Welcome Friends!

Well hello there! :)

First I want to introduce myself. My name is Lisa Bevan and I've been in the gift basket industry for almost 3 years. I know that is not a long time compared to most. But I feel as though I have learned alot in these short years.

I was born in MA but my family moved to Canada when I was 5. I moved around a bit in Canada and after college, decided to move back to the US to start a new life. I ended up in Columbus OH, it's been almost 11 years now. My specialty is IT Consulting. Mostly building online applications and websites. Sound boring doesn't it? Well it IS! That's why I needed to find something new and exciting to do so I started my own online business. My company is called MyGiftBasketIdeas.com

Why gift baskets you ask? It all started Christmas of 2006. I needed to send gifts to my clients but was having a very difficult time finding what I was looking for online. This gave me an idea - if I'm having a hard time, how many other people are having issues finding exactly what they are looking for! So, 2 months later, MyGiftBasketIdeas.com was born! :)

When I was starting out, I was pretty much on my own. I had the knowledge I needed to start an online business (i.e. website design, SEO, adwords, etc) but I was green when it came to gift baskets. I would have loved to have had access to some kind of support system with experts that could answer my questions and help me find suppliers and things that I needed. Instead, I had to learn through trial and error. That's why when I heard about the Gift Basket Association, I was thrilled! I joined the same day and have already met some great people in the industry.

The owner of GBA, Debbie Pietro-Quintana contacted me and asked if I wanted to contribute to the GBA family by sharing my trails and tribulations of social networking. So here I am! :) I know this is a new concept to most of you, but trust me - Social Networking Works!

So that's it! I will be blogging several times a week on social networking and anything else you would like to know about selling Gift Baskets online. I hope you enjoy my rants... and PLEASE - if you have any questions.... big or small.... don't be afraid to ask... that's what I'm here for!