Resources

This page contains affiliate links. Affiliate links contain a code, and if you make a purchase through that code, we earn a little money for directing you to that product or service—at no extra cost to you! We only share affiliate links for products and services that we use on a regular basis. If you have any questions about anything listed here just drop us a line through our contact page.

One thing we believe in at Treasures by the Locks is supporting other businesses like ours, and part of that is directing folks to the tools and supplies that we use and find most helpful. The websites, services, software, and tools listed below are all things that we use or have used, and have helped us in our business.

Web Hosting

Web Hosting Canada

The best website hosting is Canadian.

WHC.ca has been our go-to web host since 2018, when Mel switched from a USA-based provider after years of paying too much money for web hosting. This Montreal-based web host has specialized WordPress hosting as well as general website hosting packages and rapid turnaround on support tickets. They’re also a green business, so if sustainability is important to you, too, they’re an excellent choice.

Choose Canadian. If you don’t have a website and you need help with that, or you want to switch to a new host, contact Mel through mel@thepapergirl.ca.

WordPress

All of our sites are built with WordPress on WHC’s servers, with ecommerce functionality provided by WooCommerce. For shipping, we connect our Canada Post account to Octolize’s free WooCommerce shipping plugin.

If you understood exactly none of that, no problem! Mel can help you out.

Tools

We use Canva to create simple social media graphics. For general image editing, Mel uses Adobe Photoshop Elements with some support from Irfanview (file conversions, mostly).

Marketing, Newsletters, eCommerce, and More

Kit treats us very well. It’s free to use if you have 1,000 or fewer subscribers, plus it has some neat ecommerce features right out of the box. Set up tip jars, digital products, services, and more on the free plan and upgrade as you grow to access quality-of-life changes like automations. It’s super user-friendly and their newsletter is one of the few that Mel reads on a regular basis because it’s useful as heck.

Visit Kit today to see what this service can do for you. We switched from MailChimp and have never looked back—it’s just that good.

More resources coming soon, including free forms and documents for your business.