How to Brand Yourself as A Freelancer

Guest writer Joe Balestrino is a Search Marketing Expert who has been helping business both large and small market their businesses online for over 7 years. Check out his blog Blog on internet marketing.

If you’re a freelancer, you know there’s a lot of competition out there. Regardless of what field you’re in, it’s imperative that you separate yourself from the crowd. Let’s face it, a Fortune 500 company isn’t going to hire just anybody. Something about you needs to grab their attention.

Let’s put aside how you typically win business for a moment. If you met someone in the street and didn’t have a business card or a pen, would they be able to find you based on your name? If you Google yourself, what would you find?

More and more employers turn to the Internet to see what they can find on potential new hires. It usually starts out with Google and then moves over to Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin. Why do hiring managers and HR personnel go to the net? It’s the easiest and fastest way to find information that normally won’t make a resume, which is a document that the person applying has full control over.

So how can you better brand yourself as a freelancer? Here’s what I recommend:
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Tips for Improving Your Social Media Presence

Before we get into tactics for improving your social media presence, it must be said that solid marketing is all about the ideas behind your product or service. These ideas need to be communicated on your website with clear messaging and visual appeal (which good creative advertising firms can help you with), as well as through a variety of channels. Social media is rapidly becoming a preferred channel for web users to communicate and share ideas, and should be a strong part of your web strategy. Here are some tips for improving your website’s presence as it relates to social media.
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What Freelancers Need to Keep in Mind When Looking for Online Backup

It’s happened to all of us. We start off with the best of intentions in creating a new habit of backing up every day, and we’re committed to sticking to it. But just like any diet or New Year’s resolution, “real life” creeps in and pulls your attention away towards more important things.

At first you only skip a day here or there. But eventually, days turn into weeks and months. This is only natural, considering the busy lifestyle that most freelancers have.

That’s why, when it comes to backing up their data, freelancers really love the automation and convenience that comes with online backup services. You just install the software once, and you never have to think about it again until something bad happens. You can just feel safe knowing that it’s there, working in the background for you.

However, there are MANY different services to choose from. And prices range from FREE to $10 per GB. With so much variety, how can you pick a solution that’s right for you? Well here are a few features that freelancers should keep in mind when looking into automating their data protection: Read more

Freelancers – The New Workforce

Founder of the Freelancers Union Sara Horowitz explains why the self-employed are a bigger factor in today’s economy. Check out this video from CNNMoney:

What is Hosted Exchange?

If you have worked in any corporate environment, most likely you were using a Microsoft Exchange powered e-mail solution. The powerful service is used in the vast majority of the businesses today, and many of these servers are administered and maintained by the company I.T. department.

Hosted Exchange is a viable option for those individuals and freelancers that want to harness the power of an Exchange server but don’t want to pay for a full server license, buy the appropriate hardware and deal with the maintenance. Much like the web hosting industry where a company bundles many customers on a single web server, Hosted Exchange is a cost-effective option for individuals. The Exchange service provider bundles many customer mailboxes on a single Exchange server for a monthly or yearly fee.
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Online Printing for Your Small Business

Even today in our virtual world of telecommuting, Skype, and home offices, freelancers still have to get professional materials printed on occasion. As an independent web publisher, I have to admit that most of my working relationships are virtual, but I still find value (and contracts) in local networking and industry events. Handing out business cards and logo-laden freebies is a tried-and-true method for leaving good impressions in face-to-face situations.

Online printing services like PSPrint.com are great for saving time and money, while maintaining quality. Their digital printing methods allow you to reduce both cost and waste with small-quantity orders. Also, those methods don’t involve as many steps as other printing processes or technologies, so less time is needed in producing your prints and the turnaround time is quicker.

Sure, you can say that many digital printers are using similar (if not the same) printing technologies. But the reason I chose PSPrint specifically, is actually the same reason why many freelancers can have lasting success. It’s due to their reputation for offering excellent and attentive customer service. In a world of comparable technologies, what better differentiator for success can a company have than to truly pay close attention to their customers’ needs?

Top 4 Ways To Apply Your Marketing Knowledge To Blogging

From the marketing perspective, a blog is not really that different from an “old-fashion” media form. Surprisingly, some people, including your typical business and marketing majors don’t know this. Sure, the medium has changed, but the same marketing principle is still valid. As marketers, we need to strike a conversation with our audience. The tools and knowledge gained from marketing classes can just as easily be adopted to be used on blogs. Below, I have compiled a list of the top 4 lessons that I believe you can take out of marketing class.

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