Selling your services as a freelance writer, graphic artist, web designer, programmer, or consultant is a great way to take control of your future. But one word of warning – you’ll never get anywhere near earning a professional-level income freelancing on the cheap – and on the internet, cheap is the price many clients want to pay.

     I’d going to share key methods of growing any kind of consulting or freelancing business using the internet to promote your skills – and do it profitably.

      Joe Sugarman is one of my favorite copywriters because a) he wrote some books that influenced me a lot and b) I used to read his copy when I was a kid. Sugarman promoted electronic gadgets through space ads running in magazines like Popular Mechanics in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The technology of microprocessors was undergoing revolutionary upgrades every few months in those days – and the digital watches, calculators and primitive personal computers of the day seemed pretty miraculous to a ten year old kid.

     Of course in those days I didn’t have money to buy $200 digital watches but I drooled over the ads anyway. I’m not that interested in technological gadgets these days, because even though I find the wizardry interesting I prefer to stay engaged with it only to the extent that I can use it to get my goals.

     Last summer I ran across a bunch of old magazines with Sugarman ads in them at a flea market. I was there with my lady (who is a talented multi-media artist) looking for old tools and other assorted junk that interests me, and the magazines were a lucky find. What’s most interesting about Continue reading Swiping From The Best

      Coming as I do from a background as a small business owner who manufactured and marketed a tangible custom-made product, I know a thing or two about the way consumers perceive products as commodities: to be bought primarily on lowest-price criteria. I ran a small cabinet-making business in Los Angeles; small meaning basically me, and Los Angeles meaning I was competing against craftsmen from Mexico who usually marketed on the seductive premise of “real cheap price”.

      Cabinets are basically just boxes and you can get them at Big Box stores or have them custom-made in L.A. by the Mexican guys pretty cheap. The challenge of doing the business as a job (as in I personally did much of the labor) was that to most customers the end-product was basically the same – a box with a door on it.

Continue reading Why You'll Sell At Bigger Profits Only By Knowing The REAL Reasons People Buy

     Your ego’s job is self-preservation and advancing your personal dominance over your environment. In the old days when the law of the land was based on physical domination of others and competition for scarce resources, perhaps letting the ego run the show was a good path to becoming a successful warlord or local king.

     Today’s consumers have a mind-spazzing array of shopping options – through the internet, catalogs, and local retail. Unless you have some sort of true exclusivity (such as a groundbreaking patent) you are competing for customers in your marketplace. In order for those customers to prefer to buy from you, they need to see demonstrable evidence that you offer superior service, lower prices, more convenience, or exclusivity of product your competitors do not offer.
Continue reading How Your Big Fat Ego Is Sabotaging Your Ability To Make Money