Photo credit goes to my good friend Bill Hinsee. This is a picture of Seattle’s Space Needle on January 1, 2012. Check out Bill’s photogblog at www.billhinsee.com

Happy New Year! As I wrap up loose ends from 2011 and reflect on the year I’ve had, I thought it might be helpful to share some of the copywriting business lessons I’ve learned over the last 12 months.

Lesson #1: Don’t let distractions be your downfall.

I had a lot of personal and family stress in 2011, which ended up being a constant distraction that affected my work productivity. As a freelance writer working alone, it can be hard to detach from the day-to-day drama of life. If you’re not careful, the days can easily get filled with other people’s problems rather than your client’s projects.

Focus on one aspect of your life at a time: work or home. Freelance writing takes an enormous amount of self discipline. When your non-writing life becomes overwhelming, find a way to carve out a set number of hours each day to focus exclusively on work – and refuse to let your mind wander to non-work thoughts. When those hours are over, give yourself permission to put your work aside and focus on your home or personal life. In the long run, you’ll be a more productive freelance writer and a more attentive spouse/partner/parent/friend.

Lesson #2: Prioritize your projects and plan your day.

As your business grows, you’ll likely find that there aren’t enough hours in your day to complete everything on your to-do list, even if you limit distractions. That’s why it’s important to develop a system for prioritizing your work tasks and planning your day.

Although there aren’t any hard and fast rules for prioritizing your work tasks, you’ll generally want to focus on billable writing projects during your peak hours of productivity. For me, that’s usually 8am until noon. Using this four-hour time window as an example, I might schedule 1.5 hours for a longer project and break the remaining hours into shorter segments assigned to various writing assignments. I often use the use the early morning to answer email or finish up something quick and easy and later afternoon hours to tackle busy work, such as paying bills or invoicing clients. When possible, save personal tasks, like laundry and errands, for evenings or weekends.

In the middle of my crazy 2011 year, I bought a large white board and hung it in my office. I made a project list for every client and wrote the list on my white board, using a color-coded system to prioritize tasks and milestones by due date so I have an at-a-glance visual of my current workload. I also have a column for “Today’s To-Do” list and update it each morning. Currently, my white board has nearly 30 ongoing and one-off projects-in-progress spread across nearly a dozen clients. (In case you’re wondering, that’s a heavy work backlog, even for me!) Without my white board, I’m pretty sure that some of those projects would slip through the cracks.

Lesson #3: Pay attention to procrastination.

Procrastination was a regular visitor to my copywriting business in 2011. But the more it knocked on my door, the more I tried to hide from it. Until the threat of deadlines drove me to invite procrastination in for a heart-to-heart talk.

What I discovered is that, for every project I put off, there was an underlying reason why. To move beyond procrastination, I needed to identify why I was stuck. Some examples:

Inexperience – In 2011, I had several writing assignments that were completely new to me. Frankly, since I had never written these types of documents before, I didn’t know how or where to begin. Asking my clients for additional guidance was a tremendous help. Once I better understood their objectives, it was easier to begin these unique projects.

Repetition – When you’ve been in business for several years, it sometimes seems like you’ve written everything you can on a given topic. Trying to find a fresh way to present a repeating message isn’t always easy. To overcome this challenge, I took a step back from my client’s messaging and put myself in their prospect’s shoes. If I were looking to buy XYZ, I wouldn’t care if the message was fresh as long as it resonated with my needs.

Fatigue – Chronic stress and sleep deprivation wreck havoc on creativity. In a misguided attempt to get my work done despite feeling exhausted – emotionally and physically – I pushed myself to stay in my office even when I wasn’t getting much done. But getting up earlier and spending longer hours at my desk proved to be ineffective methods for overcoming procrastination. When I recognized this, and gave myself permission to catch up on some much-needed rest and take extra time off during the holidays, I was able to start the new year with a fresh perspective – and genuine enthusiasm for my work.

Did 2011 teach you any lessons about managing your copywriting business? If so, feel free to share them by adding your comment below.

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For a limited time (maybe a week, maybe longer), you can get 8 Internet marketing worksops for free!

Dave Navarro is closing the curtains on The Launch Coach, and for the next week or so he is offering all 8 of his bestselling workshops for no charge. Although donations are welcome, they aren’t required. And you don’t have to opt-in to a list either.

Here are just a few of the great workshops you can download:

  • Creating Products that Sell
  • Building a Responsive List
  • Optimizing Your Blog for Sales
  • Becoming Incredible Productive

Simply click here to access and download the workshop content.

Personally, I made a donation and downloaded every transcript, worksheet, video tutorial and audio file that was available because it’s really great stuff and an opportunity like this doesn’t come around very often.

Sadly, there’s a reason why Dave is shutting down his business. If you want to read the backstory, click here to read all about it at IttyBiz. The story has all the drama and intrigue of a New York Times bestseller and will leave you shaking your head in disbelief. (To be clear, I’m not affiliated with Dave Navarro, The Launch Coach or IttyBiz in any way and have nothing to gain or lose through this offer.)

But whether you read Dave’s story or not, make sure you grab his stuff before it’s gone.

Enjoy what’s left of the long weekend!

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Note: this is a guest post by Yuwanda Black of www.inkwelleditorial.com.

If you’re a new freelancer who’s sticking your toes into the waters of online writing jobs, knowing how to charge can be a bit perplexing. I mean, do you charge by the hour, by the job, by the project, by the word – how? Setting your freelance writing rates doesn’t have to be so hard though. All you need is to know what to do.

As a long-time freelance writer (since 1993) and an online (SEO) copywriting specialist, following are some tips to help you charge enough so that you’re not working for pennies – which is what so many newbies do.

3 Tips for Setting Freelance Writing Rates for Online Writing Jobs

Ask Questions: Get as much info up front from clients as you can. Why? Because time is your greatest asset as an online writer. The longer it takes you to churn out a piece, the more it’s “costing” you if you’re not charging enough.

So, find out as much from clients as you can, eg, will they supply keywords, how many words should the piece be, do they expect you to do some social media posting in addition to writing the content, do they want you to include anchor text in your copy, etc. Each and every one of these factors adds more time to each piece you write.

Create a Checklist: One of the best ways to make sure you get all the info you need from clients is to formulate a list of commonly asked questions. This way, every time a prospect queries you about working for them, you can simply pull it out and run down the list.

Figure Time: If you have no idea how long it will take you to, for example, write a 300-word blog post in your defined niche, sit down and write a few – at least three. Calculate your time from the time you start to write, until the piece has been finished and is ready to be posted (these can be used as online writing samples).

Remember, time is your greatest asset as a freelance writer. So, your freelance writing rates are heavily dependent on how long it takes you to produce a piece of content.

Note where you’re spending the most time: is it on research, writing, editing, proofreading, thinking up a topic to write about?

The more experienced you become, the quicker you’ll be able to write. When I first started out as an SEO copywriter, it took me about an hour to an hour and fifteen minutes to write a standard 400-500 word article. Now, I can write most articles in anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes, depending on the subject matter.

As an aside, the more experience you gain as an online writer, your freelance writing rates will garner you a higher per hour wage because you’ll be turning out content quicker.

Don’t be Afraid to Lose Writing Jobs: If you know what your time is worth, don’t be afraid to lose because someone tells you that your rates are too high.

Your freelance writing rates – if set carefully – are a reflection of your skills, abilities and your time. So stick by them.

About the Author

Yuwanda Black is the publisher of InkwellEditorial.com: The Authority Site on How to Start a Successful Freelance Writing Career. Get How to Set Freelance Writing Rates for Online Writing Jobs: The easy, surefire way to price online writing jobs so you never risk under charging or over charging again. Good for setting rates for blogging jobs, SEO article writing jobs, web content jobs and more.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Yuwanda_Black

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How to Write Faster

April 19, 2011

Note: this is a guest post by John Forde. You can read more of John’s stuff at the Copywriter’s Roundtable. How fast do you write? And is it fast enough? If you’re a newbie writer, it’s rare you’ll write both “fast” AND “well” at the same time. Frankly, that might be the case for your whole [...]

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Writing Copy that Sings

April 5, 2011

Does your copy capture the reader’s attention in the first sentence – and hold their attention until the final word? If not, it’s time to make your copy sing. Copy that sings evokes emotion in the reader by prompting a smile, touching on pain or initiating introspection. It also provides the promise of a solution [...]

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