Name of your website?CT River Candles
Your name?
Brenda Hunter
Your Location (city, etc)
Haddam
Please give us a short summary of your website?
CT River Candles was inspired by the beauty of the Connecticut River and a personal love of creating handmade products. All of our soy candles are hand poured with 100% natural soy wax and scented with the finest fragrance oils.
What inspired you to launch your own website?
When I begin selling my candles, I would often be asked if I had a website for people to review scents, etc.
When did you launch your first website, and what was it?
A couple of years ago, I created a website for my husband's business...Hunter's Pool, Inc. http://www.hunterspool.com This was my first website which I created using Frontpage. My existing website was used with a product called Voda which is much easier to work with.
How did you decide on a name for your website?
Last year we purchased a house which is located on the CT River. We began taking photos of the river, for example sunset, sunrise, really windy days and early morning fog. The photos were so beautiful I just knew I had to use them for my candle labels.
What makes it different from other, similar offerings?
There are many website offering soy candles and I'm sure many are very good however I feel that my candles offer something unique. The combination of really good fragrance oils, 100% soy wax, great hot throw because of time spent testing, affordable pricing and a good variety of scents gives me a good product. I then add the photo labels along with the great marketing concept of matching the cande names to the scents which give me that unique edge. For example, the Misty Morning Soy Candle is a Banana Nut Bread Scent with a picture of early morning fog on the river.....
What is your eventual goal? (To sell it, keep it for income, secure a book or other mainstream media deal?)
My goal is to sell and grow at a pace which I can continue to offer a good product at an affordable price.
How does your investment of time and money balance against your success?
My company is still fairly new so I've not reached a level of success that has balanced the investment of time and money.
If you had an unlimited development budget for development, how would you change your site?
I would advertise more with the big guns like Google and Yahoo which isn't possible at this point. I currently attempt to expand my market presence by doing link exchanges but it does take time.
If your site got really big, really quickly, would you be able to keep up with the demand?
Yes, I feel I could handle it based on my professional background in management.
What unexpected costs and headaches have you had to deal with?
Really not too many....just the usual start-up type costs.
What has been your biggest challenge?
I would say marketing has been most difficult because of budget constraints.
What method has been most successful for promoting your website?
I've recently begun using LinkPartners which has helped alot. I've also gotten great advice from Vodatalk forums in website marketing.
How has running your website differed from your expectations?
It has consumed more time than I initially anticipated but I because I have an IT Background, I enjoy working on it.
How long have you run the site already, and how long will you continue to keep it up if you don't enjoy big gains in traffic, income or popularity?
I began working on my site last Fall and will continue to work on it into the future....
What is your website address?
CT River Candles
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