The Entrepreneur’s State of Mind

by Brian Casel  ·  1.6.2010  ·  Quotes

We entrepreneurs have the special ability to see the positive in things that others see as only negative.  – Startup Advice: It’s a State of Mind.  By JunLoayza

This is from a fantastic read about refreshing your current state of mind, boosting morale, and addressing problems from a new perspective.

I can certainly relate to the idea of keeping an optimistic and positive point of view when it comes to meeting challenges.  In fact, I think this is a quality that every entrepreneur shares.

When we’re confronted with a problem, we see an opportunity to solve it.  We don’t question whether or not to do something.  We question, how can it be done?

It’s this attitude that drives us to keep going.

It’s on in 2010

by Brian Casel  ·  1.4.2010  ·  Bits

Last week I posted about my non-work goals for 2010.  Now it’s time to cover 3 work-related goals for this year.

Launch my first product-based business

I’ve been hard at work preparing for the launch of ThemeJam, my first product-based business.  It’s something I’m extremely excited about and anxious to get off the ground in early 2010.  Aside from the enormous amount of (rewarding) work involved in designing and building WordPress themes, running a new startup selling digital products will be a huge learning experience for me.

I’ll be building and marketing a new brand from the ground up, which will likely involve quite a bit of experimentation and learning on the job.  And while I’ve developed E-Commerce sites for clients, this will be the first time I’m personally involved in tracking conversions, building a customer-base, and providing customer support (for products).  I’m very much looking forward to tackling these challenges.

Seek higher quality clients

On the CasJam Media front (my client business), I’d like to continue to grow my network of client referrals.  However, the overarching goal for 2010 is seek a higher quality client than in the past.  Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been lucky to work with some fantastic clients over the course of my young freelance career.  But unfortunately I’ve had some who I regret taking on (which was the focus of my recent post, turning down client work).  In 2010, I’m not only seeking clients with bigger budgets, but those who truly understand the process and appreciate the benefits of good design.

How to do this?  It starts with continuously delivering great work.  Nothing is a better sales tool for a web designer than an outstanding portfolio.  Beyond that, there are few things I can do to step up my game:

  • Attend more conferences, meetups, and increase my offline professional networking.
  • Write more guest articles on larger blogs, establishing myself as an expert (I have a few scheduled to publish soon).
  • Market my services to businesses that are already doing well, but could use someone like me to bring their online presence to the next level.

Improve my personal branding

This will largely happen through this blog as I plan to continue posting about my behind-the-scenes thoughts on freelancing, business, and the web.  I signed on to project52, and I plan to live up to that challenge (at least one post per week for a year).

I hope to establish trust with a larger readership through providing real and valuable advice, pointers, inspiration, and/or ideas to the community.  Those of you who reached out to me via Twitter or elsewhere, know that I truly enjoy talking shop or exchanging ideas and I hope this shines through in my online persona.

Over to you…

Can you narrow your 2010 work-related goals to 2 or three big ones?  Do share in the comments (or pass along a link to your blog).

Non-Work Goals for 2010

by Brian Casel  ·  12.30.2009  ·  Bits

My first goal for 2010 is to address my workaholism.

So the first step I’m taking on that front is to list my goals for 2010 that are outside the realm of work, or business, or my career.

Go snowboarding at least once this winter.

I was disappointed that I didn’t hit the slopes once last winter.  That failure will not repeat itself in 2010.  I definitely plan to make a day trip to go snowboarding sometime in January.  It will probably occur on a weekday, when the lines are short and so I can grant myself a personal day.  Being my own boss is fun.

Take more photos.

I’m still fumbling around with a mediocre Canon point and shoot camera.  It’s not bad.  Gets the job done.  But I’d like to justify a purchase of a “real” camera at some point.  The only way to do that is to get a bit more serious about photography.  I tend to only take pictures when I travel so…

Travel as often as possible.

I already have a short trip to Costa Rica planned for February (!).  That won’t be enough.  My girlfriend and I need to take a summer trip, a fall trip, and probably several road trips in between.  Living in New York City is wonderful, but it also makes you crave a change in scenery every few weeks.

Pick up my guitar again.

Considering music was my life up until 2009, it’s pretty sad that I put down my guitar and haven’t picked it up in over 6 months.  It won’t be another 6 months before I pick it back up.  I plan to get strumming again early in 2010.  As soon as the web work calms down (yeah, we’ve heard that one before…).

Get serious about being healthy.

Everybody makes a resolution to lose weight after the holiday season.  But I need to get serious about health on all fronts – exercise, eating habits, sleeping habits.  I recently moved into an apartment building with a gym, so I have no excuse in the exercise department.  I’ve always been in decent natural shape, but since I’m not a kid anymore, that’s not coming as easy as it used to.  Time to be more health concious.

Read more books and less blogs.

I just got a Kindle, and I love it.  I read a handful of great books in 2009, but my book reading doesn’t stack up to the massive amount of blogs and websites I read daily.  I’m addicted to RSS feeds.  I’m finding that the more blogs I read, the more they blend together (most blogs echo the topics of others).  I need to be much more selective in my online reading, and spend a lot more time with the Kindle.  Furthermore, I’ve got to expand the topics in my book collection beyond business and politics related non-fiction.  2010 will be the year I pick up some ebooks in the history department, a biography or two, and more fiction.

Start video blogging

OK, this is getting dangerously close to work/business related… but I’ll continue… I’d like to introduce some video posts here on briancasel.com.  I’m still working out the kinks in my personal presentation and camera set up, but I definitely plan to get this up and running soon.  It’s more personal, could prove to be less time consuming than writing (not always true) and I’d like to video blog from lots of different locations (including travel destinations).  We’ll see…

That’s all folks.  See you in 2010!

2009 Freelance Business Recap and Lessons Learned

by Brian Casel  ·  12.21.2009  ·  Bits

It’s that time of the year – the end – when we look back and look ahead.  2009 has been quite a year of transition for me personally and professionally, so I’d like to take a moment to recap.

Earlier this year, I posted about doing a big-picture assessment of my of my freelance web design business.  The post received quite a bit of traffic from Google (mostly from mis-spellings of the apparently popular search term “big assess”, but that’s another story).  More importantly, it served as a declaration of self-motivation, mostly stemming from my desire to learn more about running a small business and taking action on the things I learned.

Here are the highlights:

Books and research materials


The Four Hour Workweek, by Tim Ferris – Probably my favorite read of this past year.  I wrote about my takeaway points in this blog post.  Not everything applied to my situation, but it definitely opened my eyes to new ways of managing time, doing business, and exploring the freelance lifestyle.

Two Books from Seth Godin:  Purple Cow and Tribes – Both highly recommended.  I’ve been following Seth Godin’s blog for quite a while, but it wasn’t until this year that I picked up his books.  Godin provides amazing insight into marketing and big-picture philosophy as we navigate today’s changing world of media.  His writing style is quick and gets strait to the point, and those points tend to be value-packed pieces of information.  Purple Cow will teach you the importance of being remarkable.  Tribes is not only about building a following, but building a movement.

The Sitepoint Web Design Business Kit – A little pricey, but definitely money well-spent.  Sure, most of it were things I probably could have taught myself or learned through various other outlets.  But having all of this information packed together in one place made it an excellent resource.  More importantly, it provided lots of food for thought.  I dedicated a few hours each week for about two months to reading chapters, then writing and reflecting on ideas that could work for my business.  I didn’t follow all of the instructions to a tee, but this kit helped me carve out a game plan that worked for my specific situation.

Favorite RSS feeds from 2009 -  As of today, I have 96 subscriptions in my Google Reader.  Believe it or not, that’s after trimming it down some.  Here are a few of my favorites from this past year:

  • The Netsetter – fantastic blog from Collis Ta’eed, founder of Envato.
  • Adii Rockstar – Insightful and interesting posts from Adii, founder of WooThemes.
  • Gary Vaynerchuck – How can you not love his powerhouse video blog (the business one, not the wine one)?
  • WordPress Tavern – Not only a great hangout/forum for WordPress, but it has become the go-to resource for WordPress news.  Great podcast.
  • Unmatched Style – This has become my first go-to resource (among others) for web design inspiration.
  • Signal vs. Noise – Great business blog and new podcast from the guys behind 37 Signals.

Blogging

2009 was the year I made a full-on commitment to blogging- in multiple places.  Through posting to my various blogs and guest blogging on others, I learned quite a bit about this great medium.  Here are the highlights / lessons learned from my year of blogging and Tweeting:

  • Don’t blog with hopes of monetizing your content (as I tried to do with servethesong.net).  Blogging should be a way to support your other business – whatever that business is.  Don’t make the blog itself the business because the chances of success are too slim.
  • I’m happy to say that roughly 25% of my web design business came as a direct result of my blogs and tweets- either through blog comments, emails from readers, or @replies.
  • Simplicity is key.  Get right to the point.  Seth Godin’s blogging style is the perfect example of this, and something I’m striving to acheive in my own web writing (obviously not in this already too-long blog post).
  • SEO – While I don’t call myself an SEO expert or specialist, blogging has forced me to learn a lot about SEO, and developing websites and WordPress with SEO in mind.

Client Work

The biggest lesson learned in terms of client work is this:  Keep it flowing, but not at the expense of a stress-free workload.

Earlier this year, I posted about dealing with work-overload and managing stress.  I had reached a point where business-wise I was doing well, but personally I wasn’t.  I was making a decent income with little or no down-times, but I was working crazy hours, dealing with crazy clients, and it resulted in high levels of stress, which affected my relationships and overall enjoyment of my chosen career path.

So now, I’m happy to say that I’ve found a good balance.  After two years of being in business, I’m no longer worried about finding work for next month and the month after.  I can (cautiously) assume the work will be there because I’ve built a reputation for myself as a reliable and recommendable web designer.  I’ve learned to be selective when taking on client work, choosing only the projects that meet these requirements:

  • The client must be respectful and professional.
  • The project budget must make it worth my time.
  • The project should bring in other benefits besides a paycheck:  Opportunity to learn a new skill, a challenging design problem, an opportunity to expand my portfolio, etc.

Other Developments

There are two other major highlights from 2009 I’d like to mention:

I moved apartments and workspace – Thanks to a successful year of client work, I managed to upgrade my living and working space.  See a pic of my workspace here and checkout some pics from my new rooftop here.

Began planning and building ThemeJam – My WordPress Themes company.  It’s set to launch in early 2010, but I’ve been hard at work planning and prepping over the last few months.  Much more to come on this topic in 2010.

Over to you!

I’m always interested to hear from you via the comments or on Twitter.  What did you learn during the past year about yourself, your business, or the web in general?  Share your thoughts in the comments below, or on Twitter.

Here’s to a successful year ahead!

Turning Down Client Work

by Brian Casel  ·  12.17.2009  ·  Business, Quotes

The biggest problem with freelancing is, ironically, that you have clients. — You Totally Missed the Mark | Second And Park

Here’s a great post by Tiffany Jones on learning to effectively manage client relationships.  Clients, as we know can be, well, crazy.  It’s about learning to manage this personalities and projects calmly and positively.  It’s our responsibility to make it work.  That’s the gist, of the post, and I agree.

But sometimes it just won’t work

We’ve all had nightmare clients who don’t pay, stretch project scopes, make insane requests…

The key is to detect these problem clients before you sign the contract.  Maybe they’re poor communicators, or display nasty attitudes during initial meetings or phone calls.  These are clear signs that you’re heading towards another addition to your “clients from hell” bin.

The ability to sniff out these warning signs will only come with experience.  At first, you’ll want to jump on any work that comes your way, due to the all consuming fear of not having work tomorrow.  But as time goes on, if you prove to be reliable, your business will find it’s own, organic success.

That’s when you need to take a step back and become more selective with the work you take on.  Do great work and work with great clients.  That’s finding enjoyment in a freelance career – past the first 3 month honeymoon period.

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