January, 2011 - Part 2

The Best Freelance Writing Course: DailyWritingTips

If you have been reading our blog for quite a while, then you know how much I admire Daniel Scocco and his works. In all his products(free and paid) he provides maximum value and he never compromises with the quality of the content.

We know how he took his highly profitable OnlineProfits.com Marketing course from $392 to almost free so that he can make it affordable to as many people as possible.

Now Daniel has teamed up with one of my favorite writer Ali Luke ( The same Ali Hale, is now Ali Luke as she got married in September 2010 ). I have been following her blog from a long time now and I really enjoy reading her articles. If you haven’t, then make sure you check out Ali’s blog aliventures.com.

A quick glance at what will be covered in Freelance Writing Course:

Week 1: Website Setup, Promotion and Guest Blogging

Week 2: Writing Content For The Web, A Totally Different Beast

Week 3: Finding Clients and Developing High Paying Jobs

Week 4: Running A Freelance Writing Business Efficiently

Week 5: Using Social Media To Promote Yourself and Land More Writing Jobs

Week 6: Increasing Your Writing Productivity to Multiply Your Profits

(At the end of each week there will be some assignment tasks to help you take action)

By the way, the course runs for 6 weeks. As usual, you will have a private forum(i.e., members only) where you can exchange your thoughts, experience and ask questions to other members or Ali or Daniel.

Here most of the linkbait stuffs and the marketing stuffs will be covered in detail by Daniel. He is a master in this area. Daniel has a lot of experience as a freelance writer too. At one point in his early days of blogging, he was making good income by freelance writing. He knows the strategies to land big freelance writing projects which pays more i.e., as much as $2000 per post. So if you ever thought of becoming a freelance writer and want to know ins and outs of it, then this is the course you must be in.

Daniel is providing 60-day moneyback guarantee. For more details about the topics covered and to know about some of the cool bonuses which you get along with this course, check out Freelance Writing Course

Getting CRC Error While Extracting Files?

Have you ever experienced the pain and frustration because you spent literally days to download some software, songs or a documentary movie and to your disappointment got a lot of CRC errors while extracting?

Well I am not sure about what’s the cause for CRC Errors, but there is a solution which works most of the times. You better give it a try before trying to re-download the beast and get the same CRC Errors!

Possible Solution
If you are using winrar, then right click on the file to be extracted and then select Extract files.. option. Once you select this option, you will be presented with a window with whole lot of options. Most of the times people don’t have time to look at all these optional options, so they hit Ok. This process is fast and fine if your files don’t have CRC Errors.

If you do have CRC Errors, then, as shown in below image; check the Keep Broken Files option and then hit Ok. Now don’t be surprised when you get the same errors which you got previously. Be patient and look at the extracted files. Most of the times it shows the errors but it successfully extracts all the files.

Now the trick is: if its some sort of video files, then it may not play in your regular player. Some players might strip the audio because of small errors in the extracted file. With out breaking your heart, just play these files in different media players and you will get the video and audio in one or the other media player. Try VLC player, Media Player Classic or there are many other commercial media players which have the capacity for error detection and correction(if its minor).

Same technique works with WinZip software. In the options select Keep Broken Files and then extract.

This simple process will save hours and hours of your precious time and bandwidth. There are some rar or zip file repair software, but will talk about it in another blog post. For now, keep this simple technique in mind and save yourself from repeated downloads.

Tip: In winrar, if you are extracting files which has a long file name, it starts giving errors. To solve this problem, you can simply rename the .rar file and give some short name before trying to extract it or use 7zip software. 7zip is open source and is highly efficient.

NYTimes Style Slider: Next Post WordPress Plugin

You might have seen NYTimes and even some blogs have incorporated a cool animated Fadin/Fadout or Flyout style of showing next post, once user scrolls down the article. Its light-weight and looks cool.
There is a WordPress plugin called upPrev: NYTimes Style “Next Post” Animated Button, which lets us add this cool little feature to our blog, within 2 or 3 clicks of the button. Just drop the plugin into plugins folder and activate it from the WordPress dashboard.

There is little to no configuration needed. You can set the style of animation: Fadin/Fadout or Flyout style. We are using Flyout style on this blog. Scroll till the end of the article and you will see a small window popping with a Flyout effect.

You can set the appearance of this window depending on the user scroll action, by mentioning the class name or the id name within your WordPress theme.

For example, in our theme we have a class by name otherstuff at the end of each article. So when user scrolls till this class element, this window will Fadin. When user scrolls up above otherstuff class element, the window automatically fadsout.

Just like the NYTimes button, upPrev allows WordPress site admins to provide the same functionality for their readers. When a reader scrolls to the bottom of a single post, a button animates in the page’s bottom right corner, allowing the reader to select the next available post in the single post’s category (the category is also clickable to access an archive page). If no next post exists, no button is displayed.

Right click and see your blog/website source code and get the class name or id name and use it to set this plugin. Make sure to put # “hash” before the ID name, or . “dot” before a class name.

Usually comment section will have id name as #comment or class name as .comment

10 Nuggets of Gold To Improve Your Business

If you are just starting out with your business, whether its offline or online; it’s very difficult to get clients in the early days. You may be “the best” in the world in your business, but its of no use until the world knows that you are the best. You need to be in front of your audience. You need to start at some point, and the starting itself will seem to be difficult, in this competitive market. And one who quits at this point, is gone forever! A man is not finished when he is defeated. He is finished when he quits.

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up. – Thomas A. Edison

You may be in offline business like insurance company, insurance agent, home loan agent etc OR you may be into online businesses like blogging, domain/hosting reseller, WordPress service, theme customization, logo designing, Business card designing, ebook cover designing, custom application development etc.

Follow these nuggets of Gold, and you will be more nearer to your clients than ever before:

1. Do proper research
You may think something as a break-through-idea, but it may not have enough market. If YOU think its a great idea and implement it, and not enough people are interested in it, then it would be waste of money and time. Instead, do proper market research before investing and implementing something.
Tip: The best way is to conduct some surveys. Before starting a service or before creating a product, conduct a survey on your blog. Give away some thing(may be an ebook) for free for completion of the survey. This way you can easily get feedback from real people and can get some insight about the market.

2. Collect data
Its also important to collect all the data related to your niche. You may want to collect data like, competitors price, competitors market share, features of their service or product etc. By doing this exercise, you can get important information which may turn key for the success of your business.
You can know what lacks in your competitors service/product, are they over charging, are they missing to target a group of target audience, by analyzing all these things you can fill the gap and attract more customers your way.

3. Concentrate on big players
If you market everyone on earth for your product, then its utter waste of time and money. Instead, market to people who are already looking for what you have. Also make sure that you target people who spend a lot of money on purchasing the type of product/service which you are selling.
Ex: If you are selling printer cartridge, then look for people who purchase the cartridge often. If there were 1000 customers, then collect the data about those who are purchasing the cartridge most often. After making a list of most frequent buyers, try to sell your stuffs to them. In most of the cases, it is 20% of the people who are buying 80% of the times. So, you can give them free samples and offer them some discounts. This way, you can easily get clients in your early days and make more profits instantly than those who have been in the business before you.

4. Advertise. Have a dedicated sales team
You can get coupon codes from almost all the advertising companies like Google Adword, Chitika, Bidvertiser etc. So you can grab one and start with advertising about your service/product. Also try to have a dedicated sales team. Its crucial to get clients for any business. So a dedicated sales team will surly help maximize your business.
This is the idea of affiliate system, wherein affiliates bring you clients and get a chunk of fee for getting you the business.

5. Don’t try to re-invent the wheel
Innovation is key for the success of any modern day business. But this doesn’t mean you try to do everything in a different way.
There are many people who have succeeded in their business, if you want to succeed too, then collect proper data and see what they did in order to succeed, then follow the steps and in most case, you will succeed too. I don’t mean that, you need to copy someone else’s steps, but just know that re-inventing the wheel will take a lot of time and if you try to re-invent the wheel, you will not have enough time to innovate in the area of your companies expertise. Market requirements(needs) change within the wink of our eyes, so we need to be flexible, agile and quick in our approach.

“Nature is neutral; if you do the same things that other successful people have done, you will inevitably enjoy the same success they have.”
– Brian Tracy

6. Apply changes gradually. Don’t hurry up in implementing changes all at once
If you want to bring some new ideas/changes inside your company, then make sure you test this idea/change on a small group. Do not adapt the entire company to the new idea/change immediately. Apply it on a smaller group, if it works, then expand. In this process, don’t forget to keep collecting the data and measuring the improvements.

7. Stand out from the crowd
These days people have multiple choices to select from. So you need to educate them about your product/service and tell them what’s different about your service/product than that of your competitors. Customers do not care what new features your product has or how famous it is, what they should be informed is, what problem of the user does it solve more efficiently than their competitors product.

8. Patience
Often times it is not about building a product for your customer that costs more. But its when you realize that the product you developed is not what your customer wanted!
In most cases, your clients will not have a clear picture of what they want. You need to be patient and educate them and make them realize what exactly they want. Patience is the key of smart business man. If you hurry up, you will screw up at some point. So its better to handle clients with patience.

9. Customer Support
95% to 99% of the time a client can find the same kind of(or even better) product or service you are offering, so there isn’t a point in telling them to buy from you because you have it. If a person has bought something from you previously, then its easy to sell such a person again, if you have quality product and good customer support.
How often have you experienced bad customer support from companies and have left dealing with them. If you sold something to a person, then its not the end. Its actually the beginning. If he is satisfied with your product or service, he will come back to you for more product or service. Even if you don’t have any other product to sell, make sure to treat your old customers properly. Treat them like your companies asset. This way, they will be happy to bring in more customers for you, for no commission!

10. Relationship, Care, Understanding
All modern day businesses is standing on relationship, care and understanding. These days everybody knows marketing tactics, so they aren’t going to be your pray. If you start behaving like a sales person and start talking about your product straight away, then people will subconsciously start developing resistant behavior towards you.
Some sales people start with “how are you? how is it going today?” etc questions, wasting a lot of time and sounding somewhat robotic and as if it was a pre-scripted talks of all sales people of a particular company.

Instead, have real concern towards your customer. Care about their needs. Show genuine interest. Don’t try to sell them something that they aren’t looking for – the thing which doesn’t solve their problem. Listen to their problems. All Bad sales people talk 80% or more. A good sales person or a good business man listens 70% or more. Listening with patience builds good relationship and shows that you really care about their problem, and hence listening. Don’t try to defend or argue. Listen to their problems, needs and wants. Latter educate them about what may solve their problems and how to handle the situation. If your product or service solves their problem, then by all means tell them whole heartedly. In your presentation, talk about the things which is of concern to your customer. Don’t try to tell everything and finish off the presentation entirely which you had prepared the day before. Talk to the point and have real care towards your clients.

Its better if someone doesn’t buy from you something that they don’t want, than to buy from you and then regret. Agree ?

Remember, people want to buy, but they don’t want to be sold.

“One customer, well taken care of, could be more valuable than $10,000 worth of advertising.” – Jim Rohn

Earn Money For Shopping, By Shopping!

This is a guest post by Jessy Troy. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here.

For many of us shopping is a bit of an addiction. With so many sales and chances to get new products online, it can become more like a mania. Of course, this means we suffer the empty checking account or high credit card bills in silence, promising ourselves that next month we will stick to budget. But what if you could shop and also make a little bit of that cash back? Yes, I am talking about making money while you shop, and without any of those mystery shopper scams.

This isn’t some kind of far off dream, and it has been proven to work again and again. This is because developers in the retail world have put increasing focus on better ways to shop online, as ecommerce becomes a regular part of the average consumer’s life. An entire industry has been created around making money as a shopping incentive to stimulate the web-based economy, and you can take advantage of that fact. Try these three tips to get you going.

Earn by Reviewing

Do you like reviewing products, or maybe just trying new products to see how they work for your own purposes? There are some sites out there that will actually pay you to write up a review about what you were already using anyway. These are not writing-specific, so don’t worry if you aren’t a world class author. They want opinions from real consumers trying real products right now.

Sadly, you have to be careful when finding these websites, as some are scams. But one good one to try is Epinions, which is a popular site approved by consumer protection agencies. They work by promoting certain products with your reviews, based on your opinions. Then, when sales are made, they distribute a percentage of that into a payment pool, which is paid out to the people who made reviews. Once you have $10 (within the U.S only) you can request to be paid. For those outside of the U.S, the amount is $100.

Sell Your Gift Cards for Cash

It has happened to all of us: you are at yet another ridiculous white elephant daytime office party and you are handed an envelope. Without even opening it you know that it will be a gift card, and almost certainly to a place you never shop at or visit. Most of those cards sit at the bottom of a drawer and are never used. But what if you could sell it to get a bit of extra cash?

There are some sites that will sell your gift card for a percentage of the price, usually between 60% and 90%. Gift Card Granny is a great example of a site that buy and sell gift cards. Ebay is another great option, as they have gift card sections where you can get up to the full price for it. Some sites also offer a way to trade yours in for a store you actually like.

Answer Questions, Get Paid

Product answering sites are becoming all the rage. The idea is a wonderfully simple one. You sign up, answer questions about products and if your answer is selected as the best you will be paid for it. Once it adds up to a certain amount you will be able to request a payout, which will be sent to an online payment third party, like PayPal.

There aren’t the many legitimate sites that work this way. So far, the best I have found is IMShopping. The only downside to this site is the amount that has to acquire before you are paid is higher than some sites, but still lower than others like Inbox Dollars. You also have to wait if you go over $40 until the next pay cycle.

Bonus!

Still want more? Try a paid survey site, such as MySurvey, or Inbox Dollars.

This is a guest post by Jessy Troy, whose online passion is collecting DIY gadgets.

10 Tips to Increase Your Rates as a Freelance Writer

This is a guest post by Ahlam Yassin. If you want to guest post on this blog, check out the guidelines here.

So, I’ve been at this freelance writing business for a little over a year now. It’s been exciting, actually earning money (not yet a living) doing something I enjoy. However, my first year of freelance writing has been one stuck in the content mills. The few hundred dollars a month I made from this type of writing may have been o.k. when I was living abroad and that was the equivalent to a teacher’s salary. However, I’ve moved back to the greater New York City area, and life is expensive! Here’s what I’m doing to earn more as a freelance writer.

freelance 5 Financial Mistakes New Freelancers Make

1. Want to Earn More? Write the part.
Here’s the thing, getting trapped in the content mills can be dangerous. You can easily get comfortable writing repetitive content. If you want to earn more as a writer, you have to put your heart into it. Start a blog and showcase your best writing. Having a place where you can direct potential clients to in order to reference your work is so much better than saying; ‘I’ve written hundreds of ghostwritten articles’.

2. Breaking the Pay Raise to Existing Clients
I have a client I really enjoy writing for, and there is a lot more work in discussion. Today, I was on the phone trying to break the news that my rates will no longer be as low as he is accustomed to. Just like a dream, the international phone call was cut off! When I do get him back on the line, we’re going to talk about my rates. The time it takes to get the academic writing done, and how I would like my pay to match the quality of work I am providing. He may say, no thanks, how can I pay you X when I’ve so used to getting it for Z? If this is the case, I’m going to have to live with it, drop this client and move on. I have $1 a word aspirations buddy.

3. Find a Successful Mentor
I’ve been finding a wealth of information online from people who have actually succeeded at this writing game. Yes, these writers are my hero, and I am a sponge for the information they are putting out, for free! I can not afford their mentoring services, but I can afford the time it takes to learn everything they are teaching on their own websites and personal writing blogs. Carol Tice and Anne Wayman have been awesome inspirations.

4. Show up and Write
It’s so tempting to get caught up in the learning process; in all actuality if you want to succeed you’ll never stop learning. This is why you have to make time to actually write. This is how you want to earn a living, so don’t forget to practice. A great resource I’ve found is Angela Booth’s ebook “Write and Sell Your Own Writing”, which is free when you subscribe to her blog. She details a mechanical process to get you writing, even when you’re not in writer mode.

5. Believe in Yourself
As a writer, it may sometimes be a little hard to match the words that are typed out on the screen with the person other people see. In order to achieve great things, including higher pay, you have to believe in yourself and your ability to communicate effectively. You have a talent, have worked hard on it, and there is a market for your skills.

6. The Power of Networking
You may not consider your aunt Sally as a contact person, but don’t underestimate who aunt Sally may know! Use your friends and family as starting points to network. This will help you practice marketing yourself to a (hopefully) more sensitive audience. Let them know you’re trying to expand your business and are looking for new clients.

7. Business Cards Matter
So, when you’re done talking to aunt Sally about any prospects she may know ask if she wouldn’t mind taking a few of your business cards. Just having a business card can get you out of the content mill mindset and help you feel like a professional.

8. Don’t Hesitate
Too often, you may walk away from a potential client feeling like you didn’t quiet make the right impression. When you hesitate too often, you may be losing a valuable opportunity.

9. Open Yourself up to the Possibilities
The best things have happened to me when I’ve completely opened up to great things happening. Why not? Why shouldn’t great things happen (like excellent resources of income) happen to you? You’ll be surprised what the right mental attitude can bring you.

10. Learn to Say No
It’s tempting to fall back into the grind of the content mill if you’re having a slow week, I know, I’ve been there. However, find the power to say no. Instead of investing so much of yourself for such little pay, work on a great article to pitch to a magazine, track down prospective clients or get inspired through reading. When you’re having a slow patch, do any one of these things and have the power to say no to low paying content mills.

Ahlam Yassin is a freelance writer with a passion for personal and career development issues. You can find out more at www.prowriterinc.com. You can follow her on twitter @prowriterinc