While reading, you’ll learn about two different mentalities, one of pursuit and acquisition, while the other of caretaking and nurturing, which Ricardo refers to as the Hunter and the Farmer mindsets.

A Hunters and Farmers mindset interpretation

Getting new customers and projects is one of the most critical jobs on Codeable. We do it with love.

We are WordPress experts. Among other activities, we participate in the company’s community, helping mates, growing the company’s roots, and working in design, coding, and fixing issues. We perform complementary activities when attending to our customers; eventually, everything revolves around projects.

Projects are the reality of our day-to-day. Our resources and money come from projects that reflect the market’s demand and demarcate what to learn and understand the society leading. 

Behind projects are customers, our wealth, and our very assets. We assemble solutions, make ideas, and turn costs into profitable investments.

Hunters and Farmers, pursuant and caretakers, aren’t enemies. They have relevant qualities and duties, natural characteristics that, if adequately merged, will succeed.

We differentiate two distinct roles in sales: 

• Getting a project from a new customer
• Getting a new project from a loyal customer

Hunters pursuantly close deals, while farmers retain those customers with care.

The Hunter naturally is conquering, active, responsive, intelligent, and quick. Contrarily, the Farmer behaves like a lover, attentive, hard-working, preserving, building, and protective.

Hunters are high-volume players and convert new leads. Farmers are relationship-builders and cultivate existing good customers, harvesting higher-value sales.

While a Hunter holds an agreement, a Farmer takes care of opportunities. While a Farmer cultivates a seed in fields, the Hunter finds precious plants in the forest.

1. Engaging

On Codeable, 35% of new customers arrive from organic growth. Other 65% come from partnership recommendations, our comprehensive affiliate program, and via word of mouth. 

We don’t have a cold prospect in Codeable. Almost all leads are highly qualified projects. When they arrive, such as a preferred project; a farmer’s job. When they are posted for all experts; a hunter job and we engage if it matches our expertise and schedule.

We receive the customers politely and while building their trust, understand their needs, generally by asking questions. When multiple experts engage, they collaborate, making complementary queries and valuable comments.

Codeable is not like other free-lancer platforms, with sellers disputing the customer. On Codeable there is no race to the lowest price, creating bidding warns between contractors. Our experts work in cooperation to study and attend to customer needs. 

As a team, Codeable experts work to understand the customer’s needs. The experts talk internally, discussing possible solutions for the project. This way, the customers have the perfect composition of experts. Whoever is available and closest to the client will take over the job, working in on-demand teams.

2. Understanding the Customer

Understanding and pursuing customer confidence is typically a Hunter Job. Customers sometimes don’t match our services because prices are too high or because of bid expectations, or even something else.

The expert and the customer both want to ensure they are a match.

Before the expert prepares a scope of work and estimate, the proposed solution needs to be fully understood by the customer. Quick video chats are welcome.

Consultation-style projects, where the expert and the client meet for an hour to discuss the client’s needs, are great, too, for beginning a long-lasting relationship.

Occasionally, there is more work in planning than can be provided for free. In these instances, a Discovery-style project might be the right place to begin.

Before we start, we must ensure the customer knows our company. Codeable has helpful articles about fees, price structures, agreements, payments, and all common questions. And the best resource in Codeable, the support staff, is always ready to help. 

3. The solution

Hunting job. After the discovery phase, the expert still has some persuasive work. Usually, an expert has to deliver a pitch or develop a document that highlights the prescribed solution, and perhaps a visual prototype as well must be included alongside the Estimate.

If the expert misestimates and charges a small amount, he will need to bear the costs. Any mistakes in size, price, and effort could destroy the customer’s confidence or invalidate the budget.

The hunter’s conquering mood helps the farmer’s protecting mood, offsetting the perfect deal.

4. Deal

It’s time to close the deal, describing the project, scope, and estimate.

The Farmer is a pragmatic, methodic person who concludes this phase. It requires care of details. The customer believes he made the best choice, but If payment methods or the agreement aren’t acceptable, the deal cannot progress, and the relationship cannot thrive.

5. On board, time to work!

Our master of love and care, a hard-working, dedicated, sensible Farmer, will protect and serve customers’ needs. The long or quick trip must be made comfortable and secure, and the process must be straightforward and well-explained.

Communication, transparency, and support set the new customer up in the system, helping them integrate, load, and migrate data, set up the contracted customizations, and optimize the workflow.

6. Retention and Care

The expert at Codeable works hard, like a real Farmer in the fields, to cultivate the growing seeds, turning them into valuable fruits and vegetables for the client.

Customer retention involves constant interactions like periodically answering solutions questions, helping customers facing challenges, or performing regular account reviews.

It’s natural for Farmers providing them happiness and an extraordinary experience.

7. Renewing the Care

Farmers meticulously will know customers’ contracts expiring and will gladly help to renew them on time. The Codeable partners depend on the experts to maintain their customers and vice-versa.

Periodically, as a Farmer planting seeds, the expert will help the customer grow this business by proposing new tools and new profitable solutions. This virtuoso partnership will make both enjoy excellent harvesting.

Our duty in Codeable is to help customers. Our endeavor lead to making customers happy so they will return and everybody will enjoy the goods.

In closing…

We lead to growth with our customers, partners, and experts. We are proud to have a big heart and evolve as humans. We are Hunters, Farmers, and also Pursuant and Caretakes for a better planet.

The post The pursuant and the caretaker, a sales model for success appeared first on Codeable.

If you are looking to hire talented women developers for your next project, please visit our developer directory where you can easily discover and quickly hire expert WordPress talent that is right for you.

Did you know that according to a recent survey hosted by UXtweak.com, women represent almost 25% of all WordPress users? It’s true. Additionally, according to a survey hosted by the United States Department of Commerce in 2021, women-owned firms make up almost 20% of all firms in the US?

Here at Codeable we are not strangers to the economic power that women hold. In fact, we frequently receive requests from clients who want to work with other talented women –  whether they are programmers, designers, or agency owners.

Can We Recommend Specific Women Developers According to Your Needs?

Here at Codeable we are more than happy to help recruit women developers for your next technical project.

Please send our support department a message using the chat icon at the bottom, right-hand side of your screen and mention that you are being referred by this blog article.

One of our support agents (who will typically respond within the hour) will assess your project needs and recommend several great women candidates for your project.

Serving Diversity through Community

Did you know that Codeable supports a community of over 700 senior WordPress developers who are ready to help your business succeed?

We understand that as our talent base grows, we will be continuously presented with opportunities to support various demographics and their communities. One of the ways we are approaching community with our women developers is through our Women of Codeable program.

What is Women of Codeable?

Women of Codeable is a program for our talented female experts. We offer private groups, chatrooms, as well as weekly hangout sessions for team bonding that builds long-lasting friendships.

If you are a woman in the WordPress space and you believe your skillset and client management experience places you into the top-tier of WordPress developers, then we invite you to apply to become a WordPress expert here at Codeable.

All of our women here have earned their position through their exceptional talent. They join the ranks of the top 3% of applicants who make it onto the Codeable platform.

The Women of Codeable

Take a look at a few of our outstanding and successful Codeable experts below. 

If you think one might be right for your project, click their hire button and you will be on your way to receiving a risk-free estimation to complete your WordPress project.

The post How Do I Find Women Developers in The WordPress Community? appeared first on Codeable.

Whether that help comes in the form of a one-hour in-person consultation, or through a well-scoped agreement, those who manage WordPress websites need to be able to hire help with a high degree of confidence and low degree of friction.

In this article, we’ll highlight how the Codeable Platform can easily help you hire a WordPress developer, as well as manage all of your WordPress outsourcing needs across your website’s lifetime.

Hiring WordPress Developers – The Safe Way 

The Codeable Platform is the world’s premier location for finding pre-vetted WordPress talent.

We know there’s nothing more frustrating than talking to someone who isn’t qualified to get the job done. At Codeabe we ask our experts, “If you cannot take on the project with a high degree of confidence, then please do not engage.”

As a platform, we have taken on the large responsibility of making sure our developers are perfectly qualified to take on your project.

When you post a project on Codeable you are not only are hiring from a pool of pre-vetted WordPress developers, but the experts who are applying for your project are only applying when they know they have the expertise to help.

Codeable is also deeply invested in ongoing developer education. This ensures that our community of developers stays on top of technical trends as well as WordPress best practices.

Codeable Provides Free* Estimates

Yes, most of the estimates are free*. Whether it is a brand new website, a re-design of an older website, or a theme or plugin modification, Codeable can help you procure an estimate to have the work completed– most likely for free.

*Estimates at Codeable are generally free as long as correspondence is kept in written format.

All you have to do is post a project to receive your free estimate. 

What If All I Need Is Advice?

Because you are a WordPress user, we know you already have a DIY spirit and are perfectly capable of doing most things on your own. What if all you need is a nudge in the right direction?

Enter the $69 Consultation

The Codeable Consultation was born out of the desire to help DIYers like you. For the reasonable fee of $69, you can meet with one of our experts on a video call for an hour. 

Just know that during these calls, our experts are not allowed to make live changes to your site or perform actual labor. They can, however, discuss plugin setup, theme set up, and overall best practices.  

If you feel a consultation is the right start for you, please be sure to mark the consultation option when posting your project on Codeable.io.

What if My Project is REALLY, REALLY Big?

Codeable Experts are required only to take on projects they know they can handle. But sometimes a project is simply too big for just one person. That’s okay, we have Agency Teams, too.

At Codeable, we not only have hundreds of individual WordPress developers, but we also have dozens of agencies ready to help with your larger projects. 

For companies that require multiple skillsets for a complex project, our more Agency teams are ready to consider your scope of work. These teams are made of multiple Codeable Experts, offer a range of knowledge specific to your project goals, and are available for ongoing maintenance.

Codeable also allows individual experts to form ad-hoc teams to take on complicated projects or to split up work that requires an urgent turnaround.

When you are ready, post your project with us, and we will be happy to help with your larger project. 🙂

What If My Project Is REALLY REALLY Small? 

If your project is small – even really, really small – Codeable can help, here, too. We can supply estimates for any sized project. No project is too big or too small. We do, although, have a 1-hour minimum deposit requirement for all our projects. 

When you are ready, post your project with Codeable and we will help you hire a WordPress developer in no time!

The post The Easy Way to Hire a WordPress Developer appeared first on Codeable.

• Everything you need to do while hiring a WordPress contractor
• How to write a WordPress project brief: The Blueprint
• How to work effectively with WordPress Experts

Now we’re going to cover a rather sticky topic – but super important topic. Getting this right will give you an ongoing relationship with your expert that can even benefit your bank balance. We’re going to talk about scope creep.

You may think that getting more from your money is a good thing, right? Nope.

Stick with me, I’ll explain why actually scope creep is a bad thing not only for the expert but the client too. Then I’ll give you some tips on how to avoid scope creep from happening.

What’s scope creep?

The project scope is the work that the expert has agreed to do for you. This is not always the same as your project brief. The brief is the important first step, but after discussion with your expert what work that get’s agreed upon may have changed. This agreed work will be put in writing, here on Codeable, it’s usually listed in the workroom.

Scope creep is when the scope of the project gets bigger without any changes to the budget. The “creep” part is because work isn’t usually added in obvious ways like “While you are fixing that bug, please redesign my website”. It’s usually in smaller less obvious ways these extra things “creep” into a project.

At least from the client’s view, these things are easy quick things that for an expert, such as a WordPress developer or designer, are just a few clicks. Here 3 pretty common examples:

Scope creep – Example 1

You’ve asked an expert to set you up a website. You listed all the things you want the website to have. When you look at the result, you say: “I need another page, just a really basic text page”.

Scope creep – Example 2

You look some more and say: “Oh the form needs a couple of extra fields”.

Scope creep – Example 3

You take another look, and say: “Can we add that contact form to the bottom of the new page?”.

If none of these items were agreed to upfront, then this is scope creep: you are asking for things that you never communicated to your developer. They are usually very small things but they mount up. Sometimes to hours more work – work that has not been paid for.

Sometimes the requested changes aren’t even small. Sometimes the request itself is an hour or hours of work, even days. For example, you ask your expert to make a plugin. The expert meets all your requirements, but it’s not exactly what you wanted. So you ask your expert to change how the plugin works.

Drawing a line: is it actually scope creep?

It’s important to note what scope creep is not. If extra work is requested and the budget is adjusted then this is not scope creep. New feature requests, although part of the same problem are not really creeping in, perhaps we should call this “scope stuffing”. It’s bad too, but scope creep is much more complex.

Need help with your WordPress theme? Hire Zackary Allnutt for your next project!

Why does scope creep happen?

A common way of working is that the client pays X and the expert will complete the project, and then the client will tell the expert what needs changing.

One of the main problems I’m seeing is both clients and expert are not used to fixed quote projects. Let me explain.

If you’re working as an employee, or to an hourly rate, then there isn’t anything wrong with this per se, the expert or employee is getting paid for the hours they work. If you change your mind or think of something else to add then it’s no problem.

When I was an employee I didn’t care my employer was “wasting my time” by getting me to do work then changing half of it. They were wasting their own resources, I was getting paid none the less.

But here on Codeable, we work for fixed quote, so we have to work differently. This is why we must be strict on the scope. If the client is willing to pay extra for those change, then great! But when the client expects those changes as part the original quote then here lies the problem.

Why is scope creep bad for the client

Now you may be wondering, as the client, why it should matter to you, right? It’s natural for anyone to want more for their money. But this is different than getting 20% off your shopping.

The difference is you’re attempting to get your expert to work for free! Why? Because your expert never factored this work into their quote. So anything that was not written down in your agreement would be work done for free.

In whatever work you do, would you appreciate anyone asking you to work for free? No, right?. Then, nor does your expert. And that’s the first reason why you as the client should care about scope creep. It hurts your relationship with your expert and there are huge cost-saving benefits to working with the same expert. Currently, I am working on a custom plugin, that took me time to get to know. I’m now able to reduce my quote for subsequent work because I know it so well now. If my client takes the work to another expert they will have to pay for that expert to get to know the plugin as I already do.

If the project starts to run over time due to scope creep, a 30-hour job would be now a 40-hour job. What’s very likely to happen is that work gets rushed. You may get those changes to wanted but quite possibly at the expense of other important jobs. The time set aside for code cleanup and testing is now gone and your expert at this point is probably feeling less than enthusiastic about your project.

I can assure you that this is not what you want. The quality control phase is a vitally important part of the project and should not be sacrificed for more features.

The key role of project briefs

So what can be done to prevent project creep from happening? Clients and experts used to the former way of working need to learn a different way of working for fixed quotes to be successful for both parties. In my experience, clarity is the secret sauce to a happy client and a happy expert. That happy dynamic is a key part of the Codeable ethos.

For the best success, that clarity comes from both parties.

How to write better project agreements

The rule of thumb is that if it isn’t written down, it’s not part of the agreement and thusly the expert has not accounted for the time to include it.

1. Be as clear as possible up front with your brief, what your goals are and what you are expecting. Try to make sure you have covered everything you need, even small things.
2. Ask questions if you’re not sure. As an expert, I’m really happy when asked questions about the agreement: it means the client is paying attention to it off the bat and I can predict a great working relationship. If you don’t know at this point everything you need, consider asking your expert for a consultation or discovery project. These pre-work projects are a great way to work with a developer to write a great brief and make sure you get everything you need from the project.
3. Never assume that a work will be done if it is not written in your agreement – even if you think it’s obvious. This is a mistake because every client and expert have a different idea of “obvious”. You may assume that styling will be included but other clients are expecting to do it themselves.
4. Remember that the agreement is the scope, not your brief. This is because there are times when things on the brief won’t be done for whatever reason. They are split between tasks, not everything can be done with the budget or not everything on the list is doable. So when we talk about scope, it’s what been agreed to by both parties.
5. If you make a request that is outside the scope, please preface it with “Can I add X as an additional task?” knowing the client is aware that this additional work, is really helpful to the expert – we now know we don’t have to have a conversation about scope.

The key role of revisions in your project brief

The work is done and you take a look at your project. You’re pretty stoked (I hope!) with the results, but there are a few tweaks here and there you would like to change. This, in my experience, is where the problem begins.

You should know that, at this point, the expert considers the project complete and is not expecting the list of changes to come. On the other end, the client might have two/three small requests like “can you increase that font a little?”. That’s no big deal.

But let me tell you this: revisions and scope creep are best of friends. Why? Well, because there’s no common answer to what counts as a revision and how many revisions are reasonable to request. And, believe me, all sort of things get requested under the guise of “revisions”. The list of revisions can double or even triple the developer’s workload sometimes.

Don’t you – the client- think this is affecting your pocket as well?

Revisions seem to be a given in our industry and, to prevent themselves working for free, experts might add huge amounts to a project quote to cover this almost inevitable flow of change requests after the work has been completed. The common workflow that clients and experts are used to (and part of the problem) is that the project is completed, presented and then the client lists everything they want to be changed. This is very bad for everyone involved.

I’ve heard of developers doubling their quote to cope with revision requests. And that’s where clients are being overcharged for the idea they might want to change things.

As Aristotle said, the truth lies somewhere in the middle. In fact, developers are not doing due diligence before starting the project and clients are doing a bad job of describing what they want. It’s important that both parties are on the same page here.

So are revisions included (or not)?

Things almost always come up during a project, things you forgot to mention or things that you didn’t realize you needed in the first place. The classic mistake here is not to have budgeted for these things. If you put aside money for them and expect them to arise, then you won’t be shocked when they do, and you won’t try to push the scope to account for these surprises.

The key concept you should not forget is: if revisions are not mentioned in your agreement, you must assume they are not included. Despite popular opinion, there is no reason why revisions have to be part of the original funding.

Personally, I’m not a fan of revisions being part of the original project as they really variable and hard to account for. They are also really hard to define, resulting in pages worth of definitions in a contract. Also, I don’t want to charge clients for revisions they may not ask for.

A big danger (at least with unlimited revisions) is it encourages carelessness at the project planning stage because the client is aware that they can just change the work after it’s done if it’s not what they wanted. I hope I don’t need to explain why poor planning is not good for your business.

Instead, consider leaving a buffer to your budget of maybe 30% to account for changes you may want to make. If you would like to include revisions in your original funding ask your expert about them. Here’s some type of revision agreements you might see:

• “Revisions are not included in the quote and are quoted for if they are requested”
• “2 Rounds of revisions are included in the quote – this does not include extras outside of scope and is limited to small design and functionality changes”
• “20 small single action revisions are included in the quote – this does not include extras outside of scope and is limited to small design and functionality changes”

Wrapping it up

Scope creep isn’t something that experts only should be worried about. Clients too have to learn how not to fall for it because it can directly affect their overall budget by ending up with higher quotes from experts. When you hire a developer, designer, security expert or any other professional, you’re building a business relationship. No matter how long it lasts.

So if you want to avoid scope creep, I’d suggest to starting with some good planning on your side, leaving a buffer in your budget (~30% as useful reference) in case you think of things you might need to add later. Then, move onto translating all of that information into an amazing project brief and keep your communication clear throughout the whole project.

And never forget: be fair to your expert by not asking them to do things that you didn’t before they quoted. How happy would you be to work for someone doing that to you? Well, that’s how happy your expert is working on your project. Do you think they will want to work for you again?

Need help with WordPress? Hire Zackary Allnutt and have him work his magic for you!

The post How To Defeat The Scope Creep Monster Once And For All appeared first on Codeable.

This mundane example opens up the topic about how life has made so hard to say “no” while, at the same time, not feeling either ashamed, sorry or like we’re missing out on something. Lacking a culturally-reinforced skill of being able to say “No” is something that can quickly turn our life, both personal and professional, into a living hell.

So why do we say “Yes” when we want to say “no”?

Linda Adam, President and CEO of Gordon Training International, lists the most common scenarios in which we all fall for that. Specifically, we tend to say “Yes” because of:

• Desire to please. “What will she think of me?” “I know it would make them happy.”
• Fear of hurting someone. “I don’t want to disappoint her.” “I’m afraid I’ll hurt his feelings if I don’t go.”
• Guilt. “I’d feel so selfish.” “How could I turn them down?”
• Surprise. “Well, I guess I could do it.” “I don’t know…well, O.K.”
• Deference to authority. “She’s the boss.” “Yes, sir!”
• Reciprocation. “I may need the same sometime.” “She’d do it for me.”
• Duty. “I ought to…” “I should…” “I owe it to them.”
• Need for power. “If I say ‘no’, they’ll think I can’t handle it.” “Now he’ll owe me a favor

And, believe it or not, many of these can perfectly apply to your freelancing and professional life.

Just a quick example here: you picked that project because it was your friend’s girlfriend, who’s teaching in kindergarten, and people teaching to kids can’t be hard to work with – you naive, dumb freelancer!. So you created that small website for that project. But it was a real PIA. Now you’ve learned your lesson.

You said “Yes” and that word made you almost break your friendship with that lady, it filled up your soul with regret, and you still don’t know if you made some money out of it or not.

So why did you say “yes” to that? Probably because you underestimated how many efforts would have been required, and you didn’t want to let down your friend. Plus, you slightly felt guilty because it was something super easy to do and you felt that, if you didn’t take that project, your friend could be hurt by that.

Why saying “Yes” is ruining your freelance life

There’s a famous quote from Richard Branson, Virgin’s Ceo, that reads:

If somebody offers you an amazing opportunity but you are not sure you can do it, say Yes – then learn how to do it later!

Well, I half-agree with it, but it’s not with the “Yes” part because accepting projects and works that aren’t a good fit for you could really be something bad. As a freelancer, you need to understand there are limits to what you could say “Yes” to.

With an ongoing stream of “Yes” to bad projects, or what social psychologist Susan Newman calls it “a yes treadmill”, your freelance career will be sentenced to death.

Why saying “No” is a freelancer’s best tool to thrive

When you’d just started and were in your early months of your freelancing life, it was so difficult not to accept projects you weren’t interested in, low-paid ones or “you’ll get a ton of exposure” jobs, which means free jobs for them and no money coming your way.

This approach relies on inexperience, not smartness.

Robert Siegel, General Partner at XSeed Capital, perfectly sums it up: “one of the most useful tools a person has is the power to say “No” to things that are taking up time but are not adding much value to one’s life.”

When evaluating if that project is something worth working on, ask yourself: is that project adding anything I value to my life?

The two immediate benefits of saying “No” as a freelancer

1. Saying “No” sets boundaries

Saying no, or at least, starting to consider whether that project or request would be worth following through, lets you create boundaries. And boundaries are your best friends when it comes to knowing what to answer to business proposals.

Building up boundaries enables you to perfectly and quickly respond to the type of work you’re interested in, knowing which price range works for you, the time you’ll need to execute on it, how that project will fit your working schedule and so on.

2. Saying “No” prevents you from wasting your resources (mostly time)

Thanks to boundaries, you’ll be at your best to evaluate whether a project fits your business path and life values. An excellent example of this approach, believe it or not, can be found in Jared Leto’s words. The singer-actor-investor explained his strategy to FastCompany some while ago this way:

Whatever you do, you have to have deep interest and desire and passion, or you shouldn’t be doing it. My work is never a job. My work is my life. If you work your fucking ass off, you can get a lot done.

How to say “No” politely and professionally (scripts)

We all have bills to pay, and sure it looks scary saying “No” to a new project coming your way. But that is just a slight fear or concern based on short-sight vision. Nobody wants to sound rude, nor impolite and we end up saying stuff such as “I’m super busy, but I’ll see what I can do about it. I’m sure I can squeeze it in”.

Please stop doing that, you’re hurting your freelance career and your life eventually.

Again, if saying “No” might sound a tough action to take, how about you give it “a twist2 and use others words to say you’re not interested in THAT project while keeping your answer conveying a positive sense.

James Chartrand, expert copywriter and owner of Men with Pens, provides some terrific real-life examples you should try:

• “I really appreciate that you offered me this job, but I’m all tied up with [insert project]”
• “I’d love to, but I really have to [insert action here]”
• “I’m already working on [insert task here] but I can [offer alternative]”
• “That would be great, but I’ve already committed to [insert event]”
• “My schedule is booked until the [date]. How about then?”

You see? There’s no negative form in these examples, and they all reads in a natural way. When you decline a project, it all comes down to being professional and honest with the prospect.

7 signs that urge you to say a big fat “No”

We don’t see the future or how things might turn into, and your freelance experience would probably be different from that of other freelancers. Being able to assess and better qualify your freelance projects is a crucial skill you should be improving from day one and never stop doing it.

What I can tell you, though, is that no matter how experienced you are, there are some proven signs that can help quickly spot projects and clients that might do more harm than good to you.

Here are the 7 most common ones:

1. If the client asks for an (almost) impossible set of things or tasks
2. If there’s no budget at all and the client doesn’t show any interest in giving you a number after you talked to them
3. If the project doesn’t fall under your area of expertise
4. If you’re not 100% sure, you’ll be able to stick to its deadline
5. If you don’t want your name and your business to be associated with that project/client
6. If the client keeps adding tasks or asks for “small tweaks” not previously discussed but after you provided a quotation (also know as “scope creepers)
7. If the client says anything similar to “it should be an easy task”, “it shouldn’t take too much time”, “You can do [task] in 15 minutes, [task 2] in 5 minutes, so the whole thing shouldn’t take you more than 30 minutes.”

If you happen to experience any of these, use those two letters and you won’t regret it.

Wrapping things up

The world is full of Yes-men, allegedly professionals that take in on any project, with no minimum understanding of the client’s needs, always providing a low-quality outcome. They say “Yes” to everything that falls under their radar; it’s their business model. If that’s something you’re interested in, keep saying “Yes” and you’ll be one of those Lemmings.

While on the other hand, if you’d like to make a huge change in your freelancing life, start saying “No” with your next prospect. The word “No” sets you apart from everybody else, and empowers you back by enabling you to choose which project or client you want to work with.

Once you learn to say “No”, you’ll face the world with a renewed meaning of the word “Yes”. And from that moment on, each time you’ll say “Yes” to a project it’ll mean you’ve insightfully chosen to do that work, and you’ll devote all of your professional experience into crafting the best outcome possible.

With better projects under your belt, on top of a fulfilled professional life, you’ll be able to provide much more value to your clients. Therefore, quote higher. And that’s something a Lemming will never understand.

Now it’s your turn: When do you say “No” to a client/project? How did you learn to do that?

The post The Power of “No” for Your Freelancing Career appeared first on Codeable.

So why is it that some WordPress developers easily earn four times as much as others, while working a considerable amount of time less? Short answer? Because they’re good at the business side of things. Development means nothing if you can’t sell it.

So here’s a few tips that will hopefully inspire you to re-think your approach to both business and development and, in turn, help you earn more.

Charge more!

I know what you might be thinking right now: “Well thank you mister obvious”, but that doesn’t make it any less valid. Your day has the same amount of hours as anyone else’s so to make more money with what you have at your disposal, you have to start charging more for your work.

There is a huge fear among developers that if they do that, clients won’t hire them anymore, and this fear is completely subjective and has no basis in real life. Quite on the contrary. Developers are in high demand (and it’s only going to go up for the foreseeable future!), so there are always clients out there, looking for work to be done on their projects.

If there are developers that make $200/hour doing the same thing you are, then it can be done! So how can you get closer to that number? First, you have to know the difference between price and value, which I’ll illustrate with the following (simplified) example:

Your client, which has a WooCommerce-powered website calls you that their website is down. You immediately investigate and find an issue, which takes you 15 minutes to fix. Now assuming they sell $10.000 worth of products each day with 20% margin, this means they lose $2000 in profits for each day that their site is offline. So how much do you think your work was worth to the client? Five dollars? Nope. Do you think the client will say no even if you charge them $100 for those 15 minutes? Or even $200? I don’t think so.

Price matters only to you. To your client, it’s the value they are getting.

It’s all about the cover letter

I learned this trick back in the days when I was still freelancing through Elance. I drastically increased my chances of winning a project, not by racing to the bottom (a technique where all the applicants lower their prices hoping they’ll win the project), but by providing an awesome cover letter to my prospective client. I would investigate who they are, what they do, where they are from and what kind of problems their business is solving in general.

This would allow me to get really them and then write the cover letter in a manner they would feel we’re on the same cultural level.

Furthermore, I’d analyze the brief in great detail, and suggest a couple of approaches with outlined pros and cons of each approach. This assured them I was the expert in a particular domain and increased the confidence in hiring me significantly.

The effect this approach had? I could easily be the most expensive applicant (even twice as expensive as the second one) and still win the job, because for the client, it was not about the money (you’d be surprised how little it often even matters), it was about getting their problems solved by a professional, in a timely manner.

Bottom line: do your homework.

Help the client with a detailed brief

If there’s one single advice I got in life regarding work that I’d recommend to my fellow developers is that good preparation is half the work done. And this holds especially true for software development – and you know it. How many times did it happen to all of us that – after the work has been done – client got back to us, saying “this is not what I asked for”.

The brief (which can be part of the contract or a separate document) should not only include all the required work in great detail but also the work that will not be included, since your clients are usually not as technical as you are so they expect the difference between features are just a couple of clicks (more on this at a later point).

The more you get into details at this stage, the better. And since you’re already spending time for the client, charge for this step as well – remember you had to do your homework and, at least, some initial research (not to mention have a lot of experience) which means you are already providing value to your customer, even if you haven’t written a single line of code yet!

Again, don’t sell time – sell value!

When estimating, add buffer

Even with all the preparation in the world, no project has ever been defined 100%, so always add an additional buffer to your estimate (sometimes as much as 30%!). The more an experienced developer you are, the easier it gets to estimate properly, so the buffer gets constantly smaller, and that’s okay – the chances are that you’re also charging more at that point. If you’re not, read the first point again.

My mate Chris Lema also has a very solid advice on how to estimate better, and he explains it in this YouTube video.

Be responsive and communicate

We see this at Codeable on a daily basis. A project goes haywire, not because of technical issues or lack of developer’s knowledge, but because the client keeps asking for updates to no avail. Sometimes they get frustrated to a point we have to refund the whole project (and sometimes kick the responsible developer out) because they get afraid they are being scammed. They don’t know the developer personally, after all.

We, developers, tend to get a bit arrogant with our supreme understanding of how computers work, so we think that updating clients on a regular basis is just a waste of time; they won’t understand what we’re doing in any case.

But that’s not the point. No one likes to be kept in the dark, especially if their money is at stake, so update the client as frequently as necessary. In some of our most productive projects, clients and developers talk on a daily basis – preferably at the same time – and go through the key daily activities and expectations.

Proper communication is also the base of agile software development, which I urge any serious developer to look at.

Avoid the undermining words (like “just”, “easy” and “only”)

This one happened to me more times that I care to admit. And it was me who said it. “I’ll just make a few modifications, and it’ll be done.” The problem with these words is that somehow they make it sound your work is easy which makes you and your client appreciate your work less. Don’t do that.

You have to realize you’re an expert in a particular domain (and you’re damn good at it!), and if you check this survey by Stack Overflow, most of us, developers, are self-taught, which means it took us years of learning and perseverance to get where we are.

The main cause of this behavior is also the fact that we love what we do so we often like to say our work is also our hobby. But it’s not! You spend money on hobbies, and you make money with work. It’s okay to love your work, but doing it for free (or too cheap) hurts you on a personal level and the industry as a whole.

The bottom line is, even if it really takes just two clicks, you’ve spent hours, days or even weeks to learn where and when to make those two clicks to get the needed results (which was an >opportunistic cost at the time).

Upsell

If you follow the tips from above, this one should become pretty obvious, or more importantly, easy. No work in software development is truly done; there’s always maintenance work to be done, such as updates and service level agreements (SLA).

This is also one of the aspects that are greatly emphasized in the startup world, but something no one talks about when approaching the usual, brick and mortar businesses: It is always cheaper to get more money from existing clients than to get new ones.

One reason for that is that you already have an existing business relationship with the client, and with it, a certain degree of trust. And trust is everything in business, because businesses are people – a thing many of us tend to forget since we’re interacting with computers more than actual people on a daily basis. And it’s so easy to hide behind a computer.

Get help

Again, one of the mistakes I’ve done in the past, thinking if I try to do all the work, I’d end up with more money, as opposed to hiring subcontractors to do parts of the project for me.

I wish I realized how big this mistake was sooner actually. Sharing piece of your pie with others has plenty of benefits:

• You expand your network
• You expand the knowledge and services you can offer
• You get to socialize more
• Others get to know your expertise and share their work with you
• **You get to focus on what you’re best at**

Look outside your community

Another thing many developers do is look for work where they live. While certainly a viable option if you live in a densely populated areas with many businesses, this plan falls flat in rural, less developed areas. It’s also that statistically, the income in these areas is lower which means businesses operate with smaller margins and can only afford lower prices.

Luckily, WordPress is a web publishing platform. And that very web spans all across our globe, so really there’s no reason for you not to look for work online.

And finding work online has never been easier. There’s Codeable, IRC, Facebook groups, Slack, you name it. Follow threads, participate in conversations and you’ll soon find some other members seeking for help that you can provide.

Become visible to the world – expose yourself.

Contribute to Open Source

You know the saying what goes around, comes around? In the Open Source community, this phenomena is also called karma. The more you contribute, the bigger it gets, the more people know you (recognition), all coming down to the most desired result: You get to become an authority.

Once you’re an authority, you don’t even need to look for work – it finds you. And with any position of power, you get to choose what you want to work on, and for what price.

Learn other tools

As much as we all love it, WordPress is not end all, be all. It’s a tool, a means to an end (that end being able to publish content online). With the recent rising popularity of the REST API, we see an increasing demand for developers with extensive JavaScript/Node.js knowledge since that’s how web apps mostly communicate with API endpoints.

And if you look at the StackOverflow survey again, JavaScript developers are paid as much as 30% more than PHP devs. Not an insignificant difference!

In my book what separates good developers from great ones is the ability to write unit tests (and a habit of doing so). Why? Because unit tests add as much as 100% of additional development time. In the beginning, it’s hard to reason this with a client, but in truth, it should become the norm (just like responsive design is becoming) – it saves the client a lot of headaches in the future. If done right, of course.

The post How to earn more as a freelancer appeared first on Codeable.

The problem is, as soon as you think about that, you’re scared that if you raise your prices, you’ll lose half of your current customers, make the other half angry, and end up broke eventually. You greedy business owner.

Fortunately, this is the less likely situation you’d experience, both as a web agency or freelancer/consultant, if you do it the right way.

Before jumping in at how you can sell your services at a higher price stack, you should consider some key areas that are intimately connected to your desired business goal. I’ll come clean: there’s no secret formula here, it’s just numbers but if you wish to earn more from your services, you’ll have to focus your efforts on 2 important aspects:

• you need to lower your business expenses
• you need to increase the amount paid by each client

On lowering business expenses

Taking expenses continuously under control and check them regularly is a great way to understand where your business is bleeding money (if any) and get to know where most of your cash is spent. So, start today by looking through all your expenses, even those you almost forgot about. The more you get close to these numbers, the more you’ll find flows that aren’t perfectly optimized, or aspects that aren’t required for each of your clients but you’ve been paying ever since.

Also, think about improving the effectiveness of your workflows: is there any activity that you’re currently taking care of but brings no money into your business? Teach someone else to do it or outsource it. Think this is a waste of your time? You couldn’t be more wrong.

Bottom line: if lowering expenses is what you need, try to streamline all your processes as much as you can. Find out how to automate all aspects that have to do, for example, with invoicing, scheduling, estimates, confirmation, and let others take care of what makes you lose time instead, and get back to work onto something that would bring more money into your business.

On increasing the price of your services

If your goal is to make more money, starting today you’ll need to increase the price of your products and services. I know it sounds counter-intuitive (you think clients will be scared away) but is something great agencies and experienced professionals have been doing for years. Let’s see how you can do the same with your business and start pricing your services at a higher stack.

Ready? Let’s jump in!

1. Perform an in-depth analysis of your business

To better understand how your business is doing, you should start with a SWOT analysis which is a great way to evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats involved in a project or in a business venture.

Specifically, you should be able to:

• Enlight your core propositions
• Find your weaknesses
• List what can be improved in-house and what you should outsource

With these crucial information around your business, you’re empowered with everything you need to analyze how your business can differentiate towards competitors.

2. Compare your business to competitors and look for opportunities

With a SWOT analysis, you should now have clear in mind all business insights relevant to your business. Now let’s start by comparing your business to that of your main competitors to gather a deeper knowledge of it and look for opportunities. With this in mind, start by looking at:

• Their offer
• Their pricing structure
• Their clients and testimonials

Try to think both as an entrepreneur and a prospect client when you’re doing this analysis. Would you buy what they’re selling? Is it a clear and compelling offer? Are there some cool features they talk about that you never mentioned on your website or selling materials? How is their tone of voice: serious, friendly, technical? Do they offer premium services or products?

By answering these questions, you’ll understand the what, why and how of their offering and, most importantly, you’ll be able to find where your propositions overtake theirs or where your business falls behind.

3. Ditch the hourly-based pricing strategy and use the value-based strategy

With a better picture of your business and how it stacks against the competition, it’s now time to take a step further and talk about pricing. If you charge clients on hourly-based fees, you’re doing it wrong because competing only on prices is always a bloodbath for your business. At first, because offering services at low costs will let clients and prospects perceive them as low quality. Secondly, if no further value is added to your services, you’ll always be in the run against smaller agencies or freelancers that cost way less than you.

The turning point here is to switch from an hourly-based pricing model to a value-based pricing strategy. In “Brake the time barrier”, an amazing ebook from Mike McDerment and Donald Cowper from FreshBook, the constraints of a per hour pricing strategy are explained like this:

“Selling hours actually creates a conflict of interest. It puts you and the client on opposite sides of the table. If you’re selling hours, it’s in your best interest to take longer, to bill more hours. But your client is interested in getting solutions that work as promptly as possible”.

And more interesting:

“Our clients don’t care about our costs. They care about the value we create for them, so that’s what we should be asking them to pay for.”

Of course moving to a value-based pricing strategy isn’t something that happens immediately, and you have to earn and develop your way into it but this will enhance your business with better-paying clients.

4. Position your services as business investments

With a new pricing approach, based on the value your services are providing, you need to position your services differently. Let me explain.
Since everyone hates to spend money, when people buy a product or service they usually try to capitalize on that and see how this expense is worth in their future, how much would this give in return to their life. Yes, an ROI.

When Mike McDerment changed his pricing approach and started to position his agency services as something able to provide an ROI to clients, he tells: “I was no longer competing with other service providers on price. My clients stopped seeing me as a commodity, someone with an hourly rate that they could compare to somebody else’s. […] Instead, I was competing based on distinction; on the unique, customized ways I could help my clients reach their goals.

As a business owner, you should leverage this way of thinking among clients when talking about your services and present them as valuable tools to achieve their goals, like business investments.

5. Communicate and show your value

With a new approach to pricing based on both perceived and provided value, you have now to consider investing some efforts in showing your prospects and your current clients what they should expect from your business services.

This means you have to be sure the following 5 elements will communicate your value at best:

• Portfolio: create breathtaking pictures and compelling copy of selected projects that align with your new pricing strategy
• Case studies: it takes time, but case studies are great tools to share meticulously how your business addressed interesting requests and business issues from your clients
• Blog: creating useful content like writing blog posts, guides and also tutorials about your market, or tools you’re using to provide some of your services, benefits your business in several way: strengthen your market position, add an authoritative layer to your business, it improves your SEO
• Social proof: it’s no secret that social proof is an effective technique experienced businesses use. That’s why you should do the same by showing testimonials, sharing comments from happy customers and anything that could help communicate how great your business is
• Newsletter: email addresses are powerful tools that let you talk directly to prospects and clients. This is where you could promote your services, share exclusive discounts to increase conversions, upsell your services and many other things. If you don’t have any idea about how to grow your email list, create an ebook, a short guide or a cool infographic and give it for free to those who share their email address with you

6. Use leveraged growth tactics (like outsourcing)

In modern business, companies don’t need to own all the assets to create and deliver services. Specifically, smart entrepreneurs can tap into one growth strategy known as leveraged growth, where you would look for resources (assets) outside of your company to improve your business earnings.

In a way, outsourcing is a leveraged growth strategy you can implement within your business because independent freelancers and experts add value to your services in a cost-effective way. And when you opt for this growth strategy, your role will be to orchestrate all the involved parts and subjects.

7. Turn services into productized services

As you learned at the beginning, streamlining your processes can have a huge impact on your way to increasing the profits of your business. That’s way productized services are worth mentioning here. Entrepreneur Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income quickly explains productized services as:

“A productized service takes a skill you already provide and allows it to run systematically, growing with or without your direct involvement. […] Productizing your service can free you from the classic freelance model, where you bill by the hour. When you productize, you’re no longer limited by the number of hours you can feasibly work.”

Given this, you should now evaluate which of your services can provide an added value to clients if bundled together, but still be something easy to manage or even completely automated to your end.

Wrapping things up

Increasing your business profits and margins ain’t easy and it could take some time because it’s a business shift that affects several aspects: pricing, market positioning, branding, value, just to name a few. With these proven tips and tactics, you’ll be able to change radically the type of clients you’re used to working with. Specifically, low-paying clients will likely leave their place in favor of those who need what you’re selling because it aligns with their business needs.

Even if all of this might sound a crazy move, don’t be afraid and take your chance: start re-thinking all of your services by the value your clients can earn from them, and not by the mere price they’re asked to pay.

How about your experience: how did you profitably change your pricing strategy? Which tips did you find more effective for your business? Share your thoughts in the comments!

The post The 7-step guide to increasing your business profits appeared first on Codeable.

Starting today, your goal is now being able to produce more valuable content for your website. Ready to roll? Your journey to quenching this content-thirsty world starts now.

Why you need more content

The need for more content is led by 3 main elements, whether your business has just started, you’re a solopreneur or you’re a small agency. The ability to produce more content is useful to any business type because:

• it adds an authoritative layer to your business
• it shows how you solve your customers’ main issues publicly to enforce your market position and increase the chance to get new ones
• it improves the number of leads that reach your website through online search engines

Let’s dig more into each of these points to uncover their specific details.

On being an authority in your market

Writing articles about your business’ most widespread issues, concerns, new approaches and trends puts you in a higher position, when compared to your direct and indirect competition. Discussing core topics within your market, empowers you to show your in-depth knowledge and experience on such areas.

Along with this great business improvement, you’ll end up strengthening the 3 core elements your business is built on: providing a real value, enforcing the idea of trust among your customers and growing awareness about your company.

On solving customers’ problems publicly

The Internet is huge and it features a unique type of inhabitants: everybody is an it’s-all-about-me user. They don’t care about you and your company. People need their problems to be solved and that’s all they’re interested in. This approach resolves in their specific online behaviour: when they don’t find a remedy to their current issue on a website, they leave and they hardly get back at it in the future.

But there’s a way to handle this selfish behaviour.

If you speak about their pain points, concerns and even show them how to address that single issue that’s been driving them crazy for days, you’ll end up having their keen attention. This would also level up the way your company is perceived, enforcing your authority and market position even more.

On increasing your SEO

Let me ask you something personal, but be honest please: when you visit a website and can’t find what you were looking for, what do you do? I’m pretty sure the answer is: “I leave”. Yes, just like you, that’s what users do with your website every time you aren’t able to answer their request or provide them outdated information.

Search Engines are an important aspect of our lives: we look for everything online. Better: we look for everything within the 1st result page, in some rare circumstances we look at the 2nd page but hardly any further than that. We aren’t aware of anything that falls on those forgotten pages.

That’s where SEO comes into play.

With more regularly published content you “feed” the crawlers with new bricks of information relevant to the people looking for that specific topic. You answer to their questions with blog posts. You show how your product could really improve their life with a case study or a video tutorial. By analyzing their words, you learn how they experience an issue and that’s where you can find something valuable to their situation.

The “I can’t write…” excuse

I know what you’re thinking right now: “Yeah, I get this and I agree. But how can I write something good for my own website, since I’m no writer?”

I get this question all the times. First of all let me clear the air here: you can write. Maybe you can’t write in another language or faster than these guys or a great poem. Ok that could be something, but it’s not what I need you to focus on right now.

I’m going to tell you the one thing you already know but don’t clearly admit to yourself: you can actually write. The problem is you fear it. Why? Because it has to do with sharing something that, in most cases, is all written by you. Once it gets published, it’s out there and you’re no longer in control. Ergo, if that content sucks, you immediately think you suck as well.

Be alerted: the “I can’t write…” pal isn’t alone, it often hangs out with “I don’t have time…”, “I’m not good enough…” and other unmotivated peers.

But I’ve got you covered here… Here’s how to overcome the “I can’t write” alibi to write more content with the 4 pillars of a productive working framework

Create your writing environment

Music/no music, ambient sounds, noise cancelling headphones, you pick what best ignites your productivity. The goal here is for you to find your most productive setup in which you’ll find yourself comfortable, relaxed and fully focused on getting that unpleasant task (that is writing) done.

Set rigid deadlines

Schedule an approximate time for each step needed to get that piece of content published. Use a pretty simple rule as your Pole star and go with it:

1 hour dedicated to researching your topic
1 hour dedicated to the writing outcome
1 hour dedicated to the editing process

This is just a simple workflow to let you get more comfortable with your new content crafter role. But it’s not the only one, of course.There’re also other ways to let you cultivate a writing habit, like the one from Buffer’s Kevan Lee or that from famous marketer Neil Patel.

The important aspect is that you need to find your own productive writing schedule and stick to it for a week and see if it fits you. Poor results? Change one element at a time to better know how it impacts the whole process.

Keep your system running

Consistency is vital to many aspects of human activities. And this is no exception. You should find ways to positively reinforce your efforts when you complete your writing task. One interesting way to get you started quickly is by going with an if this then approach, which is great to grow self-control and productivity performances.

Using an editorial calendar like CoSchedule (the one we use at Codeable), or whatever gets you inline with your publishing schedule, is also a great way to overview your content efforts and makes your life much easier if you work with several authors.

Keep away distractions

Turn off or silence every piece of technology you have for as long as you need. If you work from home, tell everybody not to interrupt you for the next hours. The more time you stick to your workflow, the more your writing benefits from it.

Now that you set up your content machine and, most importantly, you know how to start and make it run smoothly, you need to learn how to write valuable content every time you sit in front of your keyboard.

And that’s where fear pops up. But here’s how to win it over.

How to write content your audience is eager to dive in

To these days, the best single-lined tip on how to write valuable pieces of content is this:
“Write with your users in mind”.

This tip worths all you writing efforts because it sets the right perspective from which to develop your whole content strategy. But how can you translate it into a piece of written content that users are actually interested in? Let’s see.

Walk in your customers’ shoes

If you write from an impersonal point of view, a too generic one for example, your users wouldn’t feel understood, thus they’d leave your page unsatisfied and disappointed. While if you’re able to talk about their pain points, their needs, their goals also, you’re talking directly to them and increasing the chance they’d listen to you.

Fill your writing with value

Value is a wide concept that is built on the idea of improving someone’s current need. And that’s what you should strive for through your content: address someone’s problem, help them take a step forward toward their goals, share with them something you know they’d love.

Give a structure to increase readability

Do you know what’s the average attention span for online readers? 8 seconds, 1 second less than a goldphish has. This means people will most likely skip some of your words and they’ll scroll down faster than you think. They pay attention to images and big words at first then, if anything looks interesting to them, they’d read your piece. By knowing this in advance, you should structure your writing to let users scan it but still being able to get the “gist” of it so they can be hooked by your writing more easily.

Write like you speak

The power of your message is undermined by every useless, vague, redundant word you write. All these type of elements are like a layer you build between the purpose of your content and the chance to be clearly understood by your readers.

Also, don’t use jargon or technical terms when they’re not needed. Try explaining the very same concept as you would do to let your mother understand what you’re saying. Keep the rhythm of your sentences as normal as possible to create a conversation-like state of mind between the readers and you.

Set your content goals

Think about what you’d like your readers to do when they’re finished reading your content and set tangible (quantifiable) actions that your writing should provoke. Don’t over do it and keep it simple: for each content there should be 1 specific goal only.

Great content goal examples are:
– subscribing to your newsletter
– subscribing as beta testers for your upcoming product/service
– downloading materials (infographic, whitepaper, freebie, etc.)
– buying something from your website

This approach helps you to choose the right perspective, sentence structure and visuals to support your whole argument. To optimize this aspect, remember to add a call to action for each of your content goals.

How to find the right topics

You’ve come a long way but it isn’t over yet. Now it’s time to talk about another major concern business owners run into: how to get specific ideas and topics to write about.

You have no idea where to start, right? Wrong! Super-wrong! You already have plenty of unique ideas to start with. Don’t believe me? Well, I’m going to tell you 5 right below so you’re able to start writing in no seconds.

5 ideas to kick-start your content creation immediately

Forget about the “I don’t know what to write about!” scenario and let me ask you:

1. What problem does your product/service solve?
2. In which type of market is your business running?
3. Are there any common, shared or widespread issues within that market?
4. Have you ever received a “thank you, you really saved me!” email message to your company email address?
5. How do you look up for your competitors’ activity?

See what I provided you with just 5 questions? No yet? Ok, how about I re-write them down from a writing perspective:

1. What are some specific topics related to your product/service?
2. Do these specific topics can be bundled into wider concepts or trends regarding your market? What’s your take on those?
3. What are your users’ key pain points?
4. Do you have a case study to show how your product/service would affect a prospect’s business?
5. What terms and keyphrases you use to search for your competitors’ activity?

Now it should be crystal clear. You already have at least 5 type of unique content from which you can start developing your whole content strategy. Think of these as your Minimum Viable Content Strategy (MVCS).

Drumroll, please…
Yes, you’re now all set to publish your content!

But something is coming your way to prevent you from succeed. It’s the fear of making your content go public. Once it’s out, you can do nothing about it, except deleting it and trashing all your progress with a single click. There’s no reason to panic though because you already did most of the work here.

So, please, listen further and learn how to overcome this stressful feeling.

How to publish new content on a regular basis

If anyone tells you they’re not afraid (not even just a little) when they’re about to publicly share something they’ve created, they’re lying to you. 8+ experience blogger Leo Babuta says he still gets “shivers of nervousness” when is about to publish something new. Pamela Wilson, from Copyblogger Media, has lived the same fear like you do. See? We’re all on the same boat. It’s now your turn to take action and complete your writing “challenge” on a regular basis.

To help with that, remember what I’d like to call the Content triad to Publishing which is a set of 3 commitments you should embrace:

• Set up your new writing environment and keep it smooth
• Stick to your schedule, aggressively
• Click on the “Publish” button even if it’s not perfect and it scares the hell out of you

It’s now time to put in place everything you sweat your guts out on and publish that content. And remember this: consistency trumps perfect writing. It’s not about how much you publish, it’s for how long you keep up doing it.

How about you: how do you keep up with content creation? What are your best practices/habits? Share your experience in the comments below!

The post How to write more content for your website appeared first on Codeable.