First attempt at business is a launch

So, I decided to bite the bullet and take a handful of virtual dirt along with a friend and attempt to start a first business.Now; the thing is I love technology, I love reviewing technology; and so we thought "Why not try and work with that".

So, we came up with Technologist PR .. This is a work in progress, a launch of today as we have a starting foundation. And we have some ideas. For example, I know that lots of App developers like myself (as I am a developer even though I don't get to do it much) don't have money for PR, advertising, etc. So we can offer deals of say no cash up front and percentage of takings..

Now, this isn't a rash punch in the dark. I have been working on reviewing products for companies (some big companies too) for over a year working with their PR. And I have been working with a few PR companies again reviewing, advertising their products. So I have gained insight into what is required.

Basically we are offering a service that is free to try. And could potentially raise the sales of a customers product. I know how much time and effort it takes in creating a product and so believe same amount of time and effort should be paid in advertising.  But would you as a developer want to do that or prefer to pay for that to be done.

Anyhow guys, go check us out. Its my first attempt at working for myself (well to transition over time) and I will certainly keep you informed :)

Shall I write a book - can I write a book? Doing it from home...

So you may remember my recent blog about working from home. One of the common scenarios is the free lance writer and working from home; and certainly I was wandering how difficult this sort of thing can be.

Now... I have a good friend of mine that produces music - Tangent.. Hold with me, I'll get there. He's been producing music for many years, been part of many smaller bands for 30 years or more and at one point that was his job.

Now, fast forward to last few years. He has written or rather created music and using the web he puts his music on particular site(s) for sale (this is where tangent reeled back in). Now he produces good music, spends great amounts of time perfecting it. But because of the mass market he may make a few pounds a month if lucky.

So... Taking that example over to book writing or freelance writing. How many books/ebooks are written and never take off or never produce much money? Could these been great books or not so great? Is it marketing?

So, to answer my own question and research I am considering writing such a book. Now, I am not sure if I am a great writer; not even sure of a story line; but I am sure on the target market. I am going to write an ebook that a parent can read too a toddler. Why? Because I have a target audience to check if good story or not hehe. Also; such stories don't have to be very long and you can even write a series.

If that goes well then I may try moving up in number of pages? Maybe aim at slight older ages? But in all this is a research and results will be shared... Hopefully there will be results.

So, have any of you reading this blog ever produced any ebooks/books? Do you have advice, hints, tips? 

OK, this blog may not be fountain of all knowledge some people expect so I will try to get a more techie one out today also :-D

Would you like to work from home?

I know I certainly would, especially on these cold mornings. Thing is; last year I was made redundant from the company I was working for, though we were given 10 months notice so wasn't a shock. During my looking for a new role the first company I saw was a work from home role. Well, work from home 4 days of the week with a 45 mile journey on the other to the tiny office anyhow.

Now this job was a major pay cut to the border line of what could have accepted BUT the benefit being less petrol and fact that we could have moved to a different place that would have loved to have lived in; and cheaper maybe with house prices. As it goes I got down to the last 2 but the other guy knew ASP   (not asp.net, just VB ASP) and I didn't. However; I got that far due to my people management skills and developer skills in other markets.

This did leave me hungry for more though current role I drive 28 miles to the office each day :-(   ... However I still have an eager passion on the whole work from home thing. Probably comes down to when going through University and one of projects had to do was study a case of early working from home people (mainly entering newspaper articles onto website for the newspapers). Left me thinking "I would love to do that".

So a more recent study I have started have produced some interesting results so to speak. Now, you have your cons (as in con men) and you have some legit. Some are working for a company and some are freelance.

Let me first tackle the con. So sometimes you come across jobs that say you have to buy an intro pack for $xxx.xx or less. Thing one example I saw was 30GBP. Now, not all these are a con as some are legit HOWEVER my suggestion is that if you have to buy something to do the job - then probability is that the main income to the company selling are those packs. You would probably earn very little money doing the job - possibly not even enough to cover the initial pack. Now, again, this may not always be true but to be safe if you see that you have to buy something to get job then don't do it. A good company would always give that pack for free..

Other roles I have seen grouped are the support workers from home. Now these are quite an interesting one as you generally work direct for a company getting holiday, pension, etc. What you tend to do is define a time of the day that you can do the support and you get support calls and emails routed to you. Its a virtual call center to be more precise. I would say that this is the safest and probably best constant income roles and they are out there.. I saw one last night for example.

Final collection of roles saw were the freelance writing roles. Now these could be for a online paper, magazine, website, etc. To be honest the actual published site they are for doesn't matter as they are basically all the same. You write something and submit it. If it gets published you get money. If not you don't.  Your basically selling your story like freelance reporters do to the news papers. Now there is no guarantee of money for this and in the beginning your writings probably won't bring much in but may increase over time.

There are other forms of working from home such as ebay seller; setting up your own company to do something (generally retail) and even writing blogs and YouTube and trying to earn money from advertising revenue..  But when it comes down to it; if want a constant income then get one of those virtual call center roles.

Again these are just my thoughts; my findings. Please, if  you are interested in working from home go and check out what is out there - plenty of sites. And do your research on any company before you start (and don't hand over any money)