How’s your to-do list looking today?

A few weeks ago, I had the luxury of sitting down with each and every attendee at the 2011 Web Intensive for a one-on-one meeting to discuss their goals for the year and what help they needed to achieve them.

I use the word “luxury” because it was such a rare opportunity to sit face to face with AWAI members and have the time to help each person on an individual level.

Yet, even though these meetings happened privately and before the event even started, I found that many people faced the same challenges as their fellow attendees.

So I figured since you and I aren’t able to sit down face to face and talk, this week I’d share with you some of the things that were frequently discussed in these meetings so that you can benefit too.

And then we’ll be able to continue the conversation both in the comment sections on the AWAI website each day, as well as on Facebook – where I speak to and help AWAI members every day. (If you’re not connected to me yet on Facebook, you can find me here.)

For today’s conversation, I’d like to tackle something that came up a lot at the Web Intensive but also comes up again and again on the AWAI forums and website …

Getting it all done!

With so much to do, and other areas of your life competing for your attention, how can you find the time to get it all done?

In the past, I’ve written articles about setting goals, creating to-do lists based on those goals, and even drilling down to daily tasks …

But if you don’t have a good system for managing your time effectively, getting it all done can feel like an

A lot is said about time …

Time flies. Don’t waste time. Time is money.

But, we tend to go through life forgetting how valuable time really is, until we need more of it.

For a web writer, finding more time is a constant battle — especially if you’re a beginner, or if you’re trying to juggle a full-time job, your new web-writing business, your family, and everything else on your plate.

Even when you’re finally able to quit your full-time job to focus solely on your web-writing business, time management can still be a struggle. You’ll be better off if you understand how to manage your time to increase your income.

Because time management is one area I still struggle with, I posted a question on the AWAI forums to learn from the wisdom of others. I asked:

What techniques and tips do you guys use to either manage your time or save time?

I got a lot of great responses I think can help you, too, and I’ll share those in just a moment. But first, I’d like to share a point from Clarke Echols. He said:

“You can’t manage time … You can only plan and manage your use of time.”

Those are wise words we should all remember when thinking about time management.

With that in mind, here are my “use of time” management tips — as well as several from the AWAI members in the forum:

1. Escape The Office

The best thing I ever did to save myself several hours each day was to negotiate with my boss to allow me to work from home. I immediately gained two hours per day for my web-writing business. Those hours were previously wasted in a commute.

If you have a job that doesn’t actually require your

Dear Web Writer,

If your days are jam-packed busy, you’ll appreciate these five tips.

It’s part of my personal crusade to be time-efficient without feeling regulated (and so I can still have fun).

Because, I’m not gonna lie — life these days is hectic.

Along with managing client contracts, I’ve got a one- and a two-year-old who take the house by storm daily. They’re not exactly at the self-entertaining stage yet, so they account for 90% of my free time.

On top of that, I’m managing a kitchen renovation, a huge yard landscaping project, and the orchestration of three large vacations this year.

And of course, there’s the need to exercise and eat somewhere in there. Oh, and shower …

My solutions have been hard-won and time-tested, but here’s what works for me:

1) Limit the hours you work each week.

Sounds counterintuitive, right? For a while, my husband, Craig, and I negotiated my writing schedule based on projects. As in, “I need to work on this … and then I’d like to tackle that … etc.”

The result? I was never finished with anything and always needed more time. Worse, I wasn’t enjoying all the perks (like time to relax) web writing offers because I was using all my free time to write.

Nowadays, I’m “capped” at 30 hours a week. It actually makes a huge difference. I know I HAVE to be done with my projects by a certain time and that I can’t do more if I’m not done with what I have. It also makes a difference for my family, because they know when they can count on time with me — which in itself is very motivating.

2) Give yourself “play time” at the computer.

The problem with having your profession in front of the

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the writer’s life is that you get to control your own schedule.

One of the most terrible aspects of the writer’s life is that you get to control your own schedule.

To be productive as a web writer, you need to strike a balance between work time and personal time. There’s a temptation, when you’re self-employed and your office is in your home, to go to extremes. Either you work all the time — or none of the time!

Mindy McHorse has found ways to balance a booming career as a six-figure copywriter with her roles as a wife and mother of two small children. On August 23^rd, Mindy met with a group of AWAI and Wealthy Web Writer members to discuss her strategies for walking that time-management tightrope. You can listen to the teleconference HERE.

Getting Started as a Copywriter

Mindy always loved to write, but she never considered it as a viable career. She believed the myth of the starving artist, and knew she wanted to enjoy travel and other aspects of the good life, while supporting herself comfortably.

So she decided to become a doctor.

She went through all of her medical education and ended up with a job in public health at a local university hospital.

Once she achieved the “cushy, corporate position,” though, Mindy discovered she didn’t like it much. She had a micromanaging boss, and her work hours and her husband’s were opposite so they didn’t see much of each other.

Then one day, she received a letter in the mail from this organization she’d never heard of called AWAI. “Can you write a letter like this one?” it asked.

Mindy read the front page, then set it on her nightstand, where it sat

As a writer, you probably rely on electronic gadgets more than ever. But, with progress, comes a new bag of challenges. And the digital geyser of programs and apps to fix your challenges is enough to make you yearn for a new scribbler and a freshly-sharpened pencil. It’s a lot of work to figure out which e-tool you want to use to save yourself a lot of work.

And that’s just the beginning. For instance, have you ever smacked yourself in the forehead when you realized the file you need is saved on your laptop, but you only have your tablet with you? Have you ever been working on a project and wished you could make a note in the margin on your screen? Have you ever lost a document that got buried in a sea of those little file folder icons?

You get the idea.

Efficient, Effective Tools

So what are the most efficient, effective tools for us writers to organize the digital files that fuel our livelihood? The never-ending stream of e-tool options is overwhelming. By the time this article is published, there will probably be 10 more new ones in the mix.

Maybe that’s what’s keeping you from taking the plunge of switching from a pencil to a keyboard. Maybe you’ve tried one app and it just wasn’t what you wanted. Maybe you’re using several apps for different purposes and wish you had one tool to track everything. I shared these quandaries with a number of my writer colleagues so I could learn what works best for writers without panning through the flood of bits and bytes. They were happy to share the apps and programs they rely on to organize the volcano of information that spews over our screens every day.

It boils down to this…

Welcome to this month’s Reality Blog!

I had originally intended to discuss time tracking … but — although I’ve attempted different time-tracking methods and tips — I’ve continued to fail miserably at tracking my time.

Week before last, I clocked a total of seven hours of work. I’m pretty sure I worked more than that — at least I was in front of the computer longer than that — but I don’t have much to show for it.

Last week, I tracked time pretty effectively … until it came to the brainstorming stage … and then my efforts fell apart.

Later, I spent some time evaluating what happened and I think I have a hypothesis … but I’d love to hear your opinion in the comments below!

Why I Think Time Tracking and Web Writing Might Not Mix

I really, really love my “job.” I love researching for golden nuggets. I love the tapping sound the keys make. I love disappearing into my “work.” I love starting with nothing and winding up with something that people read and comment on. Honestly, the majority of my “job” feels like play.

And, as far as income goes, I’m exceeding my goals every month and taking more time off than ever before! I feel like I’ve made great progress this year, but … when it comes time to track it (and see exactly how far I’ve come), I fail.

As soon as the clock starts running, my love for writing disappears. I feel pressured and stressed. If I spend too long on research — typically one of my favorite parts — I start stressing about my hourly rate dipping too low.

After several attempts to track my time — and several failures — I think I’ve determined something vital to my success …

When it comes to big daunting projects, you have two options for tackling them. You can do a little bit every day and whittle down the project over time. For many, this feels like the less overwhelming approach. Or, you can dive in and tackle a big chunk of the project all at once. Not too many people I talk to take this second option. It’s too easy to put off the work with this approach because it feels like such a commitment.

It seems like the little-every-day approach is a no-brainer, right? It sounds good. It seems easy. It’s like a sure thing.

But, I actually want to make a case for tackling projects in big chunks. It does mean that you have to find that chunk of time, plan ahead, set aside a morning or an afternoon or a whole day, but in my experience, you’re more likely to complete projects with this approach.

With the little-every-day approach, it feels like you’re making consistent progress and that makes it easy to let yourself off the hook if you’re particularly busy one day or when it comes to meeting your self-imposed deadlines.

But when you schedule in a big chunk of time to work on something, you’re more likely to stick to it, and you’ll get more done in a single sitting.

The final thing about tackling big chunks is that it’s just more satisfying. Do it a few times and you’ll get addicted. Don’t believe me? Let’s look at some examples.

First, a domestic example. The laundry. Maybe you’ve never had laundry pile up. I have kids, so the laundry piling up is a given. Doing a load a day — wash, dry, fold, put away — is one way to tackle a pile of laundry. But when

Soccer season is gearing up, so you know what that means … get ready for soccer-inspired lessons about web writing. Not every week, I promise, but there’s bound to be at least a couple coming your way in the next eight weeks.

Including this one.

So, when your kids play soccer together eight weeks every fall and every spring, over the course of three years you make some pretty good friends among your fellow parents.

Some of my favorite people have kids on my daughter’s soccer team. A half dozen of us go out for drinks and appetizers at least every other month — whether soccer season is on or not.

This last week was spring break, and one of my soccer-mom friends decided we needed to do something fun. On Tuesday, she sent out an email suggesting a post-practice barbeque after practice the next day. I thought she was crazy. There’s no way to pull together a barbeque for 14 families in the course of 24 hours, right?

Wrong.

Everybody came. We all pitched in. We ate. We talked. The kids played tag. A fun time was had by all.

Here’s the thing. If the barbeque had been my idea, it never would have happened. I would have talked myself out of sending that email because pulling together a gathering for 40-plus people seems like an undertaking that would require more time.

How often do I put things off because the perceived time investment is just too much? Pretty danged often, I’m embarrassed to admit. This happens in my business when it comes to launching new products or services. Sometimes an inflated idea of the time investment causes me to put projects off. I know from many conversations with web writers and from reading the blogs of many freelancers

Famous TV chef, Anthony Bourdain, probably doesn’t even boil water before going through his preparation rituals.

Everything in its place may be his mantra. He studies his recipe, selects his tools and equipment, and assembles the ingredients in proper measurements before beginning.

In other words, he creates an action plan.

“The universe is in order when our station is set … ” he writes in his book, Kitchen Confidential.

Isn’t the single most important ingredient for successful freelance web writers also planning?

We don’t work in a kitchen, but we still need to collect our thoughts, assemble our research, and measure our time.

But what do most of us do when we first close our office door to the world?

• Turn on email
• Check phone messages
• Shove books and papers to the side of the desk (well, maybe not you)
• Gravitate in a zombie-like state to Facebook

As our day progresses, time has slipped away. We react to other people’s wants. Our brain becomes mush.

Another unproductive, unprofitable, and very sad day.

Yes, my friends, this is often the reality of (almost) living the writer’s life.

But it doesn’t need to be if we put a little extra effort into the first 10 minutes of the day.

Imagine what the end of the day looks like

Before you start diving into your day, you need to collect your thoughts, just like you would when you outline an article before writing.

You want to establish the three or four main activities that need to be accomplished this day and create an action plan for each one.

Psychologist, Ron Friedman, in a Harvard Business Review article, prescribes a question that will help get you started …

“The day is over and I am leaving the office with a tremendous sense of accomplishment.

I have to admit … I’ve had a difficult couple of weeks. I feel like it’s been a nonstop and unsuccessful scramble to keep up.

It wasn’t that I had taken on too much. It’s just that I was — for whatever reason — having a very difficult time breaking the projects I had taken on down into tasks. And I was having an even more difficult time prioritizing … especially when it came to the things that aren’t work-related.

I have a number of outside-work goals. They’re important to me. I have a third book in a fiction series to complete. I have health and fitness goals. Community service goals. Daily habits I’d like to develop. A marketing plan I’d like to execute. And a side business or two I’d like to launch.

I had to face the stark and somewhat painful reality that I can’t work on all of these things. At least not every day.

By Wednesday last week, my head was spinning. I felt buried under my workload and absolutely frustrated with my progress on everything else. I would look at my work list and instead of thinking, “What should I do next?” I would think, “How am I possibly going to get all this done?”

So I took a walk to reset my brain. I vented a little to my husband and business partner. He took a look at my list and said, “Just start by focusing on the client work. You can work on the other things once that’s done.”

I’ll be honest. I bristled a little at his advice. If I don’t work on my fiction every day … if I don’t work on our marketing every day … if I don’t work out every day … well, somehow that feels like I’m

Let’s set the scene …

You’re a freelance web writer. When you were first starting out, you were eager for experience … and for paychecks. So you were willing to take on just about any project that came your way. You didn’t negotiate much for fees. You weren’t working for peanuts exactly, but you had room to grow.

And that’s just what you did. You grew. Your skills got sharper. Your clients got bigger. And your fees went up.

You built a name for yourself in your industry, and now you have more work than you can take on. The problem is, you’re still saying Yes to everything that’s coming your way.

It’s a good problem to have. But it is a problem. One that you need to deal with.

Every successful freelancer eventually reaches the point where they have to say No. The question is, when should you say No? And how do you do it without upsetting your client? After all, the relationships and the reputation you’ve built are important to you. You wouldn’t want to damage either.

The first step is to figure out when you’ll say No. If you define ahead of time your criteria for taking on a new project, it’s easier to turn work down that doesn’t fit your pre-defined needs.

Three Times When You Absolutely Should Say No

You may come up with more than a dozen reasons why you wouldn’t want to take on a project, but these three biggies should definitely make your list.

1. You Can’t Meet the Deadline

If a client comes to you with a project that they need in two weeks and you simply don’t have the time in your schedule to do your best work and deliver it within that time frame — or if

My yearly goal for 2013 was to double my hourly rate. I wanted to earn a full-time income while investing part-time hours (fewer than 20 per week). My reasoning was I’d have more time for the things I enjoyed without taking a pay cut.

In my mind, that was the dream of being a writer.

By the end of 2013, I achieved my goal, doubled my hourly rate, worked fewer than 20 hours per week, and had a lot of free time (which I used to start another business).

My best tip for achieving this goal? Automate as much as possible!

Automation — defined by Dictionary.com — is:

The technique, method, or system of operating or controlling a process by highly automatic means, as by electronic devices, reducing human intervention to a minimum.

For freelance web writers, that might mean using a tool to track your time, follow-up with clients, or manage your projects. It could also include creating checklists and guiding documents to perform repetitive tasks more easily and quickly (for instance, using templates for proposals or autoresponders for inquiries from potential clients).

Truly anything from client attraction to follow-up can be streamlined to take less time and energy. The only problem seems to be finding the time to set up the automation in the first place …

However, any time you invest in automation will quickly pay off in saved time and energy. If you spend just a few hours each week automating and creating procedures, you’ll quickly have a system in place to save you hours every day.

Here’s how to get started — including the tools I use to automate my businesses — and earn more while working less:

1. Automatically track your time.

Advocates of time tracking will tell you it’s essential for productivity. What they tend to ignore is how much time it actually takes.

For instance, I once had a client who insisted I

Hello again, Wealthy Web Writers.

Welcome back to the Reality Blog!

When I came up with the title for this post, I had a funny feeling I’d used it before, and sure enough, I had!

Almost a year ago.

But in that post, I wrote about setting up an email opt-in form.

In this post, I’m just talking about the regular ol’ deluge of email I receive in my inbox on a daily basis.

So with that in mind, I bring you …

Did You Get My Email?

One of the things that’s got me thinking about email is that I picked up a new phone yesterday.

Ordinarily, this might not be big news, but it’s been mildly stressful, as I’ve finally left my beloved Blackberry behind and picked up a newfangled Samsung.

Now I have to transfer all my email accounts over … all 10 of them.

And the reason it’s only 10 is that was the limit on my phone.

Crazy, right?

I have my personal accounts, a Yahoo! one, a Gmail or two, an old Hotmail address, an email I use for junk mail, accounts for my freelance business and Money-Making Website, my community college account … even I admit it’s all a little insane.

Add to this the probably hundreds of email lists I’ve subscribed to in order to get countless special reports, cheat sheets, checklists, and e-books over the years … you can then start to imagine the seemingly unending flow of emails I receive on any given day.

Yikes.

Help, I’m Drowning in Emails

Do you feel the same way?

If so, here are a few thoughts on how to manage this onslaught …

Read and Respond

I’m starting to do this more and more, and for several reasons …

For one, I’ve

Sometimes, despite your best efforts and intentions, projects run off the rails. Often, it’s client projects that get off track, but sometimes your own work can get sidetracked as well.

Whether it’s client projects or your own, these techniques can help you restore balance to the Force that is your web-writing business.

That’s what Wealthy Web Writer’s Managing Editor, Heather Robson, told a group of Wealthy Web Writer members. You can review the entire webinar HERE.

Whatever the reason the project isn’t on track, the first rule of coping is, don’t beat yourself up over it. That’s not productive, and won’t help you regain control. Instead, focus on what you can do to get it back on track and on schedule.

Knowing the common reasons projects run amok, and being able to recognize them sooner rather than later, can help you get back in the groove more quickly. Common culprits include:

• It’s a new-to-you type of project, and you underestimate the time to completion
• Family or health issues
• A collaborator who doesn’t hold up his end of the work
• Poor communication between you and the client
• Poor time management (aka, procrastination)

Sometimes you get blindsided. Heather told us about one time she got a call from a regular client asking how she was progressing with a project. She was at a complete loss — she didn’t even know she had the job. It turned out that the company employee tasked with notifying her about the assignment hadn’t done so.

It’s easy to recognize when a project is “hideously off track,” Heather acknowledged, but it’s better if you can pick up on the early warning signs.

Early Warning Signs Your Project is Headed Sideways

1. Unanswered communication with the client.
2. Missed milestones — if you’ve missed two milestones, stop and reassess.

Most people will tell you things like goals, self-confidence, a good attitude, and perseverance are the most important parts of a web-writing career.

But I think all those things are secondary. First and most important is time. It’s like oxygen for the successful web writer; without it, nothing else matters.

The time I have to work and write is a quarter of what it used to be, even though my projects and client requests are bigger than ever. To find balance, I’ve come up with six unusual ways to handle it all and still meet my deadlines.

Counterintuitive Secret #1: Get Busier

There’s a quote I love: “If you want something done, ask a busy person.”

Back when I was a newlywed who’d quit her full-time job and only had two dogs to care for, I had all the time in the world. Yet I hardly got anything done.

Now, with three small kids, three dogs, multiple volunteer obligations, and a home that’s about to double in size thanks to a major renovation project, I’m often radically productive.

If there’s anything I wish I’d done differently in those early days, it would be that I limited my time more by volunteering regularly or committing to something big, like training for a marathon.

So, if you can’t make sense of why you never get anything done with the time you have, consider that maybe you have too much time to work with. There’s nothing like lighting a fire under your bum via scarcity to get motivated!

Counterintuitive Secret #2: Turn Expert Advice on Its Head

For years, I followed the expert advice to not check email till the afternoon. It’s true that it can help you stay focused and find more time to write in the morning, which is usually

Date: May 10^th, 2016
Time: 12pm, Eastern Time
Topic: What’s New
Presenter: Heather Robson

In this live monthly webinar, Wealthy Web Writer Platinum members have the chance to catch up on the most popular Wealthy Web Writer content, to find out about upcoming events and to ask any questions about freelance web writing.

During this May Update, Heather Robson will talk about finding the ideal balance for your growing business. You’ll learn …

• How much time you should spend working on your business.
• How much time you should spend working on client projects.
• How to make your marketing a priority.
• What you should do yourself and what you should outsource.
• The three types of learning you want to make time for.
• And more!

Join us for this fun and informative member meeting.

Access instructions will be posted here before the event.

Being a writer is a beautiful calling. You get to be creative. You get to motivate and inspire people. You get to help businesses succeed and contribute to the betterment of the lives of countless individuals. Plus, if you play your cards right, you can work from anywhere and set your own schedule.

At times, however, being a writer can turn stressful. Campaign deadlines can bring a lot of pressure. Your to-do list fills up and you aren’t sure how to manage the avalanche of incoming projects.

To return to your state of writer’s bliss — or to never lose it in the first place — you need to stay in full control, and use all the tools and apps available to you. There are plenty of handy bits of technology to help you stay more organized at every level.

Let’s take a look at some of the best tools and tips to keep you on track and enjoying the writer’s life.

Manage your time better

Even if you’re a freelancer and you work from home, you need to differentiate between work time and free time. Organize yourself a special office space where you will work. Also inform family members and friends that they should not disturb you during your work hours. That way, you’ll be able to work on your projects without distraction. You’ll get more done in less time and do better work, too. That means way less stress.

Organize your work better

Too many writing projects? It may mean more money at the end of the month, but it can mean stressful days in the meantime. When you feel like you’ve bitten off more than you can chew, it becomes more important than ever to pay attention to your overall organization. You want to do everything you

If you’re like me, you have a tendency sometimes to leave your own projects to the last minute… or later.

And you may even find yourself down to the wire with clients’ projects, too. (Although you’re less likely to let those deadlines slip than you are your own.)

If you feel like you’ve gotten into a pattern of always finishing everything with little-to-no-time left to spare, it’s time to take a look at what you’re doing. And to see if there’s a better way to do things.

We all like to think we work better under a deadline. Deadlines are motivating. But if you’re bumping up against a deadline, you’re probably not doing your best quality work. You’re not giving your thoughts time to percolate. You aren’t taking time to consider the best metaphors… the best analogies… the best structure… the best presentation for your core message. You may not even know what the best core message is because you’re just rushing to get the project done.

The way around this is to give yourself more time between when you start things and when you finish. So if it normally takes you a few hours to finish a blog post and you spread that time over two days, trying spreading it over a week instead. If you need a week to complete a landing page, give yourself two.

Here’s the next trick. You actually have to give yourself that time. You can set a deadline for two weeks out. If you don’t start until the deadline is just a week away, then your situation hasn’t changed.

Now, I’m not necessarily saying you should spend more time working on your projects. You’re the only one who can determine if you need to do that. But most writers, myself included, can benefit

Who can’t use a little more time?

With the tips you’ll learn in this video, you’ll shave time off some of the most common things you do online. A few seconds here and there, and before you know it, by the end of the day you’ve saved a half hour or more.

Enjoy!

Find more time to devote to growing your freelance web-writing business… it can seem nearly impossible. This is true for both new web writers just starting out and for those with years of experience.

No matter who you are, there are 1,440 minutes in a day. No more, and no less.

And just so we’re clear, you also need to sleep. I’m not an advocate of the “just wake up earlier” philosophy. You need to spend time with your family, too. You need to eat… to exercise… to do client work… to bathe, at least occasionally. These are all important things, and I’m not suggesting you eliminate any of them.

Instead, I’m suggesting that you can do it all. You can have the writer’s life you want…

You just have to be smart with those 1,440 minutes.

Here are five ways that have proven successful for me, and that will work for you, too:

1. Find More Time by Reclaiming “Lost” Wait Time

If you were to keep track of the amount of time you sit idly waiting for other people throughout the day, you’d probably be amazed at how those minutes add up.

How many times have you waited 10 minutes (or more) in the school parking lot to pick up your child after school? Ever spend 15 minutes (or more) waiting for a doctor’s appointment? And how much time do you lose waiting on hold for someone to pick up a call?

You probably have your own black holes of time that suck up a vast number of minutes in your day.

The first step to reclaiming your lost time is to identify those black holes. The next step is to do something productive with that time.

For example, I lose a lot of time waiting in the