Linkswitch #90, Experience Based Rates, Explosive Blog Growth and Talent vs. Grit

Every other week we roundup some of the highest quality articles and resources that benefit freelancers from across the web. We present these articles here on various helpful topics. This week we have articles on setting your freelance rates, the role of design in content creation, the power of persistence, and more.

Keys to Setting Your Rate Based on Experience

Instead of pricing yourself at a point that seasoned freelancers are getting, there’s nothing wrong with pricing yourself at a competitive wage that reflects your skill set. You can still make a good salary, plus you won’t be excluding the opportunity to build your skills and your portfolio.

The Role Of Design In The Kingdom Of Content

If content sits at the top of the food chain, why do we spend so much time talking about the finer points of design? Every day we debate, experiment with and discuss topics that easily fall into the category of aesthetics, enhanced functionality and layout; in fact, relatively rarely do we talk about content. Nevertheless, even though we should concede that content is king in this realm, this doesn’t mean that design should be devalued.

The Future of Self-Improvement, Part I: Grit Is More Important Than Talent

It’s not difficult to see how self-control would be predictive of success in certain spheres. It means trading short-term gratification for long-term goals, skipping the temptation to go to the movies and working on your novel instead. But that’s a relatively simple example — one that makes the decision to exercise, or not exercise, self-control easy to see.

5 Credit and Financing Mistakes That Will Hurt Your Small Business

Bottom line: If you have a proper understanding of your borrowing options, that should create realistic expectations. And if you have those two key components, then you’re halfway there. These are the five biggest mistakes we’ve seen since the onset of the credit crisis in 2008

13 Illustrator Tutorials for Creating Successful Print Self Promotions

Designing self promo print materials are a proven way to get attention. The more creative your graphic design self promotion is, the better you will stand out from the crowd, get noticed by art directors, and increase your odds of landing that gig you’re aiming for. Following are an assortment of print tutorials that use Adobe Illustrator and creative ingenuity to push an artist’s visual style to the front of the pack. Learn how to create a self promotional print campaign that leaves a lasting impression.

6 Ways to Master Entrepreneurial Uncertainty

used to think that successful people had it all figured out. If they wanted to make something happen, they knew exactly what to do. If they created a new product, it would be instantly popular and profitable. They knew all the right people, hired the right help, set all the right prices, and pulled all the right strings of the many moving parts of their business to make it all work perfectly.

The Secret to Explosive Blog Growth

Since launching my blog on the psychology of buying in mid-May, I have often wondered whether I am missing something; whether there is a secret to growing the traffic on my blog that I do not know about. Am I not commenting on the right blogs? Am I not writing enough guest posts? Am I not submitting my links to the right social media sites? Am I not aware of some cheap advertising source?

Your agenda

Most of the time, if you ask someone about their agenda, it turns out that it involves doing what’s on someone else’s agenda.

Online Business 101: How To Dominate Google Without Lifting A Finger

The whole point of engaging a virtual assistant is to free you up to focus on the things that matter. So does this mean getting your VA to do all of the little things that aren’t important enough for you to do yourself? Not necessarily.

The Writing Process Is a Numbers Game

You would think that it would be a words game, but it’s not. It’s all about numbers. We’ve all seen different definitions of the writing process. One thing they all have in common, though, is that they begin with ideas and end with words on paper (or screen). While the normal stages: prewriting, writing, revising, editing, and publishing are important and should be followed, there is one topic that is generally not discussed. Numbers.