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WritersNotes.Net: Helping Writers Follow Their Dreams Through Information, Inspiration, and Encouragement!
My apologies for the long silence. Client projects have been keeping me quite busy lately, and illness and other life happenings have added to the multitude of distractions that have kept me otherwise occupied. Just wanted to pop in, though, to share the latest free offerings from International Freelancers Academy.
Free IFA Video Training
International Freelancers Academy, the relatively new training extension of International Freelancers Day, has begun offering free sets of weekly training videos on numerous topics of value to freelancers.
Most weeks feature two videos that offer great advice on how to make the most of your freelance business. However, this week's IFA video training offers a three-part series on getting new clients, with Parts 1 and 2 held over from last week.
The above link will take you to the main Training page of the IFA website, which links to each week's videos. New videos are posted each week and the old ones taken down, so depending on when you read this, the videos mentioned above may or may not still be available. However, if they aren't, you can be sure they'll have been replaced with other excellent presentations.
Weekly Video Training Link
The reason I haven't linked to the videos directly is so that you'll always be able to use the link to access the current week's videos, no matter when you may be reading this post. Personally, I'd recommend bookmarking the IFA Training page as well, so you can quickly and easily access each set of new videos.
Video Release Schedule
Individual sets of training videos are available each Wednesday through Tuesday. So, be sure to watch by Tuesday at the latest so you won't miss any of these excellent opportunities to glean more freelancing wisdom from the experts at International Freelancers Academy: Pete Savage, Ed Gandia, and Steve Slaunwhite of The Wealthy Freelancer fame. I heartily recommend their videos, as well as their book. I refer to The Wealthy Freelancer often in my own freelancing work. It's a book that offers some great strategies for increasing one's freelancing income.
Hope these free IFA videos will be a boon to your freelance writing business!
Enjoy!
Jeanne
Update: Though the videos mentioned in this post are no longer available, free ongoing weekly video training is now being offered on the International Freelancers Academy Training page. For more information about these video presentations, see my post, Get Ongoing Free Training through International Freelancers Academy. You may also want to keep up with the latest IFA happenings via the International Freelancers Day Facebook page. Enjoy!
Don't Miss Out!
If you're a freelance professional and you haven't yet viewed the International Freelancers Day videos, you still have a chance to catch these informative presentations. All 24 videos will remain available for free viewing on the International Freelancers Day website through October 31st. The foregoing link will let you access the first three videos without even having to register. Then, once you've had a chance to sample the content and see its value, you can decide whether you'd like to register for free access to the other 21 (highly recommended).
I can't stress enough how many professional strategies and resources you'll miss out on if you let this opportunity slip by. These presentations could easily have been offered as paid webinars, and yet all 24 are available free for your benefit. Most are quite comprehensive and include a wide variety of principles, strategies, and techniques you can use to make your solo business more successful. I know how busy the freelance life can be, but you owe it to yourself to make time for these 24 free presentations (or at least for the ones that interest you most). I'm sure you'll find them worthwhile.
To your success!
Jeanne
Have you watched any (or all) of the International Freelancers Day videos? What did you think of them? Any favorites? What are some of the benefits you feel you've received by viewing them? Is there anything you'd say to other freelancers who might be tempted to ignore them because they're so busy?
If you're one of those freelancers who feels you're too busy to watch, what are some creative ways you might fit these critical freelancing resources into your schedule?
Freelancers' Holiday Visions
With both the holidays and the end of the tax year drawing nigh, freelancers tend to have a slightly different version of the line from the popular poem, 'Twas the Night Before Christmas on their minds. For us, Christmas is the time when "visions of tax returns dance in our heads"!
Some Helpful Links to Lighten Our Mental Load
So, to help take a load off our minds this Christmas, I've listed links to some really helpful info on filing taxes for freelance writers. Some are lists of links to other resources about income taxes, and others are discussions of tax-related topics of interest to freelancers. (You'll find some very slight overlap in these offerings.) My hope is that knowing we have these great resources at our fingertips will help us to have a merrier Christmas this year, as well as an easier job filing when tax time rolls around in just a few short months.
Excellent Online Tax-Time Guidance
Debbie Ridpath Ohi's Tax Tips and Resources for Freelance Writers
Write Stuff's Tax Tips for Writers
Freelance Factor Tax Tips for Freelance Writers - Articles by Julian Block
Deborah Ng's Weekend Discussion: Tax Tips for Freelance Writers
Amy Derby's Blog Post: Don’t Sweat the Audit Threat
Chris Bibey's Blog Post: Health Insurance for Freelance Writers and Other Self-Employed Professionals
A Great Head Start
No doubt there are many other great online tax resources for freelancers; but these links ought to give us an excellent start in preparing for tax day 2008!
If you know of any great tax-related resources for freelancers, please feel free to share them with us in comments!
Here's to smooth sailing at tax time!
Jeanne
This is not a sponsored post.
Did you enjoy this post? Have any of your own tax tips, techniques, experiences, or resources to share? We welcome your comments!
Feed Rinse Cleans Up Your Feeds
K-IntheHouse, over at ShanKri-la, wrote an excellent blog post a while back (which I just discovered today) called How to Overcome RSS Feed Overload? Just thought I'd share this really comprehensive introduction to and explanation of a fantastic free online tool that can help you organize your feeds, selectively filtering out the items you aren't interested in and "filtering in" the ones you are! This powerhouse of an RSS-feed organizer--which can be thought of as a spam filter for RSS feeds--is called Feed Rinse.
Too Many Great Blogs!
I don't know about you, but I know that I, for one, have not yet gotten a handle on my feeds; simply because it seems as though I'm always too busy to keep up with them. Lately, it's all I can do to visit and comment on my favorite blogs, much less go through all the posts of the significant number of other great blogs I've subscribed to so I wouldn't lose track of them. If you tend to have this problem, you might want to check out this free resource. It can help make a difference. Haven't tried it myself, yet, but K-IntheHouse has, and he seems to feel it's worthwhile.
I'm certainly thinking of checking it out. How about you?
To cleaner RSS feeds!
Jeanne
This is not a sponsored post.
Did you enjoy this post? Learn anything new? Have anything to add? Please feel free to comment!
A Great Article on How You Can Develop Confidence as a Business Writer
The following article was written by my friend and fellow blogger, Joanna Young, of Confident Writing. This article is offered for free distribution by EzineArticles.Com; so I thought I'd share it with my readers to help you become a more confident business writer, as well as to highlight the wonderful content you'll find on Joanna's blog. (Many of Joanna's tips and techniques also apply to other types of writing, as well; so bear that in mind as you read, and look for places in your own writing where you can practice these helpful principles.)
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Business Writing with Confidence - An ABC Guide
By Joanna Young
Confident writing is an essential part of effective business communication. Most people would agree with this statement but how many of us have the skills or the confidence to put it into practice? Anxiety about grammar rules can leave people tongue tied. All too often business writing is seen as a barrier, a stumbling block rather than something that can add value to your contribution at work.
But here’s the thing: you don’t need to learn the rules of a grammar book to write with confidence at work. You just need to work on three basic elements of good business writing: authenticity, brevity and clarity. It’s what I call the ABC guide to confident writing at work.
Writing with authenticity
Writing with authenticity means being real, sounding human, sounding like yourself. It’s great for creating rapport with other people, whether that’s your colleagues, customers or potential clients. Most people want to do business with another human being and it’s even better if that’s someone they feel they can get to ‘know’ and trust.
To make your writing more authentic:
* Make use of plain, everyday words: go for short, simple words; avoid jargon and clichés; use everyday words rather than corporate or business speak
* Use a conversational style: this doesn’t mean slang – it does mean feeling free to use short sentences and contractions like “I’m” or “we’ll” or “let’s” (all great for the flow)
* Find your own words: spend a little bit of time jotting down your own words for the things that are most important to you (ideas, your business purpose, your values) and start to work them into your writing. This is a great way to sound like you really mean business!
Writing with brevity
Most people are drowning in information overload. So much for the paperless office – most of us are suffering from too much paper, a deluge of e-mails and more reports than we’ll ever have time to read. You’ll really start to win friends and influence people if you keep your writing short and to the point. Your readers will thank you for the time and effort saved, and you’ll also make your message more punchy, powerful and memorable.
To write with brevity:
* Keep each sentence short: aim for an average of 18 – 25 words a sentence. This is good writing practice and will get you into the habit of writing less
* Cut out excess words: go back and edit your work once you’ve written a draft. Cut out as many excess words as you can. Then do it again (and again till it’s done.) Enjoy seeing your message emerge more clearly!
* Write within limits : set yourself a word limit and practice working to it. It’ll improve your skills of writing with brevity and help you stick to the point
Writing with clarity
You’ve got something important to say so you want your writing to stand out. Clear writing makes it easier for people to read, follow and understand what you’re saying. Now this is the place where grammar does come into play because there are some rules – whether you like it or not – that are there to help us understand your meaning. You need to master these basic rules if you want your message to be clear and easily understood.
To write more clearly:
* Know your point : be clear what you’re trying to say, and why, before you start to write. Boil your message down to no more than 10 words. That’s your message: focus on that and it will shine through your writing
* Manage your writing: work out which grammar points are stopping you from writing with clarity (like use of apostrophes). Ask a colleague or friend to help identify them. Then take responsibility for learning and applying the rules. There are plenty of books, websites and writing coaches who can help with this
* Keep it simple: use short sentences, cut out excess words, use plain, everyday language
I don’t know if you noticed some common themes running through these writing tips. Keep it short, keep it simple, use plain language, know your point and stick to it. These are the fundamental rules of good business writing and if you apply them you will find it easy to write with authenticity, brevity and clarity. Effective business writing needn’t be hard – it can be as easy as ABC.
Joanna Young is a writing coach who helps people to write with confidence - to realise the power of their own words. You can find out how to work with Joanna or read more of her writing tips at Confident Writing.
Article Source: EzineArticles.com expert=Joanna Young
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Hope you've enjoyed these great tips on confident writing by a very confident writer! Don't forget to visit Joanna's blog for more great content on writing confidently!
Happy writing!
Jeanne
Did you enjoy this post? Was it helpful? Have anything to add? If so, please feel free to comment!
And, while you're at it, why not visit Joanna' s blog and do the same?
A Hi-Tech Tool to Test Website Viability/Blog Vitality
I've recently learned about a couple of fairly comprehensive diagnostic tools that can help you determine the viability of your website or the vitality of your blog. (Thanks go out to K-IntheHouse at ShanKri-la, for the info, passed along in a guest post at Blog About Your Blog. A link to the post is provided below.) I wanted to pass along this info to my readers, in the hope that you'll be able to use it to make your website/blog better and more successful.
In this post, I'll cover the first of these two great online diagnostic tools: Website Grader. A great deal has already been written about these tools, so I'll limit the info I include in this post, providing a few links to other great content on the subject. Should you be interested in finding more info than these sources provide, I suggest a Google Search, which will generate many more links related to this topic. (I know; I checked.)
Website Grader
Website Grader gives your site an overall rating (so many points out of 100), which boils down to a percentage (e.g., 85/100 = 85%). Website Grader allows you to either diagnose your own site's condition exclusively or compare it to a couple of your most competitive website rivals, which is an interesting feature for those who want to know how they rank within their niche.
Some things you'll learn from Website Grader:
-Website Grade
-Google Page Rank
-Alexa Rank
-Technorati Rank
-Google Inbound Links
-Yahoo Inbound Links
-Delicious Saved Count
-Google Indexed Pages
Of course, many of the above are facts you already know about your site; however the others can certainly be helpful to learn, and even more helpful are the explanations which follow the chart listing the above data. That's where you'll find all your site's specific problems clearly spelled out for you--as well as all its positive points, using "alert" icons, consisting of either a yellow lightbulb or purple exclamation point, along with yellow or red highlighting of each of these problem sections. Blue "i" icons are used to indicate the non-problem portions of your site.
A Comprehensive Report on Your Site
The report generated by this tool is worth much more than the price of admission! (It would have to be--because it's free!) But, seriously, the report is very comprehensive. In fact, Website Grader will even e-mail you a link to the report so you can go back and look at it again later. (However, I would recommend copying and pasting it into Word [or whatever other word processing program you use].) Word will retain the formatting of the grading chart, in case you'd like to reproduce it on your blog or elsewhere, or even print it out.)
The original post from which I learned about Website Grader, as I mentioned earlier, was written by K-IntheHouse as a guest post at Blog About Your Blog. This post gives more great info about the tool. Here's the link: 2 Great Ways to Check Your Blog Health
The Website Grader report generates far more detailed information than I have mentioned here. So why not check it out for yourself and learn what's good about your website and what isn't. It will give you a great starting point for revamping your site to make it the best it can be. You'll then be able to measure how much progress you've made by plugging your site's URL into Website Grader again, as recommended by Wild Bill at Passionate Blogger, in his post, Does Your Blog Get a Failing Grade? How to Get an A+!
Happy diagnosing!
Jeanne
Did you enjoy this post? Was it helpful? Any questions? Feel free to comment!
Today, I thought I would bring you this fascinating article on how to improve your Alexa ranking, compliments of Marketing Scoop. Check it out! You'll find some interesting strategies here!
7 Proven Strategies for Improving Your Alexa Ranking
By Michael Fleischner | Marketing Expert | Internet Marketing Secrets*
After spending two years building my own website, I was very disappointed that my Alexa ranking was still higher than one million. Alexa ranks each website based on the number of visitors it receives. The top ranked website, Yahoo! has an Alexa rating of 1 or 2. Less popular sites could be ranked up to 5,000,000.
In order to improve my Alexa rating, I spent about three weeks combing the web to find tips, secrets, and proven strategies for increasing my Alexa ranking. Unfortunately, many of the sites offering advice didn’t even have a high ranking themselves. Finally I discovered a number of sites ranked within the top 100,000 that were all applying the same “Alexa techniques” to improve their ranking. I’ve begun implementing a number of these techniques and have improved my Alexa ranking by 250,000 spots in just one week.
Here’s what you need to know. The basis for many of these techniques is the fact that your Alexa ranking is based reach and page views. However it only counts those who visit your site and have already downloaded the Alexa toolbar. Anyone can download the toolbar for free which is automatically added to your browser and tracks the sites you’re visiting. Increasing visits from those who do not have the Alexa toolbar installed will not help your Alexa ranking.
I’ve summarized the 7 strategies that I’ve discovered and applied to my own website to increase my Alexa ranking. Apply these strategies to your own website and see your ranking climb towards the top.
1. Download the Alexa toolbar and use it every day to visit your own website. Alexa even gives you the ability to co-brand the toolbar with your own logo and give it away. You can download the toolbar here: http://www.alexa.com/site/devcorner/associate_toolbar.
2. Use Alexa redirection whenever you can. No matter when or where you provide a link to your website, be sure to use the equivalent Alexa redirect URL. For example, when providing a link to my website, I use http://redirect.alexa.com/redirect?marketingscoop.com/. If you copy this URL into your browser, it will take you to MarketingScoop.com. To use this technique, simply replace the name of my website (marketingscoop) with yours.
3. Encourage your website visitors to add their positive testimonials on Alexa’s detailed listings page for your website. This can be done by placing a link to the appropriate Alexa page on your website and asking visitors to “Click here to rate this website”. You can find your detailed Alexa page here: http://www.alexa.com/data/details/?url=marketingscoop.com. Again, just replace the name of my website (marketingscoop) with yours. By clicking on the URL, visitors will be able to reach your detailed rating page and write a review using the review link located on the left hand side of the page.
4. Write your own site reviews on the top 100 rated Alexa sites and include your redirect URL. The top 500 domains, according to Alexa can be found at http://www.alexa.com/site/ds/top_500. When you write a review, be sure to use the redirection URL we discussed in number 2 above specifically for your website [http://redirect.alexa.com/redirect?marketingscoop.com].
5. Download the Alexa ranking button, traffic history graph, info links, and other traffic counters onto the page of your website that receives the most traffic. For example, at the bottom of my home page http://www.marketingscoop.com, I’ve added the Alexa ranking box. You can do the same for your own site by visiting http://www.alexa.com/site/site_stats/signup. You’ll notice that I haven’t added the traffic history graph. This is because it wouldn’t look appropriate on my home page and because Alexa is only providing detailed history on the top 100,000 sites. So if you’re not in the top 100,000, site stats would not be available.
6. Take an inexpensive advertisement out on the ExactSeek search directory for only a few dollars per month at ExactSeek.com. Search engine results are directly correlated with Alexa rankings. You’ll notice that if a website is highly ranked on ExactSeek, chances are that it will be highly ranked on Alexa.
7. Get listed on as many search engines as possible by placing a free listing in DMOZ. This is the largest human edited directory on the web and is co-branded among hundreds of thousands of sites. Be patient though, it often takes up to 5 months before you see your website listed after submission. Even though it takes longer than it should, you have little say in the matter because it’s so widely used across the Internet.
These simple Alexa strategies are easy to implement and will make a huge difference in your Alexa ranking. Ultimately you want visitors to do more than visit your home page, you want them to interact with your site. Be sure to optimize your home page for SEO purposes, ease of use, and interaction. Creating a positive user experience will get visitors to return again and again.
*Michael Fleischner is a marketing expert and the president of MarketingScoop.com. Visit today for free marketing information and marketing blog directory. Michael has more than 12 years of marketing experience and had appeared on The TODAY Show, Bloomberg Radio, and other major media. Visit his marketing blog for further details.
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The above article is reprinted, with permission, from the Marketing Scoop website. Hope you find it helpful!
Happy Alexa-tising!
Jeanne
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Freelancing Journey, a blog which refers to itself as "The Road to Business Success for Writers & Bloggers," is literally loaded with info, tips, links, leads, techniques, advice, and other resources that can help you, the freelance writer, make the most of your own website or blog. Covering many different aspects of the freelance writer's creative, professional, practical, and even personal development, this site has something for everyone interested in any type of freelance writing.
One post, "Page Rank, Back Links and Blogging," posted June 22nd, 2007, explains why page rank is important and provides tips on how to obtain quality backlinks to your blog. Another, more recent post, titled "Definitive List of Paid to Blog Services," dated June 28th, 2007, links to a very comprehensive discussion of the subject found in a post on another helpful blog. In addition, Freelancing Journey's "Roll of Honour" includes a long list of links to other blogs about writing--and blogging--as well as numerous other writing resources, markets, and marketing blogs.
Freelance writers are busy people, whose time is often severely limited. But taking a few minutes out of your busy schedule today to pick up some timely tips and advantageous advice could just save you a great deal of time and trouble over the long term.
So, check out Freelancing Journey, and see if you don't agree that this blog contains some helpful literary and marketing signposts to guide you along your freelance writing travels.
Bon Voyage!
Jeanne
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If you're looking for a site that will help you master the writing craft and/or prepare you for your own personal journey on the path to publication, Writing-World.Com has a great deal to offer!
This site is chock full of great information for the aspiring--or practicing--writer! Some examples:
~An interesting variety of books on the writing craft itself and on marketing your writing, including volumes containing specific markets for your work. (Their book inventory also contains a few books on subjects other than writing.)
~An impressive list of more than 600 writing-related articles that can be read right on the site. These articles are all well catalogued and categorized for easy reference.
~A contest database featuring a wealth of info on entering--and not being scammed by--writing contests.
~A list of certain selected markets for your work.
~A long list of links to other online resources for writers.
~A call for articles on writing that they will purchase from you to add to their database, complete with Writer's Guidelines.
~A "Guide for Launching Your Writing Career," containing a wealth of great advice that can get you started on the road to a successful freelance writing business. (This section also includes a lot of great advice on the real nitty gritty, down-to-earth, seat-of-your-pants aspects of writing.)
~A great section on how to avoid writing scams, presented along with info on copyright issues, rights, and contracts.
~A free monthly newsletter, containing many great feature articles, as well as recurring topical columns that you might find helpful.
As far as payment for articles is concerned, here's what they themselves have to say: "We pay 5¢/word for original articles, to a maximum of $100 (regardless of word count; thus, a 2500-word article is still paid only $100). We pay a flat $25 for reprints, and we definitely welcome work that has appeared in other publications (especially print). Payment is on acceptance. For humor, we pay a flat $15 per item. We will also exchange advertising space for editorial."
That doesn't sound half bad for an online market! So, if you enjoy writing about your craft, check out their Writer's Guidelines and try submitting your work. But be sure to check their article database to be sure your topic hasn't already been covered. You can do this via their Topical Indexes or their Master Article Index.
Take a peek at what Writing-World.Com has to offer. I think you'll be impressed!
And good luck!
Jeanne
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Last time, I gave you four great websites where you can get your work published: Creative-Poems.com, MoonTownCafe.com, Helium.com, and AssociatedContent.com. A few helpful hints about each of these will make your experiences with them more pleasant, more productive, and less frustrating. In this post, we'll cover some of the idiosyncracies of Creative-Poems.com.
The Creative-Poems website is a wonderful site, where you can receive recognition for your work through member comments, weekly Featured Poetry Awards, and monthly Poetry Contests. They do not pay for the poems they post, though they do offer prizes in their monthly Poetry Contest.
At Creative-Poems, non-premium (free) members--as well as trial members--are allowed to place up to five posts on their site in a 24-hour period. (Premium members are allowed eight.) This is somewhat misleading, though, and requires a bit of clarification.
At first glance, it would appear that you'd be able to post up to five--or eight--poems to the site every 24 hours--and this can, indeed, be the case, provided you are very careful not to leave any typos or other errors in your poem, which might require its modification after it's been posted! The reason for this is that, should your poem require editing after posting, you will be resubmitting it after making your corrections--just as if it were a new poem--and thus you will be using another of the finite number of posts you are allowed daily. (This can be a bit frustrating.)
If you're anything like me, you could use an infinite number of posts to edit, modify, correct, and improve your poems to your satisfaction before final submission! But, alas, this is the real world, and every website is set up differently. So, always preview your work before submitting, to be sure your formatting is the way you want it and your work contains no typos. (Occasionally, you'll miss something and need to resubmit--we're all human--but at least you'll know that you aren't wasting most of your posts simply correcting errors!)
Another important point about formatting, while we're on the subject: At Creative-Poems, the default setting--for both poetry submissions and member comments--is centered. So, if you want your poem or comment to be left-margin justified (which is generally my personal preference) you'll need to select your text--if it's already been entered--and click the appropriate icon. (You can also simply click this icon before entering your text with the same effect.) Both regular and premium members may save, for later posting, up to five drafts in addition to the five--or eight--poems they may post in a 24-hour period, in case they aren't quite ready to post their work when they must leave the site.)
With a little prior knowledge of the workings of this great site and the obstacles you might encounter there, you can be well on your way to a long and fulfilling relationship with a dedicated group of site administrators and moderators who are friendly, helpful, responsive, and eager to showcase your work!
Creative-Poems.com is a fabulous forum for your work and a great community of friendly poets, who will help encourage you along the path of self-expression through that most magical of mediums: Poetry! (A very small word with a very big meaning!)*
If you are a poet and haven't yet visited this site, I would definitely--and without reservation--recommend that you check it out!
You'll be glad you did!
Till next time,
Jeanne
*I've written a short article on exactly this subject entitled "Why is Poetry So Difficult to Define?" Why not drop by AC and take a look?
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