Remember that you only ever see Supernanny dealing with really bad cases where the parents have totally lost control, or who never had a clue in the first place. What Supernanny does is serious remedial work on children who simply do not know how to behave because they have never been taught!
My daughter had all her 'basic training' instilled in her from babyhood. When she became a toddler, she acted out like all the other toddlers and threw tantrums etc. I used to time her out by making her leave the scene (she could go anywhere else, I never made her sit on a step of a chair) and telling her she couldn't come back until she could 'behave properly' ~ that way she still had some degree of control over herself and could decide when to return. Often she would be away for quite a while before she was ready to behave herself, and sometimes she would pack it in immediately.
Don't worry, I used to smack my daughter on the leg when she was your daughter's age because it was the best way to put an immediate halt to her doing something dangerous. I would smack if she ignored my "NO!", and my "if you do that again you will get a smack" ~ often those warnings were enough, but sometimes they push you hard and press your buttons. I only used the flat of my hand and never any implemement ~ but those who tell you that you can 'reason' with a toddler are usually those red~faced individuals in supermarkets saying "don't do that darling, please, that's not a very nice thing to do..." as their children trash the joint, and wonder why other people are so intolerent towards young children!
There is a massive difference between an occasional smack on the leg and wholesale child abuse, there needs to be some common sense applied here. People who say they will never smack are far more likely to be pushed over the edge by a child that knows it can do what it likes, and far more likely to lash out in anger in a far more dangerous way.
You cannot reason with a toddler, they don't yet have the capacity to understand, and distraction techniques tend to avoid the issue and are only really useful in the short term when you're stuck out in public with a red~faced bawling kid! Eventually, kids need to know what behaviour is "unasseptable" ~ in the words of Jo the Supernanny!
Reasoning is for older children and then smacking becomes unnessary and self~defeating. Then you need other sanctions!
For what it's worth AMY&JESS, your daughter sounds like a normal toddler, and I wouldn't allow anyone to make you feel bad about your parenting techniques when you're asking for advice about how to do better.