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Get Paid: 23 Useful Invoicing Applications

Published on July 23rd, 2010 in Web Application

Providing clients with quotations and invoicing them upon project milestone or completion can be quite an effort. When I started off as a freelancer, my tool has been Excel and then have it converted to PDF. I had to type them line by line, price by price.. there was no template to work the magic.

6 years down the road, thing has change. Software as a service helps alot in cutting cost down while at the same time, providing the same top-notch feature as a standalone. Today, whether you are a business magnet or a rockstar freelancer, providing quotations and invoicing the clients won’t cost you a bomb and have it done effortlessly.

Check out these 23 invoicing applications that may just help you out!

Crowdsourcing: The Designer’s Two Edge Sword

Crowdsourcing has been very popular with businesses and designers of late. Although its implication on ethics and economics has been widely debated, there are businesses and designers who believed that crowdsourcing is definitely the best option.

For the benefit of those who have not heard of crowdsourcing before; crowdsourcing is an act similar to outsourcing. However, instead of outsourcing to an individual or a contractor, crowdsourcing outsource creative ideas or tasks to a crowd (group of individual, community or contractors).

8 Baby Steps To Online Selling

Published on July 13th, 2010 in Article | eCommerce

Let’s not go into crafting a business plan. You should have already done so. If you haven’t, it’s time to crack your brain. A business plan will tell you whether what you have in mind is possible or not, really. Like really really.

1. Nice… Unique Domain Name

Like girls used to say about good looking guys – either they are taken, or they are gay. Most domain names that are obvious and nice, are mostly already bought by someone.

Think of something unique and catchy. Something your prospective customers or visitors can remember. You wouldn’t want someone who have browsed your website once and the next day go “what was the website name again?”.

Once you have selected a name, what would like to have? .com, .net, .biz? If you can afford it, buy them all. Really. Like really really. Say you do bought them all, if a visitor type yourdomain.net instead of yourdomain.com, they will be redirected to yourdomain.com via the 301 redirect.

Free Open Source eCommerce / Shopping Cart Platforms

Published on July 11th, 2010 in Web Application | eCommerce

In 2008, a research was conducted by The Nielsen company on online shopping by consumers and it was suggested that more than 85% of the world’s online population has made an online purchase. (Reference)

Companies are also catching up with this trend by providing the avenue to have their products sold online. It’s inevitable, isn’t it?

Back then, security was a concern. Today, more and more of the internet users are embracing the technologies and starting to believe that it is safe.

Blogshops have been a popular trend too. Not a bad thing. However, their credential is always questionable. It’s always good to have a proper online shop with all the functionalities of an online shop. Blogshops are free, yes, most definitely, but so are these ecommerce or shopping cart platforms.