John Dilbeck and Friends: CafePress

New group created on our CafePress Shops social networking community

John Dilbeck — Sat, 07 Jun 2008 02:05:46 GMT

First, I want to invite you to visit our CafePress Shops community at:

cafepressshops.ning.com/

A few minutes ago, I created a new group called A Design A Day at:

cafepressshops.ning.com/group/adesignaday

You are invited to come and start a discussion or post a comment each day telling us about one of your favorite designs, and please be sure to link to it so we can all see - and maybe purchase.

Every active hyperlink you add to the group, our main forum, or your blog there is another strand in the web of links that will attract and bring new customers to your shop.

I look forward to reading about your designs and visiting them on CafePress.

I started things off with a new discussion called USA Flag Wear.

All CafePress shopkeepers are invited to join us. Of course, it's free!

Act on your dream!

My domain Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com was not linking to my CafePress shop

John Dilbeck — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 15:46:15 GMT

I have been using the domain, Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com, to point to my CafePress shop at www.cafepress.com/johndilbeck for at least a couple of years.

Well, that's not exactly accurate. I was pointing to "www.cafeshops.com/johndilbeck" until I noticed a couple of days ago that the link wasn't going to my shop!

I have no idea how long this has been going on.

Since I enjoy cashing checks from CafePress every month, I had to solve this problem quickly.

I went to the domain registrar where Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com is used to forward the URL to my CafePress shop. There, I changed it to point to cafepress.com/johndilbeck instead of cafeshops.com/johndilbeck.

When I did that, I was informed that I had to change the nameservers for the domain, so I took a few minutes to do that, too.

Then, I waited impatiently for everything to propagate through the domain name system.

Finally, this morning, I verified that Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com is finally taking visitors to my CafePress shop, once again.

I don't know when the changes were made, or why, but it would have been nice to have been notified.

Oh, well, just one more little fire that had to be put out on the side of the Information Superhighway.

Act on your dream!

Election 2008 products at CafePress

John Dilbeck — Mon, 17 Dec 2007 12:54:26 GMT

I don't normally mix politics and business, but I decided to create some new designs for Election 2008.

I'm sure many of my readers will disagree with the designs and candidates and I encourage you to create your own designs and promote the candidates of your choice.

This posting is about the designs, not the candidates, so if you want to talk politics and candidates for the 2008 election, please find a more appropriate place for that.

If you want to talk about CafePress and selling products through your own shop, then this is the place.

New sections at Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com

I recently opened these three new sections at my CafePress shop:

New lenses at Squidoo.com to promote these Election 2008 designs

No matter if you agree with my favorite candidates, or not, you are encouraged to support the person you think is best qualified to be the next President.

Vote in 2008.

Act on your dream!

CafePress is migrating their affiliate program to Commission Junction

John Dilbeck — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 00:56:18 GMT

I have been a very happy CafePress store owner for over six years, and I invite you to visit John Dilbeck's Shirts, Mugs and Hats store.

One of these days, I'll have time to update it and add more designs.

I've been doing well with this store and sales are increasing every year.

For over a year, I've been earning nice commissions from the CafePress affiliate program. It was easy to use and somewhat automatic for premium shop owners.

Now, they're migrating the affiliate program to Commission Junction. Apparently, they found the affiliate program to be difficult to manage and expensive to operate.

So, they will be using CJ to manage it.

I have mixed feelings.

I've never done particularly well with any affiliate programs powered by CJ.

I may not even be able to find all my CafePress affiliate links so I can change them to new CJ links.

It will not be as easy to use as the original affiliate program.

At the moment, I have a hard time coming up with any positives for the move.

I just applied to the new CafePress program at CJ and I'll be migrating my links after I'm accepted.

Are you a CafePress affiliate? Any thoughts?

Act on your dream!

Find unique gifts at Cafepress

John Dilbeck — Sat, 25 Nov 2006 16:23:11 GMT

If you are looking for a great gift for that hard-to-buy-for person on your gift-giving list, you may find just what you want at Cafepress.

With millions of items to select from, you should be able to find something for just about anyone.

And, yes, you can buy t-shirts, sweatshirts, hoodies, caps, and other items of apparel, but that's not all that is available.

The artists who sell through Cafepress offer calendars, posters, journals, clothing, tiles, aprons, clocks, and many other items.

If you want your gifts delivered before Christmas, you should shop early and avoid the rush.

Sell your designs at CafePress

John Dilbeck — Sat, 25 Nov 2006 16:18:06 GMT

Join hundreds of thousands of other creative people who are selling their designs on CafePress.

Whether you are an artist who creates original paintings and drawings, or you have wonderful photographs, or are talented at finding just the right words to express an opinion, you can sell your creative originals at CafePress.

Perhaps you want to self-publish a book or sell your CD through CafePress.

They make it easy for all of us.

All you have to do is create your design and upload it to their server. Apply your design to dozens of products and let Cafepress handle all the production, shipping, customer service, returns, and website.

You promote your products online and offline and, when a product sells, you earn a commission based on the price you set. Each product has a baseline price and you are free to set your price over that minimum price. You earn the difference between the two prices.

There is much more information at the CafePress site about how to sell through their service.

I'm regularly selling designs I uploaded months ago and I always enjoy depositing the commission checks I receive from CafePress. You can, too.

Start selling today!

CafePress Shopkeepers - Get a free lens on Squidoo to promote your products

John Dilbeck — Tue, 19 Sep 2006 18:00:43 GMT

A Little About CafePress

I'm sure you know by now that you can get a free account at CafePress where you can upload your custom designs onto about 80 products - free.

You can open your own free or premium shop at CafePress.com and sell your own designs. Whether you want to sell t-shirts with slogans, your own original books or CDs, or clothing, mousepads, calendars, and other products with your own original art, you'll find CafePress an easy way to set up your online store and let them take care of the printing, processing, shipping, and customer service -- and send your royalty checks for the sales you make.

I've been a shopkeeper at CafePress since 2002 and I heartily recommend the company. I love getting emails telling me that I just made a sale and then, a few weeks later, getting my commission checks in the mail.

If you are serious about selling your products on CafePress, I seriously recommend that you get a premium store. You can create multiple sections and offer your designs on more products. It is much easier to manage a single premium store than multiple free ones. I know. I also know that I am making more sales from my premium store than I ever did from my free stores.

I invite you to visit my CafePress shop at Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com. You will find an eclectic collection of products with a variety of designs.

If I had known then what I know now, I would have opened several themed premium shops and I am thinking about doing that next year. It is much easier to market a themed collection because you can target your market much easier and it is easier to describe what you are selling. Each premium shop costs only $7 per month (less if you pay annually), and I'm earning enough that my shop is basically free, since it is paid for out of my commissions earned.

A Little About Squidoo

You may not have heard about Squidoo, but you will.

Squidoo is becoming very popular. In the few months since it was introduced, nearly 41,000 lenses have been built.

You can open a free account at Squidoo and create as many lenses as you want for free.

In fact, you may even earn money from your lenses. I'm getting small commission payments each month, and they are growing. You can, too.

CafePress and Squidoo Co-Branded Lenses

Now, for the news I just learned about a few hours ago.

CafePress shop owners can now create a new CafePress co-braned lens by going to the CafePress headquarters on Squidoo and following the directions. It looks to me as if you must create a new lens to participate in the joint venture, so, in addition to my Custom T-Shirts lens, I just created a cobranded lens at John Dilbeck's Shirts, Mugs, and Hats Store at CafePress.

Why go to the extra effort?

I believe in promoting my efforts as widely and as often as possible, so a new lens that links to my CafePress shop can't hurt - and neither can linking to it from other lenses, websites, blogs, and so forth.

Additionally, I don't know how CafePress and Squidoo are promoting lenses created through the CafePress Squidoo headquarters, but I did see a link to my new lens and to my list of lenses on the CafePress headquarters. So, I'm getting some additional promotion, at least.

What I don't like about it

There are many positives to selling your products on CafePress and creating lenses on Squidoo. I've mentioned some in this post, and I've talked about others previously in different locations.

I'll stipulate it as a given that you should do this if you are selling any designs through CafePress.

But, all is not perfect with this solution.

For example, on my new lens, I just wasted over an hour trying to use the automated tools provided for picking products from a particular CafePress store, in this instance, mine.

I know I have a white tshirt that says "Because I'm the Mommy, That's Why!" and I can find it in about a minute on my site.

But, when I tried searching for it using the promote a store part of the CafePress module, I could not find it. I know it is tagged with both "johndilbeck" and "mommy", but it never showed up in the search.

I know I have many products with "USA" on them and I tried to find them using the search. I found many of my other USA flag wear products, but never did find the USA tshirt or sweatshirt.

So, I manually linked to them in the introduction of the lens and deleted the promote a store module. I'll replace it later, when I have more time.

The CafePress affiliate program

Recently, CafePress introduced an affiliate program and it's starting to pay off for me. In fact, I'm earning enough from the affiliate program that my premium shop is paid for through those commissions and I get to keep the commissions from all my product sales. I like that, and I'm eager to increase both income streams.

So, I'll be doing some extra promotion over the next few months leading up to Christmas and the holiday shopping season.

I know I don't produce the best products on CafePress. I do mostly styled text designs and lots of people don't care for them. But, now, as an affiliate, I can recommend more topical designs, cute designs, artistic designs, and others that I like.

You can, too.

Unless you can drive a ton of targeted visitors to the site, you will not get rich, but you could make several hundred dollars through this affiliate program.

Here are some categories of products you can purchase at CafePress. Do your gift buying early and avoid the crowds!

Something for everyone

CafePress offers millions of products from hundreds of thousands of designers, so there is probably something there for everyone.

Not only that, but creative and artistic people can sell their own designs, and everyone who is willing to exert the effort can recommend their favorite designs through the affiliate program.

We all prosper by helping each other promote and sell our products.

It's great to see Squidoo and CafePress working together to help us in our efforts.

Because I'm the Mommy, That's Why!

John Dilbeck — Tue, 21 Mar 2006 12:56:51 GMT

Context Tag: shirts, mugs, hats, CafePress, Mommy, Daddy.

When you were younger, you'd watch your Mom or Dad get more and more frustrated when you wanted something. Eventually, one of them would say, "Because I said so!," or a variation of that.

Kids don't give up easily. They'll try asking, begging, throwing tantrums, and other assorted ways to dominate your attention and get what they want.

Now, you're the parent and your kids are doing to you what you did to your Mom and Dad.

Because I'm the Mommy, That's Why!

Because I'm the Daddy, That's Why!

Here are a couple of shirts to help you save your breath. Just wear them and point to the slogan. The "Because I'm the Mommy, That's Why!" design has been one of the most popular in my t-shirt shop.

They also make great gifts for your children when they complain about children of their own.

More similar designs are available in the Because, That's Why section of Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com.

Thanks for shopping at USA Flag Wear

John Dilbeck — Mon, 20 Mar 2006 10:30:59 GMT

Context Tag: t-shirts, mugs, hats, CafePress, American flag, patriotic shirts

I would like to thank the good people who have been buying items from the USA Flag Wear section of Shirts-Mugs-Hats.com. If I knew how to contact you, I would thank you personally.

If you've never browsed this section of my CafePress store, I think you'll find some patriotic products here that will be just what you're looking for.

Designs in the following categories are available on multiple products.

America the Beautiful
USA - Don't Tread On Me
God Bless America
God Bless the USA
I'm Proud to be an American
Land of the Free, Home of the Brave
Let Freedom Ring!
USA - No More Sanctuary for Terrorists
Americans - Soft and Cuddly on the Outside, Hard as Steel on the Inside
USA
American Flag
USA - We Stand United

If you have any suggestions for products you'd like to purchase, please feel free to let me know.