General | Paymo.biz - Part 2

We’ve all become accustomed to working with the Internet. It’s invaluable when we need to communicate quickly, whether it’s one-on-one via email or IM or socially through Twitter and Facebook, or find an important piece of information, or use a web app.

It’s also far too easy to go down the rabbit hole and spend a bunch of your day distracted by an endless Wikipedia chain or refreshing currency exchange rates.

Unless you work for in an environment that requires constant connectivity say, at a tech news blog most of us can benefit from knowing when to fire up the browser and when to stay offline. It’s probably naive to suggest turning the Internet off altogether far too many apps and operations depend on it these days but staying out of apps like the browser, email client and messenger at certain times can certainly be advised.

Don’t Start Your Day Online

The natural instinct for most web workers is to check email and missed Skype messages as soon as we get into the office (or dining room, or whether the computer is). Many productivity experts suggest that we slow down a little and leave the communication overload until later in the day. Checking in with your task manager and selecting the tasks you’ll tackle that day, and more importantly right away, is a great alternative.

It’s good to choose the biggest tasks first, those that require the most concentration and take the most time, and get them out of the way earlier, as early as you can before your eyes get tired of looking at the screen in the afternoon. Then once you’ve got those big offline tasks out of the way your output session you can check in and handle email and the like.

Schedule Times to Check Your Email

Don’t stop at just avoiding email in the mornings. Once you check your email once later in the day you”ll be tempted to keep looking every five minutes. Everyone does it don’t even try and deny it! Unfortunately, it ruins a lot of potentially productive time.

To avoid this, try setting specific times to check and zero your inbox, like just after lunch and as the last thing you do before clocking off. Alternatively, if you feel you really should handle email in the morning, try clearing it first thing, closing it, and not coming back to it until 5PM.

What If I Need to Check Facts?

Many of us are constantly firing up a Google search to check facts or do some research on a topic. It’s better not to interrupt your train of thought or flow when you’re working on something, so you should just power on with the rest of the item until you’ve done all you can without getting the facts. Cory Doctorow suggests using the letters “TK” in a document to signify areas you need to check into further, he says these letters are very rarely combined in English, so shouldn’t fire too many false positives on a search through the document later.

Does This Context Require Connectivity?

If you are an adherent of the Getting Things Done productivity methodology, you have a tool in your kit to answer the question of “should I be online right now?” already. It’s called contexts. A context is used to describe the situation “tools, locations or people” that need to be available in order to complete the next action on a task list.

Fortunately, you can easily add contexts in your system that indicate your need to be online to complete them. Commonly used options include a simple “Online” context, or you can go further and divide them up by app “Online – Email” or “Online – Paymo” for example.

The good news is that steering clear of the Internet during your most productive hours doesn’t mean you can’t use Paymo. You can still track time without your browser open. Just make sure to download one of our desktop apps for Windows or Mac OS X, or our Dashboard widget. The widget can be downloaded by logging into your account, clicking on the Settings gear icon, and selecting Download Desktop App.

If you spend some time talking with other freelancers or just hanging around on freelance forums you’ll find that one of the top complaints among freelancers is the amount of calling and reminding it takes to get certain clients to pay. In reality, most clients are pretty good about getting contractors paid, but anyone who freelances for long enough will inevitably come across a slippery client or three.

Here are a few tips for getting paid faster in the future. We stop short of discussing debt collectors, because by that stage it’s likely you’re chasing the last payment from a client you won’t work with again. These are tips for making gentle changes to get paid faster by a client you want to continue working with in the future.

Send smaller bills more frequently.

Sometimes smaller businesses balk when you send a bigger bill all at once given the effect it might have on cash flow. Instead of sending one monthly bill, you could try sending four weekly bills or two fortnightly bills. In some cases, such as with larger organizations who depend on many contractors, this may just irritate your client.

Even if the time between invoice submission and payment remains the same, since you are sending in more invoices on a faster timetable, you’ll be funnelled small amounts of money constantly instead of freaking out about the rent while you wait for that big monthly payment.

Maintain your relationship with the client.

It’s important to maintain your relationship with the client and keep them up-to-date with what you’re doing for them. If they know you’ve been on the job and you’ve developed a rapport with your client you’re much more likely to get paid faster than if you’ve developed an air of distance. It also helps to figure out who the financial controller is in larger organizations and get to know them so you can bypass the bureaucracy when needed.

Have a contract.

There are numerous benefits to having a contract that go far beyond the issue of payment, but a contract’s most useful feature is that it sets expectations in terms of payment, how payment will be done and how promptly it should be made. It also provides validation of the financial agreement in the event you need to pursue legal remedies to missed payments.

Charge interest.

A tried and true way to get your clients to pay before the deadline comes up is to include an interest charge in your terms. For each month the bill is late, you add a percentage on to the bill. Most of the time these rates are between 1 and 3 percent, but if you have a client who is perpetually late you could consider heftier penalties, though I’d not push it beyond 10%.

Give a specific deadline.

Don’t make the mistake of issuing an invoice that doesn’t have a deadline. “Please pay within 30 days” puts the reader of your invoice on a timer, whereas an invoice that’s simply payable on receipt doesn’t — even though it’s technically more urgent.

Use human terms.

Too many invoices use terms that sit somewhere between jargon and mathematical equations rather than personal communication. Remember that your bill will be paid by a human, not a robot. When you use readable sentences like “Please pay within 30 days” instead of “Net 30 + 3% interest/month overdue” you are more likely to get paid within 30 days.

It’s partially a connection thing — you empathize with other people, but not jargon, and it’s simply easier to read simpler sentences.

For most freelancers or small businesses, the majority of new clients come from word-of-mouth marketing. It’s the most cost-effective way to market your business: when you find a new paying client, you just have to do incredible work. You get paid to market yourself by providing a standard of work that makes others feel comfortable recommending you to their friends in business.

It’s not just the lack of expenses associated with word-of-mouth marketing that makes it so great. The conversion rates are higher, and you’re less likely to pick up the infamous crazy client.

Wondering how to increase the number of referrals you get? You’re in luck: here are ten tips that’ll boost your word-of-mouth contacts through the roof.

1. Always go above and beyond for your clients.

You get paid to do a job, and it goes without saying that you do it well. That’s a great foundation for getting referrals. But it doesn’t end there. Go one step above what you’re required to do for your clients, whether that’s putting in a couple of extra hours or exceeding quotas.

Things can be tight for freelancers and small businesses, leaving you with little extra time to put in extra hours or provide discounts, but try and locate one area of your business where you can sacrifice a little to keep clients happy and referrals inbound.

Under promise and over deliver.

2. Incentivize referrals.

It’s not uncommon to incentivize referrals and many freelancers and small business owners report marked increases in the number of referrals they receive after implementing one.

Typically, these incentives mean a discount for the client on the next one to six months of service you provide, and go as high as 10% (depending on the size of the contract the business generally deals with).

The incentive program should be developed in a way that makes the new work advantageous to your business even while the discount for the existing client applies — don’t structure things so that you lose money temporarily when you take on new clients through referral.

This works best if you’re not the only contractor of your type a company uses. If you provide all of a company’s web design services, they’ll probably recommend you anyway, but if you’re just one of a few hundred writers for a blog network that discount gives managers a real reason to recommend you.

3. Ask your clients outright.

Having a rough patch or on a drive for new business? Usually referrals are given when someone’s asking for a recommendation, but sometimes if you just ask your clients to let other businesses they’re friendly with know about you they’ll be willing to oblige.

The response rates on random shout outs are low, but because you were recommended by a party the recipient knows your credibility is greater than other cold techniques like direct mail and cold calling.

4. Get those business cards out there.

One of the first things we do when we start a new business is order business cards — it’s like a rite of passage. But for most of us, those cards end up in a drawer, or forgotten in a secret compartment of our wallet.

There’s a reason the business card became such a pillar of business practice. It’s the easiest way to share contact details and ensure there’s a reminder of you and your services in the possession of others who may serendipitously come across your details just when they need you or pass the card on to a more interested party.

The easier you make it for clients to pass on your details, the more they’ll recommend you to others.

5. Catch up with former clients.

Make sure you take time to get in touch with old clients every now and then. Don’t overdo it (once per year is a polite timeline) and be selective with your choices. If the client dropped you because you made some sort of Michael Scott-esque blunder you’re best leaving them off the list.

6. Make it easy to explain what you do.

It’s fine to have niches, but assigning yourself a title that is too niche-specific can be confusing. Never call yourself a social media expert (not even social media experts know what their job is) because those sort of descriptors kill referral opportunities when clients can succinctly explain the role.

Instead, use plain descriptors everyone understands, like Internet marketer, and you can mention that you specialize in social media marketing.

7. Make customer service a pillar of your business strategy.

Between equally matched professionals, the thing that sets businesses apart the most is customer service. Freelancers and small businesses looking to beat the competition can often make the most effective gains by focusing on this aspect.

While the freedom to work anywhere is one of the draws of a freelance life, the isolation can sometimes lead to viewing the client as the enemy — that pestering entity that always wants things changed at the last minute or looks for problems that aren’t really there.

A dedication to great customer service doesn’t just help you get referrals. It helps you stay sane by viewing your clients with a positive outlook and viewing great service to them as part of the package you sell. And cultivating sanity and a good, positive attitude to your work may be the greatest thing you can do for your referral rates.

8. Get feedback after project completion.

At the end of every project, gather feedback from the client. How happy were they with the result and your customer service throughout the process?

You can do this with a form through Wufoo or Formspring or an informal email. Either way, keep your questions brief — you don’t want to use up too much of your clients’ time, but you do want to find out where you could make changes that your client would notice and appreciate the most.

9. Identify your unique selling point and make it known.

Don’t be just another run of the mill writer or designer. Know what it is that sets you and your business apart from others — perhaps its your talent for writing case studies or your incredible mobile app interface design skills. Make it a part of your marketing message and include it in your pitches, on your website, and everywhere else so that those who recommend you know which strong points to talk up.

Many professionals fear that specializing in a niche will reduce the business they get, but if you do some reading you’ll find anyone who markets to a well-chosen niche does better than their generalist counterparts.

10. Spend time developing your professional networks.

Most of these ideas are tried and true methods that don’t require the use of any particular technology. But this tip is more important than ever, as more referrals are occurring online and via services like LinkedIn or even Facebook than ever before.

Spend time developing your professionally-oriented social network presences. Make sure you have one on LinkedIn that you regularly maintain. Facebook and Twitter are generally considered mandatory, but for most service businesses LinkedIn and Twitter are great places to start.

Don’t just keep your own details up to date. Share things that you find interesting even if they’re not from your site or blog, and participate in the ecosystem that makes sites like LinkedIn work by leaving recommendations for those you’ve worked with.

With these ten tips, you’re well prepared to increase referral rates and take on more business than ever before. But never forget that amazing work and great service is at the core of word-of-mouth marketing!

Time tracking software is one of the single most important tools in a freelancer’s kit. Without the ability to accurately measure the time spent on a client project, invoices are based on guesses, or worse still, the number of hours you’d like to get paid for — regardless of whether you put in the work.

And while fudging such numbers may be profitable in the short-term, it’s no good for your long-term relationship with your client. Such things become obvious pretty quickly, and your reputation and integrity goes on the line. With the web, reputations linger longer than ever before.

But ensuring your invoices are dead accurate is only one of the useful ways that you can make use of time tracking apps. Sure, it’s the only intended usage, but that’s never stopped anyone from getting creative.

Motivation

When you need to complete a task and you’re facing a high level of mental resistance, setting a countdown is a great way to motivate yourself and get out of that rut.

You can give yourself a certain number of minutes to complete that task, start the count on your time tracker, and try and complete the task before the clock hits your target. This is a highly effective method that one implementation of it even has its own name — the Pomodoro Technique.

There’s software available specifically for this purpose, but you can use Paymo’s time-tracker to similar affect without dishing out for another app.

Introspection

If you’d like to take a closer look at the way you spend your time, start tracking everything you do. Taking a few minutes to surf the web? Track it. Having a quick coffee break? Track it. Whether it’s a business task or you’re doing something personal, track everything and keep specific records.

At the end of the day you can get a feel for where you’re misusing your time. By the end of the week, you’ll start to see some real trends. Even if you think you’re pretty efficient, you might be surprised by what the cold, hard facts reveal — and you might be even more surprised by how much productive time you can reclaim.

Price Optimization

You should be tracking the time you spend on every business task, regardless of whether you bill by the hour or by the project. Particularly when your business is new or you’re simply new to tracking your time, your price estimates can be way off base. Since your per-project pricing is probably based off an hourly estimate, you might find you are undercharging well below your ideal hourly rate when those projects routinely take longer to achieve.

Having a better understanding of how long each task you complete in your day to day work takes makes optimizing your estimates a much simpler job without the guesswork. Over time, your estimates will become better informed by reality and history until you get the art of estimating down to a science.

Estimate Overheads

Tracking time in order to improve your estimates for a job is one thing, but how do you factor in administrative work overheads?

Every business, freelance or otherwise, requires you to spend time keeping the books, working through your inbox and performing other tasks that don’t belong on any particular client’s invoice. But in order to spread the cost of these hours between all your clients fairly, you need to know how much of your time is going to be spent on those tasks.

Ensure that you don’t just track the tasks you complete for clients and get those administrative tasks recorded as well. After a few weeks, calculate how much your admin work costs you based on your ideal hourly rate compared to your billable hours, and alter your hourly rate to compensate.

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If you signup for a premium version of Memonic between the 8th of December 2010 and the 6th of January 2011 you get an additional 6 months premium membership PLUS a three month premium account for Paymo for up to ten users. Memonic will save you time as you Save the Essential, while Paymo will track your time, and help you with online billing & project management.

This limited time offer will bring you unlimited efficiency in 2011 – Buy now and give yourself and your colleagues the ultimate holiday tool!