January 11, 2017
Weekly Newsletter for Freelancers
In 2016 both positive and negative things happened in the internet with its widespread use and abuse.
There was a disruption in the connection of internet during elections in some countries. The number of DDOS attacks increased and hackers get more professional in their”job”! Many hacks were done within 9-5 working hour. Australia’s census collection was disrupted by hackers using a DDOS attack to overwhelm the census website.
Some of these incidents were predicted by the experts in 2015 and came true in 2016.
We’re in for an exciting time in 2017, in my opinion. The evolution of the virtual reality and augmented reality will change society and business in many ways. It will have a dramatic impact on the way we use the internet. Have you tried virtual reality yet? I was so impressed that I bought some virtual reality domain names. You can check out the ones that I purchase at Sedo here: dld.bz/fhTDc. Predicting the future is not easy, but when Mark Zuckerberg purchased Oculus for two billion dollars two years ago it helped create a new industry. That was not hard to predict. Agree?
Craig Buckler of Sitepoint fancies himself as a Futurist in making predictions for the internet. See how his performance was in 2015 for 2016 and what he predicts for 2017. Click here to check Craig’s predictions.
Motivate Yourself!
“Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.” —Stanislaw
Jerzy Lec
People who don’t plan for their retirement and place reliance on the government to look after their retirement needs are being foolish in the extreme? Freelancers in particular need to budget to fulfill their current needs and to save money for their future. Lifestyle planning and work life balance is a key part of this process. The risk of a freelancer running out of money can be lessened by factoring in lifestyle planning.
One third of retirees think that their life is worse than their life before retiring. But there are a number of people who think they are now far better after leaving the workforce. They are now happy with their life as they can take more care of themselves and their family, they can travel anywhere they want or where they planned for in the past. The key is planning for the lifestyle they want.
Then why are some people becoming distressed with their retirement when some others are happy?
There are “eight keys to a successful retired life” according to Barry LaValley of The Retirement Lifestyle Centre. Click here to read Barry’s eight keys article.
Productivity Tip Of The Week
Handling customer complaints is a regular task for many of the giant firms. No matter how good the products or services are you provide or how efficient you are, there are always some complaints from the customers. For freelancers this can be a learning opportunity for when they have to deal with a complaint. Jacob McMillen’s article on Sitepoint show how a large business deals with it.
In the article it puts much emphasize on the customer support and adopt the most efficient way to solve customer complaints. Jacob believes that if you can answer the customer’s dissatisfaction and bring the client back as a repeat customer it is worth 10 times more than a new customer.
Jacob’s ideas are important for freelancers because they are about protecting your customer base and growing your business whether you are a sole freelancer or a large business. Check Jacob’s tips for handling unhappy customer’s by clicking here.
Work-Life Balance Tip Of The Week
Freelancers can learn a lot while travelling. Some super smart bloggers can even make money by writing about where they travel by selling articles and monetizing the content of their blog. For lesser mortals, like me, you can save on your costs by having a budget. For those that are freelance bloggers and are making money while on holidays you can have the double benefit of saving costs as well as making money. Here are some smart tips to use, whether you are a normal freelancer like me or one of the super smart freelance writers.
If you do have some tips to help the rest of us, please share them with us. If you have not monetized your blog or website as yet have a look at the top of this article which has been monetized using an Amazon Associates link. If you would like to know more about how to do this let us know.
Click here for 10 Affordable Travel Tips to Stay Within Your Vacation Budget
Financial Tip Of The Week
Creativity happens when you are comfortable in your workspace. This is especially true of freelance graphic designers, artists, writers, coders – well, let us face it, all of us who call ourselves freelancers. However, it is easy to overspend when you are setting up your workspace.
It is very helpful if you know how other graphic designers went about it when they were setting up their workspace. In this article from Millo Dan Sweet looks at how you can go about it in a professional way. When it is a home office, and most are, you are going to spend a lot of time there, but you don’t want to overspend. You can read what Dan Sweet says by clicking on the title 10 Tips For Creating The Ideal Freelance Design Workspace.
Freelancers And Cyber Security
We have gained approval from Robert Siciliano to bring you extracts from his books related to cyber security for freelancers. Robert Siciliano is an identity theft expert and consultant. He also gives self defense and personal safety seminars. Robert provides safety and identity theft fraud prevention tips and advice on multimedia channels in the United States. We have his approval to bring you weekly extracts from his books:
