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How to Get High-Quality Royalty Free Photos | Free Tools for Business

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I had no idea where to get high-quality images when I first started blogging back in 2013. Like many others, I was under the impression that I could use the photos I found through Google Image searches. Since they were online, I thought they were in the public domain and free to use. Boy, was I wrong. After a little bit of research, I found out that not all images that are online are free to use and that the person who took the photo could demand you remove them or even initiate legal action to recover any costs they feel they’re due as a result of your use of their image. Taking a good photo is hard work and photographers want the credit they’re due either in monetary reimbursement for the use of their photos or in the form of a photo credit that identifies them as the one who took the photo. In fact, they deserve it! Stock photo websites professionals use are filled with high-quality images that can be yours for a fee but when you have a small budget or have no budget p...
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How to Create Invoices for Free & Track Your Client's Payments | Free Tools for Business

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If you’re just starting out as a freelance writer or at the beginning stages of building your business finding an inexpensive way to create invoices and track your client’s payments can be a big help because it can keep costs down and help create a professional image for your business. When it comes to handling finances, accuracy is everything and if you’re not the best at crunching numbers your business’s finances can spiral out of control fast leaving you wondering who paid what when. Without a reliable way to keep track of missed payments, you run the risk of receiving partial payments from clients or not getting paid at all. While there are a variety of free ways to keep track of payments and generate invoices, like Microsoft Excel or spreadsheets in Google Drive, these methods lack important elements like the ability to schedule payment reminders. My Favorite Accounting Software When one of my very first clients told me she’d need an invoice to move forward with the p...
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Automate Appointment Scheduling for Your Business with This Free App | Free Tools for Business

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I opened my email early one morning and was happy to discover that someone had requested my editing services through my website. I’m always really excited when I receive an inquiry so I emailed my potential client back with more details about my services right away. She let me know that she liked what I had to offer and wanted me to work with her on a manuscript she planned to self-publish but that’s where things started to get a little complicated. She was in one time zone and I was in another and we both had conflicting schedules. All of this made scheduling times to meet to discuss her project a challenge. I’d been reading a lot about the benefits of automating my business so I decided there was no time like the present to give automation a try. After a little research, I chose Setmore . Setmore is appointment scheduling software that allows your clients to schedule an appointment directly from your website, blog, social media channel,  or anywhere you place y...
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Get Free Phone & Text for Your Business Fast | Free Tools for Business

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Whether you're in business for yourself, freelance for other businesses or do a combination of both setting a clear line between the personal and professional is one of the first things you need to do to improve your professional image and to be taken seriously by potential customers or clients. Having your clients or customers contact you using your personal telephone number can lead to a variety of unintended problems that can cost you business and make you appear less than professional. The problem is the cost for a whole new phone or an additional data plan is more than a lot of people who are just starting out or who have small budgets can afford. The answer is Google Voice. Google Voice is an absolutely free cloud-based service that provides free voice calls and free text to anyone with a Gmail account. Google Voice not only provides free voicemail but saves and transcribes voicemail messages so that you can read them anytime. All you have to do is click on the squa...
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How to Know if Freelance Writing is Right for You

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So, you want to be a freelance writer. You’ve heard it can be a great way to make money in your spare time or that you can work from home or anywhere there’s an internet connection and you’re ready to give it a try. Before you take the plunge there are a few important things to consider that can help you figure out if freelance writing is right for you.
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How Search Engines Work & Why Good Content Rises to The Top

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The way Google, the world’s most used search engine with nearly 4 billion searches per day, and other search engines work remains a mystery to many people who rely on them to deliver traffic to their websites and blogs. Let’s be honest. Search engines are complicated. They function with the use of complex formulas that most of us don’t fully understand. The good news is you don’t need a degree in computer science to understand the basics of how they operate.
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How to Format a Blog Post

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Just like essays, articles, and research papers blog posts have a very specific way they should be organized. Proper formatting not only makes blog posts visually appealing it increases the likelihood they'll be read all the way through. Formatting blog posts correctly can even increase the chance that visitors to your blog will return to read more blog posts in the future or become an email subscriber.
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