Category Archives: Improve Online Efficiency

19 Reasons Your Online Portfolio Gets Barely Any Visits

You are a wonderful artist and you have a great, clean portfolio site featuring lovely new art and pictures you’ve been creating. You’d like more people to see your work and to hopefully get some paid work too.

What Are Google+ Circles and How Can they Help Me as a Freelancerș

Like in real life where people tend to have various circles of friends, colleagues and acquaintances, Google’s social network, Google+, allows you to group people into online ‘circles’.

But is grouping your online contacts into circles worth it and what’s the point? I talk a little more about them and their uses here:

7 Ways to Turn Your Social Media Connections Into Paying Clients

So you’ve got a few thousand followers on Twitter and some connections on Google+ or Facebook. Where are the people who want to pay me for doing good work? Well, believe it or not, these potential ‘clients’ are out there using social networks, and they’re willing to pay good money for a job you can do well.

8 Most Useful Extensions to Enhance Your Experience on Google Plus

For those of you on Google+, there are several useful extensions you can install the Google Chrome browser to make your Google+ experience easier and more effective.

If you don’t have Chrome, I suggest you download and use it. It does seem better and quicker to me, and it generally integrates better with all of Google’s services.

8 Ways Freelancers are Losing Out by Failing to Make Use of Google Plus

I’m very excited about what Google+ can offer freelancing pros in terms of building and engaging with networks of people, winning clients and organising things.

So much so, that I’ve compiled this handy little list, not intended to scare, just to get people thinking about what they might be missing out on by not throwing themselves into the Google+ social theatre. That includes you.

How to Quickly DeClutter Your Computer Desktop

A clear desktop is not only great for reducing distraction, and improving your focus and productivity, it’s great for your computer as well. Icons all over a computer desktop are distracting. Instead, clear everything and be left with clarity, calm and focus.

10 Productive Things to Do in Your Extra Time

Even if you’re a networking meistro, there will often be times when you have little or no commissioned work coming in. It’s easy to take this as a confidence knock or grab the chance for an un-scheduled holiday, but this free time can be used productively to further your career.

18 Tools for Destroying Distraction

There is no question that a dilemma exists over the need for creative professionals to create time and space for working on amazing and high quality projects and the existence of an endless stream of distraction, both from the world around us and through the internet.

5 Other Places For Designers to Make Money on the Web

It’s often worth thinking about how to use the web to make extra income when you aren’t working on commissions or with clients. The internet is a great source of sites through which you can make some extra cash.

How to Work Long Periods at Your Desk and Come Out Healthy

I think it’s safe to say that most of us find ourselves in front of a computer screen for up to very periods everyday. This has been a personal concern of mine for some time when I think about how much time in a lifetime I might be transfixed to the screen, though I don’t think for many of us there is much of an alternative available as yet.

25 No-Nonsense Ways to Power Up Your Productivity

With tons of things to do and seemingly less and less time in the day, being productive is a core requirement to the lives of most freelancing creative professionals.

Put simply, being more productive means we get more done, and it shouldn’t require twenty cups of coffee daily to do so, even if you’re feeling low in energy. In fact there are numerous no-nonsense methods you can use right now to feel and act more productively, and have time left over to chill out. Here they are:

Set Results-Oriented Targets for Marketing Success

Right, so you’re working hard actively marketing the work you have, your services, your brand, your products.

This could be in various ways, on and offline, including the ways in which I’ve talked about here and in my ebook, such as bringing targeted traffic to your blog, making connections through social media, engaging with prospects on forums, and introducing yourself via email to your prospects.

10 Free eBooks Facebook Giveaway

Winners of FREE EBOOK announced (Tue, 9th Mar)

Congratulations to all winners and thank you ALL for taking part, and for such excellent and sometimes very funny comments.

The winners of the book are as follows – please contact me, otherwise I will be contacting you all individually with the free book on Wednesday/Thursday…

10 Ways for Creatives to Reduce Procrastination Without Planning

Procrastination, whether lacking in energy to finish a project, or being distracted by email, is stopping us from working effectively on our creations and projects and is taking valuable time away from promoting the work we have.

13 Ways to Instantly Motivate Your Target Market

A huge element to successful self-promotion, and marketing in general, lies in motivating the right people, namely your target market (your potential clients, fans etc) to take action.

This could be in the form of using your services, commissioning work from you, buying your products, spreading the word about you, and so on.

Your Online Portfolio: The Rights and Wrongs

This post stems from a tweet I picked up by illustration wallpaper site Poolga’s JC, an online friend and art-director based in Barcelona. He mentioned how difficult it could be to appreciate the work of some creatives owing to the poor design and treatment of their online portfolios. Coming from someone who spends much of his time trawling through portfolios and hiring artists, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to look deeper into this issue with his help.

10 Tips for Improving Your Writing Online

Promoting yourself online will inevitably require some writing. This might be through the text you use in describing your work on your site, the posts you write on your niche blog, or the articles you write to drive traffic to or improve the search engine ranking of your sites.

On Being Remarkable: Marketability Through Remarkability

Particularly with the explosion of Internet use, and massively increasing competition over most things, we live in a time where providing products and services that truly stand out is more important than it ever has been.

Simplify Self Promotion by Narrowing Your Target Market

Online self promotion will be a frustrating and overwhelming task if we haven’t already identified a specific target market to direct our focus towards. Many of us try hard to please various markets. The more the better, right, as there are more clients in larger groups? Actually, in doing this, you are likely to lose focus, get confused and get crushed in trying too hard. Make it easier for yourself by focusing on one, single market.

6 Ways to Save Time Promoting Yourself on the Internet

There is no doubt of the many benefits of the Internet for promoting your work and the many ways in which you can do it.

The trouble is, the net is jammed with ways to distract us in our efforts to promote, whether this be in engaging with social media, blogging, commenting, forum discussions, posting videos, and so on.

**Winners of FREE EBOOK announced** (Tue, 9th Mar)

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Winners of FREE EBOOK announced (Tue, 9th Mar)