Self-Employed Communication Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies` by Barbara Saunders

International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals

SELF-EMPLOYED Communication P R O F E S S I O NA L S Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

c o n n e c t . g r o w. t h r i v e .

A JOB VS SOLO BUSINESS EMPIRE

Mindset changes, options, personal control ...

Virtual Summit Prepping your website for e-commerce

Managing Multiple Projects & Ideas One member shares her experience and thought processes to growth

Building in Flexibility

A preferred partner explains how intuition and flexibility helps grow income streams

Tools, Tips, & Tactics

Easier ways to keep track, stay connected, & get work done.

Multiple IncomeMindsets Streams! & Management

SUMMER SUMMER | | 2010 2010

Too Much Rough Water in Your Solo-Based Business? Learn the Secret Formula for Self-Employed Success

Classes forming quarterly Visit: www.IASECP.com/academy

A rising tide lifts all boats. Our mission is to raise the tide of self-employed communication and creative services professionals. The rising tide lifting all boats

SELF-EMPLOYED C ommu n i c at i o n P R O F E S S I O NA L S Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

connect. grow. thrive.

Summer 2010

IASECP Member Emma McCreary sparkles with business savvy. P. 12

Preferred Partner Brandie Kajino shares her multiple income strategies. P.14

con t e n ts

M u l t ip l e I n come s t ream iss u e

A Case in Point:

Feature 6

Mindset Reboot The Merry Go Round Broke Down—Get Off Already! A quick mindset adjustment.

News P. 8 Illustrator, designer, teacher and solo-business mogul David Billings shares his mindset adjustments and the resultant adventure.

Pilot Program Launch Informaiion Products: Create, Launch, Sell & Repurpose. Come join us!

Member Profile: Graphic designer and solomogul Emma McCreary shares her brilliance

Partner Spotlight: Brandie Kajino, The Soho Solutionist: Flexibility as a business strategy—and a way of life.

On the Cover: This month’s issue is all about creating & managing multiple income streams as a way for solo-based businesses to stabilize and build their revenue and grow their empires.

Trends, Tips & Tactics 18

5 New Project Management Tools A review of some new tools built specifically for the solobased collaborator.

What are you doing for Summer Vacation? Tips to get a jump on Fall

Expert Advice

Mac Master Michael Pearce explains how to clone your computer’s hard drive just in case...

Take a Break! 22

For the Birds! Peeps from our peeps

Our Contributors, Thanks

International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals • www.IASECP.com | 3

We’re raising the tide | From the Bridge

Just Ask…

We’re a collaborative community that’s all about sharing & mentoring, so let us know what your challenges are and we’ll find the answers.

pring 2010 is past. IASECP hit a milestone of reaching more than 20 countries in the first quarter. We truly are a global economy with international reach. That’s exciting! We also worked most of the bugs out of our new website, made waves in the social networking sphere, and connected to new partners across the country. Summer is on its way and it’s a great time to do some business scrutiny and course corrections—flip on over to page 22 for some suggestions. Our Self-Employed Academy is nearing another graduation. We’ve beefed up our already spectacular material for this session and we will be adding even more this summer, plus new modules as well. We’re also fleshing out our home-study version.

Barbara Saunders, IASECP Cruise Director

been working behind the scenes with organizations such as the Small Business Administration, SCORE, and the Small Business Development Centers to educate them on the real state of affairs of solo-based professional businesses. We’re adding some very cool new benefits including: • Liability Insurance • A local health care plan (for Oregon/Washington) • More back-end business training • More technology help

Moving our monthly events to a webinar format has been an adventure for all. We live in an increasingly technological world—which is great...when it works. This summer will see us open our events up to everyone But for now - Enjoy! for free. Doing them virtually really lowers the overhead for us, so we can share with more people everywhere. WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU: Email comments, questions, suggestions or Some members expressed withdrawal symptoms with business challenges to International Association the end of our physical events so in April we instituted of Self-Employed Communication Professionals the Business Dinner Group, a casual and comfortable at Info@IASECP.com. Our crack team of experts setting to share resources, get support, and get out of and preferred partners, will find the answers for the solo cave on the last Friday of each month. you. Do you have a resource or tip to share? Send IASECP is also stepping up our advocacy work with that in too, and we’ll be sure you get full credit. developing connections with Mercy Corp’s business Ask us about advertising. IASECP is the only funding programs for the self-employed. We’ve also place to reach this unique group.

4 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

SELF-EMPLOYED C ommu n i c at i o n P R O F E S S I O NA L S Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

connect. grow. thrive. VOLUME 1, NO. 2 | SUMMER 2010 The International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals is a collaborative trade association made up of communication and marketing industry professionals who act as outsource consultants on communication and marketing projects. PUBLISHER International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals www.IASECP.com EDITOR Info@IASECP.com CREATIVE DIRECTOR Barbara Saunders, Newsletter Associates Info@IASECP.com CONTRIBUTING EDITORS & WRITERS Myrna Daly Nancy Davis CONTRIBUTING ARTISTS & PHOTOGRAPHERS Barbara Saunders Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies published quarterly by IASECP | all rights reserved © 2010 5273 NE 31st Avenue, Portland, OR 97211 PHONE: 503-282-3694 | EMAIL: Info@IASECP.com www.IASECP.com

International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals • www.IASECP.com | 5

mindsetadjustment

}

The Merry Go Round Broke Down —Get Off Already!

What a Ride | A Quick Mindset Adjustment

Most of us grew up watching our parents rush off in a flurry to their “jobs”. They’d come home all cranky and used up. If we dared to ask, they’d tell us that “that’s the way it is”. When we struggled with our school work, they’d adamantly tell us that that’s our “job”. It was drummed into our heads that you had to get a degree and get a job and work tons of tons of hours. If we didn’t do that the world would come crashing down to a flaming end. I don’t know…I haven’t found that sitting quietly in neat little rows and raising my hand to say something or go to the bathroom—occasionally with a wad of gum stuck to the bridge of my nose—to even be remotely what my life has turned out to be. What a bizarre concept! Where did that come from? I tried. I really did. I invested in my education; got a degree. There were no jobs when I graduated, so I took something pitiful until something opened up. I worked my behind off for some really stupid people, then got laid off. I trudged to the local university and “invested” in another degree. There were no jobs; I was over qualified. So I took something pitiful until something opened up. Finally, got a good job - worked for some really stupid people, then got laid off. Do we see a pattern here?

This happened four times until I had an epiphany. This doesn’t work. I signed on with an agency who rented me out as a hired gun—that was fun. If Aquent could hire me out at $125 an hour (and pay me a whopping $25 of that...), why not do that for myself (and keep it all!)? So I made up some business cards and went out on my own. I found work. Lots of it, actually. Of course, a great deal of it was for really stupid people that didn’t pay me well. I had created myself a job. Not a business. It’s all in your head The thing is that we were taught to do the work put in front of us. In school where we’re taught to sit quietly in our neat little rows as the teacher spewed out facts that we then spewed onto a test form. You grow up, got a job and

6 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

sat quietly in a cubicle and spewed out the work someone put in front of you. What happens when no one puts work in front of you? Where does work come from? Who decides what kind of work it’s going to be? Isn’t it interesting that those sorts of questions aren’t really asked in our society? Politicians drone on about “creating jobs” but what does that mean? If no one knows where “work” comes from how can they create jobs to do the work? It’s a pickle. It’s enough to get your goat! I saw a program on public broadcasting about these goat people of New Zealand. No, not the legendary half-goat, half-human KeeWees—but, that would have been cool. This was about people who raise goats. Since the goats probably don’t pay very much, how do these people make a living? They had a pattern they followed. They got an idea, they tried it out, it worked or it didn’t and they moved on—rinse and repeat. First, they used the goats’ hair to weave into fabric. Then they milked the goats and sold that. Then someone thought, “Let’s make yogurt!”. So they did that and sold it. How about cheese? They tried it. People bought it. And on it went. Oddly enough, they didn’t sit and wait for someone to give them work. They looked around them, saw a need, and gave it a try. Not everything went well. They made clocks out of dried goat poo. That didn’t catch on, so they moved on. They had plenty of income streams that brought in money. It didn’t matter if a few ideas didn’t pan out. At first glance, it might seem like they had to work all the time with all the different things they had going on, but there was an order—a method to their madness. Everything they did was very goat-centric. Most of their ideas came from work they were already doing. They just tweaked or re-purposed something here or there. It was very illuminating for me. I wondered if that same concept could work in the US with a less goat-y business. You see, it’s not the goats. It’s the mindset. How about a little brain de-washing? Normally, when something gets messed up, you clean it up. We’re suffering from a mass case of brainwashing. Especially in the US, we’ve been told to get a degree then get a job. If you go into business, it must be done a certain way. The

Small Business Administration still teaches new business owners to get an office, hire a secretary, pay for advertising, get in the Yellow Pages first... All of which has nothing to do with creating work! Under that plan, you not only end up in a lot of debt, but managing people and stuff instead of doing what you’re good at. Doesn’t that seem kind of stupid? The World Changed While We Were Riding The Merry Go Round Spring cleaning is a great thing. You clear out the clutter, cobwebs, mold, bugs, and whatnot. It restores order and sense to your world. We need to do that with our mindsets too. You don’t necessarily want to knock down the walls that hold up your house, but you want to get rid of the crap that’s getting in your way. Clutter and broken things build up around our houses and become major sources of stress. Mindsets about business can do the same. Doing the same things over and over, expecting different results is a definition of insanity

I think there’s a lot of insanity in our society. I’m not talking about the aforementioned goat people. I’m talking about people who continually invest in “degrees” in order to get a “job”. They polish up their resumés, seeking for the perfect formula to make them standout. Then they submit that resumé everywhere oblivious of the fact that there are no jobs. Even if they do decide to freelance, they’re just creating jobs for themselves. Why? Because they can’t think of an alternative. They’re stuck with a broken mindset. The “job” mindset A “job” mindset is the get-a-job way of thinking from the past century. The symptoms include: • Hourly work • Work “X” number of hours, get paid for “X” number of hours • Income is limited to the number of hours worked, and the fee per hour • Will work for almost anyone willing to pay • The “client/boss” is always right, you’re just hired just to do the work • You’re not going to see retirement until you’re so old that your teeth are just a fond memory

Continue Reading: Page 22

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casestudy

Continued from page 7: The Merry Go Round Broke Down —Get Off Already!

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This mindset needs to be swept away like the moldy mess that it is. The new world CEO mindset | Like riding a bike When you create your own business, you’re creating a cash machine that funds your lifestyle. Think of it differently. Business in the old model used to be done in suits with white shirts buttoned up under your chin like a noose—I mean, necktie—tied securely to ensure that blood flow didn’t interfere with your brain. Business in the new model is a free-flowing exchange of ideas and expertise. You get paid for what you know and can do for people willing to pay for it. Here are some of the characteristics of this mindset: • Income streams in from multiple sources • The business is small and nimble so you can shift with the prevailing winds • Things can move very quickly • “X” number of hours is invested in creating products that produce income repeatedly for years to come

• You choose the people that you want to work with by designing what they need and how to deliver it • Time is spent building processes and systems to market and deliver products and services • You put systems in place so the cash machine keeps working while you take time off • You choose the hours you work and for how long income is not tied to hours • Work already done is repurposed into products that you can resell in different ways • You focus on what you do best—you create a team to run your systems • Retirement? You’re having too much fun! You’ve created a lifestyle not a job (remember you set up systems so your cash machine keeps working) Changing rides can be scary. Remember when you learned to ride a bike. It was scary at first until you got the hang of it and then it opened a whole new world of opportunities. by Barbara Saunders IASECP Director

Cas e in P o i n t Illustrator David Billings of SparkyFirepants fame is the focus of this issue’s Case In Point. In our Q&A, Sparky shares his experience and some of his insights. Q: Did you start out selling your time working for clients exclusively? Or did you have a bigger vision from the first? A: I'd love to report that I knew exactly what I was doing when I started out. In fact, it was a hot mess. I had some practical business skills from my corporate job, but aside from creating art for people I had no real vision. I wanted to make a living as a children's book illustrator, but I soon realized that wasn't enough to drive the Firepants bus every day. I needed something to bring in revenue while I was chasing that dream, so I focusing on finding design clients.

Even after I found a little more stable footing by taking on clients, I spent more time finding clients then I did actually creating work for them. The ROI of chasing projects on elance.com is very small. I was afraid of finding a niche. I thought that if I stopped firing the marketing shotgun at the whole internet I would go broke. I've since learned that the exact opposite is true.

david billings Check out David’s multi-stream empire: Illustration Services Digital Illustration School Graphics Help Line SparkyFirepants.com DigitalIllustrationSchool.com @SparkyFirepants

I wanted to stop trading hours for cash, but had no idea how. The term "passive income" summoned images of a dirty basement filled with illegal immigrants typing keywords into Google Ads. So

8 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

I avoided all things "passive" and kept grinding out the client work. Q: What's changed? and what was your thinking behind the changes? I've made peace with "passive." I now have products, packages, and workshops that bring in revenue without me at the controls 24 hours a day. My problem was in thinking about it as a get-rich-quick scheme. I've learned from some great people, like Mark Silver of Heart of Business, that it's not just setting up some machine so you can sip martinis on your yacht all day. I started thinking about creating products as a way to help more than one person at a time. For example, I thought of teaching people digital illustration. Originally I considered setting one-on-one appointments, but when I calculated how much I would have to charge and how many hours I could make myself available, it looked a lot like what I was already doing (trading time for cash). Then I thought of doing workshops (which I still do), and that led to hosting tutorials online. In a month of really focused work and insane hours, I created a series of videos that teaches my process of creating vector illustration. I built a web site, got some beta testers (plus testimonials), and launched the whole shebang myself. The videos are funny, useful, and I didn't have to compromise on my personality or teaching style. The response has been awesome.

Q: You're up to an unbelievable amount of things right now, can you tell us what's going on? What are your different streams of income? I'm starting to build up my stock art offerings and getting into licensing my art to manufacturers. I'm new to licensing, but I'll be in NYC in May to attend SURTEX, the industry's biggest show and conference. It will be a fantastic learning opportunity. I hosted my first client management workshop for creatives in Phoenix last November and it was a huge success. It was a lot of material, so I've decided to split it up into smaller workshops that I'll be leading in Portland this summer. Last year I created a design retainer package for my bigger clients. The idea is that larger companies benefit from having someone like me on retainer because they save money and resources over hiring individually for each little project that comes up throughout the year. I have one client on retainer right now and it's working out very well. We had worked together a lot over the past few years so they were ideal for this package. Some months I work more and some less, but it balances out in the long run. This is a huge part of my income right now. I've also partnered with an incredible web designer to create a semi-custom web site package. We've done a soft launch and we're doing some initial testing but it's really, really exciting. You can see what we're doing at http:// haveasmoothie.com.

So "passive income ick" has turned into "helping people even when I'm not awake." I sometimes wake up in the morning to see that I sold another course, which is pretty cool. I don't make as much on each transaction as I would if I was in their home or office, but this way I've got more time to create new stuff. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m investing my time in ways that are sustainable for me. In fact, it's a lot of work on the front end. I have to actually create something of value or people will see through it â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and stay away. I'm working with some animation pals to create an unconference for independent animators and artists in Portland. It's called BeTween PDX (http://BeTweenPDX.com) and More SparyFirepants, see: Page 10 International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals â&#x20AC;˘ www.IASECP.com | 9

ait, is that

enough? I have Continued from page 9: Case In Point | SparkyFirepants more. For every we'll be hosting the first

project that I’ve launched there one in May 2010. It's

going to be an incredible opportunity for creatives to learn from each other. We've got ASIFA Portland and The Art Institute of Portland on board. We're still putting the details together, but you can submit topics on the site now.

are three more in the wings.

Wait, is that enough? I have more. For every project that I've launched there are three more in the wings. I'm like Phil Collins in the 80s. I'm everywhere. Of course I'm still working with small business clients, which remains the bedrock of my business. Q: You've really made friends with technology. Do you also have a team that does some of it for you? Yes! The people at Google, Twitter, WordPress, Apple, Freshbooks, and GoDaddy are always busy working on new ways to keep things running for me. I've heard that someone else is using Google's technology now and I predict they'll be really big one day. Other than those people, I handle everything on my own. Sometimes my wife, Jenni, will confirm an appointment or create contact profiles for me (when she's not busy with her own business). Now that I've moved much of my work into the cloud (Google apps), it's a lot easier to share the load. My kids shred documents for me. I pay them with used Apple products and art supplies. Q: How do you structure your time? I have a hard time being reined in by hard and fast schedules—which is partly why I don't work for a company anymore. I try to stick to a small list of daily tasks so I can track progress on projects, but it's still kind of loose. Every month I write down what I want to accomplish. Then I work backwards, breaking projects into smaller chunks to focus on by the week and then the day. It's not foolproof. I can easily get distracted by Twitter, or if I have

a blog post that's really timely and I just need to put it out there. I try to build in time to account for those kinds of activities because I'm not going to kid myself that they don't have a purpose. People build my business and if I'm not connecting with them it starts shrinking. Q: What do you see coming up on your horizon? Any big changes? his year is vastly The biggest change different from my in my business has been this shift in first year because thinking of myself now I actually have a vision as just a freelancer. and a strategy (at the same I've started focusing on my work as a time—wow!). way to communicate a message, helping people understand what all this super secret design stuff is all about. This year is vastly different from my first year because now I actually have a vision and a strategy (at the same time—wow!).

This is the fourth interview I've done this year, which is four more than I did in the last three years. Since I shifted my thinking from "go get clients" to "contribute to a community" the response has just been tremendous. In fact, people are coming to me to ask for help instead of me chasing them down, which just blows my mind (the irony). The money isn't so much of a concern as doing great work. I just see a lot of really fascinating people and projects coming my way. That makes me absurdly happy. Q: Anything you'd do differently? Or wish you did sooner? I would have invented a time machine three years ago and jumped ahead to now so I could have chilled out more along the way. I wouldn't trade my mistakes for anything. I screwed up and reinvented my business a lot and it's so much more satisfying to look back and see where I've been. The process of trying things out, finding out what works (and what doesn't), and figuring out where to go from here is really hard, but it drives me.

10 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

New Pilot Program Launching - Join us

C r e a t e , L a u n c h , S e ll & R e p u r p o s e ! D e v e l o p i n g I n f o r m at i o n P r o d u c t s

As a publication designer by trade, I’m sharing secrets of how to create stunning material that powerfully conveys meaningful information. Expand your income base. Repurpose work you've already done. Showcase your unique knowledge & experience. This pilot program will be a six-week one-time workshop. Since it's brand new, it’s at a super discounted rate. The rising tide lifting all boats

You’ll create your product as you learn to: Laser focus your concept Make it high-end Partner to create your material Deliver options that make it desirable Create an authentic sales page that sizzles Make money while you create Do a strategic launch Automate marketing Update and relaunch You'll also get: Tools to make creating your product a snap Planning and strategy devices Checklists and flow charts A resource list The full program begins in the Fall and will consist of training sessions, masterminds, and Q&As. Please send your name if you're interested to Info@IASECP.com.

International Association of Self-Employed Communication Professionals • www.IASECP.com | 11

memberprofile

} Emma recently bought a new condo where she could create the headquarters for her business empire. Here with her business partner, Gina, she relaxes with her brand new office furniture.

Inside Emma’s Head

Graphic designer, blogger, teacher, and business pundit, Emma McCreary shares a little peak into her evolution and the mindsets that got her where she is. Emma remembers learning early that if she wanted to make money, she had to stop thinking money was evil. That was a big lesson. Her parents always encouraged to think for herself. As long as she could defend her thought, they taught her that it was valid. She started out early with the desire to work for herself. She says she realized, “When you’re working for someone else, you’re just earning money for them”. Early on, Emma focused on creating a lifestyle that she wanted and going to a J-O-B all day was not part of the picture. She was fascinated by how things were being sold on the internet. In college, she started her bead website and found that she really enjoyed creating websites. She did a few sites

in college. Like so many others, she started charging just $20 an hour because that’s what she saw that people made in that sort of “job”. She put up her own site, someone found her and got a client who gave her a nice fat bonus. The light went on. This person wanted to pay her more.

When you’re working for someone else, you’re just earning money for them. The Mindset Piece She began by selling her services by the hour, but found that didn’t appeal to her as a long-term scenario. Emma

12 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

Emma’s World on the Web

Creating websites and content is second nature to Emma.

made the money mindset transition early in her career. She wasn’t attached to old-style thinking, so it was a quick change for her. She hit upon the idea of web hosting as an opportunity to create recurring income and Acorn Host was born. It took a few years to grow. She doesn’t like to grow too fast. What Emma does Emma has a lot of creative outlets, but she gets serious when it comes to making money. Isn’t that a great statement? She will spend money to make money, but only a little at a time. Not a big risk taker. She tracks what’s coming in to be sure that things are paying for her time. There’s a great lesson there. From the books eMyth and eMyth for Contractors by Michael Gerber, she learned that if you do custom work, you’re going to be losing lots of money unless you stan-

dardize what you offer and charge a flat fee then price on value. She put those ideas together to create a hybrid for her design services when she created a website system that automated all the routine customization so she could concentrate on the design part that she enjoyed the most. The backend was modular so she could enable the parts that client needed, so that was custom too, but very easy to do. That let Emma continue to sell at custom prices, but doing a lot less work for each job. Smart. Technology, collaboration & automation Emma made friends with technology. She gets bored easily and exploring the new things that can be done keeps her interest engaged and fires her imagination. Her mission at the moment is to figure out copywriting and sales. She’s now exploring the wide world of collaboration by partnering with other professionals. A new e-commerce solution is coming out soon with long-time partner and

More Emma, see: Page 14

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Continued from page 13 | Emma programmer pal Emily Dickinson which will be called Acorn Shop. She’s also beginning to explore teaching and coaching. Holistic Business has been a passion for Emma for sometime and she’s partnering with Sarah Lambert to teach classes. Emma’s been blogging on the topic for years on her site Tao of Prosperity. This new venture is especially for people that are spiritually minded and struggling with the business mindsets. Creating the intersection of life and business and creating the lifestyle you like. She’s been interested in coaching for a while. She’s working out the model: one-on-one coaching, teaching groups, or writing.

write more—see where the teaching goes. Her blog Tao of Prosperity (ww.TaoofProsperity.com) contains writings on her philosophy on the intersection of business and lifestyle. Learn to flow The bottom line of her business philosophy is Flow. Emma expresses the idea that we’re all divine beings with a purpose—as vessels of our knowledge, we’re supposed to deliver it. It’s just an adventure, so enjoy it. She’s growing into a desire to help people find a way to make business work for them. As she’s perfected the automation piece of her businesses, she’s created the time to be able to explore this new avenue more.

A natural researcher & a serial creator Emma loves to research and explore ways to make things easier and automated. She focuses on automating her business processes as much as possible. For example, for her site Beadage.net she has user-generated content. People upload pictures of jewelry they create with a description that Emma curates and publishes. It’s a win/win because the user gets a link and she gets content. She puts up two a week, it’s put on her newsletter and goes out automatically—part of that website system that she created. The revenue of the site comes from AdSense mostly and a little bit of advertising which keeps the actual amount of time involved very low.

Intrinsic motivation is an area of study that she’s interested in. It’s the idea of doing what you feel inside is important rather than relying on outside motivators. It’s an interesting concept: following your inner voice. What a better way to build your business to fit you?

Emma’s motto is: Do the work once and let it run. The value is in the system.

Simplify Emma works at keeping her systems as simple as possible. By being very clear about what information she wants, she can keep even her books very simple. Time and energy are things that she tracks as well as the financial costs. People get trained to inhibit their natural dislikes and they force themselves to do things because it’s expected instead of doing what’s best for them. You have natural tendencies for a reason.

For Acorn Shop, the back-end part of the system. The client’s site is hosted and run off their back-end code. The benefit to doing it this way is the recurring income. While you can get by with a lot in WordPress, Emma stresses that it’s definitely a plus to have a great programmer to partner with for this type of project. Emma also automates her billing and she has the tech support outsourced for her hosting company. What’s next? Emma’s gotten very good at repurposing content. Ideation is Emma’s main strengths. Emma’s plans are to

The cure for procrastination? As Emma shares the psychology behind this concept. The reason people procrastinate is because they’re doing things they don’t want to do. By staying in touch with her intrinsic motivation, she focuses on what she really loves doing. She sticks with where her passion is and finds that when she gets bored, it’s a signal that she’s off track.

Rewrite the program “De-programming” is eliminating those imposed mindsets. Figure out what you want your life to look like and reprogram your thoughts. Emma uses affirmations to work on her thought processes. The biggest part is identifying what’s not working, bringing awareness to it, and then changing the dialog.

14 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

Sel

ployed Communica f-Em tion Pr

ofe ssionals

Int’l Assn.

IASECP

5273 NE 31st Avenue Portland, Oregon 97211 www.IASECP.com

Working for yourself doesn’t mean doing it alone. Do you need: ...a community of professional partners? ...business help for the new technology-driven global reality? ...mentoring, resources and support?

Grab a copy of our Revenue Quadrant Roadmap. Build multiple income streams in the ‘quadrant’. Stabilize your income. Earn more and work less.

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The Rising Tide Lifts all Boats

~ we’re raising the tide | come join us

On Emma’s Bookcase Who’s leading the leader? Who does Emma follow? Some of the people are: Jennifer Louden the comfort coach (www.jenniferlouden.com) Mark Silver (www.HeartofBusiness.com) Havi Brooks (www.fluentself.com) Third Tribe Marketing (thirdtribemarketing.com) Productive Flourishing (productiveflourishing.com) Emma’s interested in Eastern spiritual material. When she feels she needs a little inspiration, she’s more likely to hop onto Twitter and just follow the conversation. She sets a time frame and she reads what topics interest her at the time.

Emma’s bookcase reveals her interests across the spectrum of business and personal pursuits.

Emma’s quick mindset tune up Don’t get bogged down with the news all over the world. Focuses on what’s going on for you. Think of business as a creative pursuit. There are no rules. See what others do and create your own version that fits your lifestyle. Create a little machine where you tweak the systems that makes it run. Plan boundaries for your life. Your business plan should be a boundary plan: Hours you’ll work, how you work, the kind of people you work with, and what you no to. It’s how you’re going to live your life. Check out Emma’s blog on the topic here: http://www.taoofprosperity.com/create-a-boundaries-plan-for-your-business/

More on Emma HolisticBusinessAcademy.com TaoOfProsperity.com CheekyBoots.com AcornShop.com Beadage.net @cheekyboots

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partnerspotlight

} Brandie designed her own office to fit her business’s growing needs. It’s got tons of surface area to spread out and plenty of organizational nooks to maintain order—plus a window looking out on a gorgeous tree in full bloom. It doesn’t get any better than that.

Brandie Kajino | An Organized Approach to Flexible Business Brandie is the go-to person for the back-end technical issues of running your business systems and procedures. Brandie’s son was two when she started her organizing business. She wanted a business that she owned and created herself. It all started by putting her house in order when she was pregnant. Eventually, she was drawn to the home office. It so often becomes the dumping ground for life’s leftovers. Most of her clients were home-based professionals—that became her specialty. Brandie has a penchant for filling the needs of the solo pro. At present, she’s finding that many clients are stumbling over simple technical issues like basic WordPress

or how to put a Paypal button on their website. That’s part of the services she’s also offering. Listening to her clients has helped Brandie steer her business. She also has a radio show where she interviews other entrepreneurs and homebased experts. She started with organizing services and found that she enjoyed writing, so her blog was a natural next step. Brandie’s blog led her to find products that she really loved and could recommend to clients. She created affiliate programs to monetize the effort. She recommends must-

16 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

read books through Amazon. It’s a great way for her to differentiate herself from other organizers. The more Brandie narrowed her niche market, the easier she found it to communicate directly with them and deliver exactly what was needed. She’s very involved with Rotary International which is involved with doing good things around the world— bringing water to children, dictionaries to third graders… Brandie’s brought that passion to her business and she likes to work with other like-minded people. Brandie is able to describe her target customer in minute detail. Recently, she launched a membership site as a way to engage people she’d already done business with or who are outside the geographical area. Her blog has opened up her reach to people are in England or Australia. This new site is a way to work with people who might not have the resources to work one-on-one with her. Her knack for writing is met as a recurring columnist for sites like Spark Plugging and Start-Up Nation. The more Brandie gets out there, the more opportunities show up. Being plugged into her community, creates the energy where others can see her so it’s not as random as it might seem. The challenge this has brought up for her is knowing when to say “no”. She’s created a value-based vision and mission statement that covers who she serves and what she really wants to accomplish. As an opportunity presents itself, she runs it through this filter—does it contribute to her bottom line and sustainablity?—if not, she’ll pass.

Brandie has built flexibility into her business and she uses it to build the business. Obsessive Flexibility Brandie has built flexibility into her business and used that flexibility to build the business. Her formula is to get to know her clients’ needs and then use what she’s already got to meet those needs in different ways. Brandie has always been aware what’s going on around her and has learned how to adjust to the situation. Adapting to her environment is essential to her nature. Part of her

business philosophy is to try things; it’s OK to fail. She laughs about some of her fabulous failures. Her system is to know her target market well and to tune into what they want. By trial and error, you find out what how to provide what clients are looking for. It’s all in the learning process. Some ideas hit, some don’t. She doesn’t invest too much energy into things at first. Brandie moves forward by focusing on one or two projects to work on at a time. She writes the other ideas down as the come but she works on the top two. She takes notice of what people are asking for, she watches trends, reads Entrepreneur magazine for ideas. Her business is all about adapting and changing—and keep an eye what’s going on. Last year was tough. A lot of people started businesses, so she’s focusing on providing groups services for them. She’s very disciplined about working on a small number of projects until they’re down before beginning new projects as a way to manage her focus. Brandie uses a little formula to judge when it’s time to revise. If it’s a product or service is not selling, she’ll work to revise and update it. If it’s a service that’s not being requested, she chucks it out. It all comes down to how much time it’s taking from her better producing areas. She’s always up for re-evaluation. She believes in working with a coach or mentor on her business to keep in touch with what’s really going on. Multi-Tasking is a Distraction “You can do “passive multitasking”—like having a load of clothes in the washer while you’re blogging. But if you have to actually put mental attention towards something, it fractures your abilities”, says Brandie. Automating systems is a big part of her business. When we’re the only business person, we’re tempted to jump from task to task. She uses the example of an office that’s not organized,. People get so that the operate in the chaos but it drains energy and it’s not productive. It can lead to burn out. When faced with the thought of changing, people are more concerned with how much they’ve invested already and don’t want to do the work to change. But Brandie suggests honestly answering the question: “Is it working?”. It doesn’t matter if your nephew designed your logo or website and you don’t want to hurt his feelings. It’s your

More Brandie, see: Page 18

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Continued from page 17 | Brandie

She suggests working with a mentor to bounce ideas off. You need someone else to share their view point from outside your tunnel vision. business. If it isn’t earning money, it’s costing you and sucking energy out of you. There are times to invest in your business. That may not always mean money. Perhaps you need to become a better copywriter to improve your articles so that you can move up to the next level. Or maybe you need to learn to do podcasts to grow that aspect of your business. It just makes sense to use your down times to make those investments. Brandie uses her intuition as a base line. Each year, she evaluates where her energy needs to go. She suggests working with a mentor to bounce ideas off. You need someone else to share their view point from outside your tunnel vision. Technology gives solo-based businesses leverage to compete on the global stage. What’s Next for Brandie? Brandie’s noticed that her clients are really needing more technology solutions, so that’s where she’s going next. Helping people figure things out. It’s the basic pieces of technology that causes so much of the overwhelm that many solo-business people feel. Things like social media, blogging, WordPress, Google apps, iPhone apps, etc. It’s a way to serve her clients in a different way. She’s bridging the gap from the solo business person trying to get simple things happening and being able to afford the $2,500 web designer who can do the more complex project. They just need to get things started until they can afford to have the professional step in. While talking with Rich Sloan of Start Up Nation during one of her radio interviews, Brandie shared how her iPhone has given her the power to leverage her time. She can now

leave her laptop at home, yet manage her business even while waiting for her son at swimming lessons. A Day in Brandie’s World Brandie only works between 10 am and 4 pm. If she has a client meeting, she knows that will take half of her work day. Occasionally, she’ll do her writing late at night after her son is down for the night. When the office is closed, the business is closed. She does like to do networking meetings and other things to get out of the office. She usually has some sort of audio going to learn in the background while she’s working. Brandie is doing more speaking and she does about half of her events online and half in person. She tries to avoid too much travel since it tends to eat up too much unproductive time. Virtual events are great. They give her the opportunity to re-purpose her presentations and leverage her time. Repurposing for maximum benefit In the beginning, Brandie felt that she was working too hard to create content. When she became a columnist for SparkPlugging she hit on the idea of turning her presentations into articles, or turn articles into presentations or creating products from her tips. For her, it’s all about creating resources for her clients and then finding new ways to deliver them. She’s doing things that are easy for her and creating systems and processes for her clients to use. Brandie’s motto is “just do it!”. People complain about motivation, but usually the task takes very little time compared to the time spent waiting to get motivated. Brandie’s Words of Wisdom • Have your own definition of what success is. Maybe you just need to make enough money to buy a new sofa—that’s OK. • You don’t have to play the game of business by the old “Man’s World” rules. • Don’t be afraid to do something that no ones done before. Just try it. • Keep your eye on the bottom line. • Have an overriding plan, but don’t be afraid to experiment. • Invest whatever you can lose. Start with investing your time, move in phases as things progress.

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Brandie puts her family first. Her husband needs to be on board with any new project. The old concept of putting business first is way over. Success for her is the ability to contribute to her family’s lifestyle. Setting boundaries from the start has really made that easy. She doesn’t set appointments for the time when her son gets off the bus. When he was a baby, she sometimes worked a day during

the weekend. She started out just doing four to six hours during the week. It’s given her power and control over her own life. Brandie has really grown her business dramatically in just five short years. She’s got a great mindset to tune into.

What’s Brandie Reading? Entrepreneur Magazine and Start-Up Nation are great resources for information for Brandie.

She likes Peter Walsh. He talks about the deeper sense of organization and lightening the load we carry.

Third Tribe Marketing is a community that she follows carefully. It’s focused on authentic marketing and social media tactics.

Seth Godin is another author that she follows. Tim Ferris’ Four Hour Work Week: Good ideas.

work with brandie Check out Brandie’s Soho Action Day and get a jump start on your next project. TheHomeOfficeOrganizer.com SohoSolutionist.com @bkajino

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what’snew?

}

Too l s , Ti p s , & Tac t i cs Multiple income streams and collaboration creates their own set of problems—like how to do track all that work and keep on top of your game... Introducting: Project Management Tools for the New Reality Not only has the way we work changed but the tools we use need to keep pace. An individual need to track time, tasks, people, and it need to be done fast, be accessible to everyone on the team and not need a fleet of IT pros or data entry people to keep it running. This is a fairly new area of tools and it’s changing rapidly, but here’s the top five that are leading the pack:

OpenGoo | OpenGoo.org OpenGoo is web-based tool focused on productivity, collaboration, communication, and team management. All in all, I think that’s a very good description. It’s a feature-rich productivity system. It can be too much for those just starting out, but if you frequently work with several partners, it’s a great solution. The reason it really gets notice is that it’s an open source system that’s really functional and easy to use. 20 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies

SuberNova | SuberNova.com Project management for rockstar freelancers’. SuberNova caters to things that freelancers and web-workers need, like invoicing, project management, and contact management — all of which is done can be done through a sleek web interface, and adobe AIR app, or an iPhone app. They have a free demo for 30 days, and then it costs only $5.99 to upgrade to the full version. Since SuberNova is available on three different platforms (web, desktop, and mobile) it’s moving towards complete integration. It’s going to be a big player in the future. Projectivity | Projectivity.biz Another open source system that you run on your own server. It’s got a combination of tools including portfolio management, project management, knowledge management, and collaboration. It’s a got an easy to use interface. Setup can be difficult if you’re not a geek, but since it’s free it can be worth getting a little help to get it set up. WorkETC | WorkETC.com/ This tool wants to handle your whole business in one place. It combines project management, CRM, time tracking, invoicing, and a lot more. It’s web based and starts off at $29.95 a month. Their mission is to completely streamline the backend of solo-based business with a do-it-all application. Daylite | MarketCircle.com/daylite Daylite is a Mac app that’s becoming popular among designers and other freelancers. In typical Apple fashion, Daylite is pretty and easy to use. Ithas a comprehensive feature set with things like scheduling, project and task management, mail integration, and more. Daylite also features mobile integration with the iPhone.

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strategyupdate

}

What are you doing for Summer Vacation? Remember those oral reports we had to do as kids: What I did for Summer Vacation? Somehow mine always involved explaining how I broke the latest bone. (Just say “NO” to camping! Girl Scouts can be dangerous! Para-military cookie pushers….) Now, we’re all grown up and don’t have summer camp to look forward to. That’s a plus for me. Traditionally, business summer slows down. What if you looked at summer as a summer camp retreat for your business? It’s an excellent time to get off the hamster wheel and revise. Here are a few ideas: Conduct an audit on: Website: Really read your content. Does it say what your target market needs to say? Do you need some repositioning? Do some polls. Get some feed back. Refine. Refocus.

Here’s some more website refinement tips: • Link Popularity Analysis How many links are pointing to your web site and how effective are they? • Search Engine Friendly Analysis How well designed is your web site for the search engines? • Web Site Analytics Review How well does your web site function for converting visitors to buyers/leads? • Keyword Research What keywords is your web site currently ranking for? • Competitor’s Comparative Review How do you stack up to your competitors? • Summary of Web Site Audit The web site audit will

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have revealed some areas for improvement on your web site. This is your task list. Marketing: Are you marketing? What are you doing? Do you have an over-riding goal? Here are some suggestions: Focus on building your list. Lead generation is the most important goal for marketing. Why? That’s where all of your work comes from. It allows you to grow your relationships with potential clients. It allows you to display your unique expertise. Your very targeted niched list is where your business lives or dies. You need three things in place for your marketing to be effective. • A professional-looking website. Even if it’s just the landing page, an about you page, a service/product page, and a contact page. • An email sign up form. Have one on every single page. • A gift for signing up. This might be a short checklist, a 3- to 5-page report – remember to include the next step you want them to take like to call you or whatever Second, you need to program in your marketing tasks into every day so that they’re consistent. 30 minutes a day is plenty to start making a difference. Here are some tasks to consider: Weekly email newsletter. It can be just a tip, but be sure that you’re in front of that list with something valuable every week Blog. Repurpose your newsletter material to your blog – no brainer Article posting. Post the article or tip from your newsletter to other places around the web – get exposure

Social networking. Post your blog link, new article link, status updates to your social media profiles on FaceBook, Linked In, Twitter, Biznik – whatever Speak up. Think about doing some talks in front of your target market. There are tons of business groups, MeetUps, chambers – they want experts come talk – so go talk Joint Venture. Get to know other experts that offer services to your target market. Brainstorm ways to work together. Direct Mail. Send some postcards – to old clients, new clients, your list, people you’d like to partner with… Offline events. Plan on attending some conferences, events, lunch and learns, whatever… Instead of thinking of marketing as this weird unnatural set of tasks – shift your thinking to it being energy. The more energy you create, the more energy comes back to you. Last tip – automate whatever you can. Other things to think about while you’re basking by the pool: How can you get away from selling hours for dollars? How can you repurpose what you’ve already done and already know into an event or product? How can you leverage the people you know to create those events or products? Can you fine tune your niche? I’ll want an oral report in September.

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Cloning your internal drive to an external backup by Michael Pearce, Moonlight Mac When you run your own business, your computer is your lifeline. A majority of us use Macs which drastically lowers the maintenance and repair costs but having a little assurance is always nice. Of course, you know to back up your work regularly—and Apple’s Time Machine makes that a breeze—but did you know that you can actually clone your entire hard drive as well? Doing so regularly makes getting back up and running in case the unthinkable happens easy and fairly stress free. Our Mac Guru, Michael Pearce explains the simple procedure and recommends doing it monthly. First: You need an external FireWire hard drive, partitioned with Disk Utility into one or two volumes. If big enough, two volumes will let you dedicate one to TimeMachine backups (10.5 or later) and one SuperDuper backup (the clone). Buy a drive that has both FireWire 800 and 400 as well as USB ports. It should be 300-500 gigabytes if used for only cloning, and a terabyte if partitioned for both backups. USB-only drives are slow, unreliable and best for small Flash drives; not for full backups. To partitioning the drive, click Options and choose GUID format for Intel Macs or Apple Partition Map for G4 and G5 Macs. Name them CloneBkp and TM Bkp.

Download SuperDuper 2.6.2 or later. Google it for the web site. Open the Disk Image and drag the program into your Applications folder. Launch it and in its window, choose your hard drive in the Source menu and the backup volume in the Target menu. Then click the button to start the copy. It will erase the volume and then copy all the files over. Takes from 15 to 45 minutes depending on how much stuff is on your main hard drive. To enable Smart Backups in the program, go to the SuperDuper menu and choose Register. In the next window

24 | Summer 2010 • Self-Employed Professionals | Insider Profiles & Business Strategies