Five advantages of coworking for freelancers

Posted in Freelancing on 11 January 2010 | Comments [3]

Last year I tried out coworking at Lewes Werks on a couple of occasions and, even though I did not do this as often as I would have liked, I plan to do more of this in 2010. I have been thinking about this for a few days so I thought I would write down a few of the advantages of coworking (as I see it, from a newbie’s perspective).

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Advice for web design freelancers about prices

Posted in Freelancing Web design on 26 November 2009 | Comments [1]

As a freelance web designer/developer, deciding on your pricing structure is pretty important. Get this right and your business has a much better chance of survival… and you might even be able to go on holiday now and again! I think it’s important to review your business regularly and pricing is one part of that. Here are a few tips about pricing from my own experience as a freelancer in the UK.

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How to write better website copy

Posted in Books Freelancing on 12 November 2009 | Comments [2]

Would you like your website to perform better? Do you want people to buy more of your product from it? or attract a higher number of sales leads? Whatever the objectives that you have for your website, it would be unusual if you did not want it to be more effective.

One way that you can improve your website is to write better copy. There’s quite a skill to writing great website copy and it’s something that many businesses overlook. Effective copywriting can persuade people to buy from you, improve the readability of your website, and deliver more for your business. I must admit that I have not thought about this subject enough but I was persuaded that I should learn more by Relly Annett-Baker who gave a presentation at the Bamboo Juice web conference earlier this year.

Of course, if you have a responsibility for managing or writing website copy, you can hire a copywriter and I would enourage you to consider this. At the same time, as a freelancer, I would like to learn more about this area myself. That’s where Write To Sell: The Ultimate Guide to Great Copywriting by Andy Maslen will help. It’s a guide to better copywriting and it contains a wealth of tips and tricks that will start you on the road to better copywriting. I’m enjoying reading it at the moment (and it makes a nice change from the CSS books that I normally read!)

Thanks to Relly Annett-Baker on Twitter for suggesting the book to me.

Some simple productivity tips for busy freelancers

Posted in Freelancing Web design on 27 October 2009 | Comments [1]

I went through a period last year when I was snowed under with work. That should be a good thing but if you are running your own web business, working from home, or freelancing from an office, getting everything done when you are in this situation can be quite stressful. I was the only person doing the work, answering telephone calls and emails, chasing up clients for payment, trying to keep in touch with the latest CSS methods, and an assortment of other daily administration tasks that I needed to do. Sometimes it felt like I was on a merry-go-round and could not get off.

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Reviewing your personal websites

Posted in Web design Freelancing on 16 January 2009 | Comments

If you are like me, you may run or manage several personal websites in addition to those that you create or manage for paying clients. I like to review the personal stuff every year just to make sure that my master plan for Internet world domination is working. Only kidding! However, it is still useful to review your personal websites and these are the points I normally consider during the review process.

Note: You may have different goals but the objectives of my review are to determine whether to continue with each website and assess how much work might be required during the year.

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