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Lidiya K

5 Tips for Turning Your Side Hustle into a Full-Time Job

December 11, 2017 by Lidiya K 151 Comments

You can start creating your ideal lifestyle while still at your regular job.

How? By shifting your mindset, learning how to manage your time wisely and building some good habits, sure. But there are specific things you can often do, that will be the foundation of a successful transition into full-time entrepreneurship. Here’s where you can start:

1. Skyrocket your personal brand.

Branding is a never-ending process. And in the digital world, anything you publish, do or say, becomes part of it. So it’s worth taking control of that, and creating as much content under your name as possible.

That’s how you can become an expert in a niche over time. It won’t happen overnight, but you’ll be investing time in that daily, by sharing practical things on social media and keeping your profiles and portfolio updated.

There will be weekly activities such as setting up a site for your business/brand/product and working on the design, authority, content creation, link building, etc.

There will be things you’ll do just once, such as:

  • Joining new platforms to make sure potential employers can find you from anywhere. 
  • Emailing influencers to thank them for the inspiration they are. 
  • Writing blog posts to discuss specific topics and for building authority.

That’s how you start to build a name for yourself and how clients will eventually interact with your brand. But the process begins today. Don’t postpone.

2. Learn the basics

One profitable way to invest your time on available mornings, evenings and weekends, is to research things about the critical aspects of your future full-time online business.

Start with the legal part – what type business structure. How will you pay taxes, what’s required from you, what can you do today to make the transition easier?

Then, learn basic financial management. Unless you hire an accountant or bookkeeper, budgeting will become a necessity to learn and track your finances. You’ll want to make sure you make good financial decisions, save every month, have multiple income streams, and calculate earnings and their sources carefully every 2 weeks.

3. Master a skill

What’s your side hustle?

Is it writing, designing, making jewelry, consulting small business owners, creating online courses, or else?

Whatever it is, make sure you’re constantly leveling up.

Read about it to remain informed about the latest trends in the industry, talk with professionals, go to seminars, take courses.

Invest in yourself as much as possible if you want to provide quality services to your clients and make sure they’re happy with your work, whatever niche you’re in.

4. Avoid burnout

It’s time to start saying ‘no’ to some things and what you’re used to, so that you can get different results this time and excel at your career, to be able to move on and build something on your own.

That might mean not going out with old friends that much. You can invest that same energy in working on the side hustle, keeping your mind clear, not hanging out with people who aren’t with the same goals, and staying focused.

It might mean making some lifestyle changes, such as waking up early to do your work before others get up, to be concentrated instead of distracted. It might mean eating healthier in order not to feel lazy and moody after a big meal.

You’ll need to take breaks frequently and know how to shut off your brain before bed so that you can recharge and be on top of your game every day of the week.

In fact, the goals of turning your side business into a full-time job can be a good reason to finally take more care of yourself and pay attention to your health.

5. Outsource earlier

Many business owners, when asked about the mistakes they made when they were just starting out, share that it took them way too long to be able to let other people handle some aspects of the business.

Why should you do that now, even if you think you aren’t ready?

Because by delegating some of the work (administrative tasks, social media, content creation, or else), you’ll stop doing repetitive tasks and be able to work on the strategies, connections, and growth.

That’s what you should be doing. And because it has the best ROI, you won’t be losing money by paying freelancers or assistants hourly or even hiring them full-time.

These tips should be enough to help you see progress pretty soon, and feel like the full-time dream job is closer than ever.

Filed Under: Business Tagged With: turn your side hustle into a full-time business

4 Ways to Work More ‘On’ Your Business, and Less ‘In’ It

April 11, 2017 by Lidiya K 380 Comments

One of the lesser known traps of entrepreneurship is that you might end up being yet another employee for your business, and do things that you shouldn’t be doing without even realizing. This can happen when you’re scared to delegate because you want to do it all by yourself. It’s when you keep investing hours and hours weekly in administrative tasks, finance, emails, social media and more, when this can be automated or done in less time by putting systems in place. Michael Gerber spells it out best in his book The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What To Do About It. His core message is discussing how to work ‘on’ your business (i.e. strategy, planning, etc) versus ‘in’ it (i.e. day-to-day admin, etc)

The worst thing is that you miss out on many opportunities for growth. And, after all, your job is to keep your customers happy, improve your business model, skyrocket your brand, network, start new projects, and think big. And all that can happen if you stop working ‘in’ the business, and start working ‘on’ it.

Here are some ways to make it happen:

1. Analyze your strengths and focus on them

Before you set clear goals for your business, you need to know what you’re best at, and what takes you way more time than necessary and can be outsourced.

Think about why you were interested in this field in the first place, what helped you take the first steps and build something out of nothing, what else you need to work on to get further.

Be honest with yourself. Gather your past successes, what others have told you you’re good at, your interests and passion, and skills and knowledge base. Examine all this and come to some important conclusions, such as which aspect of the business needs more of your focus, and what can be done better by an expert (which means hiring your first freelancer).

 2. Delegate and automate.

Not an easy part, but a necessary step on the way to growth.

Write down everything you do during the day connected to the business. Include all the small tasks you don’t even think about, every single email you write, anything that takes you 10 minutes of brainstorming before you can take a decision or contact someone.

Now see which of these don’t need to be executed by you. If you’re ruthless, you can get back hours of your day and use them for more productive and creative work instead of tedious daily tasks.

Payments, scheduling posts, sharing them on social media, analytics, making appointments, and more can be automated using the right tools.

As for handling your finances, writing content for your website, reaching out to influencers, marketing, product distribution, and administration – all these can be delegated to someone you hire virtually. Start with one freelancer, preferably a virtual assistant, and assign him anything you want to stop doing yourself. You’ll need to train him for some time, but it’s a great return on your investments as you’re freeing tens of hours of your time weekly in the near future.

3. Create passive income

That’s the dream in online business, but many don’t achieve it since they’re disciplined to endure the hard work long before you see any results.

Passive income, however, is what can let you make money while you sleep and always make sure you reach your monthly budget even if there’s a lot going on in your life, you’re traveling, or can’t seem to find new clients for your current project.

How do you start earning it, though?

The simplest way is by creating a product, something evergreen that people are willing to pay for, and making money from on a regular basis.

Do your research first, see what people are genuinely interested in learning more about, see how your competitors did it and think of a way to make it better or offer it in a more convenient way. Then, start promoting like crazy, build a name for yourself, distribute it wherever your potential customers are, and make profit.

That product can be an eBook, an audiobook or a course (these are quite lucrative now as people want to know the ‘how-to’ of anything these days and want the information to be distilled and easy to understand and implemented).

If you want to take things to the next level, get into the software space by creating a tool, a service or an app. The initial investment in terms of time and money here is bigger, but it’s also where the big money is. So you might give this a try too.

4. Have systems and procedures

In order to never make the same mistake twice (which might cost you thousands of dollars, or weeks worth of work), you need to track everything, eliminate what doesn’t work, and do more of what works.

That’s the main principle behind working smarter instead of harder.

It saves you a ton of time and worries, and makes sure you’re always on the grow and heading in the right direction.

So that’s how you can start working on the business today. Any other ideas? Leave them in the comment section below.

Filed Under: Business

Time-Saving Tips for Busy Womeneurs

March 14, 2017 by Lidiya K 1,813 Comments

The ability to get things done quickly seems to be one of the most sought-after skills for busy entrepreneurs.

One of the things business owners have in common – regardless of their industry, how many people they have working for them, what new projects they take on, etc. – turns out to be the quest to work smarter, not harder.

If you want to finish your tasks faster and to have more time to do all the other things on your list and to live your life at the same time, here are some time-saving tips that will help you out:

1. Reassess your to-do list.

Working smarter and saving time is mostly about working only on what’s necessary. But even if we eliminate unproductive activities from our days, and projects that get us nowhere, there’s more.

So I urge you to take a closer look at what you do daily, and ask yourself whether each activity you dedicate time to is giving you the results you desire. You may realize that something you’ve been working on for a long time isn’t getting you anywhere, although it still sounds like a good idea. Well, if you want to get better at time management and improve your efficiency, such items must be removed from your list.

2. Save time on scheduling meetings and appointments.

Try out  automation software that does all the work for you. No need to waste time communicating with potential clients excessively and exchanging unnecessary emails until you find when you’re both available.

With tools like Calendly and Acuity Scheduling you just share when you’re available for a meeting, and the client can book an appointment depending on their availability.

3. Always prioritize.

Sometimes we spend so much time working on random tasks, that at the end of the day, the important tasks don’t get done. Chances are you’ll feel disappointed, and although tired and emotionally exhausted, you still haven’t moved forward with our projects and goals.

So prioritize, every day. Define the most important tasks for each day (the ones directly related to your objectives), and start working on them first thing in the morning.

Set no more than 3, though. In most cases, if you don’t procrastinate and know how to make the most of your morning, you’ll have completed them before noon. That will make you feel good about yourself and see results from your efforts pretty soon.

4. Review your day every evening.

That’s a powerful practice many successful people swear by. Assessing how you spent your day at the end of each one will help you always stay on track, never miss anything important, and easily think of ways to optimize your approach.

When reviewing, think about what you worked on today, how you performed and how you feel about it. List anything you couldn’t finish on time and try to understand why that happened. Also, see how long each activity took and whether it could have been done more quickly.

Then, turn these into ideas on how to be more productive in the future. If you apply one new strategy each day, you’ll boost your efficiency in no time.

5. Deadlines.

Deadlines are powerful. When you’re your own boss, however, there’s no one to give you one. But still, having a fixed date and time when something must be finished helps your mind overcome procrastination and magically get it done right before this deadline.

Because you want to keep everything under control, you’ll never allow yourself to miss a deadline. What’s more, you can set them in advance so that you’re always ready with the work a day or a few earlier.

That makes you disciplined and you start managing your time much more effectively.

6. Outsource.

Last but not least, even if you’re not at that stage in your business yes, you need to delegate some of the work.

Here we’ve summarized why outsourcing matters so much and what aspects of the work you can outsource.

Believe it or not, there are experts in any field that can take care of aspects of your business you don’t need to deal with anymore, and thus let you focus on strategies for growth, for example.

With these 6 time management tips you can easily save yourself tens of hours each week. That will give you time to rest and take care of yourself (which will boost your productivity in return), to spend time with loved ones, to learn new skills and master what you’re good at, and even give new projects a try.

Filed Under: Business

How to Utilize Social Media for Your Business

February 28, 2017 by Lidiya K 2,905 Comments

Social media can become one of your best friends and the most powerful tools that will grow your business and personal brand, but only if used right. Okay, so you know that your potential customers are on social media. You just need to get in front of their eyes in a way that’s not pushy, but grabs attention and aims at forming a genuine relationship with them.

Unlike what many companies are doing, social media marketing is a long-term strategy. So forget about setting up an account and automating it. Instead, prepare to invest a lot of time on each specific channel where your target audience hangs out. It will take weeks and even months before you see results in terms of new customers, subscribers and users.

Here are some things to keep in mind to leverage the power of social media for your business:

1. Be authentic.

Don’t make your products sound better than they are, don’t overdo it when talking about yourself or your mission, don’t buy followers and don’t keep posting about or asking for money. On social media, it works better if you’re real. If not, people will simply stop following you and go check out a more interesting profile of one of your competitors.

What does it mean to be authentic online?

Start by posting inspirational content but adding a personal touch to it, like a description under the post where you share a story that taught you a life lesson. Create and post behind-the-scenes photos and videos to show the funny side of the work, to make people familiar with what’s going on in the office and/or during meetings, or just upload photos from daily life that you find interesting to show  that you’re more than a brand. People connect with people.

2. Engagement is one of the key metrics.

The number of followers you have isn’t that important. Some have hundreds of thousands of them but only a tiny percent of these are commenting, liking or visiting the website. Engagement is what you should be aiming for.

It can happen by creating quality content, posting consistently, asking questions, personally contacting some users or like-minded business owners or potential partners to thank them, also sharing the things you read that other people have written, or products and tools you find useful that hep you get a lot done.

Use hashtags on Instagram, follow people in the same niche on Twitter, pay for targeted ads on Facebook, and include all the important information about who you are and what you do on LinkedIn – all these will help you find the right people.

3. Add value.

Before you start expecting many followers to visit your profile and like what you have to offer, you’ll need to put something on the table, for free. and build a name for yourself. Giving comes before getting anything out of it. So leave the financial goals behind and focus on creating, sharing and providing value now.

In your profile, mention a few words about yourself and your business but also how it helps people. Share the solution, not the product or service.

Create motivational image quotes yourself, or have someone do it for you. Make them original, add your logo, and share them with the world without expecting anything in return.

Run contests with giveaways. Let the prize be one of your products, a free consultation or chat with you, or using your software free for the first few months. That’s how you get people interested and still make your products and services more popular.

And share the links on social media. Even send a message individually to the people who are most engaged with your content and who you know will like your posts.

Social media can be fun if you do it right, and measure results all the time so you know what works best.

Make sure you diversift your time and efforts, though, but over time do focus more on the channels that lead to more followers, relationships or customers.

Filed Under: Business

4 Tips For Becoming an Expert in Your Niche

February 21, 2017 by Lidiya K 7,162 Comments

When an Internet user is looking for advice on a certain topic, wants to buy something, or has another need that your services can answer, they go online and search for information. But because at least tens of thousands of results come up, and there’s literally no time and energy to go through even the top ones and find what they’re looking for, they need to check out only the source they trust the most.

That usually happens by visiting the most popular site in the niche, or following an influencer and the tips and suggestions they share. So if you want to get in front of your potential customers, you need to radiate trust before they pay attention to you and your business, and long before you even start building a more personal relationship with them.

But how do you become the so-called expert on a particular topic? How do you stand out from the crowd when so many others are talking about the same thing, have more experience and have already created their products?

It will take time, sure, but you can take the steps below, and strategize before you get to work. Here’s where to start:

1. Stay up to date.

Things change every day in the world of online business. New marketing channels, social media platforms, influencers, trends, hashtags, optimization tricks, news, etc. are being discussed all the time. If you miss something closely related to your niche, you’ll be left behind.

So it must become your habit to follow the latest trends in your field, and have access to relevant information the moment it goes live. That too is a skill which takes time to be developed as you will consume a lot of unnecessary information in the beginning, until you find the right resources and the most comfortable and practical mediums that will save you time and give you only what you need.

2. Write a lot of content.

Find your voice and start sharing what’s on your mind. Be authentic and dedicate time to creating long-form content that your target audience will find useful.

That’s one of the surest ways to be taken seriously even by other professionals in your niche. It can also turn your website into a place where people go before they take a decision related to a product you’re selling, or just to get the right advice.

Content creation is a long-term strategy, and although it’s one of the most valuable ways to build a connection with your readers and touch them, still so many businesses aren’t investing enough time and resources in it.

You should write content as crazy, so don’t just plan to do it once a week or so. You can hire people too to take care of that, or just to edit, polish and publish your words, as that part also takes too much of your time. But you should be putting something of value out there every single day.

3. Build your network.

They say that your network is your net worth. Start by connecting with influencers on social media, go to networking events, leave insightful comments under the new posts of the biggest names in your industry.

If you stay in the game long enough and keep doing what you do and are with the right attitude, you will get noticed.

Over time, important people will start paying attention to you and the work you do, contacting you and making you tempting offers to do business together, inviting you to events, and introducing you to others. Each of these relationships can turn into something big.

4. Bring something new to the table.

To be remembered, you should change the game completely. That will make people interested in you, and even if they question your status quo, it’s about how you say it and what your goal is.

  • Talk about the things in your industry that no one else dares to discuss.
  • Combine two seemingly unrelated subjects and share life lessons with that.
  • Visit forums and write long answers to people’s questions.
  • Share a lot about your personal life, especially the extraordinary parts of it.
  • Market your products in a completely different way.
  • Set prices that no one else in your field has.
  • Give more freebies to your readers and subscribers than anyone else.
  • Write the longest guide on a popular topic and put make it available for free. Mention other influencers in your niche and then contact them personally to give them a link to it, hoping they’ll share it with their social media followers.

These 4 steps should be enough to get you started to becoming someone known to be an authority in their niche.

 

Filed Under: Business

What All Good Instagram Accounts Have in Common

February 14, 2017 by Lidiya K 2,862 Comments

Simply creating an Instagram account and waiting for people to follow you and engage with the content you post every now and then won’t work.

A strategy must be created, a content and marketing plan should be prepared in advance, and then you can get to work and start building your audience.

But social media is often unpredictable, and the things that work can surprise even the most experienced business owner.

That’s why it’s worth taking a look at some popular Instagram accounts to see what they are doing right. When it comes to getting attention on a social media channel, other than monitoring engagement and tracking all other important metrics, the best marketing research is to try what your competitors are doing and see how successful it is for your audience and business.

But there are a few key features that all good Instagrammers have in common. These are elements of your overall strategy that you simply cannot go without. So instead of wasting time finding each yourself as a result of trial and error, keep them in mind now and make them part of your Instagram game from day one.

1. Great content.

Don’t skip this important step because you’re too busy to be creating content for yet another platform. And don’t think re-posting or quick photos or quotes can do the job just as good.

People want to be inspired, their attention can be grabbed by originality, and if they are to read a quote, it must be something they haven’t seen on all other accounts they are following. This is why Womeneur’s founder is hell bent on posting a lot of her own original quotes. So give people exactly that if you want to stand out.

The guys from Foundr Magazine know how to do that. And that’s why they have close to a million happy followers who engage with their content.

This means having different types of posts, but creating each one yourself and making sure it adds up to the overall value you provide with your profile.

So, make interesting videos, create Instagram stories every few days, use cool free apps to make your images professional and to add quotes to them. When presenting your products, do it right, not aggressively.

2. Give people something from the start.

If you want someone to follow you instead of the hundreds of other accounts and businesses that promise the same things as yours, you need to provide value and make that clear from the very beginning of your relationship.

The easiest way to do this is to offer freebies on your website and include the direct url to one of these in your description on Instagram.

From then on, the value you’ll be providing will be with every post you publish on a daily basis that will inspire your followers or give them some practical tips.

The folks from SumoMe, for example, are linking to an extensive guide about the tools you should use to grow your website traffic. They’ve invested tons of hours in creating it, and are giving it away. That helps people build trust and know they can expect only quality and useful information from them in the future too.

3. Be authentic, be bold in your statements.

Gary Vaynerchuk is probably one of the greatest examples of that, together with turning your name into a successful brand.

He’s crushing it with his Instagram account – and his online presence on every social media platform, really – because he’s being himself, talking about the things he’s passionate about, holding nothing back, and showing people how to do business, make things happen and do the work it takes.

If you’re looking to build a huge audience on Instagram, and even turn it into a new source of leads and income, take it seriously and make your profile anything else but average.

And if you need some cool tips and an Instagram strategy, check out our Instagram Content Calendar + 19 Killer Tips.

Filed Under: Business

How to Start a Successful Blog and Build a Name for Your Brand

January 31, 2017 by Lidiya K 2,902 Comments

Many individuals and businesses underestimate the importance of having a blog. Some decide to either not publish content at all, while others don’t invest enough money and time into content creation and distribution.

That’s a huge mistake, though. And your brand and revenue will suffer from it. You might not realize how much you’re losing by not having a blog, but it’s worth creating one to see how powerful it is for building connections and authority and turning visitors and readers into customers and users.

So, let’s see what it takes to start and run a successful blog these days:

1. Select your niche.

You might already have a company or personal website, so adding a blog will mean to just start writing and publishing articles.

But before that, you should define your overall strategy, set some goals, see what others are doing, be realistic as to how much and what type of content you can create exactly (or what your budget is for hiring a team to do that).

Why choose one niche? It’s much better to start with a particular topic and grow from there over time.

The thing is, there are too many blogs that cover all topics at once. Some of them are pretty popular and with tons of articles in their archives, so you can’t aim to beat that from day one.

The smarter approach to getting your blog off the ground is to be strategic about it. The topic you start writing about will be what people will soon connect your name and brand with. So make sure it’s something you know enough about, which you’re passionate and care about, and that’s evergreen and an issue enough people want to learn more about.

2. Make it informative and valuable.

Short blog posts with no actual advice aren’t something that will catch your readers’ attention. In fact, so many sites try this and just create content like crazy but put no time or real meaning in it, that you can consider these spammy. And Google would never rank them high because it wants to put on top only quality pages with enough words and a good link structure.

This means that you should build the right mindset starting today. Accept content marketing as a lifelong strategy and journey, which will benefit your business and authority in more ways than you can imagine.

So don’t go for the quick results.

Even if you pay for traffic, you won’t get the type of audience that you’re targeting. These aren’t the people who’ll pay for your products or services, or who even know what they need.

Also, don’t do it for the money. Irrelevant affiliate links, putting ads in the sidebar, or linking to a product of yours many times in one post is just too much. You’ll make people leave your site and never come back again.

The surest and most genuine way to get the right eyeballs is to write valuable, long-form posts on the topic, and inspire and give practical tips and steps with each.

3. Know who you’re writing for.

There are people out there whose lives will be much better if they find, buy and use your products. They just don’t know about it.

Some haven’t even thought that the solution is what you’re offering, so you need to find them, define their problem clearly and say how you can help.

To get to them, however, you need to know who these people are exactly.

That’s when you should create a reader’s and buyer’s persona.

Who’s your ideal customer? What’s his daily life, career, age, financial status, etc.?

What are his dreams, fears, goals, relationships? Where does he live and what does he want to change about his life? Where does he spend time online and what type of content is he consuming?

Take some time to figure all that out in the beginning, and start writing articles, creating information products (that you’ll give for free), publishing insightful posts on social media, and even paying for audio and video content production at some point.

Marketing research matters and, as you see, you should consider both the demographics and the psychological profile of your ideal customer.

4. Using your blog as a tool to improve your brand.

Make sure your website looks professional, but don’t overdo it. When it comes to a blog, people are there to read, and nothing else.

It’s not a coincidence that publishing platforms like Medium have no sidebars. One of the main elements of great reader experience is a full-width page template, where text is in the center of the screen, and there are no distractions around it.

Take your time when finding and choosing images too. They speak to people on a deeper level than words most of the times.

Formatting plays a big role too. Make the article skim-friendly (short paragraphs, headings and subheadings, bold and italics for key parts, etc.) as most people go through so many posts every day that there’s just no time to read them thoroughly. So they just skim the page to get the main idea. Make it easy for them to do that and they’ll check other pages on your site too.

The language you use when writing must be the right one. Don’t be pushy when talking about your business or mentioning products. Instead, simply include suggestions and links in the right places. After you’ve built trust with free stuff and great advice, people will be more likely to click on these and check out what else you’re offering.

So that’s how you start and run a blog successfully and use it to build a name for yourself.

Filed Under: Business

5 Morning Routines to Help Create a Productive Day

January 25, 2017 by Lidiya K 649 Comments

Starting the day right is key for being productive, but it can also help you be energetic, put you in the right mood and keep you focused ’til the evening. The best way to do that is to create a morning ritual that will help you be healthy, happy and successful in the long run.

A morning routine is a set of habits done right after you wake up. It may take anywhere from a few minutes to a couple of hours. But planning your morning, coupled with filling the very first part of your day with productive, creative and healthy activities is what makes this practice so beneficial.

Let’s see how to create the ideal morning:

1. Prepare the night before

It all begins in the evening. That’s when you make the decision to rise early the next morning, thus forming a desire that helps you to actually do it. Together with that, you take some actions to make the most of your morning when you get up. This can include writing your to-do list, getting your clothes ready, preparing your meals, and more.

These steps guarantee you a great morning because you save yourself some time and worries in advance, and prepare mentally at the same time. Anything you do in the evening that’s part of the morning ritual also plays a big role in your personal organization, and makes you more productive in general.

2. Wake up determined

The best combination for a powerful mindset is to go to bed after you let go of anything that has happened during the day, and to wake up with a smile ready to kick start your day. Intention is important also. If you don’t know what you’ll do once you’re awake, you won’t really be motivated to do it. An even worse scenario is to leave bed only to go to work, when you actually don’t like what you do for a living. Whatever the case, you can fix that by planning your morning the night before and having a reason to wake up.

Once you hear the first alarm, you’re more likely to get up. That makes you want to start the day, and over time, that makes you live more passionately and make the most out of each day. When you’re out of bed, feel good about it. You’re given 24 hours and can do anything you want with them. Appreciate this, smile about the opportunities you’ll be given later today. It can turn your whole life around.

3. Write

If you are looking to adopt a practice all successful people share, go for this quick and simple practice. Place a notebook and pen beside your bed in the evening and jot down anything that comes to mind when you open your eyes. Or you can open the laptop and type a few pages of what you plan to get done for the day. Both ways work. But to take morning pages to the next level, here’s what you can write about:

  • List a few things you’re grateful for. The act of writing them down makes you internalize each and you feel truly thankful;
  • Write down your 3 most important tasks for the day. Use your to-do list as a starting point (or create it now if you haven’t done it already), and see which 3 things from all items are key. Look for the ones that will actually get you closer to your goals once completed. Now put these on top. That’s how you prioritize. Then, break them down into smaller actions, so that you can know what the next steps to take are. That’s what you should work on once you’re done with the morning routine;
  • Journal your thoughts. Let out anything you’ve been keeping in your mind. Writing is therapeutic, it helps you remove mental blocks and leads to being more creative and productive. That will pay off later in the day;
  • Describe your ideal lifestyle. Write about your goals and dreams. Imagine you’ve already achieved them. Draw the picture in details in your mind and put pen to paper. This type of visualization makes you focused and you can do your work with more concentration and motivation during the day, knowing you’re getting closer to the lifestyle you deserve.

4. Get active

Many people complain that they don’t have any time to work out. But by getting up earlier, you can easily squeeze in a quick workout or even a jog.  It will not only keep you in shape, but is a fantastic way to jump start your day to feel fresh and energized.

5. Meditate

Let’s dedicate some time to your spiritual health too. The morning is the only time of the day when you probably have some me time, so doing it right means you’ll be at ease for the whole day and even react with calm when unexpected things come up.

Meditation is a quick and easy solution. Just find an isolated place and sit down. Start breathing deeply and focus on your breath until all random thoughts in your mind are gone. That’s when you find peace and are mindful. You can also think of a positive affirmation and repeat it to yourself while meditating to make the effect stronger and boost your motivation for the whole day.

All that is enough to help even the busiest person be more organized and productive, and can lead to personal and business growth too.

What other ways to kickstart a morning do you know of?

Filed Under: Real Talk, Uncategorized

4 Easy Ways to Validate Your Business Idea

January 17, 2017 by Lidiya K 2,842 Comments

Richard Branson once said that business ideas are like buses. There’s always another one coming.

If we analyze what goes on in our mind in one day, assuming we’re creative individuals and entrepreneurs by heart, there will be some solid ideas we’d even decide to turn into reality.

But there’s just not enough time to work on each; give it a try and see where it goes. What’s more, most of these won’t work. Be it because there’s no market for it, isn’t something we’re passionate about that we can dedicate our life to for the next few years or even decade, or because we don’t have the skills, team or preparation to execute something like that.

There are many reasons why an idea might not work. That’s why it’s crucial to validate it long before you start investing time and resources in turning it into a real business.

So the next time a business idea pops up in your head, here’s what you should do first to make sure you’re working on something worthwhile:

1. See if there’s a market for it

Some ideas sound too good to be true, and they probably are. Do research, look around to see if others are making money in the same niche in a similar way. Go on Amazon, YouTube, Udemy, etc. and see what topics people are looking for the most, and whether or not the top products in these categories are making profit and think if you can create something similar.

2. Don’t innovate, solve a problem

Setting the goal of creating the next hot social media network that will be bigger than Facebook and Instagram, is just not realistic. And you don’t need to go that big. The work it takes, the chaos that will bring to your life, the investors, the lack of any free time, the mistakes that might be worth millions of dollars, etc. That means no personal life, no joy found in the work you do, and so on. So leave innovation for the game changes, the ones who already have initial capital and the connections necessary for that. Instead, focus on optimization.

Have a business idea? Great. Ask yourself if it solves a problem enough people share. Every business, every product or service that’s successful, is based on this – there must be a need to meet, a struggle to help people with and make their life easier. Most profitable online businesses do well because they help their customers save time or save/make money. And these are things we all want.

So think it through. Once you find the problem and think your product is the solution, define this as clearly as you can.

That’s how you’ll promote it to potential users one day, and how you’ll explain what your business is about. Make it short and to the point.

3. Reach out to people and ask question

So far, so good. But you need other people to tell you that it’s worth building a product like that. Otherwise, you can’t rely only on your strategy and the encouragement of the people around you. It’s the users you’re making it for, and they have the final say. So ask them in advance. When doing your research to validate your business idea, you must also find out where your target audience spends time online, what they talk about, etc.

Choose a social media channel they like and use a lot, find them through hashtags, groups, or else, and personally reach out to 10 or 20 people for a start to ask them what they think about your product. You can create surveys with Google Forms, Survey Monkey, TypeForm and Facebook

And because you can’t just ask for something without giving anything in return, offer them to be your beta users and give them something free or discounted in exchange. That’s probably one of the best investments you’ll ever make.

4. Build a MVP

That’s the minimum viable product, the very basic version of how your product/service will look like when it’s finished and ready to be distributed. It’s important to keep it simple. Just create something that solves the problem you promised people to help with, don’t add any other features, don’t worry about design, marketing, or else. That happens at a later stage.

Now get this product to your beta users. Let them play with it a little. Then, wait for feedback.

Be sure that they will honestly tell you what sucks about this product, what they like the most and why, and how to make it even better. Listen to their words, take notes, and go make improvements to your product. That’s the simple and beautiful process of going from an idea to something that can become big, help people and grow your business.

So, any business ideas?

Filed Under: Business

Earning Passive Income as a Freelancer

January 10, 2017 by Lidiya K 3,024 Comments

Freelancing is a great way to start off your journey to a lifestyle of freedom, independence and doing work you love.

In the beginning, you get some of the benefits right away and you love your life more because of this. You can work from the comfort of your home, choose only clients you like and which seem like the right fit for you, start new projects whenever you feel like, set your own working hours, travel and still make money, take a day off whenever you feel like and then hustle harder for the next few to bring more money in, and so on.

These are the joys of being your own boss, working online, managing your time the way you want to, caring about what you do, being strategic and productive but not having to answer to anyone else.

At some point, though, you’ll notice some disadvantages. The main one being that you make money only when you’re at the computer. The more hours you invest it, the more you’ll make, sure. But too many freelancers fall into the trap of working too much, not taking breaks, not doing other things they enjoy, etc.

This leads to feeling like you’re at your regular job. You might start hating what you do because of that. And the magic of being self-employed is lost.

That’s not how a business owner spends his time. Administrative and repetitive tasks aren’t something you have to deal with for the rest of your life, you shouldn’t dedicate all your time to work, and you also need to grow the business.

What you need to aim at in this case is earning passive income. That’s how you take freelancing to the next level, how you get back your time but keep making money even when you’re away from your laptop, and how you take the leap from a freelancer to an online entrepreneur.

It’s not easy, of course, and you’ll need to try out a few things to see which one works best for you.

In case you’re wondering how a freelancer can make passive income, here’s what you should consider:

1. Create a product

If you don’t try something you haven’t tried before, freelancing will turn into a comfort zone. And comfort is the enemy of progress. Too many people working for themselves are scared of even thinking about creating a product. However, it’s much easier and cheaper than you think. We’re not talking about hiring a developer and paying thousands of dollars to create an app that might not even get any attention by users. Let’s start with something simpler and for which there’s already a market. You have knowledge on a subject, the point is to share it with people and get paid for it. Once you have a product, it will be a source of income for a lifetime.

Self-publishing an eBook is something you can do. You don’t need to be an expert or hire professional editors and marketers. You just need to gather your experience and knowledge on a certain topic, know more than beginners, organize the information in an understandable way (preferably create a step-by-step guide), do the work in the beginning when writing, editing and proofreading. Get help for the formatting and design if you want to or even create it in Canva or Powerpoint, and start selling it on Amazon or even your site. That’s it.

Then, you can turn this into an audiobook. In the future, you might add video and create a whole course, these are pretty profitable now. Sharing it on Udemy will get it directly in front of the people interested in courses and who want to learn more about this particular subject.

Once that’s done, the only process you’ll keep working on related to the product is promotion, as it never ends.

2. Grow a site and monetize it

As a freelancer, you should have a site and a blog where you write and share opinion on important topics connected to your field.

Put more work and effort into this to get traffic. It will take time, but it will be worth it.

Produce fresh content consistently, provide a great user experience and make the site look professional with a premium theme.

Not only will you become an expert in the field by publishing practical content so often, but your site will grow and you’ll then be able to monetize that traffic.

The easiest way is to publish ads – available in, but not limited to standard and popular sizes – 728 x 90 leadersboards and 300 x 250 rectangles. Advertisers can pay you a flat rate for a specific duration or pay you based on impresssions or clicks.

Another option is affiliate marketing. You’ll link to other people’s products from within your articles, or emails to subscribers, or will even write whole reviews to products your visitors will find useful. Your goal is to encourage them to make a purchase. When that happens, you can easily get 50-70% commission. If you’re in a niche where you can promote software services, or big networking events, or else, each sale might mean a few hundred dollars for you.

The good news, and what makes this passive, is that when you write such articles (preferably super practical and long so that Google can be happy and rank them higher), they will be found by new people all the time and you’ll keep earning commission from something you wrote a long time ago.

These are the easier ways you can start earning passive income. Choose one today, brainstorm some ideas and start turning them into reality.

Soon, you won’t need to freelance all day, every day, and will begin to earn income without being at the computer.

Filed Under: Business

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