Unlocking Your Future – the Key to Working from Home
Guest Post by James Martell
In my dad’s day, a businessman commuted from the suburbs to the office for hours each week, often traveling on business trips to meet with clients or suppliers, and spent more time away from home than he ever did with his family. Those days are disappearing, and it’s time to embrace a new normal.
Blast from the past
Back in 1998, when I first started understanding how the internet would be the future of business, everyone was a bit leery of it. When I did my first promotion for a company in the United States, everybody thought it was crazy for a Canadian like me to do business with someone from another country, not to mention someone I had never even met. I must admit I had my own doubts about it, but they were all laid to rest when the first check cleared the bank.
Today’s Information Age
Flash forward twelve years and the internet is the way we all do business, so why are so many of us still leaving our homes and families to punch a time clock in an office? Working from home is the key to your freedom and happiness; you just have to follow some simple guidelines and success can be yours.
Create your own space
Start by creating your own work space. Working from home is great, because it allows you the freedom to manage your own time and do with it what matters most, but you can’t treat your work time like home time. Creating a separate space to be your work area is essential, and allows you to mentally focus on your work, as well as keep things organized.
Some people I’ve talked to prefer to create their own office, complete with a nice home office computer desk and filing cabinets. Others prefer to make a section in their garage or a corner of the bedroom their work area. However much space you need, or the tools you require, just make sure it is a space that is all your own, and dedicated solely to your work. No setting up on half the kitchen the table and pretending you can eat dinner around it or the kids won’t scatter it. It just doesn’t work!
Social marketing
Use the internet to work for you. It’s important to realize that there’s a lot of competition out there these days, and you’ll need more going for you than just a well written landing page if you’re going to be a success. You’re going to have to make what you’re offering look appealing to the consumer and convince them that others think it has value too. Whatever you’re selling, whether it’s a product or a service, one of the best ways to sell it is with social marketing.
Just as our parents turned to the yellow pages or watched ads on TV, today everybody goes to search engines like Google when they want or need something. It’s the first place many of us get our information now.
When we want to know if the information we gathered from the web is credible, we rely on people we know for endorsements. The power of word of mouth has grown immeasurably since the advent of Facebook and Twitter. Millions of consumers are turning to these resources before making purchases and more and more of us are doing the actual buying or ordering on the internet as well. I’m sure you’ve found this to be true in your own life just as I have. These are great tools that you can use to your advantage. By getting people to talk about your product or service and consumers will seek you out.
Tools of tomorrow, here today
If all this sounds like a lot of work, just remember, you don’t have to do it all alone. Working from home isn’t for hermits or the antisocial. Thanks to today’s technology, it is as vibrant and active and social as you want to make it.
- Increase knowledge and education with webinars.
- Bring the boardroom right into your home by holding meetings and networking with them through business video conferencing or Skype.
- Utilize smart phone apps or laptops to access everything you need anywhere you go.
Do all the things you want to do with your life, and still have the access to handle all your business needs and communicate with the people you need to accomplish it all. Social networking is first and foremost about keeping social as much as you can.
Follow these guidelines and you’ll be on the path to success, and free to enjoy it when you achieve it. Your future is just waiting for you.
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James Martell, author of the Affiliate Marketers Handbook works from his home office computer desk teaching others how to make money with affiliate programs utilizing powerful tools like business video conferencing.
Read MoreBeginners Guide in Building an Online Shopping Cart
Guest Post by Elias Cortez.
Online shopping is one of the trends in today’s modern industry. People who would always want to avoid congestion in the market place, parking lots, long queue in the cashier prefer online shopping. There are many advantages of online shopping. First, it can help you save time, energy and money. Second, it gives convenience when you need to send something across the miles. Online shopping can lead you to different sites where you can liberally compare the best item at the best price. Though for some reasons, people find it difficult to liberally walk into online shopping, and cannot totally replace window shopping at the mall.
Building your online shopping cart is quite trouble-free. However, it may take several days depending on the number of products, store plans and designs. Here are the basic guidelines on how to build an online shopping cart for beginners:
- Get a domain name. When building a site, you need to find and register an appropriate domain name for it. (Example: www.mystore.com,www.mystore.net, www.mystore.org, www.mystore.info)
- Create your online store. This is considered as an obvious step when launching an online store.
- Add and supply products. What does your business speak for? What are your main products or services available? To increase visibility and sales, it is recommended to include a promotional or informational video on your product description pages.
- Select a design and layout. There are hundreds of templates available online that would fit and match your products and meet your needs. Original designs and a good layout can draw lots of customers to your site as they are very thrilling for them to see innovative and exceptional designs. Make your product labels and descriptions readable as well.
- Shipping and payment options. After you’ve created your online store, then the next thing to handle is the entire logistics chain of your store.
- Make a profit. You’re good to go! But remember that earning money on the internet requires enthusiasm and hard work. This is not an overnight-success activity. Expect some difficulties on the first stage of your business that’s why constant maintenance, advertisement, shipping arrangement, and optimization are necessary in order for your online shopping cart to run well.
Is online shopping safe and secure?
As a first time online purchaser, being nervous is normal. Many people who jump into online shopping experience apprehension and hesitation, so you are not alone. In fact, nothing is completely safe wherever you go, whether online purchase or real purchase. However, online shopping has proven itself with millions of transactions that went successful, and currently being safely processed each day. You would know if you’re in the right track if you choose a good and trustworthy company that safeguards your personal information, and ensures you customer delight.
How to find a company of good reputation?
Seeking an advice from a relatives and friends would be helpful in your selection. Remember, trusted companies are mostly recommended by trusted friends. To ensure further safety and security, it is advised that you must first know the information or background of the company on its website before making any transaction. If necessary, you can get their toll-free telephone number so you could gather more information about them.
Paying by Credit Card
When making online purchases, make sure that the company keeps all your personal information and credit number secure.
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Elias Cortez is freelancer writer that specializes in writing in the education field for students looking to pursue a career in graphic design. Read his latest articles titled “Graphic design schools” and “Graphic design career information” to learn more.
Read MoreIncreasing Your Profitability: The #1 Strategy
Guest Post by James Martell.
It’s a safe bet one of the biggest reasons you chose to go into business for yourself is to live by your own schedule. For many people I’ve spoken to since I started out in 1999 online marketing is a great way to stop punching the clock.
In fact, this is a great way to love not only what you do, but to also have a chance to enjoy life. Setting your own hours, leaves you free to spend time your free time as you see fit. An unscheduled day off in the middle of the week won’t get you fired. 🙂
Having this sense of control, and building your own paycheck means a lot less frustration. It also makes you far more productive. It’s important not to let old habits you might have learned in the 9 to 5 mindset hold you back.
Making Your Time Work For You
It’s easy to return to the grind that kept you bogged down in work that you don’t enjoy, or will take you more time than it would a pro with more experience in certain areas. From clerical help to an artistic makeover you can build your business using skills readily available to you from professionals at reasonable costs.
Use the 15-Minute Rule Guide
I’m not overly technical. I found that when I try to do something that requires that type of aptitude I’ll spend hours basically just making the situation worse, and then realize later that I’ve wasted time I could have spent on another task.
There is no reason to struggle this way because there are thousands of talented artistic, clerical, and yes, technical professionals waiting to do jobs exactly like the one causing me a problem. For these individuals it takes just a few minutes to complete a job that could keep me away from higher level, profitable work.
What I love best about the trainings I give is getting to talk to people active in online marketing. I know from these conversations that this is a struggle for a lot of people, but really, it’s unnecessary. If you find yourself wearing thin on the task at hand then try what I call the 15-minute rule.
If I am still frustrated after working on a problem for 15-minutes, and can’t resolve it, or get a project to work the way I it need it to, I will hire a service provider I can trust to do the job for me. Hiring one of the many experienced professions on sites like Elance, takes less time, and in the end, less money than it would if I squandered my day away struggling with an issue, and not getting anything done.
That 15-minute rule has worked well for me, because of the professionalism I found on websites such as Elance. In fact, one job in particular I contracted illustrates exactly what I mean as far as saving money and time working on even a small issue when you can find someone to complete any kind of job in no time at all.
Working on an Excel spread sheet I realized that I needed some of the files separated so I could work with them. As I kept working on different ways to accomplish this and getting frustrated, I realized I was in violation of my rule. I was also letting other projects wait while tried to work on this one issue.
After posting the job on Elance and reviewing my bid options, I accepted the bid of a gentleman to complete the assignment for $20. I was sure the job could be completed in 24 hours for that amount.
Except, after setting the terms for the job at 24 hours, I forgot one crucial part of the job, and I neglected to send him the file. Now, for the provider to be paid within those terms he would need to finish within that timeframe, and if I’d remembered to send the work itself I’m sure he could have done so.
Perhaps, being a professional he’d encountered this problem before, because instead of letting the assignment go when he couldn’t reach me to get the file, he wrote a short program.
What this program did was separate the files, and I all I had to do was install it. The files were separated and I could work with them right away.
If you take this one story, and then realize it happens daily on Elance thousands of times a day you will see why this is a valuable tool.
On these sites, there are thousands of professional service providers actively looking for your jobs, and they are knowledge about how best to help your resolve problems you might be having right now.
Outsourcing Doesn’t Have to Be Expensive If Done Right
Imagine you need a retouching photoshop for a banner add. After trying for awhile with no success it would be easy to exclude this from your website, and you would lose this item you want for your business only because it falls outside your own expertise.
When you only concentrate on what you can do alone due to either time issues, or know-how you’re limiting the professional quality of your endeavor. This is dropping the level of what you can do to promote and run your business, and crippling the vision, you have for all your projects.
One of the important points I make as part of my outsourcing course is that you don’t need to limit your business to those areas of expertise you don’t personally hold. Perhaps unlike me, you are a computer wizard. Chances are good you aren’t also a photo retouchers professional, writer, or software designer. You can go without being all those things, but your business will at some point need all those skills and more.
So many qualified providers and professionals with various skills sets willing to share their abilities with your site or business for a very reasonable price, that finding someone who has a specially skill or even time saving clerical support is too easy and too inexpensive to do without.
Really, the numbers of experts and professionals waiting to bid on your project is astounding. The process is simple and low in cost if you follow a few important tips.
Outsourcing Tip #1: The Myth of Expensive Outsourcing
Many people’s first objection to hiring a professional is based on the myth that outsourcing will be too expensive. Outsourcing is not expensive if you use sites like
Elance, or others where pros bid on doing your job for you. Through this process, you pick the price you want to pay.
As a job provider, you have control of the service providers you hire and how much you will pay.
The nice thing about most of the bidding for hire sites is that when you post the job, you can take the bid that appeals to you to based on the qualifications and how much you think the work is worth.
Outsourcing Tip #2: Outline a Clear Idea of What You Want
This is tip number two, but it is the number one mistake made by new job providers. A vague, undefined job posting will not get you the results you want.
Very clearly, describe what you want. A website designer for example, bidding on your project might be very good, but he or she cannot know in advance what you want without direction, and while this provider will try to give you a great results, it might not be what you need.
Instead, picture how you would like the end-result of your project to look like and write a short spec page outline with 15 or so points listed to let the writer what you want the job to include.
Outsourcing Tip #3: Protect Your Money by Setting Milestones
One very important tip is to protect your money by setting milestones, and using escrow. A milestone can be set for each phase of project. The total payment for the job can be split per each milestone performed.
On sites like Elance, the escrow system allows you to keep your money protected since you only release the funds when a milestone or the project is completed to your satisfaction.
When my wife Arlene first started outsourcing she found that through this method she had better control of each phase of her website. Since she needed many different new aspects to her site, having approval of each element from the banner to the links on the page was a useful tool for her, and is for anyone with a definite picture of what they want.
Outsourcing Tip #4: Use Feedback to Get To Know the Pro
Before you select who will work on the project check their feedback. As providers bid on your project, you can use the system to read what others they have worked for say about them. In a way, the feedback works much the same a reference.
Personally, I avoid those service providers who do not have any feedback, since their abilities, and work ethic are yet unknown.
Outsourcing Tip #5: Chose Your Own Price Through Negotiation
Negotiate the price. You can ask bidders to lower their bids through the system. Sometimes an overpriced bid represents a misunderstanding of what the job will entail or what kind of budget is possible for this work. Most bidders are open to some element of negotiation due to the competition for jobs and good job providers on the site.
One of the main reasons that my wife Arlene developed this knack for negotiation was in her experience working with her own site EpilepsyMoms.com.
Arlene noticed a need for a place online where parents could share information about Epilepsy, it’s treatment, and trade tactics for dealing with this condition. She wanted an easy to navigate site, a forum, and a recorded message that greeted visitors as they entered.
Going through some of the services out there could have been expensive, and doing this work alone would have difficult. She found that through discussions with the services providers she could get a price that was reasonable, without sacrificing expertise.
Outsourcing Tip #6: Keep in Contact and Respond to Messages
Elance provides a private message system. This function allows private emails between you and the service provider. Here you and the person working on the job can discuss aspects of different assigns and keep up with each step along the way.
The pro’s goal is to make you the customer happy, and this will mean touching base with you occasionally. Keeping in touch with the provider also lets you know that the project is staying on track, and that you will be happy the job’s results.
Elance holds these messages in the system allowing you and the service provider to keep a running record of your communications.
While it happens very infrequently, if you and the service provider disagree at any point these records are valuable in assisting Elance in resolving the dispute.
Outsourcing Tip #7: Everyone Likes to Get Paid—Pay Fast
After outsourcing more than 400 projects, I know that money is a motivator. Once you have a technical person, writer, data entry clerk, or any other sort of service provider you may very well want to become a repeat customer. Paying fast ensures the service provider would put your name at the top of their list of projects to bid on when he or she sees your posting.
When you are paying you can stagger the amounts allowing you to pay a part of the total agreed on price a step at a time, but there’s one other important tool that milestones give you. Once you’ve paid an initial deposit you can give feedback. If things start going wrong on the job, this tool allows you to have a motivator when working with the service provider.
Feedback on Elance works much the same as with other systems like eBay in which bad feedback can cost the provider future sales or work. Once you’ve made a payment through the system you have this added incentive for the service provider to do a great job.
Outsourcing Tip #8: Never Leave The System
There’s no legitimate reason for either the job provider or the service provider to want to leave the system either Elance or other service provider website has set up. If you leave you can’t use the many safe features the site provides for you.
A service provider might ask you to leave in order to avoid paying. Job providers only pay for the service provider, while Elance takes it’s fee from that total before paying the service provider.
Leaving the system is denying Elance it’s fee, and it takes away important safety features from you such as dispute resolution, a safe, private message center, and the ability to give feedback.
When service providers are used to getting good feedback they have no reason to leave the system, since while they are paying a small fee, the free advertising from a satisfied customer’s comments ensures them more work.
Outsourcing Tip #9: Build Service Provider Relationships
When you are a good client who pays on time and gets good feedback you will never have trouble getting great bids for you jobs. Once you know whom you want to work with from experience you can invite them back to work with you again,
On her own site this was a great discovery that Arlene made, once someone knows you, it’s easier for the person to produce work you will appreciate. In the case of her site past services providers who already knew her needs and her site could produce the work quickly.
Outsourcing Tip #10: Your Feedback is Important Too
Just as you are checking out the feedback of the service provider, they are looking at your past feedback to determine if you are someone they want to work with on the job you’re current listing.
Some comments such as being slow to pay, or not responding to messages can hurt you in finding future good professionals to help you. From the service providers perspective they are taking a chance that you will honor your agreement, and the best proof of that is an outstanding past record.
Your Incentive to Outsourcing
- Thousands of technicians, writers, network specialists, coders, copywriters,artists, web designers, and more professionals are competing for your business.
- Competition keeps the costs down.
- There is no cost for posting your job. The service provider pays the fee for the job.
- Feedback is an extra incentive for the service provider to do a great job for you.
- Elance has provided safety nets to ensure your privacy, and that disputes can be settled within the system.
People Like to Earn Money
From the start like many in this industry, I wanted my wife to also take part in the business. She wasn’t interested until one day she saw something she really wanted. A sofa that would exactly fit her plans for decorating. I think everyone can relate. We all see those things we want, and need then go looking for ways to achieve our dreams.
In this case the dream was at a reasonable price, but she also knew I had money set aside for the writing several articles I needed. She came to me with an idea, she could do the articles, and we both get a sofa.
She’d written before so this was a skill she possessed. We made the trade. In this case, I not only got the articles, but in writing those articles, Arlene saw what affiliate marketing was all about and started taking a big part in the business herself.
You don’t always have a professional or expert in the family, and even when you do drawing on them all the time can have a downside. You can draw on the professionals at Elance or a similar site whenever you need to for almost any type of service or skill.
Sometimes it might just be a person to go through a few administrative details to free up your time. Or you might someone to design your entire website. Either way, it doesn’t have to be too expensive, and this can immensely increase the productive or image of your site.
Over to You
What questions do you have about outsourcing? Tell us your thoughts on this way to increase your productivity.
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Recognized as a leading expert in affiliate marketing training, James Martell is President of Net Guides Publishing Inc. and host of the “Affiliate Marketers SUPER BootCamp.” A sought-after speaker, James has presented at Commission Junction University, Affiliate Summit, The System Seminar, Digital River Lab, Webmaster World’s PubCon, Affcon, and more. He is also the host the “Affiliate Buzz”, the 1st ever and longest running affiliate marketing podcast in the industry. James relies on outsourcing for the creation of his websites, graphics, articles, podcasts, and video in order to streamline his business, enabling him to break away from the daily grind.
Read MoreASE09 Session: Keeping Your Affiliate Program Clean
Guest Post by Dominic Fawver.
Session Description: Learn advanced approaches to running a clean affiliate program. A review of the systems, processes, tools and techniques used by leading affiliate programs to keep their programs clean. The panel consisted of:
- David Naffziger, CEO, BrandVerity (Moderator)
- Jamie Birch, Owner, JEBCommerce (Twitter @JamieEBirch)
- Graham MacRobie, President & CEO, Alias Encore (Twitter @grahammacrobie)
- Joshua Sloan, CEO, Sloan Tech (Twitter @sloanzone)
This session contained a lot of useful information targeted mostly to companies with an affiliate program and also outsource program managers. Some of the information was useful for affiliates, especially the need for a good relationship between affiliates and affiliate managers. The session consisted of short presentations by David Naffziger and by Graham MacRobie and then the floor was opened up for questions.
The presentations gave a brief overview of some of the common forms of abuse affiliate programs need to avoid. These include PPC violations, Cookie Stuffing, Legitimate link replacement, transaction lead fraud, and Brand Squatting. Some of the ways given to combat abuse were to know how your partners work – know how traffic is normally sent, who else they work with, is their plan consistent with their performance, and is their traffic pattern different from the normal. Examples of various software was give, a couple from Brand Verity and also free alternatives.
The question and answer portion gave several very good tips. One of the first was that no program should auto-approve, that affiliates each be inspected to make sure that they are who they say they are. Another was to go over the terms and conditions listed for the program at least once a year; it is better to have over strict rules and regs. that are lightly enforced rather than not enough. This will help in the long run because if abuse is found it can then be removed. Less than desirable affiliates are likely to group in the smaller networks as they are less likely to be discovered. More abuse is likely in a new affiliate program. Having the highest payout can make you a target on account of greed. Many of these comments can be used both by affiliate managers and also act as warnings to affiliates as to the relationship they should have with their manager.
Read MoreASE09: Monday Chris Brogan Keynote
Guest Post by Dominic Fawver.
The keynote address was pretty good. In effect it gave an overview of Chris Brogan and Julien Smith’s new book, Trust Agents. It was based on research that shows that there are more than one type of currency. One of the most important one of these is social capitol, which is based on trust. Once you gain the trust of people they will look for your opinions, and trust them, thereby making it much easier to sell things to them. People will trust your recommendations of products and services. Knowing the “insider vocabulary” can be a major advantage, and most important: “be known as a person” Julien Smith.
The keynote was mostly a conversation between Julien and Chris. I am looking forward to completing the rest of the book and will be posting a review when I do so.
Read MoreASE09 Session: What the Heck is a Website Nowadays?
Guest Post by Dominic Fawver.
Session Description: Businesses may be changing the way they look at web presence. Can you just have a blog? Is a Facebook presence alone a good idea? Does Web 2.0 mean the demise of websites? The panel consisted of:
- Shashi Bellamkonda, Social Media Swami, Network Solutions (Twitter @shashib) (Moderator)
- Kelly Harman, President, Zephyr Strategy
- Melanie Mitchell, SVP, Search Strategy, Digitas (Twitter @melaniemitchell)
- Ramon Ray, Editor, Smallbiztechnology.com
This session gave an interesting and entertaining look into how the role of a website has been changed recently with the advent of Social Media. One of the chief points that I took from the session was that your website should be the anchor for all the other forms of social media which you use. Ramon Ray brought out some points that are easy to remember and contain a lot of useful tips, these are:
- Focus on the customer.
- Have a plan of action.
- Have an easy to remember name.
- Be informative.
- Security – have as much as is needed for your site.
- Easy customer contact = good customer service.
- Have fresh content.
- Be found.
- Be simple.
