Posts Categorized: Small business advice

9 Things You Should Read If You Take Your Blog/Business Seriously

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hilarious shirt via Wild Republic Designs.

SUCH A GOOD IDEA! (all caps necessary) Tackle your passion project with the 90-90-1 rule:
For the next 90 days, devote the first 90 minutes of your work day to the one best opportunity in your life. Nothing else. Zero distractions. Just get that project done. Period.

I’ve pretty much given up on Facebook now, but if you haven’t, here’s how to see what is and isn’t working.

A checklist of 40 (!) things to consider before publishing a blog post.

How many of these do you do? 12 weekend habits of highly successful people.
Timothy Ferris: Don’t multi-task
Multi-tasking is so 2005. It may be tempting to maximize your weekend productivity by running on the treadmill while calling your mother and trolling your newsfeed, but successful people know that this just reduces efficiency and effectiveness. Instead, be present for each single activity. Ferris recommends a maximum of two goals or tasks per day to ensure productivity and accomplishments align.

Ever get a little annoyed when people want to ‘pick your brain’ (re: get free consulting from you)?
Now you can say no, gracefully.

Loved these five tips for new business 
Attract now, repel later.
As a new business, in the beginning it’s a good idea to stay open to different kinds of clients. Learn from each and build a solid financial cushion before specializing. Once you’ve passed the year mark, step back, reevaluate and decide who you’d like to attract more of. Focusing in on a particular niche will help you to position yourself as an expert and when you specialize, you’ll be able to charge more for your services.

Five really easy ways to make sure people open + read your email newsletter.

A good reminder when it comes to creativity: you’re a river, not a reservoir.
Be the river. Allow life, and people, and the universe to pour into you. And instead of worrying if you’ll ever get anything more, let it go, pay it forward, release it on into someone else’s life. Create the space for more to be poured into you!

If you’re a beauty, fashion, or design blogger you should really know about these 12 blogger blogger outreach programs.

And a few posts I wrote that you might have missed: How to blog if you don’t like writing and 6 oddly obvious mistakes you might be making online.

P.S. If you don’t want to miss any posts, jump on my list! I’ll give you two free ebooks as a thank you!

5 Questions To Ask Yourself Before Crowdfunding Your Business

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This guest post comes to us via Brenda Bazan and Nancy Hayes who co-founded MoolaHoop. It’s a rewards-based crowdfunding platform created by women to help women leverage the “power of the crowd” to grow their businesses. MoolaHoop enables female entrepreneurs, business owners and managers to garner financial support for their projects by reaching out to their customers, offering Rewards in the form of special pricing on their products and services and unique experiences. Follow along on Facebook and Twitter

So, you’ve heard the impressive crowdfunding success stories and are looking to launch your own campaign for your business. Great! Crowdfunding can be an excellent debt and equity-free way to raise funds to grow your company.

However, a crowdfunding campaign is a full-time marketing campaign. It involves a lot of preparation and hard work. Before you start your project, you should assess whether it is the right funding tool for you. Here are five questions to ask yourself to determine if your business is right for crowdfunding:

  1. What kind of business do I have?

Crowdfunding works best if you have a consumer product or service.  If your business serves other businesses, this may not be the method for you.

Rewards-based crowdfunding is essentially a pre-sale of products that your customers want right away. So the most successful campaigns offer early availability of new products or exclusive deals on things your customers love.

  1. Do I have a “crowd”?

Before you take on a crowdfunding campaign, you need to have a concrete list of who your customers are.

Collect their e-mails, invite them to like you on Facebook and have them follow you on Twitter. Once you have your followers, you’ll be able to start a conversation and engage real people in your business.

You can do things like provide special discounts, event invitations or access to behind-the-scenes content. Offer them something exclusive that is only available to people who join the community

Before you start a campaign, you need to determine how big your social network really is. How many people follow you on Twitter? How many receive your e-mail newsletter? These are the people you will be inviting to support your campaign, so the bigger your crowd, the wider your reach.

40-50% of your pledges will come from your direct social network and the remaining 50-60% will come from their networks. This means you have to have a big crowd and a story that people are compelled to share with their friends and family.

  1. How do I tell my story to best engage my supporters?

People always want to be part of a success story. They want to be able to say that they “knew you when.” They like the idea of supporting you in building your dream.

So, you have to tell your story in a way that lets your supporters be a part of an exciting narrative. Rather than saying “I can’t make my rent payments for the next three months, please donate to my campaign,” instead tell people that there’s enormous demand for your product or service but that you need their help to raise the funds to bring your product to market or move your business to a larger space. Always frame your story in a positive light to get people excited about your next step.

  1. Can I offer appealing rewards?

A crowdfunding campaign runs for a limited period of time so your rewards have to invite people to act now. That means either they get the product before anybody else, or they get a deal or experience that will never be offered again.

Get creative. For consumer products, considering offering a limited edition color or style. For services, a special event or a behind-the-scenes experience can be very enticing.

Offering things that are currently available on your website or at your place of business is unlikely to elicit enthusiastic support.

  1. Am I that person?

A crowdfunding campaign is a 24/7, nonstop marketing push. It requires you to ask and ask and ask for support. That will mean personal calls and e-mails as well as face-to-face meetings. This is definitely not for everyone. You have to be willing to really sell your business (and yourself) to be successful. You can’t just sit back after you’ve launched your campaign and hope for the pledges to roll in.

In addition to your supporters, you’ll need to get writers, bloggers and press interested in your story to give your campaign some extra PR fuel. It’s best if you’ve built some of these relationships prior to starting your campaign. In other words, you have to be constantly getting the word out.

This checklist should help you determine if crowdfunding is going to be the right method to help you to obtain the capital you need to expand your business. We look forward to seeing you grow!

Have you ever crowdfunded a project? How did it go? Share your stories and tips in the comments!

photo by david marcu // cc

How To Buy The Best Ad Space (And Make The Most Of It)

buy-the-best-ad-spaceSo you’re super serious about your site. You bought the domain name, you’ve got social media on lockdown, and you’re ready to buy ad space so you can piggyback off someone else’s traffic.

Awesome! But how does one make sure that’s money well spent?

I’m so glad you asked, friend.

1. Obviously, advertise on a site that’s read by your ideal customers and clients
If you sell artisan vinegars you should be advertising on a food blog, not a fashion blog. If you sell purses you should be advertising on a fashion blog, not an online marketing blog. If you’re a mommy blog, you probably don’t want to advertise on Rookie.  Generally speaking, lifestyle blogs are a decent fit for most products aimed at women and design blogs work for anything that’s style-y and homes-good-ish.

2. Look for (or ask for) testimonials from previous advertisers
What sort of traffic boost can you expect? How many new Twitter followers? How many new list signups? Hopefully, the site will post these sponsor testimonials (mine are here) and if they don’t make that information public, they should at least be able to tell you about an expected return on investment.

When possible looks for hard numbers. Things like “When I looked at site statistics for readers from Yes & Yes: the average (lovely) visitor from Y&Y stayed on my site for 3:22 minutes compared to an average 1:22, the bounce rate was 44% compared to the average 78%, and Y&Y was my second largest traffic source for the month.” Rather than “Sarah was really easy to work with!

3. Find sites that will include you in an actual blog post
Now, this is the proverbial needle in the haystack but if you can find a high-traffic blog that includes sponsors in real, actual blog posts, I so encourage you to work with them. I am, of course, biased because I include my sponsors in blog posts but I also speak from experience.  I’ve purchased sidebar ad space and sidebar + included-in-a-post ad space and they can’t compare.

Most people read blogs in RSS feeds these days so they never even see the sidebar! I couldn’t in good conscience ask people to pay $80 a month for an ad tens of thousands of people weren’t seeing.

4. Link your ad to a list of freebies, your ‘best ofs’ or your newsletter signup
So you’ve purchased your ad space. Are you going to link it to your home page? I totally understand the inclination, but it’s actually a lot smarter to link to your ‘best ofs’ (here’s mine), your freebies (like Danielle does), or your newsletter signup (like Laura did with her Yes and Yes ad space). 

Your goal with your ad space is to begin a long, loving relationship with your new readers. You don’t want those new readers to pop over to your site, read half a post, and then leave, never to turn their thoughts in your direction again. You want them to take action - download something, sign up for something, follow you on social media so you can keep in touch with them.

If you’re suuuuper ambitious, you can even make a page that’s specific to the readers of the site where you’re advertising and make sure that page is optimized to appeal to those readers.

5. If your ad links to a blog post(s) make sure they’re optimized + as awesome as humanly possible
What does that mean?  Optimized blog posts
* include in-text links to related content
* are related to your services or offerings and link accordingly
* have gorgeous, Pinterest-friendly images (here’s how to make your images more pinnable)
* you’ve written alt text and title text for the images (it’s not that hard)
* maybe you’ve even used the P.S. trick

I realize this sounds like one metric ton of work but if you’re going to spend money on an ad, you might as well, you know, benefit from it. If you’re interested in buying ad space on Yes and Yes, you can check out my rates and info here - my sponsors love it and I have tons of repeat business! 

Tell me: what other sites do you know that include sponsors in actual posts? Where have you advertised?

P.S. If you know someone who’s bought ad space and been disappointed or is thinking of buying ad space for the holidays, send ’em a link to this post!

photo by  // cc

6 Things Your WordPress Site Wants You To Do Every Month

This guest post comes to us from Norma Maxwell, founder and CEO of Connect Interactive, LLC, a digital creative agency that specializes in WordPress design, development and strategic online success building. Her passion is helping clients create a strategic online presence that not only connects with the right people, but resonates long after they have made their first contact. Connect with Norma on Twitter or Facebook. 

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WordPress is like a car. It needs regular tuneups to keep running smoothly.

Having your own self-hosted WordPress website is a beautiful (and necessary) thing for any serious business owner or blogger. Unlike websites hosted on proprietary platforms owned and controlled by someone else, a self-hosted website is 100% owned and controlled by you.  It’s like the difference between owning your own car, or renting from someone else.  When you rent, you follow someone else’s (always changing) rules, and you pay a lot more money for the privilege.

But, just like owning a car, having a self-hosted WordPress website requires upkeep.  You keep the oil changed and schedule regular maintenance to make sure your car keeps running smoothly. In the same way, your website requires regular maintenance to make sure it stays up-to-date, secure, and runs like it should. You can change the oil and run the maintenance on your car yourself, or hire a mechanic to do it for you. Either way, you owe it to yourself to make sure your website stays secure and maintained, so you won’t find yourself broken down on the side of the Internet highway.

How to Keep Your WordPress Website Maintained + Safe

  1. Create a weekly or monthly (depending on how much content you stand to lose if you do it less often) complete backup of your WordPress database, images, and all content.
    You can do this by purchasing a backup plugin that will help you create the backup. I use the Backup Buddy plugin on my clients’ websites. Store the backups locally on your server and on a remote storage account (such as Amazon S3). Although some hosts offer backup plans, if something happens to their server, you’ll have a complete backup of your website stored elsewhere, which gives you peace-of-mind-just like keeping your important papers stored in a safety security box in a bank.
  2. Keep your WordPress software, themes and plugins updated.
    If you don’t, you run a real risk of your website getting hacked and infected with malware. Every time WordPress releases an update, it’s because the developers have discovered a vulnerability, or are making the software perform better in some way.  The same thing goes for themes and plugins you’re using on your site. You get an alert in your administration panel when an update has been released, and it’s a two-three click operation to update your software.  Whenever you log in, if you see a plugin, theme, or WordPress requires an update-just do it.
  3. Remove unused themes and plugins, and get rid of unnecessary plugins.
    Any extra software on your website creates risk. If you’re not using a theme, delete it.  Same thing goes for any disabled plugins on your site. If you have plugins installed on your site that aren’t absolutely necessary, get rid of them.Less is definitely more in this case because the most important thing you can do for your visitors is offer them a safe visit to your website, and maintaining a healthy, fast website is the best way you can do this for them. A bunch of plugins you don’t need = slow site performance. Slow site performance = lost visitors to your website and lost revenue for your business.There are thousands of plugins available for WordPress, but that doesn’t mean you should use them all!

    Any developer in the world can create a plugin which means the quality can vary a LOT.  Some plugins are great, and some not-so-much.  Check to make sure the plugins you use are supported and regularly updated by the developer.  Read user reviews to see if people are having positive results from the plugin.  You can find all this information on the WordPress.org page for that plugin (if the plugin you want to use isn’t listed there-it’s a red flag, so I would recommend you don’t use it).

  4. Perform regular security scans.
    Hackers are busier than ever wreaking havoc on innocent websites. It’s a fact of life that can’t be ignored because one malware infection can cause you to lose all of your website content, put your site visitors at risk, and potentially cause your website address to be blacklisted by Google. All of which would definitely NOT be good for business. You can monitor your WordPress website for malware by using a plugin like WordFence or setting up a subscription web service like Sucuri to make sure you’ll be notified of any vulnerabilities your site has immediately.
  5. I also recommend installing the iThemes Security plugin to give yourself an extra layer of protection against threat by hiding vital areas of your site, restricting access to important files, preventing brute-force login attempts, detecting any attack attempts, and notifying you by email if there are any issues with your site.
  6. Use a comment spam prevention plugin like Akismet to control comment spam.
    You can review any spam comments it catches in the admin section of your site.
  7. Create a secure username and password and change it regularly.
    A secure password is 18 characters long, and contains a combination of special characters, capital and lowercase letters, and numbers. You can use a free application like Passpack Desktop to help you generate secure passwords and store them securely in one place so you can always look them up when you need them.

I know it seems like a lot of work, and it does take some time, but if you take these steps, you’ll have a safe, secure website that runs like a charm and doesn’t stress you out.  Your website takes care of you in so many ways, so it makes sense that you need to take care of it to make sure it functions as it should.  If you’d rather have dental work than do this yourself, I have a Monthly Maintenance for WordPress package just for you.   I’ll take care of making sure your website is safe, secure, and running smoothly so you can focus on what you do best!

What updates do you run on your site? What are you favorite plugins? Tell us in the comments!

P.S. 7 ways to spring clean your blog and How to use Google Webmaster tools in a non-overwhelming way.

How To Get Booked Out 6 Months Into The Future

Halley Gray is marketing strategist over at Evolve & Succeed. She focuses on getting creative freelancers booked out in advance (plus booming in business). She does this by using a specific combination of science experiments, content strategies and sales techniques. Read more about how getting booked out makes your life more fun.

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Even Batman PJs can’t keep away the crushing fear of debt and unpaid bills.

I tried.

As snazzy as I may have looked, my life was unbearably hard and I was hustling fiercely for very little money.

Once I turned that around (and am now booked out for six months) I was elated. Life was like a great massage, lotto win and high-five rolled into one.

I make custom strategies for my clients (which gets them booked out from 1-8 months over and over again) but there’s definitely a pattern that you can follow too.

So let’s skip the suffering for you and fast-forward to the exhilaration of being booked out in advance.

I’m assuming the following:
* You know what you wanna do (and it’s one thing.) You’re not changing from copywriter to designer to consultant every week.
* You have a pretty and functional website.
* You have worked with clients.
* You want online clients.

Yes? Entre vous!

1. Most people forget that what sells is a human connection. Not direct pitching. Leave out the  “Buy my package because it’s the best!” line but focus instead on “Hey, how’s your website coming along?”

Takeaway: Go find places where people are being people online. FB groups, Google + Communities, Twitter and start talking to them and getting to know them. Extra points if you can find people you really like and want to work with.

2. Instead of talking about what you’re selling, use your blog posts to sell. Answer questions that people have around the product/service, or possible obstacles they have from buying, or your best tips to help them take their first step in the right direction.

Takeaway: Every time you write a post make it valuable to your reader. Don’t withhold information in the hopes that they’ll buy from you that’ll only spook them. Have one crucial nugget (at least) to help them work towards the goal your launch is selling.

3. The crucial factor to anything selling well is the sales page. Have you checked it? Updated it? The sales page is a living organism.

Takeaway: Not sure how to improve your sales page? Ask people you’d like to work with what’s missing and for feedback. That also can result in sales.

4. Set the bar. Figure out how many clients you actually need to get booked out.

Takeaway: Once you have a number making a goal is that much easier. Plus it helps to remind people that you’re in demand and the number of people you can serve is limited. Limited availability whips desire up.

5. Show results. It’s important that you show people behind the curtain. Are your clients getting the results you’re promising? Make sure to also talk about how you’re getting clients and that spots are going. No one knows if you’re getting hired but once they hear that you are? BAM! More clients come walking thru the door.

Takeaway: Tweet it out. Facebook it. Don’t keep your awesome results quiet. People need to hear about that to gain confidence to hire you.

6. Guest post. It might seem like a lot of work but being featured on a peer’s blog? Priceless. It keeps new traffic flowing in and allows you to be the popular kid online.

Takeaway: Invest the time into guest posts. You need new blood coming to your website to keep it healthy.

FAST FOOD STYLE: If you only do one of these do #4. People have been telling me that by having a number to focus on they have been able to get booked out faster and feel less stressed.

How far in advance do you want to be booked out and why?

The One Thing I Should Have Been Doing To My Blog Photos All Along

Doing this will make your photos a million times more pinable!

Because I don’t really use Pinterest (except to make snarky joke boards about over-priced designer clothing) I’ve never paid much attention to the image-based marketing juggernaut. I put 90% of my social media efforts into Twitter and a lot of the things I publish aren’t particularly Pinterest-friendly. I mean, who’s going to pin an interview with a former stripper? Or a list of things that are annoying unless you’re the one doing them?

But I created several of my post series with the express purpose of publishing more Pinterest-worthy content. Pinterest loves fashion (like my Real Life Style Icon series) and food ( like Read // Eat and Kitchen Globetrotter) and pretty, travel-y stuff (Like the Mini Travel Guides).  And then I proceeded to learn nothing about Pinterest.

It’s time for you to learn from my mistakes, friends. Let’s talk about editing the title text of your photos.

Here’s the deal.
When someone hovers over a photo on your blog and clicks that ‘Pin it!’ badge, the description box on Pinterest will auto fill based on the information you’ve provided. Of course, people can edit that info into something clever and helpful, but most of us are lazy and will just click ‘post.’

Which means if you didn’t fill in the title text on your image, someone just pinned a boring, poorly described image from your blog and not many people will feel moved to re-pin.

changing-blog-photos-alt-textchanging-alt-text-on-blogger-photos1
And here’s the great part: it’s insaaaanely easy to edit the title text on your photos.

Here’s how to edit these in Blogger:

1. Upload a pretty, Pinterest worthy photo (Here’s how to make images more Pinterest-friendly.)
2. Make sure you’ve saved the photo with an obvious, Google-friendly name. “Girl holding cheese” not “79340_hyl.jpg”
3. Right click on the photo, then click on ‘properties’

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4. In the ‘title text’ box write something engaging and descriptive that would look good under a pin.
5. In the ‘alt text’ box describe the photo, again using obvious, Google-able terms. The alt text is helpful to assistive screen readers. 

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You can edit your title text in WordPress by editing the ‘Image Title Attribute’ under ‘Advanced Options.’

That’s it! Now people are about a million times* more likely to repin that content you worked so hard to create. 

Now excuse me please, I’ve got to go back and edit every post ever.
(Just kidding!)
(mostly.)

What belated blogging epiphanies have you had? Share ’em in the comments!
*approximate estimation.

P.S. How to get more blog advertisers + keep ’em happy once you’ve got them and How to make your blog look professional without going broke.

How to deal when people unsubscribe/unfollow/troll your blog

how-to-deal-when-people-unsubscribe
A few months ago I discovered ads.twitter.com.

In one handy dandy space you can see how all your tweets are faring.
Which ones are the most popular (this one was retweeted 13 times and favorited 9 times)
How many clicks they get (this one only got six)
And, rather horrifyingly, how many people unfollow you.

In case you were wondering, that’s the sound of me developing a complex about the 96 people who have unfollowed me over the last three months. Sure, 467 new people followed me BUT WHY DO THOSE 96 PEOPLE HATE ME? Do they really think tweets about about cranberry moonshine are that offensive?

Ultimately, sharing your life and insights on the internet is going to lead to a good dose of rejection. People will unfollow and unsubscribe. You’ll probably get troll-y comments and you might even get written up on that One Website That Shall Not Be Named where strangers will call you a ‘forever teenager.’

I’ve spent the last six years attempting to develop a (slightly) thicker skin when it comes to internet rejection. Here are five things I’ve been doing to help combat the inevitable crisis of self-esteem that comes with unfollows. 

Know that it’s an unavoidable professional hazard
If you’re a carpenter, you go into your career knowing that at some point, you’re probably going to pinch a finger in something. If you’re a chef, you realize you’ll work nights and weekends. If you’re a social worker, you know you’ll have a engage in a lot of self-care and maybe therapy to counteract the emotionally challenging aspects of your job.

Internetting isn’t any different.

If you’re online, people will leave less-than-lovely comments on your blog. You’ll get lots of ‘Dear Blogger’ emails from P.R. companies. People will unfollow you on Twitter/Facebook/Instagram and unsubscribe from your mailing list. You’ll get spammy comments. There are lots of wonderful things that will happen too, but it’s important to know what you’re getting into when you start putting your thoughts online.

Realize that in order to be successful, you’ll probably have to do things that annoy (some) people
I spent a long time approaching sales with a “Hey, I made this thing and it’s over here if you want it and this is the only time we’ll ever talk about it” mentality. Not surprisingly, this lead to very few sales.

It’s totally, 100% possible to promote yourself in non-gross ways. However. You will have to write a sales page. You really should gather testimonials. And you’re going to have to promote your services on social media - multiple times. You’re doing a disservice to yourself and the awesome products you create if you don’t.

I (somewhat controversially) tweet about each of my blog posts three times and I know there are people who think that’s overkill and have unfollowed me because I do that. I tweeted about this post at 8:05 pm (20 clicks), 1:05 pm (36 clicks), and 9:19 am (24 clicks). I’d have missed out on 50 clicks if I’d only tweeted once! It’s a post I’m particularly proud of and I’m glad I gave more people a chance to see it.

Notice when YOU’RE unsubscribing and take note of your feelings
I subscribe to verrrry few newsletters (one that I always open? Paul Jarvis’s).  I’ve joined several and then unsubscribed. When I do that it’s never with a ‘You are useless human and I hate having you in my inbox!’ thought process. It’s usually more of a ‘Ahhh! I feel overwhelmed by my inbox and this is how I’m dealing with it!’ thought process.

I’ll unfollow people on Twitter when their stream is a series of complaints about local bars or they’re just bantering back and forth with their friends. Complaining about the quality of a martini or sharing inside jokes doesn’t make you a bad person by any stretch of the imagination. I just don’t need to follow that.  I try to imagine a similar mindset when people unfollow me. They don’t hate me, they just don’t need to see photos of my cute new shoes.

Separate the constructive criticism from the trolls
When my ’31 Things I’ve Learned in 31 Years‘ post went viral, a lot of strangers happened upon my blog and some of them felt moved to leave unpleasant comments. One told me I wrote like a 14-year old. Another told me that I looked like I was 37. While these comments are deeeeeply annoying
a) they’re not true
b) I don’t know these people - why should I care what they think?

When I mentioned in  a blog post that I’d dressed a Dios de los Muertos girl for Halloween, a reader (articulately, kindly) pointed out that dressing up in the theme of another culture’s religious holiday maybe wasn’t in the best taste, I listened, agreed, and thanked her for her input.

Sometimes you’ll get trolls, sometimes you’ll get thoughtful input from people who know you can do better. It’s important to be able to separate the two.

Keep a ‘smile file
Are you dying from how cheesy that name is? I don’t care, it totally works. Whenever a reader emails me to tell me a specific post really resonated with them or that the Network of Nice helped them meet their new best friend, it goes in the email folder labeled ‘smile file’. When an advertiser tells me their traffic increased by 1200% or sells out a workshop - into the ‘smile file’ it goes.

As humans, we all suffer from negativity bias - the tendency to recall more negative memories than positive ones. With that in mind, I’ve been building up a bunker of kind, supportive emails to help me get through the inevitable unfollows and trolls.

How do you deal with unfollows, unsubscribes, and snarky comments? Share your tips - I’m sure we’d all benefit!

P.S. Why having a personality on the internet will help your business

photo by Holly Victoria Norval // cc

Fix Your Time Estimates, Make More Money

This guest post comes to us from Michelle, who lives in Austin, TX where she teaches creative freelancers how to be more productive and organized and also does writing and content marketing for businesses. When she’s not working, she can be found hanging out with her Shiba Inu, watching an exceedingly nerdy show (or New Girl), and consuming copious amounts of dark chocolate and coffee/tea. 

make better time estimates

Service providers are often told to “productize” their services by creating packages - for example, instead of having editing services available at $50/hr, having a “blog post package” that includes editing of 5 blog posts (up to 1,000 words) and editorial calendar suggestions at a set package price.

There’s not a one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to freelancing, and this is no exception - billing hourly instead of creating service packages might be the best way for you to go. There’s definitely a few strong benefits to going the package route, though:

  • As you do the work, you’ll get faster at it - meaning that you’re making a better hourly rate per package without having to have the “I’m raising my hourly rates” conversation every other month,
  • Having set service packages can prevent “scope creep” syndrome (i.e. “Can you just do this one more thing?”) - clients may still ask for additions, but you have a clear set of services that you agreed to provide for them based on the service package they chose.
  • It makes monthly income goals easier and more attainable - “I need to sell five of this package and two of that one” seems a lot more doable than “I need to bill at least 80 hours this month at $X/hr.”

The main pitfall of going this route is that, as human beings, we notoriously suck at creating accurate time estimates. Our brains are just not wired that way, unfortunately - “accurately guessing how long it takes to write a blog post” was prrrobably a low priority compared to “knowing not to antagonize a saber-toothed tiger” and “ability to run quickly.”

Getting better at it takes practice, and you will improve over time - but I still regularly talk to freelancers who are several years in and figuring it out. Learning the trial and error way is long and hard and quite frankly, it sucks. Instead, today I’m going to teach you why you probably suck at time estimates and how to create more accurate ones.

Why you probably suck at time estimates

As mentioned, “creating accurate time estimates for abstract tasks” was probably pretty low on the totem-pole, evolutionarily. However, there’s another major culprit at play here, which is being in flow.

Most of the time you’re doing your work-work (writing copy or editing if you’re a writer, actually laying out design if you’re a designer, etc.) you’re in flow state - you’re totally engaged in what you’re doing, and you’re a little challenged but not so challenged that you’re frustrated. When you sit down to work, get engrossed in a project, and suddenly look up and it’s three hours later and oh yeah, you really need to eat something? 

That’s flow state.

There’s been several studies done on this and one definitive work. Being in flow state is a really good thing - it’s similar to meditating in that doing it regularly can help dial down anxiety and increase overall feelings of well-being. Not to mention if you’re in flow state, that means you’re creating higher quality work. The problem is that one of the defining attributes of the state is that you lose track of time - we literally have no concept of time while we’re in that state. Hence, bad time estimates.

The second thing that people forget about when creating time estimates is “switching cost.” This is what happens when you change from task A to task B, and you’re not quite engaged in task B yet, but you’re not working on task A any more either, so you have about 15-30 minutes (sometimes longer, but that’s about the average) where you’re much less productive than you’d normally be. This is one of the reasons that multitasking is supposed to tank productivity instead of helping it - you’re constantly going between tasks, so you’re not doing either thing to the fullest extent of your abilities.

Now that you know what’s going on behind the scenes, let’s talk about how to fix it. 

How to create an accurate time estimate for your service package:

  1.  Create a task list for the package. This list needs to include every. single. thing. that happens in between you receiving payment and the client getting their final product. The problem people run into here is that they say, “Oh, it’s simple! They pay me, I write the copy, we do a round of edits, and we’re done! So my task list is short.” Nuh uh. It’s more like: they pay you, you have to send the intake questionnaire, you book the first appointment, you have to review their answers and take notes before the appointment…you get the idea. Every single task, no matter how small, put it on the list. Administrative work, intake work, the process of them getting the deliverables and paying the final balance, everything.
  2. Once you have that task list, create a time estimate for every single task. Ideally, you’re basing this off of actual data you have, because you’ve been tracking your time. Less ideally and more realistically, you’re kind of spitballing it (but that’s okay, as long as you start tracking your time and check back to see how accurate your estimates were). Be as accurate as you can, and again, don’t forget to include things like email - how many emails do you send to a client on average? How long does it take you to type and send each email? And so on.
  3. Then, add 15 minutes between each task. This is to cover the aforementioned switching cost and make sure it’s not coming back to haunt you, come the end of the project.
  4. Add the time estimate up and then multiply it by 1.5.

You’re probably thinking that’s a lot of padding, and it kind of is. Part of the reasoning behind all the extra padding is that I have had freelancers do this exercise and then check back with me in a few weeks. And…they usually find that after tracking their time, the x1.5 estimate was, in reality, pretty close to how much time they’re actually spending.

Part of the idea is that not every service package is going to take exactly the same amount of time. Sometimes you just have a harder time nailing the design or copy or whatever - one client might use all the rounds of revisions, one might not use any. You need to account for both of those clients in your time estimates and create a range that you can use to double-check your pricing against - if you have a client who uses the amount of time in your high-end estimate, are you still making a livable wage? 

Crappy time estimates are a large contributor to “I’ve cut down my spending, I’m working way too much, and I’m still not making enough money - what gives?” syndrome. Which, personally, is a syndrome that I’d like to see eradicated once and for all - so do your homework and make sure your time estimates don’t suck!

Do you struggle with time estimates? What tricks have you used to get better?

P.S. An insanely basic plan for starting a business + working for yourself and How to juggle freelance + a job + a blog

photo by // cc

How to figure out pricing once and for all (and stop stressing about it already)

figure-out-pricing

This guest post comes to us via Temmy Ola, a copywriter who specializes in crafting crazy-awesome copy for entrepreneurs and online brands. She believes in love selling, and helps clients craft their core messages by lovingly connecting with their tribes on a deeper, emotional level to attract the right clients, make more money and live the life of their dreams. Download her bombshell kit for free here; bearing in mind that she doesn’t mind a little stalking on Twitter.

Sitting all alone in your home office, your stress level is slowly rising. I mean, you’re done with that genius of an idea you’ve been cooking up for a while, and you can’t wait to unveil it to the world as your ‘next big thing’. Palm sweating and all, you’re struggling desperately to find that ‘price’ - the right one for both you and your ideal clients. The answer is not that simple, you turn to Google and maybe other superstars in your niche, and then you see that same over-used cliché springing up every time – “Charge what you’re worth.”

Charging what you’re worth is misleading, to say the least, and shouldn’t by any means be the yardstick for pricing your products and services. Why? Because your worth cannot be quantified. Your worth equals everything that encompasses you – the summary of your years of experience, your level of education, the skills you’ve acquired over the years and everything you’ve invested in yourself, which frankly, is priceless. So instead of charging what you’re worth, charge what your product or service is worth. How to do that? Read on.

  • Premium positioning
    This doesn’t only apply to pricing models; it applies to every other aspect of your business. Position yourself as the expert. Don’t wait for permission to own your expertise, own it already. Premium positioning awards you the opportunity to charge premium prices. When people see you as the expert in your field, and are able to associate quality with whatever you lay your hands on, very few people will have issues with your pricing.

  • Do the quality test
    The next time you want to roll out a new product or service, or even a new launch, gather a group of trusted friends or colleagues to beta test for you. This is not for collecting testimonials, but for constructive criticism and feedback. They’re getting your product or service for free, and you’re testing the waters to know if you’re truly delivering value. After the beta testing, send them a follow up e-mail and ask a series of questions. This gives you an insight into how others see your product or service and enables you to add more value before you finally unveil it.

  • Think like your (ideal) client
    Chances are you’re not your ideal client. This is where you have to get creative. Step out of your shoes for once and step into the shoes of your ideal clients. How rich are your ideal clients? Will they be able to afford this? Ask yourself all these questions before deciding on a price point. Be careful here though, as most people will buy stuffs they may not otherwise be able to afford, if it addresses their “pain points” and they can clearly see the value.

  • Keep track of your investments
    Add up every little thing you invested to make that product or service a reality. This includes every dollar you spent and most importantly your time. How much do you need to break even and make profits? How many clients do you need to work with, without compromising on quality? Add all these together, and pick a price you’re most comfortable with.

Using the above mantras, pick a price that puts money in your pocket and value in your client’s pocket. Remember you’re in business to make money, and if you don’t, you’ll eventually become stressed out and burn out.

How do you set your prices? Tell us in the comments!

photo via tax credits // cc

An Insanely Mercenary Breakdown Of Why I Post What I Post

“Well, it’s a lifestyle blog for smart, funny women. So you’re allowed to read it.”
(Finger guns, awkward winking)

This is something I say 3-4 times a week when I meet strangers and tell them what I do. (I only recently stopped following “I’m a professional blogger” with “yesthatsathing.”)

If they’re interested, I go on to tell them how I wanted to create a space on the internet that didn’t pigeonhole women and combined smart, interesting things (like career, travel, self-development, finances) and less serious stuff (cats, cheese, cute outfits).

As much as I love it, I realize that Yes and Yes doesn’t really fit into a neat, tidy blogging category. Is it a travel blog? What’s going on with those True Story interviews? Did you seriously write a post that’s just photos of animals smiling?

While it’s true that I frequently publish things simply because I think the internet needs to know about sleeping bag skirts and homemade oreos, there’s definitely a method to my madness. If you’re in the process of developing an editorial calendar for your blog, here’s a behind-the-curtains peek at my on-going post series and why I started them.

real-life-style-icon
Post Series:
Real Life Style Icons
How often: once a month
Why?

  • I want to introduce my readers to new blogs + support interesting, thoughtful content
  • These posts remind us that there are heaps of gorgeous, stylish humans in the world and we come in lots of different packages
  • When I interview other bloggers, they (hopefully) link to the post on their own blog or social media. I send traffic their way and they send traffic my way. Win/win!
  • If I’m feeling ambitious, I’ll pull affiliate links for clothing items featured in the fashion blogger’s outfits - like this. Remember, you need to disclose when you’re using affiliate links - my disclaimer is in my blog footer.
  • After asking their permission, I compiled my interviewees’ best, most clever style tips into a free ebook, which I used to get 1,000+ fresh newsletter subscribers!
  • Style posts helps diversify my content and make my blog appealing to more advertisers
  • It adds more ‘Pin-able’ content to my site. Pinterest runs on fashion, food, and craft posts - which I don’t post very frequently. This interview series changes that!

minitravelguides

Post series: Mini Travel Guides
How often: once a month
Why? 

  • Share local + expat insights into cool travel destinations
  • Introduce my readers to other blogs and writers
  • Benefit from guest poster’s traffic when they link to the post
  • Remind readers that I wrote two travel ebooks and if they like these posts, they might like my ebooks!

PicMonkey Collage

Post series: Read // Eat and The Kitchen Globetrotter
How often: once a month, each
Why?

  • Introduce my readers to other blogs
  • Benefit from the bloggers’ traffic when they link to the guest post
  • Diversify my content
  • Post more ‘Pin-able’ content
  • Stuff my face with great recipes, drool on my keyboard

Untitled

Post series: Network of Nice
How often: once a month
Why?

  • Support my readers in making awesome things happen
  • Build community
  • Close the karma circle
  • Differentiate myself from other blogs

Untitled

Post series: Web Time Wasters
How often: every Sunday morning, at 6 am
Why?

  • Introduce my readers to awesome new blogs
  • Give my readers cool things to read on a Sunday morning - a time that’s usually ‘dead’ on the internet
  • Non-sleazily network with the people I’m linking to
  • Insert affiliate links to cute things I would/will/have purchased
  • Promote conversation about interesting or thought provoking things that I’m linking to
  • Empty my favorites folder, already!

Untitled

Post series: True Story
How often: Every Monday at 6 am
Why? 

And that, friends, is the ridiculously transparent, somewhat mercenary break down of my seemingly directionless, lifestyle-ish blog. If this level of steely-eyed strategy doesn’t terrify you (or even appeals to you) you can hire me here.

Now you tell me!  Why do you post what you post? What’s your strategy?