Do you have to be a person to be social or successful?
There’s a US company I communicate with via email and they are fantastic. They solve problems 24 hours a day and they jump right in an do the little stuff that we don’t know how to do. It’s a supplier to a company I work with and they are a very important part of that company’s business. The most amazing part is that no one has spoken to a single person from this company.
It’s a far cry from the days when we were scared to communicate with strangers online let alone trust crucial parts of your business to them and give them your credit card details.
This company is social, with a Twitter page, Facebook page and even a LinkedIn profile and yet still there is no sign they are humans. At no time has a name ever been revealed and in a way it makes sense. I mean just because you speak to Lucy from Telstra, does that make Telstra a different company?
The good news is that this company will receive more business soon and its because they do such a great job!
Read MoreWhen does a website designer charge $9 per hour?
What do you look for in a designer? What’s involved in creating a logo, flyer, business card or website?
With the exception of creating a logo, most “design” work actually involves much more than just design. It involves writing and structuring the words you use to convey your message and sell readers on your product or service.
If you want someone to draw a picture or design a logo then anyone in the world can do that without requiring a solid understanding of English. That’s why crowd-sourced design competitions draw designers from all over the world. It’s the same if you know exactly what you want on your brochure but just don’t have the software skills to create it yourself. If you know exactly what you want and you just want to tell a designer exactly what you want then you will find that person for a very low rate in developing countries.
It’s a little different if you have a concept but want someone with design skills to give you their interpretation. It’s when you want a result but don’t want to micro-manage that you realise the value of a higher priced designer.
I’ve used remote contractors from all over the world and realise that Australian virtual assistants are worth the money for certain tasks. Confidence in writing skills and the ability to communicate over the phone are critical if you want to earn the Australian dollars. If you choose the right remote contractor you don’t need to micro-manage and can leave the task to your team member. That’s really what people are paying the higher rates for these days.
Do you want to give someone a brief and get back some magic or tell them exactly what you want them to do?
With all the new software and internet technology it’s surprising that English writing and speaking skills usually make all the difference. If you want to earn the good dollars then become the person who is dependable and can complete the task without micro managing.
Image from flashxml.net
Read MoreIt’s not about the market but individual stocks
There’s a lot of news around today. Everywhere we look someone has an opinion about how everyone else is doing and some of those opinions are from smart people who’ve really thought about what they say. But does it matter to you?
You can compare your business with those on the stock market. Some are doing very badly but better than their competitors, others have had to make changes but as a result they can become hugely profitable in the future.
If your business has taken a hit in the last 6 or 12 months, take a look at what is affecting it and make some decisions and a plan for change in the future. When you make a plan for the future you can forecast and look at how much money you could be earning you might become quite positive. It’s really a simple case of putting some figures together in Microsoft Excel for the coming year. You can always base it on lasts years figures and make an adjustment for current circumstances.
The most interesting thing about creating a forecast is you can then look at it regularly, focus on it and develop a desire for success. That desire and the knowledge that what you earn depends on what you can do for other people can make you perform better than the overall market. Why not give it a try.
Read MoreLess than $3 per logo design
Are you looking for a new logo? Do you have a strict budget? Have you heard about Crowd Sourcing?
The proliferation of the Internet and its ability to connect people from every country has been evident in the political unrest in the middle east in recent news, but it is also causing a massive shift in employment for work that can be completed at home. In Australia we have very strict wage rates and conditions that unions have fought to improve and maintain but tasks like graphic design, building websites, creating apps and programming can be performed from home. That means it can be performed in anyone’s home, in any country and it has greatly empowered the concept of crowd-sourcing for these tasks.
The downside for Australian workers is that they are now competing for certain tasks with workers who would be thrilled to earn several hundred dollars per month, let alone per week (or per day for some workers).
I had the pleasure of hearing DesignCrowd pitch for funding at a SydStart event in Sydney in early 2011 and since then I’ve also come to use a similar site, 99Designs. After using these services you start to realise the game changing potential. Rather than spend a lot of time and money getting YOUR designer to give you a couple examples, you can have hundreds of designers presenting their ideas. Best of all, they all want your feedback and suggestions so that they can create something even more to your liking.
After using both these services with various clients I pondered the future for this type of service for the investors in the businesses, the designers and the customers and here are my observations:
- The investors receive a commission for each competition and will need to find different models to earn more revenue to satisfy their investment desires. These companies may become print or website brokers.
- Each competition provides a connection between a company and a designer and once the connection is established the customers wants good artwork and must pay their new designer to do it. How much do they pay. Many designers then try to charge a “developed country” rate.
- How often will a designer “tender” for work by submitting designs if they don’t win any “competitions”.
- Some customers will get put off by bad design submissions and the need to spell out exactly what they are looking for and may stop using this type of service.
One of the projects I worked with last year gave us 133 design submissions for a total of only $295 which is less than $2.22 per entry so needless to say we were thrilled with the outcome.
We did find that DesignCrowd appeared to have more people you could contact if you had a question or an issue, the only way we could successfully contact 99Designs was via Twitter. Here are a couple other reviews about these sites that may interest you.
http://bloggingyourpassion.com/99-designs-review/
http://www.clickfire.com/99-designs-review/
http://www.xemion.com/blog/99designscom-a-warning-to-freelancers-67.html
Needless to say, with 100% money-back guarantees, there’s no reason not to give it a go yourself:
Read MoreWhy should your business be compliant?
We know that a business is like a cash-flow generating, revenue earning engine. It’s a machine that needs to be maintained and steered (managed) so that it’s revenue is greater than it’s expenses. You could spent a lot of time studying strategic management to learn how best to steer your business forward but you’ll never know which decisions you need to make until you understand what you need to change and that’s when we look at what we have already done.
Getting reports from your database, enrolment system, memberships statistics, accounting system will give you a great insight of historical performance and this is vital if you want to forecast the future, but there is a final step to ensure that you have the real information. You need to be compliant.
Compliance means you have completed your paperwork, lodged it with your account and with the regulatory bodies like ASIC, ATO etc. Only then will you know exactly how much you have really made in profit and only then will you know if your plans have been successful.
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