Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is the final part in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their businesses.

Day 10 – The 10th Law of Simplicity: The One

Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious, and adding the meaningful.

This entire series has been about extending your existing life as any kind of freelancer or even a full-time web worker and adding a social media perspective to it without being a victim of information overload. In achieving this goal, this series consists of two distinct kinds of of posts. The first is the immediately actionable advice and the second is more holistic. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 9 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their businesses.

Day 9 – The Ninth Law of Simplicity: Failure

Some things can never be made simple.

This whole series has been about succeeding at what you do — in fact, being the best at what you do — and taking advantage of new technologies to take that success even further. Why all of a sudden talk about failure? Because failure is one of the most important experiences you will have. Just like there is a return on every good investment you make, there is an equally important return on every wrong decision you make. Remember the fourth law? Learn. Here’s how to make the best of your failures. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 8 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their businesses.

Day 8 – The Eighth Law of Simplicity: Trust

In simplicity we trust.

Trust is one of the most important elements of any relationship. Whether it be the relationship between a writer and her audience, a consultant and his client, or an individual and his fellow community members, without trust, the system screeches to a halt.

Trust and You

Before you can do anything worthwhile, you have to learn to trust yourself. Only once you trust yourself will you be able to trust your peers and trust the system, and if you don’t trust yourself, others are even less likely to do so. Every time you start a blog, someone has already started one better, when you start a business, there are a dozen more people trying to do the same (and with the backing of venture capital), and every time you go to participate on a socially driven site, there are dozens of “top users” who are dominating the conversation. But this shouldn’t be discouraging, not as long as you trust yourself and your abilities that given time, you can rise to the top and be a part of the so-called “A-list” crowd.

If you trust yourself, you make your life simpler by not wasting time worrying about everyone else and can actually achieve your dreams. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 7 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

With these tips, over 10 days, you can simplify and streamline your social media workflow and ensure that you take advantage of all that social media has to offer but still have time for other things.

Day 7 – The Seventh Law of Simplicity: Emotion

More emotions are better than less

The internet has revolutionized our existence. In most ways this is a positive development but in many other ways it has taken us a step backwards. For example, many people have questioned the value of online relationships. Not the kind of relationships you can develop through Match.com and its kind, but the kind of relationships that a designer in Russia has with her client in Portland, OH, or the kind of relationship a blogger in Sydney has with his audience all over Europe and the Americas, or the kind of relationships we have through social media. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 6 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

Day 6 – The Sixth Law of Simplicity: Context

What lies in the periphery of simplicity is definitely not peripheral.

Here’s something you don’t hear very often: context is King. Let’s look at an example from The Tipping Point, an increasingly important book by one of my favorite authors, Malcolm Gladwell. In the book, Gladwell presents the following situation:

Imagine there is a deck of cards which has letters written on one side and numbers on the other. In addition, there is a rule that any card which has a vowel on it, must have an even number on the other side. Knowing these circumstances, if you are shown four cards on the table, labeled A, D, 3, 6, how many, and which cards do you have to flip before you know for a fact that indeed, the rule mentioned previously holds true.

Now consider the same question, but this time in a more contextualized form. Imagine that there are four people in a bar. One of them is drinking juice, one of them is drinking a beer, one of them is underage (a teenager), and one of them is over 25. Knowing that no one under 21 can consume alcoholic beverages, how many and which of the four people do you have to ID before you know that no illegal drinking is taking place (i.e. the no drinking under 21 law is being upheld)? Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 5 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

Day 5 – The Fifth Law of Simplicity: Differences

Simplicity and complexity need each other.

Maeda perfectly captures the necessity of acknowledging the importance of differences and contrast. “Even a child that is allowed to eat ice cream three meals a day will eventually tire his sweet tooth.” Thus, to prevent yourself from falling in a rut, and to prevent your audience or clients from getting bored with you, your content/services, it is important to create differences, and help them appreciate these differences. I have previously extolled the virtues of narrowing down your goals and having a laser-sharp focus on what you want to do, and this is not in contradiction to that. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 4 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

Day 4 – The Fourth Law of Simplicity: Learn

Knowledge makes everything simpler.

It seems paradoxical that achieving simplicity would be such a laborious and complex process, but it’s true. Simplicity rarely comes naturally and we have to learn how to achieve simplicity in our daily routines and how to live by its principles.

There are entire industries and business models built on simplifying the learning process and teaching people how things work, how to do things, and lately, step-by-step guides to performing certain activities online or using web 2.0 sites and technologies. Even this site simplifies for it’s expansive audience the process of getting started as a freelancer, how to price yourself, finding freelance jobs, dealing with clients, and remaining productive as a freelancer from day-to-day. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 3 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

Day 3 – The Third Law of Simplicity: Time

Savings in time feel like simplicity.

Time is of the essence. Time is money. And for a freelancers, it is doubly important. The faster you accomplish what you set out to do, the more free time you have to do multiple things and the more you can branch out and diversify. Today we’re going to prove what Douglas Adams said, “Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.” Time is what you make of it, so let’s try to make the most of our time.

Every minute you spend reading this article (and this series in general) will translate to hours saved and spent elsewhere in the future, without compromising on the quality of the work you’re doing already. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 2 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

Day 2 – The Second Law of Simplicity: Organize

Organization makes a system of many appear fewer.

Because there are so many different things you can do on social media, and because there are so many new sites launching daily, it is easy to get overwhelmed. Of course you can decide not to participate at all, but where’s the fun in that? You’d be surprised how far a little organization can take you in terms of simplifying your social media life and enabling you to better use all the tools at your disposal. Continue Reading

Muhammad Saleem is a social media consultant and a top-ranked community member on multiple social news sites.

This post is part 1 of 10 in our groundbreaking series on how freelancers can use social media and the principles of simplicity to build their business.

We as human beings are always striving for efficiency. However, the harder we try, we somehow manage to complicate things for ourselves.

Just as we’re getting a foothold in the offline world, we have to compete in the online world.

Just as we think we have a fair presence, we’re rudely awakened by newer technologies that help new entrants propel themselves forward faster than we imagine.

Making changes and embracing new ideas and technologies can be difficult. Especially considering the prevailing notion that once you get sucked into the world of new media (i.e. the social web or web 2.0) that it will consume you and all your time and that there will be no turning back.

The idea behind this 10-part series is very simple. First, we want to disprove the notion that it’s either your business or the new web by providing a set of “tricks” that help you separate the signal from the noise and integrate useful technologies in your daily workflow. The tools that various social media sites provide us are revolutionizing how we conduct our business and our relationships online, and there is no reason that anyone should be left out. Continue Reading