! I've tried everything, how do I get it back?

Microsoft posted a help page to make the address bar display again in your browser:
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=842903

For my friend, she had gone to View and looked to see if Address Bar had a check mark next to it. It did. We unselected it, but nothing changed. Then we followed the Microsoft directions for the link above, and looked to the right of the browser window for a word called "Address." She found it, clicked on it, and dragged it to where she wanted the Address Bar to display. Voila.

Thanks to AskLeo.com for first posting about this.