How Not To Be a Client From Hell: Understanding How the Web Works, Part 1
Over the weekend I spent a ridiculous amount of time reading my newest Tumblr addiction, Clients From Hell, a collection of true-life anecdotes about the sometimes bizarre, occasionally illegal, and often frustrating demands that freelance designers encounter. Some of the stories on there are so outrageous that you have to laugh to keep from crying, and a great deal of them involve clients who believe that the "free" in "freelancer" means that we work for free. But I was struck that a lot of the entries involved clients who simply don't understand how the web works. In many cases, it seemed that the problem was simply that the client needed to be educated about what's possible with web design, and to have their expectations managed accordingly. It's easy for web professionals, who are online all day, every day, either making the web or studying how to make it better, to forget that we had to learn this stuff, too. In an effort to bridge the gap between clueless clients and know-it-all designers, I'm going to address some common misconceptions that non-designers have about web design.
7. February 2011
3 Not So Obvious Ways To Get Backlinks That Count
Backlinks: the holy grail of SEO. What Are backlinks? Simply put, backlinks are inbound links to your web site from external web sites. Why are they so coveted? Because Google and other search engines view links from other sites as votes for your web site. The more quality backlinks you have, the higher your site will rank in the search engines. Which Backlinks Are Best? The key word in that last sentence is "quality." The highest quality backlink is a prominent link within the content of an article on a popular blog or web site. This is pretty much out of your control, unless you're good friends with some popular bloggers. On the other end of the spectrum are things like link farms, paid links and link exchange programs, all of which are easy to get but don't really do anything for you in terms of SEO. In some cases they can even hurt, causing Google to consider your site to be spam and remove it from their listings entirely. ...
3. February 2011
When Should I Hire A Virtual Assistant?
If you're running a small business, eventually you're going to need some help. It's tempting to do everything yourself to keep down the cost of overhead, but sooner or later you'll find that the time you spend wearing all those different hats cuts into your profits more than getting help would. Not to mention, it's exhausting. Maybe you're there already, and have been there for a long time, struggling with the decision of whether to hire someone to make your job easier; or maybe being busy enough to need help is a benchmark of success you've yet to achieve. But when the time comes, there's an easy way to get help: hiring a virtual assistant.
31. January 2011
New Virtual Assistant Package: Get Help With SEO & Social Networking For Just $90!
Did you know I offer virtual assistant services in addition to consulting and web design? In addition to -- or instead of, if that's your preference -- helping you develop strategies for marketing, online brand building and content development, you can also hire me to do the work that you don't have time to do yourself.
29. January 2011
Video: The Web Wrangler Update
The first month of 2011 is about to come to a close. In lieu of a Link Roundup this week, I thought I'd use Friday's slot to discuss how my goals are going so far, and to tell you what I'm planning for February. And since one of January's goals was "Video Marketing," I decided to try my hand at vlogging instead of doing the usual written post.
15. February 2011
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