Before we get into the topic of New Year’s Resolutions, I’d like to wish you a happy New Year from myself and everyone else on the FreelanceSwitch team. Here’s to another year of growing our freelance businesses and our knowledge of freelancing!

Occasionally I’d like to ask the readership for their thoughts on a subject, and today that is the topic of New Year’s resolutions for freelancers. What are some good ones? Bad ones? Are there rules you follow for making resolutions? We’ve discussed this topic over at WorkAwesome recently, but haven’t put it into a freelance perspective. I’d love it if you’d help us do that. Comment away!

The Simple, Ridiculously Useful Guide to Earning a Living from Your Passion

“It’s not easy — I’ll tell you that up front. If you hope to make a quick buck, or a fast million, you’ll need to find another guide. Probably one with lots of flashing ads in the sidebar. So you have your passion picked out? Here’s how to turn it into a living.”

How to Understand Your Audience: Data Collection & Analysis

“The internet is a fast-paced environment. People can come to your website at any hour from a wide range of locations, each of them with different intentions or needs. Unlike physical retail stores, you can’t see who is coming in and browsing around. You don’t know much about the people reading you. How can we develop a rough profile of all these individuals?”

Five Useful Ways Dropbox Can Improve Your Business

“If you were using a good backup solution you could just keep on working, otherwise you could be in a lot of trouble. For those of you who don’t already have a backup and file sharing solution in place, you’ll want to learn more about Dropbox.”

Why You Shouldn’t Stick to Your Niche

“Humans. We love our common sense, don’t we? It’s brought us far as a species. If something causes pain, we tend to avoid it. If something causes pleasure, we do more of it. So when it comes to business, it only makes sense to stick to a niche where you can dominate and completely rock, right? WRONG!”

Social Media Monitoring 101, How to Get Started

“You’ve probably heard people talking about social media monitoring. It’s wise to listen to conversations before you participate in them. Social media monitoring allows you to do just that.”

Replace Yourself – A Guide to Delegating Your Workload

“For most entrepreneurs, ambition far exceeds even a superhuman workday. No matter how you slice and dice it, one person can only do so much. To do more, requires something more than working really, really hard. It requires delegation.”

20 Free Mac Apps For Web Designer’s Toolkit

“Professional web designers on the Mac platform rely on commercial heavy-hitters like Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Fireworks, and InDesign for their graphic design needs. And when it’s time to slice and dice, some depend on the excellent Dreamweaver CS4 for WYSIWYG design/development; while many Mac code jockeys swear only by editors like Coda, BBEdit or TextMate. Others prefer to mix, match or blend.”

10 Definitive Tips for Writing Captivating Emails

“Emails are a great way to reach people, to keep reminding them that your site still exists and that they really should keep checking you out. After all, the people who receive your emails should already be familiar with you, they will have opted to receive emails from you, but now you have to make sure they pay attention to what you’re sending them.”

How to Start (or Start-over) Building Your Personal Brand

“A ‘personal brand’ is in many ways synonymous with your reputation. It refers to the way other people see you. Are you a genius? An expert? Are you trustworthy? What do you represent? What do you stand for? What ideas and notions pop up as soon as someone hears your name?”

To celebrate the end of 2009 and the Christmas season, we’re giving away prizes on FreelanceSwitch and WorkAwesome. All you have to do to enter is tell us the most important thing you learned about freelancing this year in the comments–but make sure you read the instructions below before you do so!

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How to Stop Being a Workaholic

Let’s start by saying that there’s nothing inherently wrong with work — it can be fun, exciting, fulfilling, rewarding. I love my work in a way I never did for most of my life, until a few years ago, and work is one thing I live for, that I jump out of bed each morning to do. However, the reader recognizes that there’s more to life than work, and that relaxing is important, and that stress is a major problem.

The Quentin Tarantino Guide to Creating Killer Content

There are few writers like Tarantino, and though his verbal carpet bombs and kinetic escalation of violence aren’t for everyone, there is no doubt that the dude follows his muse. Those who love him will eagerly wait in lines wrapped around the block to show their support.

CNN’s New Website Design Deconstructed

The new design is beautiful, clean, organized and well-structured. It invites the eye to scan and find something interesting with the goal of clicking through to another page. So, let’s look in more detail at not only the notable improvements, but some of the questionable design and usability decisions.

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Is Your Email Address Losing You Clients?

“New freelancers make a few mistakes that no one will tell you are mistakes, because they don’t want to offend you, or they may have already disregarded you because of this stupid mistake and don’t wish to become mired in the soup of your (sure to be squalid) company.”

How to Make a Positive First Impression with Potential Clients

“Part of being a freelancer or an independent designer is communicating with potential clients and landing new work. This is part of the business aspect that is not a favorite with many designers, but it is critical if you want to establish a successful business.”

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Elegant Themes

“I created this website to provide WordPress themes of quality and integrity. I craft my themes with a goal of simplicity and professionalism and strive to inject each design with a dose of modest elegance. I believe that your website is not just a tool, it is an integral part of your identity.”

Freelance Feed

“Serving up delicious nuggets of hand-picked freelance wisdom on a daily basis.”

Review Interview: Collis Ta’eed (Envato)

“We had the privilege of asking Collis Ta’eed, founder of Envato, a few questions. We learned that he is more than an awesome entrepreneur with a bunch of great sites; he’s got a great sense of humor and a story that might be similar to yours (we certainly have a few things in common). Read on to learn more about his life before the founding of Envato, his advice for freelancers and plans for the future.”

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Freelancing From The Road: The Tools to Take With You

“One of the great things about being a freelancer, is the freedom that comes with having chosen this career path. As a freelancer you can take to the road when you need, and the best part is, that you can also take your job with you! Now this is conditional on being able to put together the proper toolkit to take with you on your journey.”

How to Work ON Your Business, Not IN it

“We get so caught up in the daily life of running a business, it’s easy to miss the forest for the trees. Not that you have a choice! You’re fighting fires, handling a pissed-off customer, rending your face over an emergency bug-fix, the website just went down, and the accountant is coming tomorrow and the books are in shambles.”

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Freelance Contracts: Do’s And Don’ts:

“Drafting a contract that covers you, and doesn’t just enumerate information, is more than important: it is a must. Freelancers do not have the benefit of a legal department dedicated to protecting their interests with a watertight contract. Nevertheless, a freelancer’s contract must be comprehensive, concise and clear. It should outline the scope of the job, scheduling demands, the expectations of both parties and more.”

The History and Evolution of Social Media:

“Social media has become an integral part of modern society. There are general social networks with user bases larger than the population of most countries. In this article, we’ll review the history and evolution of social media from its humble beginnings to the present day.”

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The Most Powerful Way to Presell Any Product or Service:

“Preselling is the art of conditioning potential customers and making them more likely to buy products/services. It is usually performed at your website before you send the visitor over to the vendor’s store or landing page. The goal of all presell tactics is to get prospects into a frame of mind whereby they not only feel comfortable about making a purchase but desire to do so.”

25 Creative Retro Styled Website Designs:

“My goal is to make sure the showcase posts that I create are ‘out of the box‘ and something that will spark your creativity. So, in this article I am going to showcase 25 creative websites that have a retro theme. They range from the use of old-time photos to retro patterns, colors and graphic elements. I hope you enjoy it ”

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How Increased Productivity Can Hurt You:

“A big part of being awesome in the workplace is being highly productive. Any time we can get more done in the same amount of time means greater profitability for you personally and the company you work for. Since profitability is ultimately what business is about, increased productivity is a big focus for any organization.”

The History of Web Browsers:

“The tools that we use to browse our favorite websites has a (relatively) long and rich history rife with battle for market shares and dominance. This is a look into the past major events in the browser history.”
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25 Social Media Sites for Entrepreneurs:

If you’re an entrepreneur who has been seduced by social media tools such as Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook, you may realize the benefits of using these basic tools to finding and staying in touch with business partners, employers and customers, along with learning new information.

5 Ways to Get Your Blog Indexed by Google in 24 Hours:

Let’s say you launched a blog today and want it on Google’s results tomorrow. Can this be done? Yes.

8 Ways Doing Less Can Transform Your Work & Your Life:

Doing less is not about being lazy (though being lazy is a good start) — it’s about focusing on quality rather than quantity. It’s about getting off the hamster wheel of productivity, so that you can create something great rather than just being busy.

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Breathtaking Typographic Posters:

“You can’t design without type. However, yon can use only type (or mostly only type) to create breath-taking designs. In fact, many graphic designers and artists take exactly this route to communicate their ideas through their works. The results are sometimes crazy, sometimes artsy, sometimes beautiful, but often just different from things we’re used to. Thus designers explore new horizons and we explore new viewing perspectives which is what inspiration is all about.”

8 Tips and Resources for Managing Your Business Finances:

“One area many business owners struggle with is keeping track of their finances, but it is one of the most important areas given that cash flow is the lifeblood of the business. Small mistakes and a lack of knowledge and resources can be costly and problematic.”

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