Creating Rituals To Do Significant Work
I recently read Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World, in which the author, Cal Newport, makes the case for engaging in sdeliberate, uninterrupted
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ARTICLES.
Tips and Insights on Mission, Mindset, Mechanics, and Marketing for Freelance Creatives
How To Pay Yourself As A Freelancer
Paying yourself as a freelancer is often as perplexing as how to price your services. To simplify it, begin with the knowledge that there are
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Profit Motive and the Freelancer: You May Be Running A Business If…
A photographer is still in school full time but is already establishing connections for professional work. She is purchasing cameras, lenses and equipment she will use
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Show Your Work: How Sharing Your Process Increases Your Value
When a client is looking for a creative firm, process and procedures are not obvious priorities in evaluating performance. The prospect is going to look
Alvalyn Lundgren
Advice For Clients: A Designer’s Value
Without the aesthetic, the computer is but a mindless speed machine, producing effects without substance, form without relevant content, or content without meaningful form. –Paul Rand
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How’s Business? Five Tested Ways To Help Your Freelance Business Thrive
Did you know that your creative business thrives because of how you do business and not because of the quality of your work or your
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Why You Can’t Have My Font Files
Business and creative culture now runs on creative rights and intellectual property. Theft, abuse and alteration of intellectual property is as rampant as ID theft,
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The Value of the Design Brief
Recently, I met with a start-up business. As we discussed the scope of work and began putting the design brief together, it became clear that
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I’m Not That Kind of Girl: Manage Perceptions To Do The Work You Love
Let’s begin with the premise that design, illustration and photography are service professions, and that being a professional means you’re in business. You’re making a
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159. To Quit, Or Not To Quit
How do you know if you should quit or not? Sometimes quitting is in fact, the wise and right option. Freelancing isn’t easy. It takes courage and tenacity to push through. It starts out being fun, like a great adventure, especially when you land your first couple of clients and get paid for the projects. But when obstacles and opposition show up, what will you choose?
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How To Manage Your Brand
In Part 1 of this article I focused on what a brand is, and the visual and conceptual components of an effective brand. Brand is
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Competence, Confidence and Baseball
One fact about playing baseball: To advance to the next base, you need to leave the one you’re on. Baseball forces you to advance to
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How To Attract Your Ideal Clients
First of all, let’s define who your ideal clients are. An ideal client is one for whom you do the kind of work you want to do, and
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Risky Business
© Alvalyn Lundgren. All international rights reserved. Risk. It’s a small word with big impact. Taking risks involves change and the unknown. We’re usually not
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Freelance or For Hire? Clarifying The Designer-Client Relationship
Misunderstandings can exist between clients and freelance designers regarding their working relationships. Questions of who owns what, what files are provided to the client, when and
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Understanding Your 1099-K Reporting Changes for 2022 and Beyond
We’re on a mission to cultivate a business mindset in support of our creative work. If we want to profit from our creative work, we
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How To Use Change Orders To Manage Freelance Projects
When I first learned about the power of change orders it changed everything in my workflow. When I implemented the practice, I actually began looking
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How To Build An Effective Professional Network
When you’re in business (and freelancers are in business), you build reputation through social and in-person networking. According to the Oxford Dictionary, a network is a
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Don’t Cry When A Client Leaves
How we can best respond when client relationships end? Here’s a professional, non-emotional approach you can take when a client informs you they’re leaving or have left.
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Do You Need A Marketing Plan?
Q: As a freelancer, do I need a marketing plan or can I just wing it? A: Indeed, you do need a marketing plan. Marketing
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Keeping Good Clients: 10 Ways To Build Loyalty
Most freelancers will agree that it’s easier to hold onto an established relationship than begin a new one. And it’s less work to retain a client
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7 Reasons Why Freelancers Should Not Discount
With value pricing for design and illustration projects, I am able to custom-tailor my services and fees to fit each client and project. But even
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The Designer and the Relief Pitcher
If you know me well, you know that baseball is my favorite sport, and I often employ baseball analogies to explain concepts to students and
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8 Qualities of Successful Freelancers
Freelancing is on the rise. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the freelance (contract, temp worker and freelancer — in all industries) economy has a healthy
Alvalyn Lundgren