Daily Archives: December 10, 2015

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How To Manage Time Off for the Holidays when you are Self-Employed

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'Tis the season to be jolly…and busy! Here are six tips to help you enjoy the holidays. 

work at home

The holiday season is here – and hopefully, amid the big dinners, shopping, decorating and parties, is, somewhere in there, a break. But taking some time off is a bit different when you are self-employed. For one, there's often no one to pick up the slack when you take a vacation, and you probably have to plan ahead so there's no slack in the budget either.

Keep Family in the Loop

Before you plan your time off for the holidays, chat with your family. What days will your spouse have off from work? Does little Johnny's Christmas play fall during the hours you would normally be working? Will you go on any special family outings, perhaps to pick out the Christmas tree or visit Santa? Knowing all your families activities ahead of time will help you plan how much time you'll need off, and when.

Stay Organized

Organization is an essential quality for a work-at-home-mom, and it certainly comes in handy when you are preparing for time off. Create task lists that outline what you need to accomplish both before and after your break. Block out time on a calendar so you know what you need to be working on and when. Find a system that works best for you – just remember to stay organized.

Notify Consistent Clients

You probably don't need to notify clients when you are taking a national holiday off – but if you plan on taking the whole week off or a few extra days, be sure to let your consistent clients know ahead of time so you can make sure you'll both be prepared.

Set Up an Automated Email and Phone Message Response

Whenever you take a vacation, it's a good idea to set up an away message in your email so no one gets upset when you don't respond right away. And if you use a phone for business calls, change your voicemail as well if you don't plan on picking up for business calls during your time off.

Arrange Extra Work Time Before and After

Depending on the type of work you do, you may need to make up for the time you take off. Plan extra slots of time both before and after the holidays. Schedule when you'll take care of the extra work, so you're not stressing about when everything will be done. Ask for help with the kids and housework if you need.

Embrace Technology

Thanks to technology, there are a few ways to be present without actually being present. Schedule social media posts during your time off – try a social media management system such as Hootsuite if you haven't already. The scheduling feature makes it easy to ensure there isn't a big lapse in posts while you're away. If you use a blog to promote your business, most platforms will allow you to schedule entire posts as well.

Holidays should be spent enjoying time with family – not worrying about work. With some organization and planning ahead, you can take some time off without a drastic impact on your business. Chances are, you started working from home so you could spend more time with your family – don't let your work interfere with enjoying the season with your loved ones.

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Stephen Hodgkiss
Chief Engineer at MarketHive
markethive.com

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member

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Using The Markethive Plugin ( version 1.7 Update}

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News:

Hello to all my subscribers.

WordPress released ver.4.4 recently and It is mobile friendly. Please updagrade the Markethive Plugin to Version 1.7 when using WordPress 4.4 otherwise the postings will stop both manually and automatically

This pdf can help with using the Markethive plugin with your Domain.

http://brian-walters-online.com/flyers/WP-and-Blogging.pdf

 

Here is a timely post about the importance of creating your own Blog for your Business.

Blogging could be the fastest way to build one way permanent backlinks for better rankings and massive traffic! Listed below are some reasons why your business is important.

Anyway about the business you are in. The very first question that you must ask yourself before anything else. You got to demand yourself to an answer to this. Why the heck on earth would anybody pay for what you're selling?

1. Why should there be anyone would do business with you?
This could be the very first question that you must ask yourself before anything else. You got to demand yourself to an answer to this. Why the heck on earth would anybody pay for this "Junk" you're selling? Yup, "Junk", as I phrased it. It doesn't matter how good your product is to be, to the eye of others, it's just another piece of product in a sea pool of other similar products. So, still be very proud of your product or service? Truly you're 100% proud of it? You truthfully and deeply believe people would be dumb by NOT buying from you?

Well…you passed the first barrier! You're ready to start go to next stage.

2. The basic business needs 3 things:
Lawyer, CPA, and Creative or crazy fellow, which could very well be you.
Almost every business gets themselves for the first two. It's understandably so. Good creative people are really hard to find, hard to manage, and you'll never sure of what you're paying for.

Every established and sizeable business knows the creative side plays a heavier weight than the lawyer and CPA. CPA's and lawyers can help you when you are up there. But at the early stage when your business is still an infant, your business live or die depending on it's business branding activities in areas like business identities, logos, marketing campaign, advertising copy and business slogans.

Have people been calling you NUTS?  Now, are you NUTS enough?
If so, you are ready for the next stage! Do give yourself a "Cheer"!

3. Singing for Your Own? You Got To Promote Yourself In Every Possible Way.
Do all of them. Yes, do whatever possible to get your business name to be up there! Get your Business Brand being noticed by others. There more the merrier!

Businesses can just come and goes so fast before anybody could hears of them. People are busy, what do they care? They don't care about you and your business. Why should they care? Get serious. Do everything you can possibly and reasonably afford to do. But beware; you must not mislead others because it'll backfire quickly enough to wipe your business off.
Do you "Sing for your own self"? Then you've passed! Move on to next stage.

4. Big Decision: Could You Win The Competition.
It's very likely that you're entering a crowded business market when you first started. Take a hard and closer look at what other fellows are doing; what your competitors are doing right now could affect your business greatly.
At this stage, you got to decide: Are you going for "Head to Head" fight? Competing on better quality? Crazier pricing strategy? Extra Mile Service Level? Better Marketing Campaign? or what else? Or you would avoid all that, and create your own niche, where you are the leader?

If you decided to be offering the same or very much similar product at the same price, but your marketing materials doesn't look half as good as your competitors…hey, you're in deep trouble! If you're charging half compare to others, then it's still alright to "Look" cheap, simply because you are the "Cheaper" alternative where people are looking for.

5. Do Love Your Business, just like you love yourself.
Without visitors to your website acquiring Leads is nearly impossible. Here I am talking about Internet Leads and not the people you used to get leads by cold calling on the phone. Increasing traffic brings extra visitors to your website which in turn creates leads.

The Importance Of Visitors
Without visitors to your website acquiring Leads is nearly impossible. Here I am talking about Internet Leads and not the people you used to get leads by cold calling on the phone. Increasing traffic brings extra visitors to your website which in turn creates leads.

So without website traffic the business you do on the Internet will be zero. Sure you may get people buying from your website because you handed out a few hundred business cards at a Home Show or a Convention but huge volumes of traffic; well you need to make other arrangements. Anyone can sell just about anything with enough traffic. Although one thousand hits maybe sound like a good number but in advertising as in life you have to maintain the interest of the visitor. Some campaigns require many thousands of ongoing hits to achieve reasonable results. Remember once the leads have arrived, the information must be captured. This can only happen if the form is filled out and unless there is a benefit in this activity (a tangible gift of some description) why would a person type in personal information on the form to you.

It is essential when creating your Online presence that both the online and offline advertising activities you design are supported when the visitor arrives at your website. The numbers game here also plays a critical part in retaining visitors and getting new ones. The more your different forms of advertising are seen the greater potential for results. And if you are building an Internet business, ongoing daily traffic is essential.

After all a potential customer is the person who originally responded to your web site lead generation page, flyer, mailing, newspaper advertisement or some other means you employed to capture this original information. The important thing here is, has enough interest has been sparked in the lead to respond back to you.

In other words, did the information you supplied in your ads bring the appropriate response from the client, was it relevant to your business or are you getting leads from people who misunderstood your message.

The average Internet user that enters your keyword may see your advertisement multiple times in different places before landing on your Website. This branding and consistency in advertising is important as the information being supplied is a consistent message both in the ad and is again supported when they arrive at your Website. Only at this time are they ready to get more info, signup, and/or make a purchase.
 

Enjoy

Article by:
Brian Walters SEO

Skype: tuneup_bj

Brian Walters MarketHive
http://brian-walters-online.com/

http://briansmarketing.net/

Alan Zibluk – Markethive Founding Member