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Thursday, January 31, 2013
Lincoln car Super Bowl 2013 ad
This past Sunday, Lincoln cars ran a 60-second Super Bowl 2013 ad featuring alpacas ('alpaca-lypse').
The idea for the ad came from San Clemente High School senior Karina Rose White who responded to a Twitter campaign hosted by Jimmy Fallon called 'Steer the Script' which allowed ordinary people to pitch ideas for scenarios for the ad.
Watch Karina talk about her idea.
The alpacas were provided by Rancho Keleje Alpacas in Fillmore, Ventura County in southern California. The alpacas were taken to another location for filming.
This is great exposure for alpacas nationwide and puts them more in the mainstream as the unique producers the world's most luxurious fiber rather than being perceived as exotic pets.
Many people haven't been exposed to the virtues of alpaca fiber and have often formed inaccurate perceptions about alpacas from people like John Stossel, portraying alpacas as a tax shelter rather than a viable livestock business.
Alpaca fiber, called the "fiber of the gods" by the ancient Peruvians, is superior to all other fibers because:
- It is a hollow tube, like polar bear fiber, rather than a hair, such as sheep's wool, giving it amazing insulating properties and warmth.
- The air pockets in the fiber make it incredibly lightweight.
- It does not contain lanolin, as with sheep's wool, making it hypoallergenic, non-itchy, and odor-free.
- It has a naturally bright sheen or 'luster.'
- The lack of oils means you can spin it without washing first.
- It can easily be blended with other fibers, both natural and synthetic.
- It is incredibly soft due to its low micron count, comparable to Merino wool and close to that of Cashmere.
- It doesn't absorb water and is naturally wicking, taking moisture away from the skin.
- It is 7 times stronger than sheep's wool, making it very durable and hard-wearing.
- It resists pilling and abrading, keeping it looking good for years.
There are many other benefits to owning alpacas, other than the fiber end-product. Many people have found a slower, more meaningful way of life farming these magical creatures, which require relatively little care, are safe around young children, and make a great business for the whole family to participate in.
There are thousands of alpaca farms all over the U.S. but most are concentrated in the northeastern and west coast states. You can find farms near you using Openherd's farm search or browse locally made alpaca products in our store.
Openherd.com is the largest and most popular alpaca marketplace and community in North America, with over 3000 alpaca farms represented and over 23,000 alpacas listed for sale. Openherd also provides website hosting and medical record-keeping software to alpaca farmers and hosts the only nationwide Affiliate marketing network.
Visit and "Like" Openherd on Facebook.
Karina Rose White, 17, will be a part of the Lincoln car ad.
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Friday, February 17, 2012
Photo: Richard Drew/Associated Press
So why is Openherd featuring the flamboyant and vivacious creations of the New York fashion scene? We're noticing a growing presence of alpaca being featured in all levels of the clothing "hierarchy" - from artisan, locally-made garments, to main street offerings, to the catwalks of New York, Milan, London, and Paris.
It's not that New York's taste for high fashion is the key to the future of the alpaca fiber industry but the first step to marketing any product or service, is awareness. New York Fashion Week attracts designers, buyers, media, and public figures from all over the world and they in turn heavily influence popular culture and create demand for what's being showcased.
Our goal at Openherd is to highlight the growing awareness that alpaca is getting in various circles of culture because this is both a gauge of its progress and a source of encouragement to all who aspire to see alpaca become recognized for its inherent qualities and become a more economically viable fiber industry.
The two alpaca coats we featured can be seen here and here (click to slide 2).
Photo: Lucas Jackson/Reuters
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Monday, January 23, 2012
Openherd logo ads can double your page views!
If you're running an ad on Openherd, make sure that where your ad click leads makes sense to your potential customer and capitalizes on their attention and current level of interest:
- Make sure the page that your ad points to mentions any offer or event you are promoting in your ad.
- If you are featuring your farm tagline/slogan or what you want to be known for, make sure you talk to this on your page.
- Consider creating a special ad landing page using the My Pages tab in your account. Upload photos, links, information to draw your customers in and get them engaged with your message.
- Tell your prospective customers what to think and do next – don’t let them have to figure things out for themselves (i.e. Click here, book a breeding before... and get...)
- Put a limited time frame on any offer to give a sense of urgency and prompt them to action while their interest level is high.
- Know what you’re especially good at and promote that consistently in advertising. This is called "branding" and takes multiple exposures for people to "get the message."
To reserve advertising on Openherd.com, click here
We'll talk more about advertising in detail in an upcoming article so check back soon for more!
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Monday, January 23, 2012
Your local weather without a single click - right on Openherd's home page!
Everyone is familiar with checking their local weather online. But it's usually a hassle: Whether you visit a website like theweatherchannel.com or a favorite news website, you still have to type in your zip code and end up on the sponsoring weather website to get your results.
Not with Openherd.com. Just pull up Openherd's home page and your location will be detected automatically without ever having to click or type anything! If the location detected is not quite accurate, then just type in your zip code or city/state and it'll be saved for subsequent visits.
If you take your computer on the road with you, just type in your new zip code or click "Auto" to make Openherd revert to detecting your location automatically again.
So why not make Openherd your home page and get your local weather where you check on all the latest alpaca happenings?!
Weather info provided:
Today: Current temperature, high, low, wind speed, precipitation, humidity.
Tomorrow: High, low, wind speed, precipitation.
Your location is detected automatically
Click "Change" to save your zip or city
Click "Auto" to revert back to automatically detecting your location
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Saturday, January 14, 2012
Meta tags in the head of the html page and how they can be used in search engine results.
A number of you who have your personal farm websites through Openherd have asked for the ability to customize your web page meta tags. We have now added this feature to additional web pages and articles under the My Pages tab. Just click the "Edit Meta Tags" link on the web page or article edit page and it'll expand a box where you can enter your own keywords and page description.
What is a "meta tag"? you might be asking. The word "meta" is Greek in origin and means "after", "beyond", "adjacent", or "self". In terms of web pages, meta tags provide additional information about the content and subject matter of the page they belong to. Meta tags are hidden html elements that are in the head of the document and can be used by search engines to identify or verify the relevance of page's content to keyword searches.
In the early days of the web, meta tags were used prominently in indexing and ranking page content. However, soon spammers put an end to that simplistic way of ranking pages by "keyword stuffing" meta tags with any words that would promote their page, regardless of their relevance. Today, most search engines pay little or no attention to meta tags as far as determining the relevance of a page's content but may use the meta tag information to supplement the information that is displayed in search results.
For example, if Google determines that one of your pages is a good match for a certain keyword search, it will grab a snippet of text from your page to display in search results. If you have included a "meta description" tag, then the search engines may opt to use your own meta description instead of the one they will automatically generate.
To summarize, meta tags can be worth the effort but they don't play a very big role in how you get indexed by search engines. It is more important to write articles and blogs that have content with your targeted keywords included in the text, page title, and any included links. Search engines try to mimic how human beings evaluate a page, so if you just focus on good, relevant content, you'll be doing well.
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Monday, December 12, 2011
Openherd hosted farm/store website
We have just completed a major upgrade to our Openherd hosted websites, providing a complete shopping cart that lets customers add multiple items to their cart and check out their cart items all at once.
Payments are processed via PayPal. Customers don't have to have their own PayPal account and can pay via most major credit cards.
If you are looking to have your own online store but can't afford the high costs of having your own custom e-commerce website and credit card payment gateway, then an Openherd hosted website with online store is a great and easy way to go. To learn more, go to: www.openherd.com/websites/
Openherd websites use PayPal to process payments. The website owner/seller needs to have a PayPal Business account that charges the following rates on transactions (as of the date of this writing):
$0-$3,000 monthly sales = 2.9% per transaction + $0.30 fee. (View PayPal rate information)
"Pam and I want to say thank you for the great job Openherd has done for our website. It is easy to make changes and we love the way the store is set up and works."
— Pam and Jeff Bush, PB&J Ranch, Lipan TX
Store home page
Product detail page
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