Scarlet Paolicchi of Moms Wear Your Tees Social Media Marketing is among the women featured in Mom, Incorporated. We caught up with this mother of two — ages 4 and 6 — for an interview recently. She’s giving away one Moms Wear Your Tees Business Directory listing. The listing includes a tweet about your business and with your business link via @mwytsocialmedia. ($25 value). To enter, you have three options:
- Follow our Facebook Moms Wear Your Tees-Small Biz Tips.
- Tweet about the giveaway with @mwytsocialmedia
- Let Scarlet know your favorite article from http://momswearyourtees.com
Scarlet Paolicchi
Mom Incorporated: When did you start your business and what inspired you to do so?
Scarlet Paolicchi: I started Moms Wear Your Tees Social Media Marketing in January of 2010, and I did it because I wanted to be able to do something I enjoyed doing that had enough flexibility to work around my family schedule and to help supplement our household income.
Mom Incorporated: What were some of your initial challenges setting up your business and how did you overcome them?
Scarlet: Luckily for me I was able to set the website myself with no problem, but the challenge is then letting people know you exist and getting them to visit your website and then converting them to customers. I overcame this through social media. The only advertising I have done for my business is through social media, and all of my growth is organic. I have a lot of repeat customers and I have had excellent referrals, so this helps get my website out there and visited as well.
Mom Incorporated: How have you carved out time to work and what kind of hours do you keep?
Scarlet: I try to get my work out of the way before noon and then be free to devote my time to my son and daughter, but it doesn’t always work out that way!
Mom Incorporated: How have you handled child care while running your business?
Scarlet: Because I work from home, I don’t have to use child care. I am able to get my son busy with a project or just let him free play, and it is OK if I need to get up and help him with something or get him busy with something else.
Mom Incorporated: Where is your home office? Describe your setup, favorite equipment and, if you run your business online, any favorite software or apps.
Scarlet: My couch! I work from my couch with my MacBook and I blog, tweet, and facebook all day on and off.
Mom Incorporated: What are some ongoing challenges of running your business from home? How are you working to overcome them?
Scarlet: The biggest challenge for me is getting my name out there. I just keep plugging away at sharing my website social media marketing services and free business resources through different social media venues.
Mom Incorporated: What is your support network like — for your business and for you?
Scarlet: I have a wonderful husband and kiddos that support me and I have also met a lot of really great entrepreneurs online, and I enjoy networking with them as well.
Mom Incorporated: What do you do for yourself apart from your business and your family?
Scarlet: I like to get out in nature. I love to go canoeing, walking and hiking.
Mom Incorporated: What advice would you give other women about starting a home-based business in general? Any specific advice about starting a business like yours?
Scarlet: I think that getting up the courage to start something new is always tough, but I think if you can find someone else who is doing it successfully, it can give you the confidence to say, “I can do that, too.” You have got to believe in yourself AND work hard consistently, and you can achieve your goals. (Having goals is important.)
Specific advice for any business is to pick your URL with care and make sure you have your keywords in it to make your search engine optimization that much easier. I learned from my mistake and chose a more suitable URL for my blog- Family Focus Blog. http://familyfocusblog.com
Mom Incorporated: How do you market your business and what seems to work really well for you in terms of marketing?
Scarlet: All of my marketing is through social media. My biggest producers are Twitter and Facebook, but I have several other networks that I engage with as well. I have some articles on my website that share great tips on how to use Twitter and Facebook to market your business effectively. I have 22, 700+ twitter followers @familyfocusblog and 7,700+ twitter followers at @MWYTsocialmedia, and I get a lot of traffic to my sites from Twitter.
Mom Incorporated: Anything else you would like to share?
There are several free business resources on Moms Wear Your Tees Social Media Marketing including articles on business management tips , marketing tips, and a great business resource award that I offer.
Mom Incorporated: The Book 