Effective Promotion With the Use of Signatures

Written by Rachel Goldstein


Article submitted by http://www.Allfreelancework.com - 1000s of freelance jobs, articles, and resources.

Are you looking for an inexpensive way to promote your freelancing business? The email signature is a very powerful and reliable method of marketing your services . and FREE! Not only would I recommendrepparttar use of signatures, I am telling you that signatures are vital torepparttar 117414 growth of your business.

What is a signature?

A signature is a few lines of text that are automatically added torepparttar 117415 end of every outgoing email by your mail program (for ex. Outlook Express, Netscape Messenger, etc.). Email signatures can normally be set up in your email program very easily. Browse around your email program's menu bar to find out how to set up your signature or just look atrepparttar 117416 help files in order to figure it out. If your email program doesn't have a signature option available, try keeping your signatures in a text file and then cut and paste them into emails. This is less convenient, but another option non-the-less.

How can a signature help promote my business?

Consider all ofrepparttar 117417 emails that you send out daily. You could harnessrepparttar 117418 marketing power of email by adding information about your services torepparttar 117419 end of each email. If even just one person remembers that John Doe is a web designer when they need a web site designed, John has gotten his name out there successfully.

For ex:

EX#1: John Doe (JohnDoe@deezin.com) Inexpensive Web Design http://www.deezin.com/

How do I effectively use a signature?

1. Include your full name and email address (to make clickable use mailto: before email address)

Pricing Your Projects

Written by Rachel Goldstein


Article submitted by http://www.Allfreelancework.com - 1000s of freelance jobs

This isrepparttar second article that I am writing about setting freelance rates. The reason I am writing another article is because of numerous questions that weren't answered inrepparttar 117413 previous article. I will first summarize whatrepparttar 117414 last article was about and then I will go on to new details.

Determining how much to charge for your services is often one ofrepparttar 117415 biggest challenges for a new freelancer. If you charge too much you won't get hired and if you charge too little you'll starve. Takerepparttar 117416 time to read this article and you will figure out what you need to charge to thrive.

If you are a new freelancer, you have probably searchedrepparttar 117417 Internet trying to look for average rates of professionals in your field. Don't even bother. I will let you in on a secret . now thatrepparttar 117418 Internet is here, there aren't any "average" rates because demographics are too widespread. The United States has banned competitors from discussing rates amongst each other based on Antitrust laws. This is why you are having such a hard time finding rate surveys, there aren't any. Instead I will show you how to figure out what your rates should be by using a formula.

Start by figuring out what you want your annual salary to be. To determine your salary, you might want to pay yourself what you earned as an employee or take a look at salary.com to find out what an average salary for your profession is.

For this formula, you will need to figure out what your overhead is. Overhead is an expense that cannot be found billable to a client, it is just a cost incurred by running your business. Please fill outrepparttar 117419 following form. If you aren't sure what your overhead is, then look back on last year's credit card bills and checking account statements.

MONTHLY OVERHEAD:

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Rent

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Income Taxes (Use 45% of your annual salary)

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Utilities

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Insurance

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Office Supplies

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Marketing

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Postage and Shipping

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Telephone

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Accounting / Legal

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Travel

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Office Furniture

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Dues & Memberships

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Licenses

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Health Plan / Medical Insurance

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Disability Insurance

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Retirement Savings

======================================================= | | Multiply above by 12 to get yearly Overhead | | | | =======================================================

NONPRODUCTIVE TIME

There are duties that must be completed for each client that are not productive towards completion ofrepparttar 117420 project. Figure outrepparttar 117421 actual work hours are spent onrepparttar 117422 following duties. You will need this total later, so keeprepparttar 117423 number handy.

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Sales

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Emailing Customer

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Phone Calls

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Meetings

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Administrative duties

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Training

======================================================= | | TOTAL | | | | =======================================================

PROFIT

Now you will need to figure out how much of a profit you wish to make. Profit isrepparttar 117424 amount that you make over expenses. I recommend 20% in order to make an acceptable profit margin. Profit is necessary for a successful business so make sure to count profit into your formula.

VARIABLES

There are always variables that you will need to take into consideration when figuring out what you will charge. You must take into considerationrepparttar 117425 following:

1. What does your competition charge?

2. What is your niche?

3. How many years experience do you have under your belt?

4. What skills do you have?

5. What clients do you want to attract?

6. Are you working online or local?

FORMULA 1

Follow these steps to figure out what your hourly rate should be.

1. Subtract nonproductive time from Annual Hours to get Billable Hours.

2. Add Salary and Overhead Together

3. Multiply Total By Profit Margin (10% - 20%)

4. Add Total (1) and Total (2) Together

5. Divide Total (3) by Billable Hours (the amount from #1)

For example, ifrepparttar 117426 following is true:

1. Salary = $30,000

2. Annual Hours = 2,080

3. NonProductive Time = 500 hours

4. Profit Margin = 20%

5. Overhead = $15,000

Then this is how you figure outrepparttar 117427 hourly rate:

1. 2,080 - 500 = 1,580

2. $30,000 + $15,000 = $45,000

3. $45,000 X 20% = $9,000

4. $45,000 + $9,000 = $54,000

5. $54,000 / 1,580 = $34 / hour

FORMULA 2

This formula isrepparttar 117428 easiest of them all. However, I don't recommend this formula unless you are a very established professional. This isn'trepparttar 117429 way to start out your freelance business, only very skilled freelancers can get away with this.

Cont'd on page 2 ==>
 
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