eDesign-Pro Company

Tag: work online

  • Tips For Work-At-Home Professionals

    Tips For Work-At-Home Professionals

    Being that I am a work-at-home mom, I spend a lot of time online — I go to school online, have conducted web, graphic, and virtual assistant business through eDesign-Pro since the beginning of 2005, and have developed friendships and partnerships by connections I’ve made through social media. I have a network full of other business minded mamas (and papas)! Because of the growing blogosphere and the desire of parents to be able to support their family with incomes generated from the comfort of their homes, there is a sort of “underground” economy developing through ecommerce between mom-and-dad-owned online businesses and the clients who contract our services.

    Lately, I’ve recognized a complete disregard for standard business practices and it seems necessary to make a few points on both sides of the debates I’ve seen take place. Because I am a designer, many of these will cater directly to my industry but most of the advice here should easily be cross-applicable to other professions as well. If you’re a work-at-home professional, continue to the article below. If you are a client, you’ll want to read the Tips For Clients Who Contract Work-At-Home Professionals!!

    1. Be professional. I had a friend tell me about an experience she had with a designer who treated her rudely, talked to her like a child because she was unfamiliar with the new platform she was moving to, and conducted business very fleetingly without any defined priorities. When you market yourself as a professional, it doesn’t matter if you are working at home or in a business environment — your practices and your communication should be defined, particular, and straightforward. Respect your clients in your dealings with them. It only takes a few seconds to proofread an email and assign an appropriate subject line. Small details like this reflect well on your business.
    2. Execution is crucial. We know as work at home parents, things can — and often will — come up. When you are scheduling jobs, don’t overextend yourself. Make sure you are allowing enough wiggle room so that when life happens, it doesn’t affect your ability to deliver on time. In those times when life throws its curve balls and you have no choice in late execution, communicate unexpected delays in a timely fashion to your clients so that they aren’t caught off guard at the last moment. As soon as you know their project won’t be complete when expected, so should they! Also, know what your clients needs are when you start. If a client is meeting an event deadline for a new website launch, that information allows you to reprioritize so that important dates aren’t neglected when deciding how to rearrange projects and discerning between which ones have target dates that can be pushed back and which ones cannot.
    3. Treat every client like your best ever. Word of mouth travels at the speed of light! If you make it a common practice to treat every client and prospective client as though they’ve been doing business with you for years, chances are eventually that will be the case… and more importantly, they will be more likely to confidently recommend you to others as well.
    4. Develop terms of service and/or terms of use and have them readily available. Your potential clients should be able to locate and access your terms without having to request them or click some tiny little hyperlink contained in your fine print. Post your terms in a conspicuous place. This saves time for everyone involved because they should have a firm understanding of how you conduct business before even contacting you, and in the event they are unwilling to adhere to your terms, they won’t even waste time bothering to contact you in the first place. Make sure your terms are clear, concise, and reasonable. Anything too stringent may be losing you significant revenue.
    5. Be willing to learn. Occasionally you will come across a client who has a project that will challenge you. When you’re met with completing a task you are not entirely familiar with or knowledgeable about, don’t be afraid of reaching out to others in your field or even consulting your favorite search engine in order to find the answers. There is a plethora of resources available online. Take advantage of them! This will help you in the future and will you to presently — and continuously — provide quality work to your clients.

    Recommended reading: check out The Four C’s of Successful Working Relationships!

  • HOW TO: Organize Your Client Projects into Manageable Task Lists

    HOW TO: Organize Your Client Projects into Manageable Task Lists

    Three words: Project Task List! If you are anything like me, you typically accept more than you should, have more going on in your life than just clients, and end up having to bounce back and forth between projects to make progress on all of your concurrent jobs simultaneously. Here is the strategy I developed over the last few weeks to keep myself productive and keep my clients happy:

    LOG EVERYTHING!

    It may sound like common sense to some, but to many businesswomen/men the little details get lost in the grand scheme of things. When was the last time you talked to Client #3? What was your conversation? What was that change that Client #7 wanted to make? Who was it that asked for me to return a phone call today? What price did I quote Client #4 for the additions she requested? When you have several projects going, several phone calls/emails coming in daily, and several “lines of communication” open at once, no matter how good you are at multitasking, you’re going to forget something! You will do yourself a HUGE favor by logging it all in ONE place that gives you easy access to all those little details any time you need them.

    GET ORGANIZED AND BE PREPARED!

    I have 5-subject notebook that is dedicated solely to work. I do love to keep track of things digitally and accessible by my computer and smartphone but I also prefer to keep my information written in a book so that I am able to jot more detailed notes immediately and organize them more efficiently. No matter how much technology improves, I’ll always believe that paper is KING ;) Why? Because I’ve had one too many overwrite, sync, and deletion mishaps to trust a digital version as my only source of information.

    I do keep a very condensed version of my project tasks in GTasks, which is an app based on Google Tasks that I have added to my Android smartphone, my iPad2, and my web browser on all of my computers and syncs across all platforms. In addition, a simplified version can be accessed in my Google Apps email account. The items in GTasks are very basic and include my client’s name and the most broad task descriptions that need to be processed on each particular project. They are hierarchical and have a check box to click when a task has been completed. This is mainly for me to keep track of the main events, and to keep my clients in order according to priority which isn’t always possible in my notebook since I can’t move pages around to accommodate changes.

    Here is a snapshot at the organization of my log book:

    • The first subject of the notebook is strictly for correspondence logging. If I send or receive an email or phone call from a current, former, or potential client I write it in there. I write the date, time, and take notes that will remind me about the high points of the conversation. If I quoted them a verbal price, I notate that beside the record. I also have notes I put out to the right side of the line, such as “follow up” or deadline information for certain things.
    • The second subject of the notebook is my actual work log. I make a note of when I start and stop and what exactly I’m working on as well as how much of it I completed during that time span. This helps me to get a better feel for how much I’m actually getting paid in respect to the work I’m doing (I then transcribe this information into my Freshbooks timesheet and apply it to the project there to keep a permanent record). Without knowing exactly what resources I’m putting into my business, there is no way to be able to gauge what I’m getting out of it, so periodically reassessing my pricing structure based on this continuously compiled data helps to ensure I’m always turning a profit and getting paid what I’m worth for the work I perform. It’s very important to know how long certain tasks take to carry out, especially since time slips away from me most of the time. Toggl.com and Freshbooks.com both have great time-tracking tools integrated into their services, and both provide a free option. {Neither of those links are affiliates — I’m simply sharing intuitive functionality I’ve found that works for me.}
    • The remaining three subjects of the notebook are for client project tasks lists. I allot two full front-and-back pages for EACH project. I write down their preferences at the top, any applicable login credentials and contact information, and notes that include details like the HEX codes for their color scheme, font families used in the graphics and/or text styles, and other pertinent information. Next, I make a list of EVERYTHING that needs to be done to complete the project. I check each item off the list as I finish them. Last, I have room for notes about processes I have run (such as import tools, installations, custom modifications, etc) and various other information that needs to be recorded along the way. This is all valuable information to refer to when my client wants an update on our progress.

    Operating this way allows me to quickly see where I left off of a project and thus I am able to know immediately where to pick up when I come back to it. Keeping track of things this way means I won’t forget to do something. Because I’m typically working on several projects at once, I’m always double and triple checking to make sure I haven’t missed something; it’s easy to omit an element or skip a step when you’re working on similar projects if you aren’t closely keeping up with which task was performed for which project… I don’t worry about that anymore because if it is not checked off the list, it is still pending. If it is checked off, it’s no longer a worry of mine :) Plus, marking an item with a “check” gives me an unparalleled sense of accomplishment LOL!

    What are YOUR productivity tricks? How do you keep yourself in check when you are your own boss? Share your tips in the comment section below!