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[B127]Bad Place To Earn A Living

by Timothy Tye, Tim

My name is Tim. On 1 November, 2007, that's three weeks ago as I wrote this, I was suddenly made redundant. Although I never expected that I would be working for the same company until I retire, the speed at which the job was taken away can be described as nothing but abrupt. In one swift stroke, my whole
department was told our services were no longer required. I lost my job. My boss lost his job. My colleague was transferred to another department. We were each given a Separation Package. The company even threw in a 3-month free consultation, so that a career consultant can help us brush up our resume and job-seeking skills.

I was with the company for almost ten years, and suddenly I was told that I do not need to come back to work the next day. In the interview I had with the career consultant, he said to me, "Some people, especially one who has been with the same company for ten years, can get quite emotional. How do you feel?"
"I am quite emotional too," I said. "I am laughing all the way to the bank!"

Indeed, rather than looking at my sudden joblessness as having hit a brick wall, I consider the Separation Package a bonanza. An early Christmas present. My friends however are split in their views: some were saying how sorry they were to learn that I have lost my job, the other group was congratulating me for the windfall. Myself, I am not sadden by it at all. Now I can look forward to living my life exactly how I want to live it.

I know, for some people, losing their job was humiliation and utter devastation. They take it personally, and are unable to move away from the fact that their services were no longer required by the company. Throughout their working life, they have built their world around their job; they interacted only with the people in their office, that when all this suddenly evaporated into thin air, they were lost.

If you are one such person, stop it at once. There is more to life than holding a job, and in fact, it is a much better quality life, once you learn to be the master of your destiny. Why do I say that?

If you don't have a job, you don't have to worry what time you go to bed at night, and what time you wake up in the morning. You don't have to be stuck in rush hour traffic, and you have unlimited days off without needing doctor's permission. You can go on holidays for as long as you want, and never having to worry that work is piling up for you back in the office.

Okay, even as you read this, I know lurking in your mind is that perennial question: but if I don't have a job, how do I earn a living and pay the bills?
That is indeed a pressing issue, and that's why I created this website, to deal with it, in the most high-tech way. And surprisingly, it is something which everybody can learn.

But before I go into that, I want to show you how stupid it is holding a job. You go to work at eight in the morning, and you're not home again till six, or more likely seven. You are trading away your time and energy - both depleting resources - for money. All the things that you can do with your life is squeezed into the few hours in between the time allocated for your job, things like playing games, exercising, cooking meals, going to the movies, etc. On the other hand, have you wondered why is it that rich people have so much free time. While everybody is busy with their jobs, rich people are out playing golf, lying on a beach somewhere, sipping Mai Tai ... don't they have jobs?

I think you can answer that quite clearly: rich people don't have jobs. And how is that possible? Because, rich people own businesses! Usually, when you own a business, you have people working for you, so you don't have to work. They have jobs, not you.

I realised that some years ago. If you want to be rich, you should be owning businesses. That's quite straightforward, right? There are plenty of books on that subject. To pick one, read "Rich Dad Poor Dad" by Robert Kiyosaki. It's a very famous book and is easily found in most bookstores. I read that book some time in year 2000, and it converted me to the idea that I must detach myself from the idea of holding a job, and start looking for opportunities to own businesses.

At that time, I wasn't sure how I am ever going to own a business. I also thought that to do businesses require a massive injection of capital. Looking around me, I saw many businesses with half-baked plans sprouting up and then toppling over just as quickly, and I know starting a business is not as simple as it sounds. If I cannot afford to hire people to work for me, what other avenues I have of owning a business?

And then I discovered MLM, Multi-Level Marketing. For a while, I was very passionate about it. I dug up all my present and long-lost friends and acquaintances, and tried to convince them to join me. Through MLM, I can have an entire battalion of downlines working for me, so that - assumably - I don't have to work. I know there are many people - including you perhaps - who are very successful in MLM, but it was not long before I realise MLM is not for me.
I will write in more detail about this is a separate chapter. But it did teach me something called passive income.

Passive income is indirect earnings. If I cannot afford to have people to work for me to earn passive income, I learn that the two other options are to have my money working for me, and to have machines working for me. To have my money working for me, I first need to have money! But what if I don't?

That's when I realised the only option available is for machines to work for me. And it was through this search for that tireless machine that finally took me to where I am today: the Internet.

Although I have been building websites for fun since 1997, it was only in 2003 that I started my first serious website, AsiaExplorers, http://www.asiaexplorers.com. At that time, I created it simply to support my passion for travelling, and to find an outlet to escape the drudgery of my routine job. But as AsiaExplorers continued to grow and become successful, I realised what a powerful tool I have in my hands. Today I have other travel websites including EarthDocumentary, http://www.earthdocumentary.com and WorldGreatestSites. But it was through AsiaExplorers that I started earning passive income in any substantial amount from the Internet.

One limiting factor between 2003 and now that has hindered the growth of my web-based passive income was my job, which consumed much of my free time. Also, I have to honestly say that I was pretty new to the idea of earning from the web, and had to learn things the hard way - through trial and error. I wasted a lot of time in the process. Nevertheless, since I discovered the Internet, I am sold: if you want to remain happily jobless, the best way to do it is through passive income from the Internet.

What I am about to teach you in my website, HappyJoblessGuy, is a very important and valuable lesson, applicable to you whether you are presently jobless, holding a job, or sick and tired of your present job. If you have been searching for a way to earn an income from the Internet, stay with me. In subsequent chapters, I will discuss what is available for you to tap. I hope you will read every chapter that I write, and will be eager but not impatient to earn money from the web. If you want to do it well, you need to do it right, so take it step by step.

There are many things I will share with you, but I will not be holding your hand. Many times I will provide recommendations for you to go, read and discover something on your own. It's a mean world out there, so if you ever contemplate surviving it, you better learn some independence. However I will provide you the necessary leads, so that it doesn't become an impossible task, and that eventually terms such as Search Engine Optimization, AdWords, AdSense, etc will become commonplace to you.

Nowhere on this website will you find a request for password - this whole website is free. Along the way, however, some of my recommendations may require you to pay money to a third party, whether to set up your website account, or to gain a specific web-related knowledge. It is entirely affordable and essential in your quest towards owning your own web-based business. And let me tell you this: don't believe people who tell you that it's going to be easy, and that money will start falling from the sky. If you think there is a shortcut, you're in the wrong boat, friend.

In the next chapter, I will talk about the right way to earn from the web. To read it, and other chapters in the Guide to Earning a Living without Holding a Job, go to my website, at http://www.happyjoblessguy.com.

Whenever I get asked what I do for a living, the answer of being a writer evokes two main responses. Either I get a polite nod, which means they consider my answer somewhat above "bank robber" but below "actually employed" or I get an eager look from somebody who wants to know how to become a writer. This is usually followed by a request to read something, often a poem.

Being a writer is a form of gainful employment. Would-be writers generally ask me questions about writing. I am almost never asked questions about the business of writing.

The business of writing separates the sheep from the goats. A writer who sees her writing as a business can actually make money in the field, even pretty decent money. A writer who sees her work as her passion, her creative outlet, or her hobby generally does not make money.

Writers who want to support themselves writing need to stop thinking and talking about writing and focus on the business.

If you want to earn a living as a writer, you have to sell what you've written. One way to do this is to get a job at a corporation as a writer. You may not realize it, but most large corporations (and many smaller businesses) have full-time writers on staff. You may wind up writing manuals or reports or brochures or web content, but you can write for a living.

Just about any organization that puts words on paper, whether in shareholder newsletters, annual reports, product manuals, ads, strategic plans, and so on has a need for writers.

Freelance writers can also write for businesses but instead of being on staff, they work from their own office. Some companies contract writers to do writing work on-site for specific durations or projects.

Landing freelance assignments from businesses can be pretty lucrative work but you have to know what you're doing. Businesses tend to be sort of humorless about deadlines and quality of work. A freelancer working for businesses needs to maintain regular office hours, answer the phone professionally (don't let your toddler grab the phone before you), and have all of the equipment businesses expect. This means you need e-mail, business phone, and fax line. It doesn't hurt to have a website, even if it's just basically a business card online.

To start looking for work at businesses you should first try to network. Referrals are a great way to get jobs, but you need to start telling people about your services. It's easy to start with folks you know. From there, expand into people whose contact information you can get.

You can prepare a simple mailing with a letter introducing yourself and your services and contact information. Send it out to businesses in the fields you'd like to work for. Mention any special expertise, training, or background you have.

As an example, let's assume you have written a newsletter for a dentist in your town; you can contact other dentists or physicians and tell them about your writing expertise in this "specialty." With the Internet, you don't need to be local anymore. If you can get permission from the dentist, send out some copies as samples to show off your work (called "clips").

What if you're just starting out and don't have a specialty? It's easy to get one. Just start writing. Contribute material to local newsletters, the local paper, and websites in your field. Notice I said "contribute." You increase your odds of getting published if you give this stuff away. That's good business sense because you need published clips.

Want to write about financial services? Start by writing anything and everything you can on the subject for free, save up the clips, and then prepare a letter and mailing with your best work to attract business clients.

Writing for business can be done for a flat rate or by the hour. A flat rate works well if you know the exact scope of what you're doing. Since many businesses can make changes on the fly, even changing the direction or scope of the project, an hourly rate is often used instead.

Where else can you sell your writing? Magazines, newspapers, and websites are all hungry for content. But don't just throw something at a magazine and wonder why they don't publish it.

Always analyze the publication before you submit or suggest anything. For instance, you wouldn't want to submit an article on "World's Worst Airline Disasters" to an in-flight magazine. If you can't get a handle on the magazine or newspaper, look at the other articles and the advertisers. If you see a magazine with lots and lots of cigarette ads, you won't get far with a piece on the dangers of smoking.

The better you can fit your offering to the publication, the more likely you are to make a sale. For instance, one of the first articles I sold was a story about how and where teachers could change careers. I sold it to a free newspaper published by a local employment agency. It sold not because it was some great literary masterpiece but it was a great fit. The newspaper was actively seeking people who wanted to get a new job. What better story than one aimed at disgruntled teachers seeking a new line of work?

You'll notice I have not mentioned writing fiction, poetry, or plays. J. K. Rowling notwithstanding, you can't make money writing those things. This is not to say no one makes money in those fields. Of course that's not true. The hard truth of the matter is the artistic forms of writing, including fiction, are highly competitive fields that have very high barriers to entry for unknown writers. There aren't many publishers actively seeking new and unpublished writers. Your odds are better playing the lottery.

If your dream is to write a novel, that's great. But don't call it a business, at least not until you've sold your novel. I don't discourage such activities, but it is not the same thing as having a real business.

You can make a living as a writer. Actually, the Internet has opened up so many new business opportunities for lkinds of enterprs, but no one is better poised to take advantage of some of these opportunities than a savvy and adventurous business-minded writer. Now writers can sell their work directly to the public, bypassing the whole publication process.

Again, this works best for nonfiction. In fact, the online world is always looking for lots of practical how-to content. How do you fight a speeding ticket? Improve your credit score? Get the best deal on an Alaskan cruise? Today, a business-minded writer can prepare a book, publish it (either electronically or using a cost-efficient digital printer) and sell it directly to people who are interested in that particular subject.

In fact, there may never have been brighter times for an ardent, business-minded writer willing to make a living from non-fiction.

Meanwhile, if you want to write poetry, a great drama, or an award-winning novel, those are wonderful ambitions. They are laudable, and you may even get rich and famous. But the real business of writing belongs to those who translate the existing opportunity into action.

Article Source : Hunting Land In Texas

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Both Timothy Tye & Jo Ann Lequang are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.

Timothy Tye has sinced written about articles on various topics from Careers and Job Hunting, Travel and Leisure. . Timothy Tye's top article generates over 2900 views. to your Favourites.

Jo Ann Lequang has sinced written about articles on various topics from Careers and Job Hunting, Writing and Finances. Are you a writer ready to get serious about your writing business? Want to find out more about Internet writing? Please visit . Jo Ann Lequang's top article generates over 33100 views. to your Favourites.