In the previous section of this two-part article, we talked about the first three steps to help you plan a better giveaway. Here are the rest of the steps.

4) Set your contest rules.
Each giveaway has different rules. Just make sure you state them up front. How will contestants enter? Can they earn extra entries by blogging, tweeting or facebooking the contest link? Is it only open to US residents? Residents of your own country? Do they need to write a short essay of why they want to win? Remember that the smaller the prize, the less people will want to …read more

So you want to do a giveaway. You’ve seen it on many sites and you wonder what the best way to jump in would be. It’s always a good idea to think about your strategy before embarking on a contest. The following six steps will help you make your giveaway easier to manage and hopefully save you some frustration.

1) Figure out your giveaway goals.
What do you want or expect from a giveaway? It could include any of the following: a new clientele; potential new customers; new readers; a list of people who might be interested in your product/service; or increased …read more

Memorial Day is about remembering the veterans who have given their lives for the freedoms we enjoy in the United States. On your worst day, or our worst day in this country, the freedoms we enjoy are unmatched by any other country on the earth. You may be having a bad day or what I call a bad patch, but in the grand scheme of things, you are still alive, you have the opportunity to work through issues on your job or in your job search. What price are you willing to pay to accomplish your goals?
As you remember those …read more

Another key to having a successfully working team is one that reaches its goals. To reach your goals, means that the team players are working on one accord, following a strategic plan, and working through any issues that may arise. Having these in place along with a vision, can help a team be successful in reaching their goals.
One of the essential components that can help a team reach their goals is having a communication plan in place. According to the article “Want to Be More Effective? Learn to Listen” which is located on Inc.com by Sarah Fenson, there are three areas …read more

What are your goals for your business?  What sales goals do you have?  What about profits? Have you put your goals in writing?
As I discussed in my post about commitment , active commitment is much more effective than passive. Research has shown that a commitment that is written and publicly stated is more likely to be taken seriously and worked on.
Making Goals a Reality. Some suggestions for making your business goals a reality:

Use the SMART principle to create your goals; make your goals Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely.
Get input in writing your goals. If you have a board of …read more

How are you doing on the goals or the vision you set for yourself this year? You did set some, I assume, becuase most of us seem to. I actually believe in Visioning and goal work; I wrote about it at the end of last year in a post called: Sneaking Up on 2008 – Goals for Freelance Writers
For reasons that are totally obscure for me, I didn’t share my goals with you. I just dug them up, and, with some editing, here they are:
• Stay quit from nicotine
• Lose a pound a week which would put at around 120, yes …read more

Earlier this year, “The Secret” made the rounds. If you happened to be off planet and missed it, it’s a web movie and book that tout the law of attraction. I blogged about it here. It’s tricky because although I don’t believe we create our own reality, at least not in the way the movie spells it out, I am convinced that my beliefs about myself and my world do have a real influence – or at least my perception about myself and my world does. Which brings us to goal setting.
Although the end of the year is a traditional …read more

A week or so I blogged about finding your “enough point.” Mark Silver, a truly remarkable business consultant who owns Heart of Business, commented pointing to an article of his called Profitability: How to get from “just enough” to “extra.”
First he blows apart the whole notion of “extra” then introduces the idea that our desires work best when what we desire actually nourishes us. Then he gets really radical and suggest that we make those nourishing desires actual necessities.
It’s so easy to be bamboozled into the idea that we can have anything and everything we want. Most goal setting …read more

The week of June 1st is an excellent time to review your writing business.
I start by looking over the Vision that I created for my business at the beginning of the year. Next, I review my goals.
I want to know if I’m on track, ahead, or behind. I also want to update both the Vision and the goals because in six months time things change. In my case, all my plans for WritingWithVision got upended because of the business development class I’ve been taking from Mark Silver over at HeartofBusiness.com.
When I first put up that site I had …read more

Several days ago, Lisa Gates, writing coach and creator of Design Your Writing Life, commented about creating a writing plan. I asked her for more information and she responded with this:
Thanks for the invitation to blab, Anne, and I think you probably do have a plan…I just may not have phrased things very well.
If you are a “declared” writer (I don’t mean famous or even published here) it is important to acknowledge that you are in business for yourself. As an entrepreneur, then, how would your business plan look? What are the elements? In this model, we typically flesh out …read more