Apple and AT&T today announced service plans for iPhone

daveschroeder writes

"Apple and AT&T today announced service plans for iPhone, 4 days before its release in the US at 6pm local time on Friday, June 29. The plans are $59.99/mo for 450 minutes, $79.99 for 900 minutes, and $99.99 for 1350 minutes, and all include unlimited data, 200 SMS messages, rollover minutes, and unlimited mobile-to-mobile calling. Any other standard AT&T service plan may also be used. A two year service plan is required, with a $175 cancellation fee if terminated early. In addition, activations are done via iTunes, so only the hardware is purchased in the store. Interestingly, activation of a contract via iTunes is required to enable the iPod/syncing functionality of the phone as well. (It will remain to be seen whether there are workarounds for this for those who only want the iPod functionality of iPhone, and whether the iPhone is easily unlockable for those who wish to try it on alternate carriers, and so on.)"

Apple: iPhone Battery Life Improved

© 2007 The Associated Press

SAN JOSE, Calif. — Apple Inc. gave rival smart phone makers another reason for heartburn Monday, claiming its upcoming iPhone will have a battery life that exceeds the company's previous estimate and the battery life of competing phones.

With the iPhone launch still 11 days away, Apple said the hotly anticipated gadget will last for 8 hours of talk time, 6 hours of Internet use or 7 hours of video playback.

When the company previewed the device in January, it said the rechargeable battery could last 5 hours handling any one of those functions.

Competitors' phones _ such as Palm Inc.'s Treo and Research in Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry Curve _ tout talk times of about 4 hours. Samsung Electronic Co. claims about 5.5 hours for the BlackJack.

The announcement lifted Apple shares, which have soared more than 40 percent over the past three months in anticipation of the iPhone, which combines the functions of a cell phone, iPod media player, digital organizer and wireless Web device.

After a day of heavy trading, Apple shares climbed 3.8 percent, or $4.59, to close at $125.09.

Shaw Wu, an analyst at American Technology Research who has a "buy" rating on Apple, was skeptical, however. "Our sources have indicated iPhone's active use battery life may be closer to around 4 to 5 hours for heavy use, similar to other smart phones," he noted in a research report Monday.

He also predicted Apple will face complaints over the design of the battery, which can't be easily swapped out by users. It's a convenience that other gadget makers often offer but one that Apple has not, most notably in its iPods, forcing users to send in their devices when the battery wears out.

If Apple's new iPhone battery life claims are true, analysts say the gadget will set a new performance standard for smart phones _ handsets that handle voice and data communications.

The Cupertino-based company also said the iPhone battery can handle 24 hours of music playback and up to 10 days of standby time before requiring a recharge.

"It is amazing," said Richard Doherty, president of The Envisioneering Group, a research company. "I'm not aware of any smart phone that has that amount of talk time without needing a battery the size of a cigarette pack."

Apple did not disclose details of how it achieved the new iPhone specifications. Doherty said that since battery technology has only seen limited improvements recently, Apple likely lengthened battery life by optimizing the iPhone's features and components, such as automatically powering down the display or wireless chips when those features are not in use,

"There has to be very efficient circuitry inside," he said.

Given its past legal battles, Doherty thinks Apple might be treading cautiously this time with its performance claims. Apple reached a settlement with affected consumers in another case over allegations of defective batteries in early iPod models.

In another change, Apple said the iPhone's touch-sensitive screen will be made out of glass instead of plastic, for "superior scratch resistance and clarity." Apple has been criticized and sued for how the screens on its iPod Nanos get scratched easily.

The iPhone will only be sold at stores owned by Apple Inc. and AT&T Inc., which has an exclusive deal to offer cellular service for the device when it goes on sale in the U.S. on June 29. It will also be available at Apple's Web site.

The device will be available in two configurations, $500 for a 4 gigabyte model and $600 for one with 8 gigabytes of storage.

Source : http://www.chron.com

Each your sales copy will play a major role in your success

Original Tittle : "Writing Effective Sales Copy"

A professional looking web site is a very important part of developing a profitable Internet business. However, your sales copy is just as important -- each will play a major role in your success.

The key to writing effective sales copy is simply learning how to write persuasive words specifically written for your targeted potential customer. You must feel their needs and write your copy with passion, excitement and benefits. Tell them exactly what's in it for them by writing copy that evokes a specific emotion and stresses your product's benefits.

Use the following formula when writing your sales copy:

A - Attention - Use a powerful headline that demands attention
I - Interest - Intrigue interest and create curiosity
D - Detail - Provide details about your product or service
A - Action - Call for action

When you begin writing your copy, your text should be written in a black, legible font with a light background. Avoid using fancy fonts or backgrounds that will make your text difficult to read. Write in small blocks of text with a space between each block. There is nothing that will make your visitor click away faster than a sea of black text --so make sure you use plenty of white space.

A great way to write your copy and come up with new benefits is to use the "so what" strategy. After each sentence, say to yourself, "so what" and then elaborate.

Example:

XYZ computers are lightning fast. (so what) They can process information faster than any other computer on the market. (so what) Your programs will instantly load on command, (so what) saving you hours of valuable time and frustration over the life of your computer.

Remember...benefits sell not features.

Headline

The first and most important part of your sales copy is the headline. If your headline doesn't instantly capture your targeted potential customers' attention, and arouse a specific emotion, the rest of your sales copy will be useless.

In order to write an effective headline, you must learn how to use specific words to achieve a specific reaction.

Before writing your headline, you must first learn a little bit about the basic human motivators. According to psychologist Abraham Maslow, human behavior is always the result of one or more of five basic needs. He listed these needs in a sequence that he refers to as "the hierarchy of human needs."

He believes that until a less important need is met there won't be any desire to pursue a more important need. Below are the five human motivators, beginning with the basic needs and continuing to the most important needs.

Physiological - Basic human needs include hunger, thirst, shelter, clothing and sex.
Safety (Security) - Human need for physical, emotional and financial security.
Social (Affiliation) - Human need for love, affection, companionship and acceptance.
Esteem (Self Esteem) - Human need for achievement, recognition, attention and respect.
Self-actualization - Human need to reach their full potential.

When you are aware of the basic human needs, you can incorporate these needs into your writing. A great headline will appeal to your potential customers' emotions. You must feel their needs, wants and desires and write your headlines with passion and emotion.

Introduction

Just as your headline is a very important part of your sales copy, the first paragraph is just as important. Studies have shown that if your headline attracts your potential customers' attention, and you can maintain their attention through the first paragraph, chances are they'll read the rest of your copy.

The first paragraph should clearly define the benefits that will be outlined within your sales copy -- identify a problem and promote your product or service as the solution.

Subheadings

Subheadings are basically just smaller headlines used to break up your text blocks. They also provide your readers with important highlights of your paragraphs.

Use plenty of subheadings throughout your copy, as not all of your visitors will read your copy word for word. They'll simply scan it and only read what catches their attention.

Remove the Risk

You must provide your potential customers with a solid, no risk, money back guarantee. In addition, provide a limited time free trial or download that will completely remove their risk. This will build your potential customers' confidence in you and put their mind at ease.

Call for Action

Once your potential customer has read your sales copy, you must direct them to your order page by asking for the order.

Use a P.S.

When your visitor scans your sales message, chances are they'll read your headline, sub headlines and your PostScript message. Place your most important benefits within your PS message.

Provide Testimonials

Testimonials provide a great way to reassure your visitors. Blend your testimonials in with your sales message. Avoid making your visitors have to click to another page to view your testimonials -- chances are, they won't. By blending your testimonials in with your sales message, you can ensure they will be read.

Long Copy verses Short Copy

It is a proven fact that long sales copy out-sells short sales copy. However, some visitors do prefer a short sales letter. You can provide your visitors with both. For those who prefer a short sales letter, provide opportunities to click through to your order page prior to ending your sales letter.

Try to keep your sales letter all on one page. Your visitors would much rather have to scroll through your letter than click through and load another page. With each additional click, you'll lose a percentage of your potential customers.

Your words should seamlessly flow together from your headline through to your order page. Every word, sentence and headline should have one specific purpose -- to lead your potential customer to your order page. The simple, well-designed web sites with killer sales copy make the sales.

Copyright © Shelley Lowery

About the Author:

Shelley Lowery is the author of the acclaimed web design course, Web Design Mastery. http://www.webdesignmastery.com And, Ebook Starter - Give Your Ebooks the look and feel of a REAL book. http://www.ebookstarter.com

What's Apple's Safari strategy?

By Stephen Withers

Windows doesn't really need another browser, so why is Apple porting Safari from Mac OS X to Windows?

The answer is market share.

With Safari, Apple currently has less than 5 percent 'web share' according to recent figures from Net Applications, with other browsers - primarily Firefox, but also Camino and Opera - taking nearly a quarter of the Mac's platform share.

Whether 75 or 85 percent of Mac users actually use Safari is neither here nor there. Even if the Macintosh's share of the market is growing, current levels of use are not enough to encourage many web designers and developers to check that their pages work with Safari unless their target market is particularly Mac oriented or especially vocal.

I'm not going to get into a debate about which browser most closely supports the relevant standards, but as long as there are any significant differences in the way major browsers handle the code they're fed, minority browsers like Safari are going to be a nuisance that many web developers would prefer to overlook.

It's just that Apple's about to start selling this thing called the iPhone, which uses Safari as its web browser. Not only that, but initially Web 2.0 applications will be the only way non-Apple developers can get their software onto the iPhone.

The company could quickly find itself selling more iPhones than Macs, but that would only mean Safari had perhaps a 10 percent web share - not really enough to impact on the IE/Firefox hegemony.

But if Safari on Windows could attract another five percent, then Safari is snapping at Firefox's heels, and web developers would have less justification for ignoring it. Steve Jobs seems to think it will come at the expense of Firefox, but we would be amazed if it didn't attract some Internet Explorer users.

With Macs - especially MacBooks and MacBook Pros - becoming more commonplace in corporate environments, you can see that IT staff might be keen to encourage the use of one cross-platform browser to minimise support loads. If Apple does a good job, that could be Safari rather than Firefox - but either way it would be IE that misses out. (Unless you think they'll recommend IE under Parallels or VMware instead.)

So why has Apple released a beta of Safari for Windows that some people are describing (unfairly in our view) as being of alpha quality?

Those Web 2.0 developers with an eye on the iPhone need a way of testing their apps on Safari now if they are going to be ready for the iPhone's release at the end of this month. They probably wouldn't go out and buy a Mac if they don't already have one, but installing a pre-release copy of the Windows version isn't much of a hardship.

Why Video Publishers Have More Inventory Than They Think

By Aimee Irwin (http://www.imediaconnection.com)

Think we're at our video inventory limit? Think again. Advertising.com's VP of video networks gives pointers.

According to data from AccuStream iMedia Research, 75 percent of all video advertising inventory is sold each month. The truth is that publishers aren't exploiting all the advertising potential of their video content. They are not sold out; they're simply not selling everything they have to offer.

With so much money to be made from video advertising, how can this be?

One reason is that unlike display advertising, unfulfilled video inventory doesn't leave a big blank space on your site. If there's no ad to show prior to a video clip, the publisher can simply skip right to the video content, which means publishers cannot easily account for missed ad opportunities.

Another reason for this overreporting is that, due to the early stage and rapid growth of online video, inventory simply isn't as predictable or easily monetized as display inventory, particularly when it comes to sudden spikes in traffic. For example, breaking news events can dramatically increase video viewership, creating a high volume of unexpected advertising inventory.

These factors and more lead publishers to overestimate the percentage of video inventory sold, simply because they're not factoring in the hidden potential of their video content. And this can be a costly oversight.

With high CPMs and strong demand for video advertising, publishers should be taking advantage of every second of video ad space available. Here are some ways you can extend your video ad inventory and better monetize your current assets.

1. Use continuous play for continuous revenue
It can be hard to get off the sofa. That's why at the end of a TV show, plenty of viewers stay put and get drawn into the next show. Video publishers, too, can leverage this phenomenon with continuous play, positioning multiple clips back to back in order to keep the user interested and thereby multiplying opportunities to run ads.

2. Partner with a network to fill every minute
If you want to fill 100 percent of your ad inventory, an ad network is the way to go. Partnering with a network is the most efficient way to deal with the ups and downs of video viewership. Networks eliminate the unpredictability problem, absorbing any available impression you have, in real time. So, if traffic spikes as the result of a breaking news clip, a network will automatically ensure that additional inventory is monetized.

3. Improve your advertiser appeal
Boost the value of your video inventory and you'll keep advertisers coming back for more. One way to accomplish this is to offer formats that give advertisers the most bang for their buck. Another is to make your video advertising as appealing and welcoming to site visitors as possible. Consumers who have a better user experience are more likely to view video again on your site (creating more ad opportunities) and will have higher response rates (creating happy, loyal advertisers.)

Here are a few value-enhancing strategies that work:

• Enable companion banners: What really sets online video apart from TV advertising is its interactivity and measurability. Like TV, video offers great visual and emotional impact. But video also offers a way to immediately generate and measure consumer response. Perhaps no format combines emotional appeal with actionability better than video advertising with a companion banner. Companion banners are clickable static ads placed inside a video player, just outside of the video clip. These ads are extremely attractive to advertisers, who essentially get twice the exposure for their money. In order to remain competitive in the video space, companion banners are a must-have value-add.
• Set session limits: Check out your favorite TV program online, and you may see the exact same ad before the content and at each '"commercial break." This creates a less-than-desirable to downright frustrating user experience. Unfortunately, that repetitiveness can also diminish response rates. One solution is to cap ad frequency based on session limits (the length of time the consumer has been viewing your video content). Reducing ad duplication may not only improve response rates, it will also open up your content to additional advertisers and revenue opportunities.
• Adapt ad length to clip length: Thirty seconds of advertising before a 90-second clip? What consumer wouldn't feel burned? A better approach is to adapt ad length to clip length, so a 90-second clip will have much less ad time than an hour-long program. Again, keeping viewers happy keeps them coming back to your content.

Boost the volume and value of your video ad inventory
Before you put up your "sold out" sign, take a closer look at your video assets for untapped revenue opportunities and ways to improve the user experience. When it comes to video advertising, every second and every impression counts.

As vice president of Advertising.com’s video network, Aimee Irwin is responsible for strategic publisher initiatives for the company’s video product, including the ongoing growth and development of its publisher base.

Easy Money of CNBC

by Tim Catts

In the past few months, Jim Kraber became more than a little obsessed with CNBC's "Million Dollar Portfolio Challenge." At the peak, the 42-year-old was spending 12 hours a day on the contest, using three computers in his Greenwich Village apartment to trade 1,600 different portfolios, all in an effort to win the $1 million grand prize. He even dropped his studies for the chartered financial analyst (CFA) exam, given once a year, so he could have more time for the financial news channel's game.

He made it into the group of 20 finalists, but in mid-May, as the last round of trading opened, he noticed an unusual pattern in the picks of other contestants. One trader had a stream of near-perfect picks, consistently placing huge bets on shares that soared in after-hours trading. Kraber suspected the trader and perhaps others were getting help from someone who was changing their picks after the stocks' increases—and he quickly notified CNBC. "I went back and looked at his trades and thought, 'This is pretty much statistically impossible,'" says Kraber, who holds master's degrees in business and statistics from New York University.

Kraber says CNBC rebuffed him at the time, but now it looks like he may have been right. Several contest participants have told BusinessWeek that there was a flaw in the design of the CNBC game that allowed certain players an unfair advantage. As many as four of the top contestants in the million-dollar contest may have exploited the flaw, according to the participants interviewed by BusinessWeek. On May 30, two weeks after Kraber says he notified the cable channel, CNBC posted a notice on its Web site that there have been allegations of trading strategies "in violation of the contest rules" and that it is investigating the issue. It has not disclosed the nature of the alleged problems.

"An Aggressive Investigation"

For what is essentially the American Idol of stockpicking, the stakes are sky-high. A million dollars is on the line for the ultimate winner of the contest, along with fame and future opportunity. CNBC, which bills itself as the essential news channel for investors and businesspeople, has a reputation to protect. With constant promotion from channel anchors like Becky Quick and Joe Kernen, the contest attracted 375,000 participants and nearly tripled the traffic to CNBC's Web site. Now, the channel, which is part of General Electric (GE), may have to publicly acknowledge mismanagement of the contest and could face potential lawsuits from disgruntled participants.

"I figured out very quickly what was going on—and they were looking at all the trades," says Kraber. "It's not negligence that they might have made bad software. It's negligence if they knew this was going on and did nothing to stop it."

CNBC declined to comment specifically on Kraber's allegations. A spokesman for the cable channel says, "Once these issues were raised, we launched an aggressive investigation immediately. The integrity of the contest is very important to us." CNBC, run by President Mark Hoffman, has been a money machine for GE, even as NBC overall has struggled (see BusinessWeek.com, 2/5/07, "Jeff Zucker Takes Charge at NBC Universal").

Too Good to Be True?

The performance of some participants does look unbelievable, literally unbelievable. Over the first nine trading days of the final round, the top five stockpickers tallied average returns of 45%, according to a BusinessWeek review of their trading portfolios. If that kind of performance was stretched out over a year, it would work out to an annual return of more than 1,200%. "Obviously if you have knowledge of what's happening with the stock, that would really skew the results," says Lubos Pastor, a professor of finance at the University of Chicago, who is speaking generally and has not studied the trading in the CNBC contest.

The top traders are reluctant to discuss their performance. Four of the top five performers declined to discuss their trading in detail with BusinessWeek, and the fifth could not be located for comment. "I don't want to jeopardize anything by saying something stupid," says Joe Dondero, who was fourth in the standings on the last day for which results have been made public.

How could traders exploit CNBC's glitch? According to several participants, the technique was relatively simple, but not obvious to all participants. A trader could go to the CNBC Web site and select a number of stocks to buy, but hold off on executing those trades. If you made the selection before the close of regular trading at 4 p.m. EST and left your Web browser open, you could execute those trades after hours and still receive the 4 p.m. closing price. For example, if a company whose stock closed at $20 a share rose to $25 in after-hours trading, you could buy the stock at $20, even though it was already worth 25% more (see BusinessWeek.com, 6/8/07, Slide Show: "How to Game CNBC's Stocks Contest").

The allegation is that certain traders may have used the technique with companies that were reporting earnings and other important news after the market's close. They could select as many as 50 stocks and then execute trades for only the one or two best performers.

Serge Amelyan, a real estate investor from Mequon, Wis., was one of the 20 finalists with prescient trades. On the first day of the final round, he placed a big bet on Mindray Medical International (MR), which was reporting earnings that afternoon. Amelyan cashed in as the stock rose 7% in after-hours trading, more than any other stock with a late earnings announcement. The very next day, he invested heavily in Compuware (CPWR), which again reported strong earnings and surged 7%. In all, seven of the nine stocks Amelyan invested in during the finals announced earnings after the markets closed. Six of those saw sharp increases, while one had a slight decline. Amelyan says he didn't use any unusual trading practices. "I didn't play that way," he says.

From Pharmaceuticals to Finance

Kraber, the player who helped uncover the CNBC contest's possible flaw, grew up in Dixon, Ill., about 100 miles west of Chicago. He majored in chemical engineering at the University of Illinois, where he says he began to develop an interest in the markets. But when he graduated in 1989, he found he didn't have the stomach for the risk he saw in a career trading. Instead, he took work in the pharmaceutical industry and moved to New York.

Kraber's interest in finance remained strong, however. So after five years working for Merck (MRK) and Schering-Plough (SGP), he decided to pursue an MBA in finance at New York University and then followed that with a master's in statistics. He says his three degrees have quite a bit in common: The knowledge needed to analyze heat transfer and, say, trade complex derivatives are closely connected, maintains Kraber. "I see it all as very much related," he says. He now trades for his own account and does market risk analysis for others on an ad hoc basis.

When Kraber heard about CNBC's million-dollar challenge earlier this year, he knew he wanted to enter. But it wasn't until he read the rules of the game that he figured he had a pretty good shot at making the finals. The key was that CNBC put no limit on the number of portfolios a player could manage, and only the best-performing one would count. So Kraber, with his expertise in statistics, computer-programming, and stock selection, could set up hundreds of different portfolios, all pursuing high-risk, high-return strategies.
By sheer chance, at least one of his portfolios would do well, and he figured that with smart strategic picks he'd rank near the top of all the participants. "I realized I had an almost 100% chance of making the finals," he says.

The first round of the CNBC challenge, which began on Mar. 5, consisted of 10 one-week contests. The winner of each weekly game won $10,000 and automatic entrée into the final round. In addition, the top 10 finishers overall made it into the final round. In mid-April, Kraber grabbed the weekly prize for the sixth week of the contest, with a portfolio that included WD-40 (WDFC), Cascade (CAE), and Apogee Enterprises (APOG). He became one of 20 contestants for the big-money prize.

"Very Suspicious" Trades

But it didn't take him long to notice curious behavior. On the morning of May 16, after the results of the final round's first day of trading were posted on CNBC.com, at least two traders posted big gains from Mindray. As Kraber saw what he thought were uncanny picks by other finalists he became incensed. He called CNBC and requested an investigation into any trades processed after 4 p.m., the official deadline laid out in the contest rules. "It's obviously against the rules, which say there's no after-hours trading," Kraber says. When he pointed this out to a CNBC marketing rep he managed to get on the phone, "she went off on me," he says.

Unbeknownst to Kraber, other contestants began to notice peculiar trading patterns. Two other finalists, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity, say they also saw that several of the top contenders were consistently picking the stocks of companies with strong earnings reports after the market close. "It was very suspicious that people were making such good calls so consistently," says one of the two finalists.

The two traders say that it wasn't until they started talking with each other and two other finalists that the four of them together developed the theory of how the CNBC glitch may have worked. They hypothesized that if a contestant left open the browser window with the challenge's trading interface past the 4 p.m. deadline, it might still be possible to reorder, but not add, cancel, or change the quantity of trades. The two sources say that members of their group have demonstrated how this could be done.

Winner to Be Named

The two sources flagged CNBC near the end of the competition, when they became convinced they had figured out the puzzle. On May 24, the day before the contest closed, the pair scanned all the companies that were reporting earnings after the market's close, and noticed that Verigy (VRGY), which makes semiconductor testing equipment, had soared 20%. They thought that if their theory was right, many of the leaders would end up getting the stock at the 4 p.m. closing price. The group alerted CNBC to look for Verigy picks. The next day, they saw that three of the four players they suspected had picked Verigy. Amelyan didn't buy Verigy, opting instead for Red Robin Gourmet Burgers (RRGB), which gained 8.4%.

Now, it's left to CNBC to sort through what to do about the contest's troubles and who will get the million-dollar prize. The cable channel has said that it hopes to name the winner by July 8, but it may push back the deadline if more time is needed to get to the bottom of the trading issues.

Kraber realizes that he is unlikely to receive the prize money, even if the people suspected of exploiting the software glitch are disqualified. He finished in 12th place, behind several other people who don't appear to have used the loophole. He says he just wants CNBC to do what's right. "I think they knew about this and let it go," Kraber says. "I just want some accountability."

------------------------

Catts is a reporter for BusinessWeek.com.

How You Do Full Time Freelance Job?

By Gareth Butler

In December 2004 I got made redundant and made the decision to become self employed. I started with no industry contacts (had been too busy being pulled in all directions in my full time job to meet anyone else in the industry!). I only had enough cash in the bank to last me a couple of weeks. I didn\'t know anyone else who was doing what I wanted to do.

Today, just 18 months later, I have around 20 clients, a fully booked schedule for the next five months, I work all over the world from London, to Chicago, Europe and Hong Kong. I have over six months months worth of cash stashed in the bank, all the money for my next tax bill accruing interest in another bank account, and no debt. I\'m invoicing around $10,000 each month -- over 2.5 times what I used to earn full time.

And I have to say -- going from full time to freelance was one of the easiest things I\'ve done in my life. I\'m kicking myself for not doing it sooner. My life has improved immeasurably in so many ways.

Here are my four key rules of freelancing that have worked so well for me.

GO OUT AND FIND CONTACTS

No one will offer you work if they don\'t know you exist! Marketing yourself is probably the most important part of my success. Remember, when I started I had no contacts in the industry at all. I had to make them all from scratch -- and fast, before I ran out of money.

I started by going to my local reference library and finding a directory of companies in the industry I\'m in. This didn\'t cost me a penny. I made a note of all the company names and websites I could find. There was about 400 in total. I checked out the website of each company to check they did the work I wanted to do, and whether they would need the services I was selling.

The next step was the hard bit. I phoned every company on my list to make contact with decision makers.

This strategy came from an excellent book called The Well Fed Writer at www.wellfedwriter.com. I thoroughly recommend you visit this website and buy the book, even if you don\'t plan on becoming a writer (which I\'m not). The author, Pete Bowerman, has some excellent advice for striking out on your own. My marketing plan was based on the advice he gives in his book.

It was hard at first. I felt really nervous picking up the phone, speaking to strangers and begging for work! On the very first call I made, the person shouted rudely down the phone at me! A great start! But he was the only unpleasant person I spoke too. Without exception, the other 399 companies were interested to hear from me, even the handful whose business was slightly different that I thought and had no real need for my service.

When I phoned, I had a pre-written script that I read out. It introduced me as a freelancer, gave a bit of detail about my past experience (which was very, very little), and asked if they were interested in the service I was offering. Normally the person would ask a bit more, such as details of who else I\'d worked for, how much I charged per day, and so on. Nothing tricky. And by the end of the 400 calls, I knew all my answers off by heart.

At the end of the call I\'d get my contact\'s name and e-mail address, then send them an e-mail straight away with my own contact details, then go straight on to the next call.

I made about 30 calls per day, which took between one and two hours. Thinking back, I know I could have done a lot more each day. But the important thing is that I did it. And the phone calls I made have laid the foundation for my successful freelance career. I still get calls today from that original round of 400 calls.

MARKET YOURSELF CONTINUOUSLY

People\'s memory is very fickle. If you don\'t remind them you exist, you\'ll slip out of their mind! That\'s why the marketing is an on-going process, not just a one-off week or so of calling.

I send out a short, monthly e-mail listing my availability to clients I\'ve worked for in the past 18 months. Normally, right after sending the e-mail, I\'ll get calls asking me to go and work. It\'s that easy.

Every three or four months I send another e-mail out to the people I haven\'t worked for but made contact with on the phone. I remind them of what I do again, and give them all my contact details. I normally pick up a new client or two every time I send this e-mail out.

I haven\'t made any calls in about six months. My diary is pretty much full for the next few months. But if I knew I had a quiet day coming up, I\'d prepare a new list of contacts in advance to call and start the process over again. I now know that this method of marketing works amazingly well and wouldn\'t hesitate to repeat it.

The mistake many people make is to stop marketing themselves, especially when they\'re busy. But that\'s exactly the time you should be doing it. You need to continuously remind people you exist -- then one day you\'ll be in the right time, at the right place and they\'ll pick up the phone and book you.

MANAGE YOUR MONEY CAREFULLY

One of the best parts about freelancing, for me, is the way it forces you to manage your money more carefully. Pretty soon, you\'re going to have to pay that big tax bill, or your income one month will vary massively from the other month. You must manage your money with care.

A great idea that\'s worked for me is to have different bank accounts for different expenses. I have five. One for my business income, one for my personal expenses (mortgage, electric, water, and general groceries), a savings account for tax money, another savings account to act as a living expenses \"buffer\", and a third savings account I use for a rainy day.

I also have a credit card to pay for all my business-related expenses. It helps with my cash flow -- I buy items on the card, then pay it off when the invoice comes in.

The key is to make the system automatic.

When a client pays an invoice, I split the money out five different ways. First, I pay off the expenses for that job to my credit card. That leaves me with my profit for the job. I put 30% of my profit straight into my tax account which just sits there, gaining interest, until my tax bill is due at the end of the year. 55% of my profits goes into my living expenses \"buffer\". More about that in a second. The final 15% profits goes into my rainy day savings account -- money which will just sit there until I need it in an emergency, or maybe for a holiday, or to treat myself to a new MacBook Pro!

At the end of each month, it\'s my pay day. I transfer the money I need for the month from my \"buffer\" savings account to my current account. That way, I only have easy access to a set amount of money for the month, the money in my current account -- I can\'t spend all the money I\'ve been paid. There\'s six months living expenses in the buffer -- more than enough to account for the varied ebb and flow of work you experience as a freelancer.

By the way, when I started I only had a few weeks worth of cash in hand, which I knew wasn\'t enough. So I applied to my bank for a small loan which would last me for four months, enough, I figured, to get started. I\'ve since paid that start-up loan off and have saved up enough cash using this technique that I have no money worries. I could live my standard of living for six months before I ran out of money. Something would have to be seriously wrong for that to happen. And, if it did, six months is more than enough time to sort something else out. Being a freelancer is a far more secure position than full-time employment.

MAKE PEOPLE\'S LIVES EASIER

Remember why people give you work. Because you\'re there to make their lives easier.

If you start making excuses for not doing work, such as not having the right computer, the right software, not being in the right frame of mind, not having enough time, then clients won\'t ask you back.

Don\'t complain if their brief sucks -- ask the right questions to get the answers you need. Don\'t complain if your time span is too short -- find a way to make it happen. Don\'t complain if you\'ve got 101 things to do that day -- get done what\'s important for your client. Stop complaining, just solve your client\'s problem.

A successful freelancer keeps makes client\'s lives easier. That is they key to getting repeat work. If you do that, you\'ll have a queue of people lining up to hire you.

18 MONTHS ON

I started marketing myself in January 2005. In March that year, I invoiced 150% what I would have made if I\'d still be full time. Now I\'m invoicing 250% regularly. This year I\'ll make over $100k I have a long list of clients who have begged me to go and work for them. I have had the pleasure of turning down maybe 10 full time job offers since being freelance. I travel the world, and get paid handsomely for it. Freelancing has changed my life for the better. I can\'t believe I didn\'t do it sooner! I wish you all the best with your freelance adventure and hope this article will prove useful.

Making Flexible Retirements Work

By DAN KADLEC

After 30 years as a truant officer in Detroit, Jacqueline Kahn is a cardiac nurse.

Alex Harris

Making the most of our retirement-age population has become a hot issue in Washington, where for the past 75 years federal policy has been designed around easing folks who are past 50 out of the workforce rather than enticing them to stay in it. If you're reaching that age now, however, you're headed for a whole new reality.

Everyone knows the fiscal pickle we're in: baby boomers are about to retire and tap Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits. To make good on the promises of these programs, the government may have to go much deeper into debt or increase the tax burden up to twofold on those still working. The math is suffocating. Something has to give.

Inside the Beltway, one answer is increasingly heard: let's get a continuing economic contribution from folks after their primary career has ended and before they start draining the system's pension and health-care assets. That's bad news if you're looking forward to a kick-up-your-heels early retirement; the financial and cultural support for a purely leisure-filled later life is drying up. But if you crave opportunities for a flexible job that you will enjoy or volunteer work that makes use of your skills and speaks to your heart, then what's good for the federal budget may be good for you too.

The whole idea of productive aging--getting an economic return on the accumulated knowledge and skills of what might be called the young old--has political steam and will probably surface on the presidential trail next year. "There are candidates on both sides giving this a lot of thought," says Maya MacGuineas, fiscal-policy director at the New American Foundation, a think tank that promotes new ideas. We're a long way from fully tapping this vast resource, says Marc Freedman, author of Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life. "But we're getting there," he adds. "You hear oxymorons such as 'young old' and 'retirement job.' Anytime the language starts collapsing on itself, something big is about to happen."

Already, most mandatory-retirement ages have been removed. But other obstacles to longer working lives--like required distributions from tax-advantaged savings plans in your 71st year and payroll taxes after age 65--should start to disappear, encouraging employers to hire seniors.

A little rejiggering of the pension arithmetic could improve things too. John Shoven, director of the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, believes that when you start receiving a pension should be based not on how long you have been alive but on how much longer you are expected to live. By his calculations, counting back from the expected end of life rather than forward from birth would lead to reasonably delayed benefits that would boost the labor force 10% by 2050 and GDP as much as 10% a year. If those who retire volunteer at something, it bumps GDP an additional 5%.

To encourage such unpaid work, there might be a federal health plan for those who give 10 hours a week. But the most exciting news is here now: flexible work for pay in rewarding fields for folks past 50. Freedman notes these areas with gaping needs:

Education. Teachers are always in demand, especially in cities. If you have a college degree in any field, you can probably get into a program that will let you start as a substitute almost immediately. Check at the school or district office.

Health care. Hospitals actively recruit midlife career changers. You do not have to be a doctor or a nurse. In many cases you can train while you work for pay and benefits as a lab assistant or in areas like music or art therapy, or radiology.

Nonprofits. There are nearly 2 million nonprofits in the U.S.; they make up a fast-growing sector that offers lots of paid (as well as volunteer) positions. For a look at what jobs are available, go to bridgestar.org

Government. Civil service jobs are available in every state, and many of those jobs offer good benefits and flexible schedules. Start your search at usajobs.opm.gov

Other promising later-life careers include working with religious ministries or the elderly or even launching your own nonprofit (and taking a salary). Today's average 65-year-old man has the same 2% chance of dying within a year as did the average 59-year-old man in 1970, says Shoven. "If you have a low chance of dying, you're not old," he maintains. So take advantage of the options opening before you. True retirement may be a thing of the past--or at least a thing of the much less immediate future.