Cyber security is essential for freelancers

Weekly Newsletter for Freelancers: Here is the latest newsletter of this week starting on 5th of March 2018.

Freelancers are at the cutting edge in the changes to the Future of Work because they have to constantly update their skills to keep abreast of the rapid changes in technology.

At the same time, we are exposed to more operational risk of losing our data, access to it, identity theft and loss of money and intellectual property.

cyber security is essential for freelancers

In many respects, we are pioneers in what is called the Fourth Industrial Revolution and this is what it means to us is summarized here. It is hard to think of ourselves as pioneers, but we are and there are dangers that we have to recognize.

A recent World Economic Forum, the global leaders have moved to recognize and counteract the activities that are what are now recognized as individual and organized cyber criminals. You can read about what is planned to here.

That is all very well, but what can we do at a local level to help protect ourselves and our families? That is the important question.

IT Governance Ltd., a leading cybersecurity, company has moved to help us with the publication of the Kindle eBook Security in the digital world – For the home user, consumer and home office.

I would have added freelancers to the title, but the vast majority of us are covered as home users. I have written a review of the book for IT Governance Limited. I will also publish a review on my websites Freelance Work Guide and Identity Theft Scout.

You can have a look inside the Kindle eBook by clicking on the icon below and following Amazon’s instructions to read the index:

Motivate Yourself!

“To get rich, you have to be making money while you’re asleep.” –
David Bailey

Fiverr Matters To Freelancers And You Should Be Motivated To Find Out More!

Fiverr matters to freelancers and you should be motivated to find out more!
Imagine that you were finding it hard to make your family budget balance after your housing loan interest rates went up and you had to find another $10,000.00 p.a.

What could you do to prevent losing your house because you could not afford the repayments? Further imagine that you were having a lunchtime coffee in the city with a 9 to 5 corporate friend and she said to you, after hearing your story, that she and her husband earned $50,000 a year moonlighting on Fiverr!

Would you believe her? It can be achieved! This is why you should be motivated to find out more. Laura Shin has written How to Make $1 Million on Fiverr: Secrets from a Top Earner.

This is a great true inspirational story about Charmaine Pocek and Laura wrote the story for Forbes magazine. You can read the story here.

For those readers who have read about Charmaine’s story and want to learn more about Fiverr you can learn more by clicking on the icon below:

Productivity and Budget Tip of the Week

How Much Does It Cost You Not To Outsource Skills That You Have To Learn?

As a freelancer do you consider yourself in a management position? If you are new to freelancing and have just left a management position in a corporate 9 to 5 job you may think that you have left management responsibilities behind.

The most successful freelancers quickly realize that managing themselves and their time is critically important. It might not be obvious at first as you are keen to get your first gig and get some money flowing in.

However, as the gigs start to flow and you get busy you will start to realize that some of the jobs that you do are not the best use of your time. Where you are swamped by low paying jobs or parts of jobs this quite often overflows into your family time and puts you under pressure.

This is where managing your work-life balance comes in! It is here that it costs you not to outsource skills that you have to learn because it slows your productivity down.

The most successful freelancers learn this lesson very quickly. It is our job to tell you about this and help make you successful.

Chonce Maddox has written the following article for the Due.com blog Why successful freelancers need to outsource.

If you want to learn more about what you can outsource and why you should here is an Amazon Kindle eBook to help you:

Work-Life Balance Tip of the Week

What Is On Your Not-To-Do-List For 2018?

I have never considered having a not Not-To-Do-List until I read this article by Tim Ferris, which you can read on his blog here. It seems very obvious when you think about it, but it had never occurred to me.

That is because I believe, that bad habits are hard to break let alone identify objectively. Have you noticed this yourself?

I decided to do some research to try to find an authoritative article on this subject that was printed more than five years ago and sure enough, I found one.

The article was entitled Breaking bad habits and appeared as a paper issued by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in January 2012 and you can read it here.

I wanted to do this for a reason. It was before, I believe, there existed so many apps to help us all form new habits and break old ones. There is a multitude of apps today for numerous purposes.

I felt I would be able to find one and I went to the Amazon App Best Sellers here. I felt I was certain to find one that would be 5 starred on review, but I didn’t.

Eventually, I turned to Stephen Covey’s book that has stood the test of time and here it is:

If you find an app that will help us all please share it on our Facebook page.

Financial Tip Of The Week

Have You Read The Best Budgeting And Personal Finance Apps?

How do you decide which apps to use for budgeting and personal finance? If it is by trial and error there is sure to be a better and more productive way.

There are three main methods in my view of determining which apps to use in this category.

One way is to place reliance on your professional association (e.g. The Freelancers Union), the second is the advice from your freelancing platform that you use (e.g. Upwork) and the third, probably the best, is to use an independent body to do a comparison for you on a spreadsheet basis (e.g. Top 10 Reviews).

The following are examples from all three methods:

-The Freelancers Union: The best accounting software for freelancers in 2017 by Kristen Bonkowski which can be read here.

–Upwork: 8 helpful finance apps for small business owners by Yana Yelina which you can read here.

-Top Ten Reviews: The Best Personal Finance Software of 2018.

I find that the format of Top Ten Reviews easier because of the spreadsheet comparison of the features and benefits of each provider. You can readily see which ones have what you are looking for apart from the overall ranking.

Tom’sGuide.com is another technical product reviewer which is featured in the heading Best budgeting and personal finance apps which is an article written by John Corpuz and Jackie Dove which you can read here.

It all comes down to personal preference in the way you research for information, but because of my banking, accounting, and financial planning background, my preference is Top Ten Reviews. It is a spreadsheet approach!

Amazon Associates Website Case Study

The history of the Case Study can be read at links to the previous newsletter issues.

The work on the Amazon Associates website has progressed with new articles being added which can be seen here:

The articles have been searched engine optimized and have started to be promoted on Facebook and Twitter. Instagram, Pinterest and Google Plus accounts have been opened.

The research works are continuing and the current results can be seen here:

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: