Now that you’ve had some time to reflect, what was the single best lesson from FreelanceCamp Fort Collins that you’ve put to use?
For Nick, it was: if your services are priced so low that you can’t afford to hire someone to help, you’ve priced too low (from @RedHeadWriting)
When asked how much it cost to put on an event like FreelanceCamp, I decided to share all of the numbers. Both to satiate your curiosity and to help future volunteers, sponsors and organizers understand the quantity of money that is necessary to put on a well-run, professional event.
Money In
Ticket Sales: 845.00
Sticker Giant: 120.00
Cohere, LLC: 75.00
Digital Gunslingers: 75.00
The Hive: 75.00
Shir Joy Creative (Liz Sunshine): 75.00
Total Income= 1,265.00
Otterbox: $120 In-kind donation of 12 otterboxes and gift cards for the volunteers
Old Town Media: $40 In-kind donation of a boat load of snacks
Money Out
Venue: FREE
Breakfast, Lunch, Coffee, Tea: 672.21
Akinz sunglasses at a HUGE discount: 230.00
Eventbrite Fees: 62.75
PayPal Fees: 36.73
FreelanceCamp Stickers: 82.81
FlipChart, dry erase markers, nametags: 41.74
Plates, cups, bottled water: 36.33
3 Pizzas at After Party: 48.00
Total Expenses: $1,210.57
Difference: + $54.43 (to be applied towards next FreelanceCamp Fort Collins)
Definition: being prepared to take on more clients without quality of work diminishing or potential to continue successfully as its size increases
Going from Start Up to BIG – communication isn’t as easy – and not as efficient
“Didn’t you get the memo”
When you have to say that = you’re not scaling well
Steve Blank is a venture capitalist, founded companies, and has a great blog on this topic – Steve Blank
Who HAS succeeded at scaling their business?
First: talk about employees they are a means to a goal – not the goal itself
Code Geek – web firm: himself alone at first
He did all: design and development and writing….. better graphics ability – networking, user groups in Denver, id people who were skilled
Hired freelance at first – now dozen 1099s – he needs NOW to replicate himself
Delegation is crucial – find the right person who has the skill set – who can clone him
Programming and can also talk to clients
He SHOULD be the salesman, always
ID point of pain – I’m not a designer – knowing what your limitations, where your box is
Whatever goes into that box, comes out as amazing stuff
Try to not be an assembly line – be creative – keep YOU in the product/service
a) Who am I/what do I do well/what can others do better?
If an owner can’t go on vacation for a 6 months stint – then it’s not really a business
Difficult tasks:
Accounting
Operations
Networking/Presenting/Sales
Web design
HTML
Marketing
Question: ought you to outsource sales of services?
Of products, yes.
The only thing you can’t outsource is OPERATIONS
Risk of growth – leader originally holds the red balloon (the vision) – as they grow the balloon gets harder and harder to see
Look at Home Depot and New Belgium – Corporate Culture – its embedded into the organization.
Chic’Filet – it’s my pleasure – that’s not REALLY their pleasure : welcome to Walmart
Keep the vision because that’s what we are passionate about – and translate that into future branches, it will be fail
Be the charismatic leader of the cult
————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Another aspect: Why am I growing and what does the picture look like?
Am I a steady presence or absent leader?
Think about what you really want!
Don’t grow for the sake of growing – that’s what society says, get a loan and grow and grow and grow – that’s peer pressure!
Different levels of scaling.
How much of a hand in it?
How do you replicate yourself?
Look for people who are different – those who excel where you don’t.
Having two visionaries as partners – kind of a nightmare!
To get an employee you need an EIN, but you don’t have to be an LLC.
Rules of contract vs employees:
W9/1099 contractor – can’t dictate the span of control.
Ramifications: contact CPA – keep you out of trouble with the IRS but consider that there may be back Unemployment Taxes and Social Security owed.
2 must haves: a good lawyer on tap and a good accountant to do your taxes
Find an EA (enrolled agent) with the IRS they can represent you without being there!
______
Hiring someone – options are limitless – take the time to hire a quality employee
Develop an interview process, an application form, look it up on the internet for sample questions, personality matches
Why do you want to have employees – ways to scale without never hiring.
Comes from strategic partnerships – those who do exactly what you do, and are complementary
RESOURCE: Erica (RedHeadWriting) – ODesk.com – do your admin while you are asleep
– concentric circles – more business but not expanding your services; more employees then
VS
- scaling your business – increasing your scope; get strategic alliances
OTHER:
Take time to find people you can work with and can support you.
If you can’t go on vacation, you’re failing at business
How can employees and contractors be invested with you – honor them in front of client, reward them, emotionally as a human being, how you manage them
Trust your contractors; but if you’ve done it right – they’re going to leave and do their own stuff – which is GOOD!
Price your services so you CAN scale – you have to be able to outsource, pay your vendors ½ of what you charge – if you can’t then raise your prices! OR send that vendor overflow!
Reward: energy to grow your business and be on your bike or wakeboarding.
Collaboration with Freelances
Offer more services than you can do yourself –
Surround with idea peoples – by virtue of being with freelancer
Real world - collaborate on a problem together
Financial benefit to collaboration – one person specializes in X, another in Y
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts
When did you collaborate – alliances with people
Chicks who click – was the place she sourced that expert
What does like minded mean?
Ideas, values, goals,
Get advice from other freelances – vs employees – they don’t have RISK in their business
Places you get collaborators: FCIP, co-working places, camps
Backchannel on IRC – chat channel, log into that whether they are in the space or not (don’t have to be a member)
Co-optetion – people often want to protect their business –much rather be helpful and work together; it’s OK to be helpful. There’s more than enough clients for everyone and your X factor distinguishes you.
AND they can be back ups too. And the general marketplace is informed about your speciality as well.
Be an orchestrator and parcel jobs out. Everyone is in the same boat together – toss work to others, benefits YOU and helps the freelancer get work too.
Strategic alliances are different from the resources who do exactly what you do… there’s a lot of trust there.
Stealing clients is bad juju – and those are so rare occasions – don’t stress.
More brains involved in a project – yeah, that’s such good input! Those WOW moments you wouldn’t have had without that collaboration.
Can position yourself as an expert if you show yourself as cooperative and providing valuable information – don’t keep the knowledge to yourself.
Keep an open mind about collaborators. Don’t shut yourself off. Entertain possibilities.
As your business changes your collaborations will change.
Co-working opens up the ability to ask questions of others – you can pick brains for free. Those sorts of questions are so much easier if you are co-working – or on social media.
It’s ok to be in the same facility as your competitors! And networking groups too. What is this about networking associations restricting competitors from being in the same leads group!
One connection can make all the difference – must be generous from the start.
Traditional businesses won’t go for collaboration with competition – spread the word about this sort of open minded collaboration – be the evangelists for this paradigm shift. It’s a thought-shift.
There are people who will not use a business unless they have a brick and mortar office.
Clients benefit from collaboration – they can be over the moon.
All collaborators can share email addresses so they come under the business banner.
Us now film.com …. biggest thinkers talking about this stuff. Coolest many to many features out in the world, soccer team owned by the fans.
RESOURCES: Check out Start Up Weekend – coolest unconference in the world. Start companies over the weekend – now in over 100 cities. Had one in Boulder previously.
Bar Camp – about:
Mid 90s in SF, Tim O’Reilly invited friends to Foo Camp, then it became community-sourced, and started Bar Camp – host our OWN conference, same framework across the world (Change Camp, Bacon Camp, Demo Camp, … etc.)
There are emerging field of leaders… think about IGNITE as similar – let people do their thing.
Biggest Bar Camp is in Austin week before SXSW (music, design community fest.)
Make it happen here – NXNE!
Denver rules – Austin drools.
The awesome foundation – 10 trustees put $100 a month and support good causes (don’t ask for a stake!)
Think about this people – go talk to Angel. No metrics, no grant forms. No business plans or loans. Just rewarding and acknowledging awesomeness.
Beer thirty – we’re winding down.
Definition: being prepared to take on more clients without quality of work diminishing or potential to continue successfully as its size increases
Going from Start Up to BIG – communication isn’t as easy – and not as efficient
“Didn’t you get the memo”
When you have to say that = you’re not scaling well
Steve Blank is a venture capitalist, founded companies, and has a great blog on this topic – Steve Blank
Who HAS succeeded at scaling their business?
First: talk about employees they are a means to a goal – not the goal itself
Code Geek – web firm: himself alone at first
He did all: design and development and writing….. better graphics ability – networking, user groups in Denver, id people who were skilled
Hired freelance at first – now dozen 1099s – he needs NOW to replicate himself
Delegation is crucial – find the right person who has the skill set – who can clone him
Programming and can also talk to clients
He SHOULD be the salesman, always
ID point of pain – I’m not a designer – knowing what your limitations, where your box is
Whatever goes into that box, comes out as amazing stuff
Try to not be an assembly line – be creative – keep YOU in the product/service
a) Who am I/what do I do well/what can others do better?
If an owner can’t go on vacation for a 6 months stint – then it’s not really a business
Difficult tasks:
Accounting
Operations
Networking/Presenting/Sales
Web design
HTML
Marketing
Question: ought you to outsource sales of services?
Of products, yes.
The only thing you can’t outsource is OPERATIONS
Risk of growth – leader originally holds the red balloon (the vision) – as they grow the balloon gets harder and harder to see
Look at Home Depot and New Belgium – Corporate Culture – its embedded into the organization.
Chic’Filet – it’s my pleasure – that’s not REALLY their pleasure : welcome to Walmart
Keep the vision because that’s what we are passionate about – and translate that into future branches, it will be fail
Be the charismatic leader of the cult
————————————————————————————————————————————————————
Another aspect: Why am I growing and what does the picture look like?
Am I a steady presence or absent leader?
Think about what you really want!
Don’t grow for the sake of growing – that’s what society says, get a loan and grow and grow and grow – that’s peer pressure!
Different levels of scaling.
How much of a hand in it?
How do you replicate yourself?
Look for people who are different – those who excel where you don’t.
Having two visionaries as partners – kind of a nightmare!
To get an employee you need an EIN, but you don’t have to be an LLC.
Rules of contract vs employees:
W9/1099 contractor – can’t dictate the span of control.
Ramifications: contact CPA – keep you out of trouble with the IRS but consider that there may be back Unemployment Taxes and Social Security owed.
2 must haves: a good lawyer on tap and a good accountant to do your taxes
Find an EA (enrolled agent) with the IRS they can represent you without being there!
______
Hiring someone – options are limitless – take the time to hire a quality employee
Develop an interview process, an application form, look it up on the internet for sample questions, personality matches
Why do you want to have employees – ways to scale without never hiring.
Comes from strategic partnerships – those who do exactly what you do, and are complementary
RESOURCE: Erica (RedHeadWriting) – ODesk.com – do your admin while you are asleep
– concentric circles – more business but not expanding your services; more employees then
VS
- scaling your business – increasing your scope; get strategic alliances
OTHER:
Take time to find people you can work with and can support you.
If you can’t go on vacation, you’re failing at business
How can employees and contractors be invested with you – honor them in front of client, reward them, emotionally as a human being, how you manage them
Trust your contractors; but if you’ve done it right – they’re going to leave and do their own stuff – which is GOOD!
Price your services so you CAN scale – you have to be able to outsource, pay your vendors ½ of what you charge – if you can’t then raise your prices! OR send that vendor overflow!
Reward: energy to grow your business and be on your bike or wakeboarding.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
2:00 PM
Horror stories:
o Check out http://clientsfromhell.net/ for horror stories
Why/Who (to fire):
o Clients who don’t ever deliver the stuff you need to do you job done
o Clients that always ask for things out of scope / over and over / even after you have educated them on workflow.
o Clients who blame you when they make mistakes.
o Clients or Prospects that make threats / or hold things “over your head”
Signs (that you may need to fire):
o Clients that don’t know what they want (only what they don’t want) should raise a red flag.
o Long emails that you have to scroll to read (especially if they are aggressive)
o Horribly disorganized clients lead to issues that make your job very difficult
o “Follow your instincts”
o People who are condescending
o Unreasonable time expectations
o Email threats
o Cheap / prospects or clients that want you to do more for less
o People that are taking up a lot of time (the result is less time for the work you are enjoying)
o If you avoid taking their calls… hiding them in your chat program to avoid them
o Check your emotional during interactions for a gauge on who the working relationship is going.
How (to fire):
o Entrepreneur.com “Fire Your Bad Clients” - great article
o Five Steps to firing
1. Education - educate them to see if that helps the situation
2. Re-education
3. Try to transfer them
4. Last Request
5. Firing
Prevention (vetting clients to avoid the need to fire):
o Educating your clients in the beginning is the best way to avoid issues.
o Remind people that you are hiring you for your expertise - let you do your job.
o Having a “system” and set of rules that the client needs to follow in writing
Notes:
o Be sure to know your PERFECT clients AND also know who you don’t want to work.
o Create your list of your ideal client and keep it close.
o Know what personality types you get along with and who you do not.
o Have a PIA (“pain in the ass”) factor on your estimates / try to figure out how much of a PIA they are going to be.
o Include an “out clause” on your contract
o 80/20 rule
· 80 percent of your time is spent on 20 percent of your clients
· 80 percent of your money will be made with 20 percent of your clients
· 80 percent of your problems will come from 20 percent of your clients
o You may have to loose the money owed to you if you do not have enough outstanding to warrant paying a lawyer to help collect.
- It is OK to turn down business, and how to know when to do that.
- Networking is crucial when it comes to making the right connections to the right clients.
- Especially network face - to - face.
- You usually aren’t going to get a client at a networking event, you’re going to get a referral out of networking.
- Networking is also useful not only for what you can get from it, but what you can provide to other people.
- Limit yourself to how many networking events you go to.
- It’s usually more beneficial to show up many times at a few events, than once at many events.
- Don’t feel pressured to network. Network only when it feels right.
- Know how much you are worth.
- I wish I hadn’t worked for free so much.
- Put a dollar value on how much pro-bono work you’re going to do during a year.
- Sometimes, pro-bono work can be a tax writeoff.
- Be careful doing work for friends or family.
- Oftentimes, friends or family don’t know the value of the work they’re asking you to do.
- Have a good accountant and a good lawyer. Lawyer first.
- Surround yourself with people that know what they do.
- If people want to help out of the goodness of their heart, that’s fine. If they just want part of the business, then run for the hills.
- With free help, you get what you pay for.
- Up-front contracts can and should be used in every situation.
- Take a sales class. Know how to sell yourself.
- Whether you think so or not, you’re probably selling something. Usually yourself.
- RESOURCE - Ogilvy on Avertising - book
- Don’t get so caught up in your current work that you forget to get new business.
- RESOURCE - The Business Librarian at Poudre Libraries - Anne McDonald - FREE RESOURCE
- Have a Business Plan!
- Usually you have two different business plans - one for the bank, and one for how the business will actually be run.
- If you’re going to make a business plan, make it an attainable goal.
- RESROURCE - The Workforce Center does a Be Your Own Boss Class. Contact Cohere for the list
- In a proposal, assume everyone’s an idiot.
- Don’t be afraid to consult a lawyer for proposals and contracts.
- Make sure you have a payment deadline in your contract.
- Just because you’re a freelancer doesn’t mean you have to make less money than big companies.
- If you don’t know how much you’re worth, neither does anyone else.
- Make people realize that the value now isn’t worth the trouble later.
- Draw a triangle. Label the corners “Price”, “Time”, “Quality”. Make them pick two, you can’t have all three.
- Don’t forget about taxes.
- Factor in ongoing web support, if you have a website.
- Don’t forget about old-fashioned media. It’s a great way to get your name out there.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
1:00 PM
Started by getting a feel for range of experience. Room ranged from people without a business yet to people with more than 5 years on their own.
Veterans Sharing ideas:
It is okay to turn down business and how to know when to do that.
o Story: Use to take work no matter what it was, hated the work so much she even subcontracted it out. In the end it took up too much psychic energy… she made money but it filled out too much other time and energy.
o If you are in for the money - don’t do it.
o One of the benefits of freelancing is that
o Time = money…
How do you find the RIGHT kind of client:
o Networking - - face to face networking is the best way to meet people. Don’t get too tied up in only in the technology - face to face networking is never going to go away.
o Don’t feel pressured to do everything, there are hundreds of events every week - just do the ones that really work for you.
o It makes more sense to go to fewer events… but go regularly. People need to see/meet you 7 times before you are recognized.
o Several people stated that leads group are usually a waste of time unless you are real estate or a similar business.
o Chamber of Commerce: After hours groups seemed like a waste of time unless you go regularly and build relationships.
o You don’t get your customer at a networking event - you get a referral from the people you meet at these events. It is about building relationships.
o Don’t go to networking to GET something out of it - spend your time getting to know people. Ask about people and what they do… get to know people. Ask first. See if you can be of service to them // see if can make a connection for them - they will remember you if you add value.
o Know where the bar is at the networking events… :D
o Avoid events that have “youth” or “young” associated with it… it is more about brainstorming and partying and less about getting business and/or referrals.
I wish I realized what I was worth from the beginning.
o Don’t get too caught up on the pro-bono work - you can only “build your portfolio” so much.
o Set a dollar value on your annual gifting and stick to it.
o Don’t over extend resources on the free work even to build your portfolio.
o Remember that pro-bono work is a tax right-off
How do you handle friend/family or acquaintances who want
o Just be clear on what you are worth and be okay with saying no.
Start-up Cautions/Info
o If you are having people who want to help and be part of what you are doing be sure they are as invested as you are - including money. In the end if it your checkbook and your name on the line.
o Be ware of “good hearted” free help. You get what you pay for.
o Get an up front agreement in writing.
o Surround your self with people who know what they do. Don’t try to do it all yourself. Get a good accountant and lawyer. Even a marketing agency. IT.
o Free resource - Anne McDonld at the Poudre Business Library. Call the Poudre Library and ask for her. She is a great resource - she even sent Angel a list of all companies with under 4 employees - name, address and phone number. She can help you find your target audience within 5 miles of your business (or where you want your business to be).
o Workforce Center does a class called “Be your own boss” and they will send you a packet of info of forms.
Business Plan
o Two different plans // one for the banks and one that you will follow for your business model.
o If you are going to take the time to write one out - make it an attainable goal.
o Veteran: Wishes she had created one because having a strategy ahead of time she wouldn’t feel like she was chasing her tail.
Estimates
o Use a boiler plate template
o Include EVERTHING and assume everyone is clueless and cover all details.
o Consult your lawyer about your estimates and contracts.
o Include the option to add-on with a change order / more work equals more money.
o Include a timeline so that you know you will get paid. Include a deadline on deliverables, if they don’t get back to you in a certain amount of time you should bill them at the end of the deadline so that jobs do not get drawn out forever.
o If you are doing web design: be sure to include that changes once the design is in code will incur additional costs.
o Freshbooks.com is a great tool for estimates and invoicing.
o The iphone app for it is Minibooks
Money
o If you are a freelancer it does not mean that you are not worth the same amount of money as the big corporate entities. Don’t think you can’t charge as much.
o Freelancers have a reputation of doing anything for any amount of money - you have to know your value.
o Know that your product is worth the money and don’t be afraid to remind prospects that they get what they pay for.
o People are too tied to the lowest cost - but you can educate them and help them understand the value of what you do.
o Don’t forget about taxes
o Factor in ongoing web support
Sales
o Take a sales class - you are SELLING your product and/or service.
o Go to a networking even with sales people.
o A sales class can be invaluable - learning a sales technique will help your business thrive.
o As a business owner/ freelancer YOU ARE A SALESPERSON… Learn how to sell yourself.
o Sales has a negative connotation - but EVERYONE is a sales person.
o A good book on advertising: “Ogilvy on Advertising”
o Spend a day at a car-lot and you will learn a ton about how to sell.
o Dedicate a certain amount of time to sales even when you are busy - you have to plan ahead. If you don’t have leads you will run out of work when the busy time is over.
o Cold-calling is a good way to get business. Sean says he even starts his calls with “Hi my name is Sean and this is a cold call” - he gets a giggle and they don’t hang up. But don’t forget to TARGET your list… find people that are real prospects.
o Don’t forget about old fashion media - newspapers are looking for “experts” and looking for content and can bring you a lot of business. Advertising, submit press releases, submit articles.
Quality — Price — Time
o There are three things and you have to choose two - you can’t have all three.
o Price is lower the quality will be lower / if you want something tomorrow the price will go up and the quality will go down…
Blogging for Business
1 pm, 28 July 2010
If you are going to have a business blog, it should be a part of an overall marketing strategy.
Creating content, especially for technical topics, where to find content?
Paying attention to what’s going on in the field.
Writing about things you’ve learned.
Solutions to problems - can generate a lot of traffic, because people are looking for answers.
LifeHacker style - “this is the one thing that will make your life easier if you do it today”. Nick finds that kind of topic meaningful if posted by someone he trusted or valued.
Roundups - list of 50 blue web site designs, things like that. People like that type of content.
When do you publish content? You need an editorial calendar for your blog. Onus is on you to establish expectations with your readership. How often will they find new content on your blog. They need to understand the 36,000 foot view of what value your blog brings to their life.
Map out your content.
How many times a week?
What time of day will you publish?
All important components of a successful blog.
Consider publishing in set categories.
Set times of the day - publish during “distraction times”. If target audience is people with day-jobs, usually between 9 and 10:30 am, 12-1:30 pm, 4-7 pm.
All RHW’s blogs (redheadwriting.com) are live by 9 am - hits key times here, and the second
Make sure you are blogging to your customers and not your colleagues. The people you are selling to.
Length of blog posts?
Katrina likes 500 words or less.
If you are doing SEO, no shorter than 250 words (SEO standards for “quality” content)
Thoughts on re-posting or summarizing someone else’s blog post. It’s crap! Don’t do it, it’s stealing content. Post a link instead. That’s valuable for the blogger.
Credit the author in your post that was inspired by theirs, give a link back to that blog, and make a comment on their blog.
Duplicate content penalty we’ve heard of about Google is a myth. What does matter is that it’s someone elses content.
Three most important things to RHW:
- Determine why do you want to blog in the first place, do you have the time to make it work?
- who are you talking to and who do you want to talk back to you (2 different things)
- how will you differentiate yourself from everything else out there
Your content affects your choice of technology:
Photo blogger - could use WordPress, but Tumbler might be better
All about your friends, only want your drinking buddies to read it, use the notes section on Facebook - Google and clients won’t find it.
Blogging for business - WordPress, can be styled like the rest of your web site
Wanted to sound “cool” like other blogs she was reading. Very hard to try to write like someone else. Much easier to just say what you want to say - find your own voice, your own identity.
Important way to get a sense of what others are saying - leave comments on others’ blogs. Gives you good content ideas too. Do what you want others to do
One-to-one comment policy. If someone leaves a comment on her blog, she’ll leave a comment on their blog.
RESOURCE: disqus - comment notification system plugin for WP, also let’s people login to your blog using OpenID, Facebook, Twitter, etc. Can be used to follow conversations of comments.
IntenseDebate is also a good platform.
Techniques for helping you focus: Create a profile sheet - identify your ideal client. Talk about who that specific person is, what they do for a living, for fun. Helps you understand how to write for them. These people are looking for you. Use keywords they would use to look for you.
Kick Ass Blogs:
DustinCurtis.com
ProBlogger (also has a book 31 days to better bloging)
RedHeadWriting.com (check out her FB fan page too)
TheOatmeal.com - premier humor site. No comments on blog, but FB fan page has 4000+ likes
http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/
ChrisBrogan.com
CopyBlogger.com - a strong community built here for engagement and interaction, built on Thesis WP Theme. - They are doing lots of things right. They understand their responsibility to their readers.
CohereCommunity.com
Feld.com
Katrina’s health and wellness blogs.
Useful components:
Blogroll to reach out to people - list of links to other blogs (e.g. see redheadwriting.com)
Important to keep that vital, change out top few links from time to time.
How do you monetize your blog?
You don’t.
Affiliate marketers are selling you a bill of goods.
RHW is a contract writer, her blog is her “close” and gets her writing gigs.
Chris Brogan for as big as he is, his blogs are just now paying his
Daryle: It is hard to make a living from blogging, has had success with getting sponsorships - getting the money up front rather than waiting for people to click (on affiliate links). Daryle used footers so the ads made it into the RSS feed but was subtle.
RESOURCE: RSS FOOTER
Clearly defined focus: Old Town Lofts. (Kevin Buecher)
Images.
Where to find royalty-free images, images that aren’t copyrighted.
iStockphoto (photos for purchase, many very inexpensive)
CreativeCommons licensed images - make sure to cite them.
WikiCommons?
CompFight.com - Flickr search tool
When using images on your blog, be sure to specify the Alt Text, useful for SEO. Can include keywords, but be sure to include a description of the photo.
Use Twitter and Facebook to promote your blog. 80/20 rule, 80% should be about other people, everyone else, 20% about you. RHW Tweets in the “distraction” periods mentioned above, or during lulls in other time zones where she has readers.
Try different headlines. RHW uses catchy, snarky titles. Works for her brand. What is going to get someone to click that link. You have to dare them! “5 simple things”, “One thing you must do now”.
Have a marketing strategy as well.
Leverage you audience. Send them the exact Tweet you want to go out and ask them for a lunch time push.
Tell the story: how you got your skills, how you got inspired, how you got your chops.
RSS subscriptions: subscriptions are great to have, but there are a lot of things to take into account when gauging the success of your site.
Use Google Analytics, use Clicky
A lot of readers may just come once, and that’s not a slight.
RHW gets four times as many page views as RSS subscribers. People are finding her other ways, including her marketing efforts. Friends, blog directories like Technorati, FB, Twitter.
RESOURCE: Article about good places to list your blog: http://kikolani.com/increase-traffic-and-authority-by-listing-your-blog.html
Don’t shove it down peole’s throats. When people find what they like they will tell others, they will share your content. Your audience is the best marketing you will ever have.
markwilliammann.com. Just redesigned it, including the sidebar. How do you design the sidebar so people don’t want to vomit. Keep things simple. People are smart, trust them to find what they are looking for. Be choosy.
Best times to promote your blog:
