Working as a freelancer has several advantages. Hence, many people prefer to work as a freelancer than an employee in a firm. Moreover, freelancing is recognized as a profession in its own right. Furthermore, a number of people find that their skills attain more recognition if they work as a freelance consultant than an employee for a firm. Some of the benefits of being a freelancer are listed below.
* You have the freedom to choose your own hours of work. As a freelancer, you decide what your working hours are. You can choose to take a half day off anytime when you need to attend to family matters, etc. If you think that you are over stressed at work and need a vacation, you can plan for one anytime you wish.
* You are your own boss. Being a freelancer allows you to set your own priorities. If you work in an office, you need to comply with certain standards of discipline set by your employer, managers or colleagues. However, as a freelancer, you set your own standards of discipline. You have the independence to decide what you want to do with your time and how you want to execute your work.
* You choose how much you want earn. If you are working for a company, you receive the same amount of salary every month no matter how hard you work. Whereas, as a freelancer, you determine how many jobs you want to do at one time. Hence, the more hours of work you put in each day, the more money you earn. Being a freelancer gives you the flexibility to determine how much you wish to earn.
* You choose how you want your office to look like. You can use one of your rooms at home as your office and decorate it the way you want it. You can pick your own furniture and interior furnishings to create a wonderful surrounding which will make you comfortable while you work.
* You have an improved quality of life. As you have the flexibility to choose when, where and how you want to work, you have more control over your life. You can exercise an ideal distribution of your time between work and leisure, hence achieving a better quality of life.
* You can have the chance of working on a variety of different projects. This could help you to improve your skills in different areas.
Choosing the kind of projects to work on depends very much on the skills you have, for example, writing, art work, graphics, accounting, training skills, administrative skills, etc. However, some basic computer skills are certainly necessary for freelance work, such as being internet savvy, able to type and able send emails.
One of the ways to find freelance jobs is to go to freelance job boards available in the internet. Freelance work employers advertise the available jobs for freelance workers in these job boards. You can browse through the jobs posted, select the one you want to do and bid for it. One advantage of using these freelance job boards to find freelance jobs is that it saves you time and effort in doing marketing. Another way of attracting new clients is to create a website and place it in the internet. You can advertise your experience and services through this website. Most potential clients will request to see some references or samples of your work before they assess whether you are suitable for the job. Hence, you need to prepare your portfolio as well as a list of some excellent references when you start looking for jobs.
Due to the advantages of working as a freelancer, many people prefer freelancing than working as an employee. Being a freelancer, you will enjoy lots of freedom and flexibility in your work. There are some ways of finding freelance jobs via the internet. Depending on the skills you have, you need to select projects relevant to your skills
It is Now the Perfect Time to Work From Home
Everyone knows it but few are willing to explore it. The "work from home" internet business is a huge diamond mine waiting to be mined. Billions of dollars are being made on the internet year in and year out. It is like a treasure chest that only a few people around the world has found and opened. These people also found the ultimate treasure in the same search - freedom and independence. If you are willing to work hard, smart and spend a few hours on the internet each day then you can do it too using one of various legitimate "work from home" internet businesses.
"Work from home" internet businesses are growing at the speed of light. More and more people are using the internet to generate additional income and millions are using it as their primary source of livelihood. This treasure chest becomes more accessible by the day with all the legitimate "work from home" internet business opportunities popping up.
The beauty of these "work form home" internet business opportunities is that your monthly overheads are minimal. You normally only need to pay a few dollars per month to the internet company for the usage of their concept and system and a few dollars to your internet service provider for your internet bandwidth. You only need to make a few dollars to cover these operating expenses on a monthly basis. Depending on where you reside and what system you opted into, you are looking at roughly $200 per month. Compare that with any brick and mortar business and you will realize that it is "nothing". The other advantage is that you can do your business form literally anywhere,only a laptop and internet access are required.
The bottom line is: It is now the perfect time to "work from home". Legitimate systems are ready available to make this possible. Remember that the principles are exactly the same for any business, whether internet based or not. These systems simply provides you with the tools.
It is important that you do your due diligence and rather anticipate enrolling into older internet opportunity that has stood the test of time. Make sure that the company is at least two years or older.
You still need to do the work day in and day out to build a successful business. It all depends on you at the end of the day. If you choose the right "work from home" internet business opportunity and you dedicate yourself for at least twelve months, then chances are that you will make a success of it. If you see yourself doing that - then the time is definitely now.
"Work from home" internet businesses are growing at the speed of light. More and more people are using the internet to generate additional income and millions are using it as their primary source of livelihood. This treasure chest becomes more accessible by the day with all the legitimate "work from home" internet business opportunities popping up.
The beauty of these "work form home" internet business opportunities is that your monthly overheads are minimal. You normally only need to pay a few dollars per month to the internet company for the usage of their concept and system and a few dollars to your internet service provider for your internet bandwidth. You only need to make a few dollars to cover these operating expenses on a monthly basis. Depending on where you reside and what system you opted into, you are looking at roughly $200 per month. Compare that with any brick and mortar business and you will realize that it is "nothing". The other advantage is that you can do your business form literally anywhere,only a laptop and internet access are required.
The bottom line is: It is now the perfect time to "work from home". Legitimate systems are ready available to make this possible. Remember that the principles are exactly the same for any business, whether internet based or not. These systems simply provides you with the tools.
It is important that you do your due diligence and rather anticipate enrolling into older internet opportunity that has stood the test of time. Make sure that the company is at least two years or older.
You still need to do the work day in and day out to build a successful business. It all depends on you at the end of the day. If you choose the right "work from home" internet business opportunity and you dedicate yourself for at least twelve months, then chances are that you will make a success of it. If you see yourself doing that - then the time is definitely now.
What is Twitter?
If you haven’t heard about Twitter you must have been living, well, in a third world prison!
Everyone and their dog now appears to be using Twitter! It’s currently the 15th most visited site on the internet according to Alexa Top 500 Global Sites list and growing rapidly.
Twitter is a micro-blogging platform that allows you to tweet your message to your followers and the world. If you are a Facebook user it might be easier to understand Twitter if you liken the service to Facebook status updates. A tweet is simply a message of up to 140 characters, just a sentence or two to convey your message.
Twitter allows anyone to broadcast to the world, and more specifically their followers, updates on their business, website or life. Take a look at the following video for a basic, plain english description:
Once you have an understanding of how easy Twitter is to use you can begin to see the power of the microblogging platform.
One of the keys to harnessing Twitters power is interaction. Follow users who follow you (if you find their tweets interesting), answer peoples questions and re-tweet interesting messages. Growing your follower-base is essentially growing your customer base and to make Twitter an effective business tool you need to build the trust of your followers.
Everyone and their dog now appears to be using Twitter! It’s currently the 15th most visited site on the internet according to Alexa Top 500 Global Sites list and growing rapidly.
Twitter is a micro-blogging platform that allows you to tweet your message to your followers and the world. If you are a Facebook user it might be easier to understand Twitter if you liken the service to Facebook status updates. A tweet is simply a message of up to 140 characters, just a sentence or two to convey your message.
Twitter allows anyone to broadcast to the world, and more specifically their followers, updates on their business, website or life. Take a look at the following video for a basic, plain english description:
Once you have an understanding of how easy Twitter is to use you can begin to see the power of the microblogging platform.
One of the keys to harnessing Twitters power is interaction. Follow users who follow you (if you find their tweets interesting), answer peoples questions and re-tweet interesting messages. Growing your follower-base is essentially growing your customer base and to make Twitter an effective business tool you need to build the trust of your followers.
Why you need a Workspace
Working and living in the same space can be difficult, it can sometimes appear that you are always “at work”. Whilst there are certain benefits of working from home, there are also as many drawbacks.
I love working from home, I love the flexibility of being able to spend time cooking in the kitchen with a laptop on the dining table, tweeting, stirring, blogging and chopping! However there are definately times when the work part of the work life balance spills over into my private life when I wish it wouldn’t.
To counter this, I also have a workspace setup in the corner of my bedroom with a PC and a phone. Not an ideal solution but better than constantly working from my dining table. The most ideal solution could be a seperate room where I could close the door and work with some peace (I have 3 children), however some may argue that this would defeat the object of working from home. The most important thing to my mind is to create the perfect work life balance and this is where setting aside a perfect workspace for you is important.
Notice that I said setting aside a perfect workspace for you, what works for me may not work for you. As I have said, sometimes working from my kitchen table is the perfect solution for me, whilst other times I need to shut myself away in my bedroom office to get a bit of quiet time. But what is apparent is that to effectively work from home you need to designate a workspace. It need not be the most regal of offices, but simply somewhere to switch off from home life and focus on the work life.
I love working from home, I love the flexibility of being able to spend time cooking in the kitchen with a laptop on the dining table, tweeting, stirring, blogging and chopping! However there are definately times when the work part of the work life balance spills over into my private life when I wish it wouldn’t.
To counter this, I also have a workspace setup in the corner of my bedroom with a PC and a phone. Not an ideal solution but better than constantly working from my dining table. The most ideal solution could be a seperate room where I could close the door and work with some peace (I have 3 children), however some may argue that this would defeat the object of working from home. The most important thing to my mind is to create the perfect work life balance and this is where setting aside a perfect workspace for you is important.
Notice that I said setting aside a perfect workspace for you, what works for me may not work for you. As I have said, sometimes working from my kitchen table is the perfect solution for me, whilst other times I need to shut myself away in my bedroom office to get a bit of quiet time. But what is apparent is that to effectively work from home you need to designate a workspace. It need not be the most regal of offices, but simply somewhere to switch off from home life and focus on the work life.
Bet
OK, I bet the post title grabbed your attention. And now I have your attention I’ll explain how just 2 minutes of my time netted more sales than a £250 targetted Google Adsense campaign.
Manchester United CakeI’ve been a member of Facebook for a while now and have amased the completely average total of around 250 friends. Not bad for a 30-something guy, but not great either. But these 250 (real-life) friends helped me achieve something that all of my online marketing nouse couldn’t… Allow me to explain.
For a while now the wife and I have made a little extra income from making custom cakes and a while ago I hit upon the idea that we could generate more business by making a simple website with a small gallery. This coupled with a Google Adsense account, geo-targeted to our local area seemed like a winner of an idea. Unfortunately this idea proved fruitless and left us over £250 out of pocket, which was about the same as we currently charge for around 5 cakes! OUCH!
Fast forward a few months and I realised that for some reason I had neglected to put any cake photos onto Facebook. I just assumed that friends knew we made cakes, but as the famous saying goes “Assumption is the mother of all mistakes”. I simply added a few of my favourite cake photos to my profile and thought no more of it.
Within hours of posting 3 photos, I had received 5 firm orders for cakes along with 2 possibles and an enquiry as to whether we could cater for a buffet for 600 people.
The moral of this story is never underestimate the power of your own personal friend base, or network and never ever be afraid to show off.
Thanks to facebook we have now recouped the cost of the failed Adsense campaign and have learned to keep updating my profile with new cake and food pics as they are created.
Manchester United CakeI’ve been a member of Facebook for a while now and have amased the completely average total of around 250 friends. Not bad for a 30-something guy, but not great either. But these 250 (real-life) friends helped me achieve something that all of my online marketing nouse couldn’t… Allow me to explain.
For a while now the wife and I have made a little extra income from making custom cakes and a while ago I hit upon the idea that we could generate more business by making a simple website with a small gallery. This coupled with a Google Adsense account, geo-targeted to our local area seemed like a winner of an idea. Unfortunately this idea proved fruitless and left us over £250 out of pocket, which was about the same as we currently charge for around 5 cakes! OUCH!
Fast forward a few months and I realised that for some reason I had neglected to put any cake photos onto Facebook. I just assumed that friends knew we made cakes, but as the famous saying goes “Assumption is the mother of all mistakes”. I simply added a few of my favourite cake photos to my profile and thought no more of it.
Within hours of posting 3 photos, I had received 5 firm orders for cakes along with 2 possibles and an enquiry as to whether we could cater for a buffet for 600 people.
The moral of this story is never underestimate the power of your own personal friend base, or network and never ever be afraid to show off.
Thanks to facebook we have now recouped the cost of the failed Adsense campaign and have learned to keep updating my profile with new cake and food pics as they are created.
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