Entries from October 2008 ↓
(I’ll be continuing with my series on how to start your freelance writing business on Monday, but I wanted to hold it off just through the weekend. I received an email yesterday from Yaro Starak regarding his Blog Mastermind program, and thought my readers might find this information valuable. Enjoy this message on behalf of Yaro.
DISCLAIMER: the links below are affiliate links. I do earn some money if you enroll in Blog Mastermind by clicking on them. However, I encourage you to enroll whether or not you do it via my links, as I think Yaro’s advice will prove extremely valuable if you have any interest whatsoever in making money from your blog.)
Unless you are an Australian you probably don’t know this.
The Australian dollar has dropped dramatically, from 95 cents US a few months ago, to about 68 cents US as I type this.
Why this matters to you is that Yaro Starak’s blog coaching program, Blog Mastermind, charges admission in Australian dollars.
I’ve already raved about this program before and if you don’t believe me, just do a search on Google for “Blog Mastermind Reviews” to see what other people are saying.
It’s the only program of it’s kind that teaches you how to make a full time living from blogging only part time, and is led by one of the best blog teachers I know of.
Already over a 1,000 people have taken part in the program, with many satisfied graduates earning good money from their blogs.
YOU CAN SAVE IF YOU ACT BEFORE MONDAY
If you paid for entry into the program right now with a credit card that is in US dollars, you would save roughly 32% off the entry fee, because the course fees are in Australian dollars.
If you ordered the $97 month for six months plan, your credit card statement would show about $66 as
long as the Aussie dollar remained where it is now.
For the $497 AUD prepaid package, where you get the entire program up front, the cost on your US card would show roughly $338.
Note of course these prices are subject to change based on the current exchange rates, but it doesn’t look like the Australian dollar will climb back up any time soon (but who knows!).
It really doesn’t matter though, because Yaro is changing his pricing from Monday and will be charging in American dollars then. So you only have until Monday to save.
You can join here.
When you go to the payment page you will see prices of $97 or $497 depending on what you choose.
Those prices are in Australian dollars, so the discount will show up if you pay with a US dollar credit card, assuming the Aussie dollar was still weaker when you ordered.
THE $97 MONTH PAYMENT PLAN IS GOING TOO
On Monday Yaro is also eliminating the $97 a month pricing plan. He said he does have plans to bring it back, but because of his bank and online shopping cart system, he can’t charge in USD for recurring subscriptions.
Until he changes his system or they upgrade the features, there won’t be a $97 a month option, only a $497 prepaid course option.
To put it in simple terms – If you want to join Blog Mastermind, the cheaper price deadline is Monday, so you better decide soon.
Here’s the order page.
Good luck with your blog and make sure you tell me what you think of Yaro’s course if you join.
One of the most common questions I get asked by my readers is “how do I get started writing online?” In some ways, I feel underqualified to answer the question. Like I’ve said before, I sort of fell into my writing career while I was doing other things. I hobbled together my writing business rather haphazardly.
If I were to start over today, I’d be more organized about it. I’d avoid some of the mistakes I’ve made over the past five years. I’d put energy into the projects and ideas that were a good fit for me, and I’d let all of the extraneous stuff go.
To be sure, you can’t exactly do that. You can’t mystically experience what I’ve experienced, and some of the things that are a good fit for me aren’t going to be a good fit for you. There are lessons that only experience can teach.
I can certainly share my experiences here, pass along things that have worked for me, identify some general pitfalls to avoid. I can identify writing resources that have helped me immensely. I can talk about the freelance business, share my setbacks as well as my successes. I’ve done all of those things. All of these things provide benefits to you, but they don’t tell you how to get started.
So, over the next week or two, I want to offer my plan. I want to tell you how I’d do it if I could do it over again. Along the way, I hope we’ll have some interesting discussions, and that you’ll offer me your thoughts and questions in the comments section.
Follow The Journey: Other Posts In This Series
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Introduction
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Education
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Honing Your Craft
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Planning
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Building Your Portfolio
How To Start Your Freelance Writing Business: Finding Work
photo credit: Jon_Marshall
Over the last week or so, I’ve written about freelance setbacks and failure in your writing business. While it’s worth thinking about such things from time to time, I want to look at the flip side today.
I want to talk, just briefly, about success.
A funny thing, success. You work for it, day in and day out. You toil and sweat and push for it, hoping that tomorrow will be even better than today.
The funny thing is, though, that success can be a bit elusive. If you’re not careful, it can sneak right up on you. In fact, you can get so busy working hard, trying to be successful, that you miss success when it comes.
Success can take different forms, too. Sometimes, your idea of success can be very different from how success actually manifests itself in your life.
For example, you might feel like your writing business will be successful when you land a sizeable project, or when you get a new big client. While you’re digging around for that big project or client, though, you’re doing plenty of smaller gigs for your regular customer base. You’re paying your bills, you’re feeding your kids, and you even have a few bucks left over for pizza night.
You might not recognize it, but that’s success.
I’m not suggesting that you have to settle for “just getting by.” In fact, I believe quite the opposite: if you settle for just getting by, you’re ultimately going to fail. If you run your business that close to the edge for too long, it’s going to get knocked out from under you. It’s tenuous, at best.
What I am suggesting, though, is that you take a minute, every now and again, to think about what success means for you and for your writing business. What are the things in life that truly make you happy? Do you have those things? If so, you may be successful without even knowing it.
From time to time, I like to go through my blog stats and see what brings people to my shores. While search engines aren’t my main source of traffic, they do bring in quite a few people. I’m always interested by what searches lead people here.
I found one yesterday, though, that seemed to hit home. Someone plugged this into a search engine, and it landed them here:
Every time i build up hope then i fail.
Now I don’t know about you, but it sounds to me like this particular web surfer has had a rough go of it. It sounds like he’s had his share of setbacks, that he’s seen some dreams fall by the wayside. I feel for this reader, I really do. I’ve been there.
But there’s a problem here. I think the reader has some cognitive distortions.
What are cognitive distortions? Simply put, cognitive distortions are ways of thinking that don’t reflect reality. Here’s an example of a cognitive distortion:
My daughter forgot her lunchbox today, therefore she must not like my cooking.
A cognitive distortion often takes the form of a fictional cause-and-effect relationship. Here’s another example:
My boyfriend left me because I’m a worthless person.
Unless you believe that the universe itself is out to get you, “Every time i build up hope then i fail” is a cognitive distortion, too.
You see, I’d argue quite the opposite of my reader’s supposition. I’d argue that hope, while it doesn’t guarantee success, is one of the prerequisites to success.
While I don’t believe that positive thinking is enough to bring something into being, I do think that positive thinking combined with informed and dedicated action will eventually produce results.
So, what do you think? What advice would you offer to my visitor?
photo credit: Ligadier Truffaut
It doesn’t happen very often, but it has happened to me twice in ten days.
Last week, I had a client kick a project back to me. The client didn’t ask me to revise the project; instead, he said “I’ve already paid you for this half, don’t bother with the other half. This just isn’t what I was looking for.” Upon reflection, I realized that he was right; I’d written the material with a fever of 101.6, and it wasn’t my best work. Not by a long shot.
I had another client, just today, email me saying that she was dissatisfied with my product. In her case, I bit off more than I could chew. Because of that, I didn’t produce the deliverable in a timely fashion.
Now, I’ll gladly take my licks here. In both of these cases, I made mistakes. In the first, I let a product go out, not realizing that it didn’t meet client specs. The fever, well, that’s incidental. I should have known better than to try to write in that condition.
In the second case, I just overestimated how many hours were in a day, and how much time I’d have to meet the client’s expectations.
So, what do I do?
I’m going to do what I’ve always done.
I’m going to admit my mistakes.
I’ve done that, right here. Confession is good for the soul and, while those two clients likely won’t read this, I’ve already contacted them, offering my apologies and trying to set things right. I hate for there to be bad blood between me and anyone, for any reason.
I’m going to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
This was a tough lesson to learn. My instinct is to become indignant. “I was sick! You have to give me another shot!” is what I want to say. But I realize something: as a freelancer, I alone am responsible for what I deliver to clients. If it’s not my best work, every time, then it’s not good enough. If I’m sick, I need to ask for an extension. Better yet, I’ve decided to push out my editorial calendar a bit, just to get a little bit of extra wiggle room for emergencies. So, rather than offering a turnaround time of a week on a project, from now on I might ask for ten days, or even two weeks.
In the other case, I’m learning to let my assistant handle more and more tasks. She’s amazing at what she does, and when I’m overwhelmed she helps me sort it all out. I’m learning to let her help prioritize tasks, figure out which ones can wait, which ones can be outsourced, and which ones I have to jump on right away.
I’m going to focus on the positives.
it’s easy, when a client drops you or when a project gets kicked back, to start dragging yourself through the mud. You start telling yourself you aren’t good enough, that you have no business writing for a living, that you suck at business. But those are damn dirty lies, folks.
I’ve worked with more than a dozen clients in the past month. The overwhelming majority are thrilled with my work. If I extend those numbers out to the past year, I’ve only had three incidents where clients didn’t like what I provided, out of more than a hundred. Those aren’t bad odds.
So, I’m going to dig through some old emails. You know the ones I’m talking about. The ones that put you on top of the world for a full day after you get them. The ones you print out and tape to your desk, just like my kids do when they bring home a test with an “A.”
So, what about you? What do you do when you have a setback of your own making?
photo credit: Dawn Ashley
