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Preparing for Valentine’s Day

Preparing for Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is not as far away as you might think. It is not too soon to start thinking about what you plan to do for Valentine’s Day. If you are not planning on going out, you still may want to plan something at home. How much do you know about Valentine’s Day? We have become so accustomed to seeing boxed of candy, roses and cards galore on Valentine’s Day that we tend to not pay as much attention to the history of Valentines Day. For example, do you know that jewelry is the worst seller during Valentine’s Day? Do you...

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Freelance writers and their own blogs

Freelance writers and their own blogs

Freelance writers shouldn't have a blog if they cannot spare the time to maintain it. Here are some things to think about before you start a blog of your own.

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Setting the bar higher for yourself

Setting the bar higher for yourself

Working smarter, helping others and committing to the quality of our work can only help us raise the bar further than we had anticipated.

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iPhone application to help with code combinations

iPhone application to help with code combinations

If you have a storage container, a gym locker, a bike lock or other types of locks that have a combination, chances are that you have trouble keeping track of them.  It is a nuisance to keep these combination numbers at home, especially if you are at the gym or someplace else you need them and you can’t remember the password. Storage sites, your garage door, your gym locker even your work locker – they all have a code.  Think about it how many codes do you have to keep track of?  Well, finally, there’s an App for...

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Am I ready to be self employed?

Am I ready to be self employed?

Successful people share certain traits. Most can handle a great deal of responsibility and are hard working, persevering, honest and capable of self-evaluation. They understand that self-employment generally implies the pressure to perform, long hours and irregular income. To decide whether you need to become self-employed, you need to examine your motivation and commitment of such an undertaking. Then you need to look at your strengths and weaknesses. Once you identify them, you can capitalize on your strengths and compensate for your weaknesses. When making your decision, a few questions you should ask...

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Blog Spam

Blog Spam

Why does it seem that the bulk of comments that show up in most blogs, are trying to sell pharmaceuticals, pay per click sites, and a variety of other “name”? I’ve long since been convinced, that most of this crap comes from bots. I’m not too sure how to avoid this stuff. Short of ending comments completely, there does not seem to be another way of dealing with it. Like most WordPress users, I use Akismet, I put all comments in moderation,and I try to review new comments daily. One of the challenges, is that “Pingbacks” often wind up in...

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Safe Affiliate Marketing

Safe Affiliate Marketing

Many freelancers take advantage of affiliate marketing as a way to increase their income. When considering affiliate programs, it is generally best to go with the ones you know and trust. Regardless of where you go on the Internet today, you will find somebody who is promoting one affiliate or another. As you may be aware, I’m not a particular fan of the typical “affiliate marketing plan”. In fact, for the most part I avoid them. There are a couple of exceptions. I have had Google ad sense program’s running and not just my blog, but also in Hub Pages...

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Goals for 2010

Goals for 2010

If you have not set your goals for 2010 perhaps it is time to think about them.  While we are a few days into the new year, not everyone took the time during the holidays to set their goals. Goal setting should be done with caution. Do not set unrealistic expectations for yourself.  While you certainly want to stretch your limits a bit if you can, do not set goals that are unattainable (i.e. I’m going to make a million dollars in 2010).  Setting your goals should include: A)  Monthly work goals – These would be the goals that you wish...

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What’s with the Spam? – An Ounce of Prevention

What’s with the Spam? – An Ounce of Prevention

There are thousands of blogs that are available online.  If you are a blog owner, chances are that you have had spam comments. What’s curious about them is what is behind them? Most of these spam comments are all about promoting something – whether it is an online dating site, a pharmaceutical site, or some other bogus website or link that can cause you nothing but grief. In under two hours today I eliminated more than 50 spam comments from this very blog. What are these people getting out of this? Chances are that someone is trying to increase their back-links. ...

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Article Writing Tips

Thanks to MJ Logan for allowing me to use this. Here’s some tips, I use these every day. 1 – Copy and paste the Marketplace Guidelines into your word processor. 2 – Go through the guidelines and single out specific requirements. For example, in recent marketplace titles for travel, the publisher wanted 10 subheadings. Start your article by making a section for each of those subheadings. 3 – If they give a URL to look at, copy-paste that into your word processor as well. Go visit the page. Look at examples of what is there. Read them because this is the...

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Spread your wings!

If you’re a freelance writer and you are looking for (a) additional experience; (b) additional income; (c) an opportunity to build your portfolio, there are some websites that are available to you to help you do this! Here are some examples: Helium – if you’re interested in writing about a wide variety of topics and you want the opportunity to practice your writing, Helium offers you a wide range of topics that include poetry, creative writing, business, legal, family issues and the list goes on and on. One of the nice things about Helium is that you will earn residual income off...

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Non Specialized Freelance Writing

If you’re just getting started freelancing you might be wondering if you should be focusing on just one field of freelance writing or if you should be expanding your horizons. There is something to be said for both options, let’s take a look at the advantages and disadvantages of both types of freelance writing: Specialized Writing It’s been said by many that freelance writers who specialize in one field (finance for example) often garner higher wages for their services. While this may be true, not all freelance writers have a single base of knowledge that is marketable. Advantages of Specialized Freelance Writing 1. Higher...

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Making yourself Marketable

It’s one thing to decide that you want to venture into freelancing, and it’s another thing entirely to make yourself marketable. One of the first things that you’ll quickly come to the realization of is that no matter how good you think you are at your given talent, there are another 50 (or more) people out there that believe themselves to be better than you are – and they can offer their service less expensively than you can. If you’re leaving the brick and mortar job market for a virtual job the f irst thing you need to do is make...

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What’s Your Niche?

You might think that because you’re a freelancer that it’s ok to offer a variety of  skills and technically speaking you’d be correct. However, there are some things that you need to be aware of: If I’m looking for a programmer (i.e. C Programming or other types) and your profile highlights what a great article writer you are, I’m not likely to even interview you. If your skills are complimentary skills: I.E. a writer who’s really good at proofreading for example, I want to know that in your cover letter.  The same thing would go for SEO marketing – if...

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Virtual Reality 2

We talked in our last post about giving yourself a break – but there’s a downside too. Too often when folks work at home they think they have far more time than they really do! What can happen? The biggest problem for many people is working at home can lead to a lot of wasted time. If you’ve made the decision to work at home you have to be totally committed to working a set number of hours every day – and once you do that you need to stick to it. Whether it’s 3 hours every morning...

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