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March 2, 2018 Daily Motivation

How to be Productive by Knowing Yourself Better

Hey Spiders, today I will discuss the need to know yourself better. It will take about 3 minutes to read so hang in there till the end.

We all want to get the most of our time and make sure that we don’t regret it later on. But we end up doing the complete opposite, right? Don’t feel bad, you are not the only one there. Honestly speaking, this is the issue I have been struggling with for several days and months of my existence in this whole wide world.

We always decide that from now on we will not waste our time, we will only do those tasks which will help us reach our goals in future and blah blah blah and the list goes on.

We unsubscribe every Instagram page we feel we don’t need to follow, youtube channels that waste our time, we stop visiting social media accounts. We take all the extreme measures possible.

But all this last for the only small amount of time. Why?
We all the know the reason behind it, But we fail to recognize and address it. You know why is it so? Its just because “You are lost amidst all the clutter that you value which doesn’t even justify your valuable time”.

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We are so much lost that we don’t even want to talk with our inner self. Ask yourself, when was the last time you had a chat with yourself properly or spent time with yourself alone.

You need to realize that you are the only person whom you can fully trust on. If you would ask me “Bro, what should I invest on, which will give me the best returns in future?”, My answer would always be to invest in yourself. Cause I believe if you gamble and place the bet on ourselves, you can get the best odds of success that you have ever witnessed.

To do that first you need to know yourself better.
I know most people will say “What are you talking about. I know what I want. I am already in sync with myself”.
Trust me, more than 95% of the population can’t justify the logical aspect of their current plan of actions.

Ask yourselves these questions to Help You Know Yourself Better ——
1. What are my strengths?
2. What are my short-term goals and long-term goals?
3. Who matters most to me?
4. What am I ashamed of?
5. What do I like to do for fun?
6. What new activities am I interested in or willing to try?
7. What am I worried about?
8. What are my values? What do I believe in?
9. If I could have one wish, it would be ______________________
10. Where do I feel safest?
11. What or who gives me comfort?
12. If I wasn’t afraid, I would ______________________
13. What is my proudest accomplishment?
14. What is my biggest failure?
15. Am I a night owl or an early bird?
16. What do I like about my job? What do I dislike?
17. What does my inner critic tell me?
18. What do I do to show myself self-compassion and self-care?
19. Am I an introvert or an extrovert?
20. What am I passionate about?
21. What is my happiest memory?
22. What do my dreams tell me?
23. What is my favorite book? Movie? Band? Food? Color? Animal?
24. What am I grateful for?
25. When I’m feeling down I like to ______________________
26. I know I’m stressed when I ______________________

Trust me these set of questions are not as easily answered as it may seem. Comment down if any one of the questions left your head blank thus proving my point.

To spend every second of my existence happily without a moment of regret is my goal and I would want all of us to achieve the same.
After all, we all are spiders trying to web our home and rest in peace. Though we know we will fail many times before building it and we also risk our home being destroyed after its made too. But that’s life all about buddy. I love this dialogue heard in a movie named PADMAN —

People always pray to God, please don’t give us any problems. So if you don’t want any problems Then Die, the end solution to all problems. Simple 🙂

So to make every moment of life valuable – Know Yourself Better. Trust me you will be surprised at knowing How interesting as a person you are on the inner side.

So Spiders, Thats all for today till then

Keep Webbing and Stay Happy

P.S. Bookmark this post and read it whenever you feel that situations are not in your favor.

Keep Reading
Read About: Why I chose Freelancing?
Read About: Complete Guide to Freelancing and getting your First Client.
Read About: What’s stopping you to start a successful startup venture now? Startup Motivation
Read About: Guide to Resolutions this New Year

Want to start Freelancing? Register and start getting Clients on Fiverr.

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February 13, 2018 Freelancing

How to respond when client says “You are too expensive”

I will portray a common scenario from our everyday life which will throw light on the “You are too expensive!” situation and will let you easily digest what I am about to say.

Imagine This –

You visit an open vegetable market. There you witness hundreds of hawkers selling their vegetables. Now as there is huge competition in the market, you will try to get the best value for your money in terms of fresh healthy vegetables. So you will now bargain with the vendors due to the prevailing fact that you can always buy vegetables from other available options in your hand. Now the basic tactic of bargaining will start by saying – “Hey! You are too expensive. Others are offering the same product at a lower cost.”

Now there are three options available to you:

1) Give him the product or service at or near the cost he is expecting.

2) Directly say No! and lose the customer forever.

3) Use your presence of mind and explain why your product is best in the market and offers the best value for money.

Option 1 will surely increase your customer growth rate and sales but it will put you in a suffocating rat race with the other vegetable sellers.

Option 2 will make your conversion rate or customer growth rate decline.

Option 3 will make you better profits, provide the right value of your product and in the long run it will help you establish your own parallel personal brand in spite of the competitiveness of the market.

So today’s tip straight from Spider’s mouth is

Treat yourself as a Brand from the first Day.

Follow this and in the long run, your achievements will soon become grand. (That sounded so poetic :p)

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A regular client chat goes on like this:

You will find a potential client and start webbing them around your net by answering their questions and convincingly working through their fears around the question “What if things don’t work around as you said”.

All goes great every time but the dishes fall when they ask you the price and

You quote a rate.

They hear the rate.

They take a moment and reply “Oh my gosh! You are too expensive!”

Most of us can sell our services or products to anyone with ultimate dedication until someone ask about the price. This moment makes even the most experienced person commit some common mistakes which drive the potential client away from you.

Common mistakes which most of us commit on hearing

“You are too expensive.”

Mistake #1 – You lower your price immediately

Never ever do this. Doing this will let your client believe that they can negotiate the price even lower than they started out with. Also, this makes your client think that you are desperate enough to get the project.

Mistake #2 – You let them go

You just say No, I can’t help you in that price and stop responding them. This act doesn’t justify your behavior towards the client because both you and client invested the same amount of time to find and convince each other to crack a deal. So you must respect that and at least give them a proper justification why you can’t accept the deal made by them.

Mistake #3 – You refer them to someone else

You already did 80% of the work by converting your lead into a potential customer. Just by referring your client to someone else you have wasted your time and energy and you also lost all the referrals you might have got from the client in the future.

Mistake #4 – You get angry

You need to understand everyone wants a great value for their money so being negotiable is not at all criminal. It’s your job to understand why your client thinks that you are expensive.

So here are the tips on “What to say when client says “You are too expensive.”

Note: You can just copy paste the templates which I provide and tweak for the type of client you are dealing with.

Ask them just one single question:

“Really! Is it too Expensive, compared to what?”

That’s it. Asking this one single question can shift the gravity of the negotiation in your favour.

Why? Because the client has to give a justification of the statement ‘why you are too expensive?’
And as you were already near to making the sale when the issue of the price arrived, you now just need to overcome four possible mental barriers stopping you to make the sale.

1. The client is trying to justify the purchase to themselves.

2. The client isn’t aware of the cost genuinely as they are new to this.

3. The client is comparing you to someone else.

4. The client isn’t interested in buying and is using “You are too expensive” statement

as an excuse to buy time.

From their reply to your question, you can easily judge under which category do they fall and then overcome the hurdles by following the strategies given below:

Justification of the purchase:

When the reply hints that they are trying to justify the sale to themselves, then let them continue and once they are halfway through, remind them why they contacted you in the first place and the value you can provide through your product or service. You just have to stress on the pain point after they are halfway through their justification.

Unaware of the cost:

Pin point the emotional problems you solve through your product and service. You can also provide a fair comparison that they can relate to, for example, a 500 dollar yearly subscription can be reframed as costing less than their daily cappuccino at The Starbucks. Compare it to a common thing in which they must be in a habit of paying so that they see it in context.

Comparing You to a Cheaper Option:

Know why you are awesome and pinpoint it in your justification and the pain your service will alleviate. For example, if Xyz provides the service 200$ less than you, then remind them why Xyz won’t be able to solve all their problems and what part will they be missing out. They will ponder and soon realize the value you will be provided.

Not Ready to Buy:

If their reply hints that they are not interested to buy now then come up with now or never offer or discount which they will lose if they don’t buy your service now. You can also remind them how will they feel after their problem is solved, for example, if you provide digital marketing services, tell them “Our average customers gain 3000+ leads from us in a month so you can imagine how much customers you can gain by the end of the month if you start today.”

That’s it.

This statement will shift the sale from a seller-trying-to-convince-buyer to buyer-trying-to-convince-themselves situation.

Even if they didn’t buy from you now (which is less probable if you use the above tactics smartly), they will surely come back later on because they have subconsciously convinced themselves that you are the right seller to buy from.
Who says negotiating is tough to crack?

Bonus Materials

Some common phrases used in between conversation to shift the gravity towards your side:

Email Scripts You can use to reply to your clients:

Option One – Tell them why you are awesome

Hey ____!

I understand that this is a large investment to make, but I assure you that you will receive a top notch service which you won’t be provided by any low-cost alternative. My clients have been satisfied with the results I provide such as _____ and ____ because I provide with a service perfectly designed to work for your service and brand. My service doesn’t end with just the delivery of the product but my service will help you achieve your goals.

If lack of funds is the problem right now, I understand. Please keep me on your books for the future. If you are willing to invest at this moment, let me know and I will guide you through the next steps.

Thanks!

-NAME

Why this script works –

You acknowledge your cost, but you explain that you are skilled and qualified enough to ask for the quoted price by giving references of your past clients. You give them a option to walk away, but you stand firm on your price, shifting the gravity towards you.

Option Two – Offer a Little Less

Hey ____!

I understand that this is a large investment to make altogether, so working with your budget I have come up with a feasible option. You will still get a fantastic output, I will just remove some add-ons for now, so that we can stay on the budget. Right now we will stick to the main goals of your service to create something that meets your goals. In this case, I have removed_______ so we can include_______ which is what will drive to meet the end goals. If you want to add those extra add-ons down the road, we can assist you in another project to do just that!

-NAME

Why this script works-

You acknowledge the quoted price, but don’t back down on your cost, instead, you offer the same great results in a lower price with less amount of features, which provides the near about value the client needs. For example, if your client wants custom made theme for his own website but you can provide the same with a pre-made template in a lower price which will deliver the same look and functionality the client needs.

Bonus Tip:

You are too cheap if you never heard your client say that “You are too expensive!”

I would like to add on an important analogy. If you observe that you hear the phrase “You are too expensive!” too often then it’s time you ask yourselves these questions.

Is your marketing justify how expensive your services are?
Is your marketing targeting the right people?
Is your service really worth the price?

Keep Reading
Read About: Why I chose Freelancing?
Read About: Complete Guide to Freelancing and getting your First Client.
Read About: What’s stopping you to start a successful startup venture now? Startup Motivation.
Read About: Guide to Resolutions this New Year

Want to start Freelancing? Register and start getting Clients on Freelancer or Fiverr.

January 27, 2018 Freelancing

17 Things You Should Never Say at Work

All of us are tied up during their working hours, so amidst the busy atmosphere, some phrases come out prominently and effortlessly from our mouth, during communication with our Boss or client, which unintentionally leaves a very bad impression over our personality and the organization we work for.

“Words are like arrows, you can’t take them back once you let them go, so speak wisely”

Today I will list 17 things you should never say at work. Read till the last and tell us by commenting which one you realized saying at work was not appropriate.

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1) “That’s not my problem” or “It’s not my job” or “I am not getting paid enough” –

We all have been there where our boss or our client assigns unrealistic tasks within a stipulated time frame to be completed.

Firstly you need to understand that if the task wasn’t important for them, they wouldn’t have asked you to do it.

When we are juggling in between a pile of tasks, we tend to say these phrases to easily dismiss the tasks which are “not your problem”.

Trust me saying above phrases will not make your situation any better, instead it will make things go even worse.

It will make you appear as self-serving person and not a team player. This limits career advancement and put a negative remark over client satisfaction. A good team player works toward the success of the team members before their own.

So instead of saying “Sorry, It’s not my problem, I am not getting paid enough for this” try saying this “I will love to help you out. Given my current to do list, tasks X, Y and Z are pending. Which one shall I keep on hold to work on the new task?”

Saying this will make your Boss/Client aware of the current workload over you and make them set realistic goals and sensible tasks for you in future.

2)”But I have always done it that way” –

General work population is scared of change. Having blessed with technological advancements in our age, one should not turn their back with innovation, creativity and out of the box thinking. Change is always an invaluable experience.

Saying these words make you appear inflexible, closed minded, and a person who is stuck in the past.

You should embrace new problem solving skills and instead of saying those words say “Wow, that’s a different approach towards solving the problem, Lets discuss why it’s better than the usual one”.

3) “It’s impossible for me” or “There’s nothing I can do” –

Sometime it really feels like there is no solution to a certain set of problem, when we exhaust all possible ways to solve it.

Saying these negative words will make you look like a pessimist with a hopeless attitude. A can do attitude will help you run a longer run in your career instead of admitting defeat easily.

One should be optimistic and try to discuss and contribute anything which might help with the situation.

Instead of those phrases say these –

“I will be glad to give another shot at it again.”

“Let’s discuss what are the current possibilities.”

“In the current situation what I can do is this …”

“I’m in a fix, can you help me find any other possibilities”

4) “This will only take a minute” or “That’s very easy for me” –

For getting clients to assign us projects we usually say that the project will only take a minute to do, or it’s very easy for you to do.

As a freelancer you need the client to value your skills and there is no value in getting things rushed.

So always say – “I will get back to you in a timeframe” or “I have the required skills to complete the task, so you can trust me to complete the task on time”.

5) “That makes no sense” –

Sometimes we jump to conclusions hastily, and ignore the other person’s perspective completely.

It marks us negatively and a closed minded person who doesn’t even try to understand.

Try this instead “I am not sure about this idea, can you please explain why you think that way?”

It will surely help to strike a healthy discussion which will benefit both the sides.

6) “You are wrong” –

If you disagree with a colleague or a client’s idea or thought, you should not directly say that “You are wrong”.

It will make you appear as a Bully, which may strike up a heated conversation.

You should try a more diplomatic approach like this “I disagree with your idea and here’s why ….”

7) “I am sorry but” –

We don’t realize but we often use the word sorry like an excuse. It lowers the influence we have on the person we say sorry too often, and hand the steering wheel over to them for dominating our path.

If you did something wrong say “I am sorry about that, next time I will make sure to complete the task on time”. Don’t try and make up an excuse which may sound fake.

Or you can entirely skip the apology part in some cases. For example you are late to a meeting you can say “Thanks for waiting.” instead of “I am sorry I was late”.

8) “I just assumed that” –

Due to lack of communication, sometimes you might just assume certain points of the work according to you and start doing the work. Most of the time you would regret later on when things would get clearer.

So the situation here would demand you to say “Can you please clarify what are your expectations from me“.

So it’s always better to express what your assumptions are from the beginning only and never start the work before you are 100% sure about the client’s expectations. Till then try to get you and your client on the same page.

9) “I did my best” –

We all try our best from the beginning, but things always don’t turn out how we expected them to be.

So instead of saying “I did my best but…” and using it as an excuse to escape from the situation, you should learn from your mistakes and say “What could I do better next time?“.

10) “You should have” or “You could have”

Pointing out mistakes when you’re furious or frustrated is the common practice which you might commit which isn’t the best approach according to me.

You yourself won’t like it if someone said: “You should have informed me earlier” or “You could have created a backup yourself”. These are finger pointing words which triggers guilt on the person you are trying to blame.

Workplace is a collaboration of teamwork and equal treatment to all the persons who are involved. So a more productive and non-judgemental approach will be to say –

“In future, I recommend ..” or “From the next time, please bring issues like this to my attention immediately, to ensure proper planning and workflow“.

11) “I may be wrong, but” or “This may be a silly idea” –

These phrases lessen the impact of what you will be saying after it. Your spoken words shows how much confident you are on yourself and how much value you place on yourself.

You words shouldn’t lessen the importance of what you are about to contribute.

Stop discouraging yourself and discuss your idea fearlessly.

For example instead of saying “This may be a silly idea, but I think that we can do an online meeting on skype to save time” start like this “Here’s an idea, let’s do a meeting online on skype to save travel cost and time“.

12) “I haven’t had time” or “I am too busy ” or “I don’t have time for this right now” –

No matter if this statement is true or not, you should always avoid saying this.

No one likes to feel less important to anyone.

To maintain healthy relationship and convey empathy with your clients and colleagues you should be polite and say “I would be happy to help you after I finish my task at hand. Shall we discuss this issue after lunch ?”

13) “Don’t you think?” or “Okay?” –

These words are used when you are seeking validation from the client or your boss.

If you truly want their approval you can use this but if you want to send a commanding message confidently or you need them to perform an action, you should prevent using these words.

Imagine a Doctor saying “This medicine will work best for you, don’t you think? I will write this down on your prescription if that’s okay with you.” This would send instantly lower down the Doctor’s observation and decision making skill.

Instead you would like to hear something like this “This medicine will work best for you. I am writing it down on your prescription.”

14) “You guys.” –

This phrase should be limited to our friendly conversations and should not be used professionally.

It will appear inaccurate if a women is present in the group who might feel offended which can lower down the level of your professionalism.

“Your organization” or “Your team” or simply “You” are the best possible options available.

15) “I think…” –

Which of these two type of statements sounds easier to buy? “I think my company can provide you with the best services possible” Or “I believe that our company… ” Or ” I am confident that our company will provide the best services possible”.

Though only slightly different, you can notice the difference between the confidence and energy conveyed in these two different lines.

You need to stop sounding weak and insecure and sound more assertive and certain and passionate about yourself and your company.

16) “No problem.” –

“You are welcome” is the most courteous reply you can give when someone says “Thank you”.

It implies that it was a pleasure for you helping them out and their appreciation was gladly received and recognized.

You don’t want to be misjudged from the help seeker that their work was a problem for you. You should sound well-mannered while and after helping them out.

“No problem” is a laid back reply which doesn’t sound pleasing at all.

17) “I’ll try.” –

Nobody wants a half-hearted answer to their assignment of task or request for help.

For example if your client ask you to complete the work at max by 27th of august, and you reply with “I will try”. The client will sense a possibility of failure which may result in slipping of project from your hand.

Instead of this phrase try adding the intention of “will” to increase the client’s confidence on you. Try saying “I will do my best to complete the task by 27th of August.”

So these were

17 things you should never say at work

which I thought we all need to eradicate while we work. I am laying down few tips which might help you reach your goal.

Record yourself. Take a minute and install a call recorder and try recording all your professional conversations. At the end of the day listen to these and make a list which phrases you used were wrong or needed to be changed. Write down their alternatives and keep them handy by your desk or computer. Review them daily to keep getting better.

Take the help of your buddy. Ask your co-worker or your colleague to listen to you when you speak at meetings or phone conversations to a client. Take them out for lunch or a treat, keep your ego aside and listen out to their suggestions and feedback and try improving upon those. Ask them to remind if things go the other side.

Always ask yourself, “How could I have structured my idea in a better way?” Or, “What phrase would have communicated my idea or intention more positively?”

Remember

“The words you speak, Becomes the house you live in”

I hope you all got what I wanted to express. The suggestion I gave come from my personal experiences while doing freelancing and client management. Comment and let us know your reviews on it.

P.S. Bookmark things you should never say at work to keep your career in check.

Want to start Freelancing? Register and start getting Clients on Freelancer or Upwork.

January 19, 2018 Freelancing

17 Protocols for Freelancing Professionally

Stress and hassle are inevitable if you don’t follow certain protocols for freelancing. Freelancing is doing what you love and make money out of it. But you may soon end up crying about your decision if you don’t follow these protocols while practicing it.

Your ability to define your own path can be a model to others.

– Gary Swart (CEO of UpWork)

Freelancing is a boon to people like us, and in freelancing Time is Money and you can’t afford to lose time in dealing with unnecessary conflicts with clients.

So let’s get started with protocols to follow if you are a professional Freelancer. Read and comment below those protocols which you already follow and which one you think you needed to know before you started freelancing.

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Protocols for Freelancing

Always get your Advance Deposit –

Yes, we all have been there where we worked our ass off to complete the project and due to one reason or the other the client decided not to pay you.

People who make cakes or build small treehouse always ask for advance before they start their work as there is resource involved in starting the project.

Similarly for us Time is the resource involved and you don’t need me telling you that in freelancing Investing is directly proportional to amount of money earned (Well in most of the cases).

So don’t hesitate asking for advance, let your client know that you value your time and you don’t work for charity (no offence intended). Getting advance deposit always serves as an excellent motivation to kick start the project leading to faster and better work completion for the client.

Advance deposit is a risk for client too, as it means the freelancer can cut off contact after receiving money. So you will need to assure your client to give the deposit.

Get 100% sure what the client want –

Never start the work unless you are 100% sure what your client exactly wants.

If you skip this part, you will frequently find yourself wasting several hours of work for nothing as client will render it wrong when he will view it.

So it’s wise for both to discuss the whole detail of project before starting the work.

Get a full written document (Known as SRS technically) describing the complete points to be completed and the deadline.

Decide whether you want to get paid on hourly or on project basis –

It’s smart to charge project basis for small projects and hourly basis for big projects.

Hourly basis is beneficial, as it allows you to deliver the best you got. It covers the time required to do research, which is not feasible when you charge on project basis.

And if the client wants to redo some parts or want to modify sections of your project, you can freely work more as long you are paid on an hourly basis.

Have a fixed mode of communication –

Declare or agree on mode of communication with your client. I personally prefer chat to be more effective and stress free than phone calls. I receive more than 30 calls a day related to work which affects my productivity a lot.

Using chat service has its own advantages and disadvantages, where advantages are having a record of conversation, it doesn’t disturb your nap, and you can manage multiple clients at the same time using chat service. While disadvantages are urgent messages can get ignored or client may not be able to express what he/she wants perfectly.

Inform your client at what time you will be available to discuss about project or help them out with their issues. (You can’t always be available).

You can always choose phone call hours, to efficiently manage your project and clients.

Set a Deadline –

It’s crucial both for yourself and your client to set a date of completion of the project or a part of the project. Clients are usually keen to see what progress you have made on an interval of time. So you need to make sure that you give them a completion date in which you can complete the project or a milestone of a project. It will also help you to organize your tasks at hand and your free time easily.

Get paid in steps –

My recommendation is to have an agreement with client to get paid in steps rather than waiting for a big chunk of payment in the last.

Freelancer.com has a feature in which you can set milestones of a project and get paid as soon as you complete a milestone. Freelancer.com is a great platform to get started as a professional freelancer.

This part is important as by choosing this mode of payment, interests of both the sides remains preserved while boosting Freelancer’s motivation for work.

Don’t settle for pay lower than your value –

You need to set your value of time invested in projects as this will only pay your bills. Never settle for less pay no matter how attractive it may seem.

Clients always ask for cheap budget promising more projects, referrals, or less work. But no one knows what lies on the other side. Current money always have more value than the future. 100$ today have more value than 100$ tomorrow, so always charge the clients the true value of your time and skill.

Always charge extra for extra work –

Points other than discussed should always be charged. For clients it’s always 2-3 subpages or informative pages. But for you it’s more 2-3 hours of work. So make it clear to them that the service is chargeable rather than complementary.

Overtime or Urgency should be charged as agreed.

Agree on free bug fixation service for a fixed period of time, after that it should be chargeable.

Never ask for referrals –

Don’t ask your clients to refer you to their friends and clients, which will make you sound desperate.

Instead work so good that it happens without asking. If you work well, naturally you will get referred. Let your work travel places where you could not.

Always update your clients –

Make it a habit to update your clients on a regular basis. They pay your bills so they must know how much you have progressed with their work.

Let your client know if you are going to take a day off beforehand, so that they can discuss important points prior to your holiday.

Let your client know if your extra services cost you as well –

If you give extra services to them like hosting, Bulk SMS service or a digital product license, then always remind your client about it so that they include it in your final pay.

Always Be Honest-

Don’t give false excuses or come up with a story for a delay in completion of your project. Don’t charge them unnecessarily because “You always get what you sow” and a good client relationship is always based on trust. Trust towards the client that he/she will compensate for your time and the trust towards the freelancer that he/she will give his best to complete the project on time and provide the best value for money.

Always keep your business and friendship separate –

Keep a strict protocol that you will never work with your friends or relatives no matter how tempting it may seem.

Most of time friends and relatives expect us to work for free, which is most of the time not possible due to obvious reasons.

Money issues always pour out venom in between strong relations, so prevention is better than cure.

Be flexible –

Freelancers and flexibility go together so you need to be flexible with your timings and work.

If your client didn’t show up for a Skype meeting or something, you need to reschedule it patiently while managing your other tasks efficiently.

Have good client management skill –

Try to remember your client name and about their bio. Make small conversations with your clients on a personal level, like sport or hobbies etc. and at the same time don’t sound too creepy. This all will break the ice and the client will know you are interested in them and make them comfortable in employing you for the project or future work.

You don’t want clients to get an impression that you are so busy person that you don’t have any time for a normal conversation. Always ask your clients for feedback and try to improve on those fronts.

Learn how to say no-

When freelancing is in the picture, you can imagine yourself multitasking with multiple projects piling up at the same time. So you need to say no to unnecessary outings or task which will eat your precious time. You need to stay professional while dealing with your projects at hand. Always set priority level for each task to manage all situations efficiently.

Always provide a world class service –

No matter who your client is, service provided must always be of world class. To make yourself stand out from the stack, you must be ready to go that extra mile for your projects. For example, If you just wrote a post for your client, you can go a step ahead and say you know what I can make or find a featured image for you, for free and not extra expenses. The client will leave you amazed and will definitely come back asking for more.

There goes a saying that “Customer is always right”, it’s true to an extent with exceptions. Sometimes they can be wrong, so you need to deal with such fussy clients on a professional level while showing your maturity.

I hope you all got what I wanted to express. These protocols come from my personal experience while doing freelancing and client management. Comment and let us know your reviews on it.

P.S. Bookmark Protocols for Freelancing Professionally to keep your Freelancing career in check.

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January 6, 2018 Motivation

What’s stopping you to start a successful startup venture now? Startup Motivation

Now, who doesn’t want to be successful, have money, and live a happy life. You need to understand that these are the results which you dream of, but to make this dream come alive you need to understand the harsh reality :

“To live the dream you have, you need to spend countless nights awake 🙂 “.

Quoting the late Indian President Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam

“Dreams are not which you see while sleeping, but are those which doesn’t let you sleep “

Get this fact that, the barrier between you and your success is only You. No matter how hard you justify the situations not being in your favor, you will have to digest the fact that in order to be successful one must not only have the intention of success but the determination to make that happen.

The world is filled with innumerable examples of people pushing their way to success no matter what. so if you haven’t achieved success yet, You just didn’t want it as bad as them.

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Now its time for some Startup Motivation.

Prime reasons You will always have will be one of these:

1) Its too late to start now.
2)I am too lost in life to know what to do.
3)I have failed far too many times for success to be a possibility.

Let me tell you Even if all these reasons are combined, these are not enough to stop you from being successful.

Let’s discuss each reason one by one. Read till the end to get the the key to success to work for you.

It’s too late to start now

Let’s start with live and popular examples :

Jan Koum founded Whatsapp at the age of 35.
Michael Arrington started TechCrunch at the age of 35.
Tim Westergren started Pandora at the age of 35.
Jimmy Wales founded Wikipedia at the age of 35.
Mark Pincus founded Zynga at the age of 41.
Robert Noyce founded Intel at the age of 41.
Craig Newmark founded CraigsList at the age of 42.
Robin Chase founded ZipCar at the age of 42.
Ray Kroc started McDonald’s at the age of 52.
John Pemberton invented Coca-Cola at the age of 55.
Harland Sanders started KFC at the age of 65.

So now you might have understood that “Its never too late to start” and it’s “Better to start late than never”.

I am too lost in life to know what to do

Many famous founders and Personalities were also lost in life before they started-

Mark Cuban, Dallas Mavericks owner, was a Bartender until 25 in his own bar.
Suze Orman, Finance Guru, was a waitress until her 30’s.
Harrison Ford, an Actor and Producer, was a carpenter until his 30’s.
Pejman Nozad, an Angel Investor, was a rug dealer until his 30’s.
Sheldon Adelson, Las Vegas Sands founder, sold shampoo and windshield defroster until his 30’s.
Manoj Bhargava, 5-Hour Energy founder, was a taxi driver and monk until his 30’s.
J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter, an author was a single mom on welfare until 31.
Ang Lee, Film Director, was a jobless house husband until 31.
Amancio Ortega, Zara founder, was shirt shop helper until his 30’s.
Andrea Bocelli, a Singer, was a piano player at bars until his 33.
Mary Kay Ash, Mary Kay founder, sold books and home goods door to door until 45.
Ray Kroc, McDonald’s founder, sold paper cups and milkshake mixers until 52.

So even if you are lost in your life, find a way towards your heart and always be ready to hustle your way up towards your dream.

I have failed far too many times for success to be a possibility

Time line of these famous founders will clear this out too-

Richard Branson

Sold Christmas trees -failed
Published a student magazine
Started Virgin Records
Started Gay Night Club
Started Virgin Airlines
Founded Virgin Cola and Vodka – failed
Wedding dresses – failed
Cosmetics
Virgin Galactic

Mark Zuckerberg

Zucknet
Synapse
Coursematch – failed
Facemash – failed
Facebook

Bill Gates

Traf-o-Data – failed
Microsoft

Chad Hurley

Youtube
Delicious
Zeen – failed
MixBit

Elon Musk

Video Games – failed
Content Publishing Software
PayPal
Space X
Tesla
Solar power service

You need to understand that no matter what the outcome was – Failure or Success – the key point is that they never stopped. They kept trying and working things out. Failure is the most important part of success. It teaches us that important lessons of life which we won’t learn even after spending millions of dollars on it.

Now lets address How to never give up on Becoming an Entrepreneur

Persistence is the key :

Let’s assume you are 30 years old now when you are reading this, so you have 60 years from now to work productively. If it takes 3 months to do a big project then that is (60*12)/3 = 240 shots to success. Trust me You Only need it to get it right once and you have to be the world’s most unluckiest person to not hit the bulls eye once. Hard Work and knowledge creates Luck and more the luck you acquire more the chances of success increases. So Don’t Stop. As long you are alive anything is possible.

Lower your Expectations :

Michael Jordan missed over 300 important shots in his life but he is still one of the most successful sportsperson in the world. 99.99% success took TIME. Don’t expect to get it right the first time and never expect all your ideas to work as you expected them too. Lower your expectations and work to change the world for a better place, Keep your faith and success will arrive gift wrapped in your career. The goal should be to make a difference in the world and yourself . If you are at a better place mentally and financially from the place you started, your work was worth it, if not, restart again 🙂 .

Be Strong :

You are stronger than you think. You can’t expect to swim without getting into the water first. You cannot predict the outcome and Trust me you yourself don’t realize how much strong you are unless you try something Brave. I remember these words always as it perfectly define my status as of now.

“It’s okay to be scared, It means you are doing something brave”

Trial and Error is the key :

Yes my friend, ask any Successful individual, all of them will give you the same advice. Get an idea, Try working it out, If it works out the well and good, and If it doesn’t , Don’t Worry, Grasp the errors , Learn from it and Restart again. As Suggested by Paul Graham

“Try a lot of different things.”

Fake it Until you make it :

You need to fake success before it is real. You need to fake confidence before you can complete a project. As Richard Branson says :

“If you get an Opportunity, Take it and Learn How to do it Later”.

Don’t Compare:

Comparison can kill you and your Career. Every one has their own story and what worked for them might not for you. You need to create your own original story and You should believe that yours is the best Cause you made it.

Expect to hit the dip:

Before reaching the finish line, You must expect the worst. Because every leg pains before reaching the finishing line. You never know when the next step will hit the success button. Remember that If you haven’t cried for your success then you don’t deserve it. You can’t make a great body in a day, its accumulation of years of hard work and persistence.

“Start slow, then gain pace, cross milestones, then again drop to slow, and then repeat till the end line is reached”
– A perfect line wriiten by Us to follow to complete a marathon, and life is a marathon :).

I can say from my own experience that You don’t regret what you did but always what you didn’t. I have always believed in these lines from my start, and till now I have always done what I wanted as There is no time to regret in our fast daily life. You don’t want yourself realizing this later on and saying that- “what if I had started working towards my dream, things would have been better than now“. So Gear Up and Start working towards your dream the next moment from now.

P.S. Bookmark this post and read it whenever you feel that situations are not in your favor.

Keep Reading
Read About: Why I chose Freelancing?
Read About: Complete Guide to Freelancing and getting your First Client.
Read About: Get Started with Web Development
Read About: Guide to Resolutions this New Year

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January 5, 2018 Web Development

How to Install XAMPP and WordPress Locally on Windows

In our previous article, you learned how to install WordPress manually on any web-hosting. Do you know you can also run WordPress on your computer locally? Having WordPress installed on your localhost will make work easy for you. You can easily install and test themes and plugins on locally installed WordPress website without affecting your main website online. Working locally also increases the speed of your work as you are working on your computer rather than using the internet. The most important advantage is that you don’t need to have any domain name or web server to run any WordPress site. Today I will guide you How to install xampp and WordPress locally on Windows.

Note: For running any website online you need to have a domain name and web server.

Localhost is nothing but the computer you are using. When you connect to the internet and enter some URL in your browser you are connecting to a host computer server somewhere in the world. This is similar when you type localhost in the browser to connect, means you are connecting to the computer you are using, which is your own computer.

Local websites are only visible on our own computer. I prefer working on localhost because my website loads faster here and also I don’t have to worry about changes affecting the main website in case of any mishappenings. I can try different plugins and themes and check it whether it is working fine or not. I update it afterward on my main website. I can also debug errors in my environment easily.

In this article, I will explain step by step process to install WordPress on localhost.

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As I have told you to run any website online you need to have a web server, similarly, for working on localhost you need to have a server. For this, you need a software which has a pre-built local server in it.

For Windows you have WAMP, For Linux – LAMP, For Mac – MAMP, and XAMPP is used for any operating system.

Read Here: Difference between LAMP, WAMP, MAMP and XAMPP

Running WordPress locally also needs PHP (a programming language) and MYSQL (database management software). Installing both of them individually is difficult. This is what XAMPP/WAMP/LAMP/MAMP will do easily. Everything is inbuilt inside them.

I will use XAMPP here. XAMPP stands for Cross-Platform, Apache, MariaDB, PHP and Perl. Since it is a cross-platform, it can also work on Mac as well as on Linux. Here I will show you how to install xampp it in Windows.

So let’s get started –

1. First learn how to install XAMPP on your computer

For downloading XAMPP go to Apache Friends website and download XAMPP for windows.

After downloading it, run the downloaded file to launch the installer. If you have any antivirus software then you might get a warning. Click yes and continue.

You might also get a prompt of User Account Control (UAC) warning. UAC helps to prevent malware from damaging your PC and helps to deploy better managed desktop. Click OK and proceed.

After everything you will get the installation screen.

Click Next to continue.

It will then ask you to select the software and packages you want to install. You can go for default settings also. But for running WordPress you just need MySQL and PHPMyAdmin.

After selecting click Next.

Now it will ask for selecting the folder where you want to install XAMPP on your machine. You can leave it default also. Then click ‘Next’ button.

Then you will get a prompt asking you to install Bitnami for XAMPP. You can go for default settings. But you don’t need this for installing XAMPP and WordPress so you can also uncheck it.

Now It will show that your setup is ready to begin installing. Click ‘Next’ button and proceed.

After clicking Next, it will run the installation wizard and start the installation.

It might take a few minutes.

After that finish wizard will be displayed.

Check ‘start the control panel’ option now and click Finish. It will launch XAMPP control panel.

Now in the control panel click on the start button next to Apache and MySQL. It will now start the Apache and MySQL.

Now you will get a window security alert showing Window Firewall notification. Click ‘Allow Access’ button and Continue.

You will now see the status of Apache and MySQL to be highlighted in green. It means both have started.

Now you can test it by going to any web browser and open http://localhost .

If you will be able to see this then congrats you have completed the installation of XAMPP successfully. Now it is time to install WordPress and create a website locally.

2. Creating a WordPress website locally using XAMPP

Adding WordPress files

If you have read our post on how to manually install WordPress on any web-hosting. Then the further steps will be easier for you.

First you need to download latest version of WordPress from its official website https://wordpress.org/ .

After downloading WordPress extract the files.

Now go to the XAMPP folder which you have already installed. For me it is C:\xampp . Then go to htdocs sub folder.

Now create a sub folder inside htdocs folder. You can name this folder whatever you want to give. This will be the name of your website.

I am giving it ‘weboftwo’ so I will access my site by going to http://localhost/weboftwo

Similarly you can access your site by going to http://localhost/{your-folder-name}

Now copy the extracted files of WordPress inside this folder. You will get something like this.

Creating database for WordPress

You will need database name, database username, password and host name to go further.

Now we will create a MySQL database for installing WordPress.

For this we will launch PHPMyAdmin from XAMPP control panel. Click on the admin action of MySQL.

This will open a tab in browser http://localhost/phpmyadmin/ . You can also do this by directly going to your browser and visiting this address. This will launch PHPMySQL app which is pre-installed in XAMPP. You can easily create and manage database using it.

Then click on the Databases.

Now by giving any name to your database, click on create button.

I am giving database name as weboftwo_database.

Running WordPress Installer

Now open your browser and visit your website http://localhost/weboftwo (In my case it is weboftwo).

Choose English and click ‘Continue’ button.

Then click on the ‘Let’s Go’ button.

Now it will ask you for database name, database username, password, and host information. Further steps will be similar to the installation of WordPress on any web hosting. The only difference is for the details of database.

For database name – Enter the name of the database that you have created earlier (in my case it is weboftwo_database).

For Username – root

For Password – leave blank

Fill the details as shown in screenshot below and click ‘Submit’ button to continue.

Now click on ‘Run the Installation’ and you are ready to go.

After that WordPress will ask some details about your website. First you need to fill the title of the site. You can give it anything you want.

Next you need to enter username, password and email address for creating admin account.

In my case I am giving these details : Site Title – weboftwo_site , username – Nisha, password – 123abc , email address – contact@www.weboftwo.com .

Enter the details as shown in screenshot below and click ‘Install WordPress’ button.

Now click on ‘Log In’ button and login to your account.

You can login to your account by giving your username and password that you entered during installation of wordpress.

Once everything is completed and you are logged in, you will see a new WordPress website running. This is the admin panel of the WordPress.

Congratulations you have successfully installed your first WordPress website on localhost.

Don’t forget to bookmark our WordPress Installation guide, which will come in handy whenever you require it.

In case, you can’t successfully install WordPress using the above-explained steps, feel free to comment or contact us at contact@www.weboftwo.com.

Always Happy to help you.

Hope your journey in starting your WordPress website be fruitful for you. Do Subscribe our Newsletter here and keep yourself updated with Weboftwo for more such interesting and informative articles 🙂 .

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Read About: Why WordPress should be your first choice for starting a blog
Read About: How to Manually Install WordPress on any web hosting.
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January 3, 2018 Responsive

Top 9 SEO Benefits of Responsive Web Design

Do you ever wondered why some of the websites are shown on top while searching of any topic on Google and why not yours. This is only because these websites follows some set of rules to optimize their website known as SEO. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the process of improving ranking of your website to appear top of the search list while searching on any search engine. It is now one of the most important factor leading to success of any business website. There are many ways how you can improve your SEO ranking. One of the ways which is easy to achieve and also very crucial is to have a responsive web design. In this article I will discuss about SEO Benefits Of Responsive Web Design.

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Here are the Top SEO benefits of Responsive Web Design –

1. Increases your Website Usability

No doubt responsive website looks better than static website in every device. Today everyone has smart phones so due to growing mobile users, your website is more likely to be opened in mobiles or tablet. If your website is user friendly and responsive it will attract more users. As a result it is more likely that users will come back to your website and hence increase conversion rate.

Google treats ‘time on page’ as an indicator to analyze website performance.

Dwell Time

It is the time lapse between a user clicks on any website displayed in search result and the time when they come back again to the search result page by clicking back button.

Why Dwell time is considered as an important factor in SEO? It matters because logically users will spend more time on your website only if they are impressed by contents of your website.

So if the website is easier to read for the visitors, it will definitely increase the chance of getting good dwell time and time on page thus improving SEO ranking.

2. Site speed –

Speed of website is another important ranking factor. Websites those are responsive in nature loads faster than non responsive websites. Users love and happy to visit faster websites rather than slower one.

Google uses website speed in search ranking. One of the signals included in their search ranking algorithm is site speed.

There are many free online website speed test tools available like –

KeyCDN – It is a lightweight and fast tool used for measuring performance of your site. It also includes a waterfall breakdown as well as your site preview.
Page Speed – It is an open source Firefox add-on provided by Google which measures the performance of web pages and also gives suggestions for improving it. It ranks your site speed on a scale of 1 to 100.

Think with Google is also a new tool made by Google for testing your mobile speed.

WebPagetest – This tool shows the waterfall view of your page.
Pingdom speed test – It is one of the popular and best known website speed testing tool available.
YSlow – It is a free tool provided by Yahoo.

There are many other tools available .So I suggest you to improve your site speed just not for good SEO ranking as well as for better User Experience.

3. Improve Mobile search ranking –

Surfing the web using mobile becomes so common these days so it is more likely that your website will be opened in smart phone and mobiles. Responsive web design makes a website look great in mobile view, thus attracting more mobile users towards your site. This will increase traffic and rank your website better in mobile search ranking.

4. Decreased Bounce rate –

First let me tell you what this term bounce rate is and what role it plays in ranking of your website.

Bounce rate is a factor that decides what action is taken by any user when they visit your website. Whether they are going to some other page or just leaving or bouncing back from your website. It is determined by just the time any user is spending on our website.

Higher the bounce rate, lower will be performance of your website.

By higher bounce rate Google interprets that either the users didn’t find your contents relevant or may be experiencing difficulty to read or understand the contents due to bad User Interface. When your site is not responsive, contents are not displayed in clean and readable form.

Responsive design helps you to get rid of clumsy, cluttered and distracted environment of your website for users and hence helps you to improve your SEO ranking of website.

5. Stronger building of link –

Earlier people used to create different pages for using on different devices which lead to multiple URLs containing the same website contents.

But when you choose to implement responsive web design on your website, a single URL is created for every device. This will make easy to integrate your link anywhere easily, without thinking about different links of different devices.

Google uses page rank algorithm for ranking your website. Page rank algorithm not only looks for contents of your website but also how many pages are linked to your page.

Link building is also an important skill in search engine optimization.

6. Less duplicate content –

When your website is not responsive, you will definitely make another website for mobile version. So there will be two different URLs for same contents.

If we do not clarify Google that which content is more necessary while displaying search results then it will be hard for Google to find which page of duplicate content to display in search result. This will result into lower search result ranking.

When your website is responsive the chances of duplicate contents will be less and Google will easily search for right contents.

Single website for every device also helps you to get rid of difficulty to improve SEO of every single one individually.

7. Social sharing becomes easy –

When you will have same page URL for any device then it will become easy to share on social media. You will just have to share one URL for any page everywhere. It will increase more traffic and gives you better recognition of your website on social media.

For example if any user shares some content of your website which is optimized only for mobile phone on Facebook and if someone reads it on laptop, he/she will view the distorted version of the page.

Social media plays an important role in increasing traffic of your website thus improving search result ranking.

One more thing that users will get in responsive design is properly designed share buttons. It will help users to find share buttons easily on your website.

8. Improves conversion rate –

The goal of improving your SEO is not just for getting traffic towards your website, but also for increasing conversion rate of your website.

Conversion rate is a term used for potential visitors performing any desired action on your site. Actions may be such as filling a form, buying a product etc depending on your website services. Larger conversion rate of a website means more successful your website is.

Responsive design will drastically improve your conversion rate, since your website will be user friendly on all the devices.

9. Recommended by Google

Google is world’s most popular search engine so it is like a Boss in the world of search engines. So naturally, we need to follow the guidelines recommended by Google. Google treats Responsive web design as an important factor to determine ranking of the website. Google loves responsive web design.

Now you have realized that responsive web design plays an important role in growing and increasing your business online. There are many other advantages of it –

Read here: Advantages of choosing Responsive web design

Unresponsive website leaves an unsatisfactory impression on your Business. So don’t wait and opt for it today to make your website at par with Industry standards.

You can test responsiveness of your website by using available free responsive testing tools like –

Hope so I provided useful insights about SEO Benefits of Responsive Web Design. So keep updated with us and subscribe and follow for getting more such kind of posts in future. Hope your journey in Web Development be fruitful for you.

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Read About: Why WordPress should be your first choice for starting a blog
Read About: Complete Guide to Freelancing and getting your First Client.
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December 26, 2017 Web Development

Top 9 reasons why you should choose Responsive web design from the beginning

These days, every client want to implement responsive design for their website to look perfect in all the devices whether it be a smart phone, tablet or laptop. It is very essential due to the reason of growing smart phone users. So will you make different layout for different devices for your website? Absolutely Not! Yes it is possible to do so but the time you will spend to do that will be equivalent for making many responsive websites.

This is when responsive design came around. It is the solution for this problem. It is the approach of designing any web page to adjust its behavior according to the behavior of device or environment i.e. Its screen size, orientation and platform. The main goal of any responsive design is to recognize the size of device it is being seen through and adapt to it. You don’t have to scroll horizontal to look full web page layout.

So you don’t have to code another website from scratch for mobile versions. You can simply add different style sheets for the same page for different screens. I will explain about this more in this article.

CONTENT IS LIKE WATER

To explain about responsive designs, Josh Clark a Brooklyn based designer, memorably adapted the famous Bruce Lee quote:

“You put water into a cup, it becomes the cup.
You put water into a bottle, it becomes the bottle.
You put it into a teapot, it becomes the teapot.”

From this quote he wanted to explain how content is like water? As water has no form, it takes the shape of container it is put into. When it is put into cup or bottle, the same water is there too but only the difference is the shape that it acquired due to the shape of the container. Similarly contents also have no form. Its takes its form in respect to the device it is seen through. It adjusts itself according to the size of device just like water.

A good responsive design do not adapt itself to the size of screen but it grows , shrinks or do whatever to adjust within the size of the screen. Page elements reshuffle themselves as the screen grows or shrinks.

There are three layouts to consider for any web page –

1. Static Page Layout

It uses the present screen width and doesn’t change according to width of device. It is also called a fixed layout or fixed width layout. It will be treated in different way by different devices. For small screen width devices you have to scroll horizontally to see the whole web page. Today static websites are not preferred as then you have to design another website for mobile devices.

2. Liquid Page Layout

These types of layout use relative units instead of absolute pixels. Generally percentage is used instead of pixels for layout width. They are also called fluid layout or fluid width layout. This layout always fits in the browser, no matter whatever the size of screen is. May be it padding, width or margin everything is given in percentage rather than pixel. But this is also not the perfect way to make layouts for mobile. Imagine a case when there are many columns on any page, it will become very crowded in small screen devices.

3. Adaptive Page Layout

In this type of layout, every elements of layout is given fixed width but these widths are different depending on width of browser or viewport. They use something called breakpoints to make web pages. They are defined by specific media queries.

You might have wondered what is breakpoint in media query while working in responsive design.

Breakpoints are the points that define how the layout of your page will look above and below that point. They are normally based on the width of the screen. There are no pre-defined fixed breakpoints to consider while designing your page. It’s a common idea to take breakpoints based on screen sizes but there are no fixed screen sizes. You can define your breakpoints according to the device you are targeting and whenever your contents need them.

Keep in mind that it is your contents that define breakpoints not the size of screen.

How breakpoints are defined in code –

For designing an adaptive page layout, same HTML file is used, only CSS portion differs for different screen width. CSS is written differently for different screen width i.e. by defining breakpoints. They are known as

media queries.

Media Queries are the set of questions that a website asks to the device or browser about its size and adjust or apply CSS according to it. They are defined in CSS3 specifications. It enables to create stylesheets based on width, height or even color and orientation of elements.

I am adding an example of

media query

in CSS to explain it –

@media screen and (max-width: 699px) and (min-width: 520px) {
div {
padding-left: 30px;

}
}

Here in this example media query is defined for the devices having minimum screen width equal to 520px and maximum screen width equal to 699px. So if the width of screen is between 520px and 699px then div will be padded left of 30px.

You can take an example of it by considering any page having 4 columns per row in laptop , 3 columns per row in tablets and may be only 1 column per row in mobile devices.

4. Responsive Page layout –

This layout is the mix of liquid page and adaptive page layout. It uses the relative units of fluid layout and breakpoint of adaptive layout. As the size of screen changes the layout will change its width just like the liquid layout but when the width reaches to some defined breakpoints it will change it its structure and position according to defined breakpoint in media query.

Responsive designs are built on mobile -first approach. That means its layout for mobile is defined first and then adjusted by expanding the size of browser for tablets and laptops.

These amazing collection of animated GIFs are together by the guys Froont, a San Francisco-based company specializing in making tools for designers to create responsive websites.

How Responsive web designs work?

Responsive web design is broken down into three main components-

Flexible layouts–

It is technique of building a layout with flexible grid and which can be easily resized to any width. They are built using relative length units like percentage or em. They don’t use fixed length units like pixels or cm.

Some relative length units introduced by CSS3 –

Unit	Description
em	Relative to the font-size of element (3em means 3 times the size of current font size)
ex	Relative to the x height of current font
vw	Relative to 1% of the width of the viewport
vh	Relative to 1% of the height of the viewport
vmin	Minimum of the viewport’s height and width
vmax	Maximum of the viewport’s height and width

Media queries

I have already explained basics about media query above. For more detailed explanation you can visit here.

Flexible media

This is also an important component of responsive design. Since the size of viewports began to change, it has became necessary for media elements to be scalable and adjust their size according to size of viewport.

Why Responsive Website?

Source : Responsive Design Animation by Vadim Gromov

More traffic –

Imagine if you’re losing 49.74% mobile phone users worldwide who are not visiting your website due to the reason that your website doesn’t look great on mobile phones or tablets. You cannot simply ignore them. Whether it may be an iPhone user, android user or a windows phone user, you have to take care of each of them to give them a nice experience from your website.

Flexibility –

The designs are fluids in nature, it means contents moves freely across all width of screen. Thus user has flexibility of viewing your website on any device without distortion of contents or slow loading time.

No need of separate website for mobile phones –

Since responsive designs are made by keeping size of screen in mind so you don’t have to worry about separate website for mobiles or tablets.

Websites loads faster –

Responsive websites loads faster as compared to mobile websites, thus saving time.

As a survey by Google says 53% of mobile users abandon sites that takes time longer than 3 seconds.

Lower Bounce Rate –

Bounce Rate represents website traffic which let you know about percentage of visitors entering your site and then leave without going to another page of your site.

Almost half of the users don’t want to visit a static website. So if your website is not responsive, due to its slow speed and not proper appearance of web page user will not stay at your website and will go back. This will give your website higher bounce rate.

Higher Conversion Rates –

Lowering bounce rate of website is not only the solution. You also have to create consistent user experience which will convert new customers for your website. They will subscribe for your service. So if you have one professional website for all the platform, chance is less that user will visit your competitor website after getting frustrated or irritated from yours.

Easy to manage –

Managing and updating two separate sites is more difficult and time taking than one site. For example doing SEO of one website is easier than doing it for both the websites.

Recommended by Google –

Responsive designs are also recommended by Google as they have same URL and HTML for every device so it is easy for Google to crawl, index and organise contents. If there will be different URL links of same website for different screen then Google have to crawl and index multiple times.

It is also useful for users to access same link on any device of a website. Imagine a social media website having different links for mobile and laptop. If your friend is using his laptop to post something on it and if you are viewing it from mobile you might not able to see that as the links are different. User experience should be taken into account for SEO as Google is ranking a website according to user experience analysis.

Cost Effective-

One website design as well as construction costs less than two, and the savings can be substantial.

Popular technique/framework used by developers to make any website responsive is Bootstrap

It is the most popular, free and open source framework used for making responsive websites. It is based on HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Bootstrap was made by Mark Otto, and Jacob Thornton and was originally called Twitter Blueprint. It can be downloaded from its official website.

Download Bootstrap from here

It can be bit confusing at first but you can learn it easily. There Documentation is very elaborate and is present on their website.

There are many more frameworks. We will soon write another article explaining about them.

So now you have seen responsive designs are not that difficult to make and has many advantages compared to static website. I gave you a basic understanding about what responsive design is actually.

You can test your website here https://search.google.com/test/mobile-friendly to know whether you website is responsive or not.

Much more is there about responsive designs and about the used ways to achieve it. To know more keep updated with weboftwo .

December 23, 2017 Web Development

How To Manually Install WordPress Blog on any Web-Hosting

You must probably be here to start a blog or a business based website using WordPress. WordPress installation is a very easy and takes only 2-3 minutes of your time. Hosting service providers offers services like Fantastico and Simple script which offers one click installation of WordPress. So are you ready to install WordPress?

I will teach you how to manually install WordPress either in your localhost (In your Personal Computer) or in your Hosting account. Its always beneficial to learn it Due to the following reasons:

Manual installation is more secure.
Installation using Fantastico and Simple script may impose limitation like uploading data limit may be set to only 2mb.
If you are providing web hosting or development services like in Freelancer.com, learning this will help you in your journey.
Read About: Why I chose Freelancing?
Read About: Complete Guide to Freelancing and getting your First Client.

We are powered by A2-Hosting

Now lets dive into the steps required to install WordPress.

Requirements :

There are few things you will require while installing WordPress. Be ready with these to speed up the process.

Download WordPress file from its official site. Download it here.

You will require to create a ftp account and access files of your hosting account through Ftp client such as Filezilla. ( optional )
You will need access to Cpanel of your Hosting account to create Database and its Username. (explained below) ( I am using Inmotion Hosting as an example for this).

Steps to install WordPress

Step 1 -Create Database and its user :

This is the only technical step in which you will struggle if you are not used to handling technical stuff, but don’t worry, I will make it as easy as possible for you 🙂 .

cPanel is provided by almost all hosting providers and cPanel contains MySql database wizard which makes it easier to create database and its user.

So First Login to your hosting cPanel account and click on MySql database wizard under Database menu category and create a Database by giving it a preferred name.

Select next step and provide a username and password to your newly created database. Though you can set password to anything but my personal suggestion will be to use password generator provided there to create a strong and complex password which will be hard to guess.

Now click on “Create user”, and in the next step provide privilege to the user. On the next page, click on “All Privileges” checkbox option and click on next step.

That’s it , you just have created a database and its user for your new WordPress installation. Just make sure you have noted down your Database name, username and its password as we will soon require it during WordPress installation in the next step.

Complete WordPress manual Installation Tutorial:

Now, I assume you have successfully completed the above steps. Now we have three options ahead of us:

Installing wordpress via ftp
Installing wordpress via Web Hosting cPanel File Manager

I am going to cover the 2nd way as its the most easiest step for beginners.

Step 2-

Open Files > File manager from cPanel menu and open public_html directory.

Step 3-

While you are in public_html folder click the upload icon and when a new window opens browser and select your downloaded wordpress file ( explained in the above steps ).

Now extract the zip file by right clicking on the zip file and selecting the extract option.

Note– If you intend to install wordpress on an add on domain, extract the files to the directory or folder which you have allocated to the add-on domain. Usually public_html/add-on-domain name.

For the general case I am extracting/unzipping all contents under directory named public_html.

Usually, all the files extracted will be in a folder called “WordPress”. Since we want our site to open like www.domain-name.com and not like www.domain-name.com/wordpress, so we will open the wordpress folder and select all files and move files by clicking “Select all” and then “Move” option from the top. Set the location to public_html and click ‘move’.

Step 4-

Now open the url http://domain-name.com/wp-admin/install.php ( where “domain-name” will be replaced by your purchased domain name, for example in www.weboftwo.com, “weboftwo” is the domain name).

First select the language of WordPress installation.

Now, fill the Database name, username and password which you noted down earlier while creating database.

Database host usually is “localhost” in most shared hosting companies like Inmotion, Godaddy etc. Click on save changes after filling all the details.

On the next screen, Provide username and password for your WordPress installation. Avoid giving admin as username and always make it a habit of using complex password for making your website secure . Now submit changes and once everything is finished, you will be able to login to your wordpress admin dashboard by visiting the following link. Replace domain-name with actual domain name:

http://domain-name.com/wp-admin ( where “domain-name” will be replaced by your purchased domain name, for example in www.weboftwo.com, “weboftwo” is the domain name).

Congratulations! Your WordPress website is installed.

Don’t forget to bookmark our WordPress Installation guide, which will come in handy whenever you require it.

As some Web hosting companies like iPage don’t offer cPanel (Which is very disappointing! ), so in that situation you can follow this guide to manually install WordPress.

In case, you can’t successfully install WordPress using the above explained steps, feel free to comment or contact us at contact@www.weboftwo.com.

Always Happy to help you.

Want to start Freelancing? Register and start getting Clients on Freelancer or Upwork.

December 21, 2017 Web Development

Beginners Guide: What is CMS and Which one to choose

Confused about CMS, what does CMS stand for and why is it popular among people? Well I was too unaware about the term when I started using WordPress. Though using WordPress had nothing to do about me knowing CMS, but its a common saying that

“To run the long run, You need to Get the basics right”.
Lets start..

CMS – Content Management System

These days most of the websites are made using CMS. They come with ready to use administration panel which can be used by anyone. They are mostly used by the website owners who need to update their website regularly. So that they don’t have to depend on developers every time we change something in our website. This will also help in saving the money and time that they will spend on developer.

We are powered by A2-Hosting

CMS is a simple Graphic User interface of a website that facilitates the following functionality –

Adding new contents to the website.
Editing and organizing contents of the website i.e. changing its appearance.
Publishing, reporting and modifying the contents.

In simple it is used to manage the website and its contents for a particular set of users. It usually provides the way to make these tasks easily possible. So these are also called web management systems. It enables even a non- technical user to efficiently build and manage their website. You can easily change the design and content of website through admin panel just by changing theme or adding any plugin whenever you want. You don’t need to deal with complicated codes. Everything can be done by just clicking buttons, as simple as that.

CMS administrate every contents of the website throughout its life-cycle i.e. from its start to end.

If you want the below things to be implemented then you must go for any CMS for your website –

If you want to update your website’s contents regularly
If you want to restrict access to any page of your website.
If you want give access to some non-technical user to manage and update your website.
If you want to manage your contents of website remotely.

A good CMS is known by its user friendly interface and functionality that it provides for easy creating and managing of contents even by a non-technical user.

CMS provides access of contents to a particular group of users for editing and publishing. It is inherently collaborative process. How a user use CMS totally depends on his/her role.

Roles and Responsibilities

CMS generally provides following roles and responsibilities –

Creator – They are responsible for creating and editing contents of website.
Editor – They edit the contents created by creator. They are also responsible for tuning the content message and the style of delivery, including translation and localization.
Publisher – They publish the contents for use.
Administrator – They manage rights and permissions given to users and even files and folders. They also assist and support users in various ways.
Consumer, viewer or guest – They are the people who read your contents after visiting your website.

CMS are of two main types:

Proprietary CMS and Open Source CMS

Proprietary CMS –

These CMS are not free. They are built and managed by any particular company and you have to pay for using it either on monthly basics or subscription plan.

Normally they don’t allow you to access source code rather they provide you API to make any changes or view existing data.

They are also hosted by the providing companies only. They will provide you login credentials which you can use to login into their CMS.

They require License for using if you are hosting it on your website.

Some example of proprietary CMS are –

Shopify, Zepo and many more

Open Source CMS –

They are free and are created by group of developers across the world and can be used by anyone.

They have a large base of developers who are working continuously on it to improve their functionality and are regularly updated.

They provide source code available to all and give total control of the files and documents to the user, it means you can modify and change it according to you.

They can be hosted anywhere as per your requirement and even don’t need license for using it.

They are portable and you can easily move your data from one platform to another.

Some example of open CMS are –

WordPress , Joomla , Drupal, DotNetNuke and many more

Which one to choose open source or Proprietary CMS ?

Choosing a CMS for your website is the most important decision you will make and it totally depends on the need of your business and resources for using it. There are many factors to taken in account.

But before choosing any CMS, you must look into it for a good interface, intelligent search capabilities, how many people will be using the application, whether the CMS will require multi language support, what will be size of support team needed to support operations etc.

The most important thing you should not forget is to go for a CMS which you can handle easily. This can selected by keeping in mind that are you a technical or non-technical person or are you be able to understand codes.

I recommend you to first choose open source CMS in most of the circumstances. They are more customisable and offer more freedom to clients. Their flexibility nature allows clients to achieve exactly what they are looking for and even at the free of cost.

Some of the proprietary CMS too offers these things, but taking everything in account open source offers the best values to clients.

Why CMS

Easy to manage website – CMS makes it very easy to manage website by providing a simple administrative panel, which can be used by anybody.
Built in SEO Tools – A great CMS will have built in SEO tools which help user to automatically create search engine friendly URLs. It also helps you to create keywords and tags.
High Performance and scalability – CMS also offers great caching mechanism which improves website performance.
Free modules help to add new features – Many CMS provides free easy to install and integrate modules and plugins which are very helpful in adding new feature and functionality in your website. You don’t have to write long codes for adding any specific desired functionality, you can easily do it with help of pre available modules.
Flexibility – CMS are API friendly i.e. you can easily integrate it with other softwares to enhance its functionality. For example: Google analytics, Facebook Comments, Twitter tweets etc.
Social media integration – It provides easy integration of social media sharing buttons on your website. Social media sharing buttons will help users to share your contents on social websites, which will help you to increase traffic on your website.
User and group functionality – By this functionality of CMS you can create different groups of users and provides different access of data and files to them. You can give different editing rights to different group of users. Page access can also be restricted to specific group of users.
Template support for changing designs – There are hundreds of free templates available which you can install and easily change your website design.
User-friendly results – Simple built contact forms, discussion forums can help you to interact with users.
Easy backup and restore – You can schedule your backup regularly which makes it easy to restore the website during any loss of data or damage.
Security and data integrity – CMS helps you to prevent any intrusion from attackers and filter data to eliminate any kind of spamming activity.
Easy Upgrade – Most of the CMS can be easily and free upgrade to its higher version just by clicking a button, as easy as it.

The type of CMS depends on nature of contents or digital records such e.g. video, text, graphics, blog etc . They are categorised as follows –

Web CMS –

They are especially for managing webpage contents. It helps in maintaining, controlling, changing and reassembling the content on a web page.

Enterprise CMS –

They are designed to manage any organisation’s documents. The driving force behind implementing it to do business better as it handles all the documents in a proper way. They remove dependence on paper and streamline business processes and drive better customer service and increase productivity.

Component CMS –

Component content management systems are a special type of system which manages content at a component level rather than at document level.

Mobile CMS –

Today due to increasing demand of mobile phone users, it is important to manage contents on mobile optimised websites too. This is what a Mobile Content Management system do for you. They manage contents on devices such as mobile phones, smart phones, and PDAs to make it look responsive.

Some of the Popular CMS used today are –

If you don’t need to spend money and yet want something very powerful then go for either WordPress , Joomla and Drupal . They have been around since 2003, 2005 and 2000 respectively. Don’t think since they are free, they are not good. They are the most popular open source CMS used today.

WordPress –

WordPress is the most popular CMS in use today and is getting more comprehensive, intuitive and popular with each new update release. It is an open source software which can be used to create beautiful websites or blogs. It is the easiest and most flexible CMS (Content Management system) for beginners and very popular for its easy to use interface and managing contents.

It is easy and free to install. It has thousands of available themes and plugins that you can install and use for tweaking your site and adding contents and functionality.

The dominance of WordPress in the CMS market is amazing. Today it powers almost 25% of the all websites across the web.

Read here why to choose WordPress for your CMS .

It can be downloaded at from its official website https://wordpress.org/ .

Joomla-

Joomla is one of the most popular free content management systems (CMS) that allows you to easily create and manage a dynamic website. It has an user friendly management system to control all the features and functionality they provide. Furthermore, there are hundreds of free extensions made for Joomla that make almost every task possible.

It is very advanced CMS in terms of functionality. Its first version was released in 2005 and is still improving. It is very popular, easy to use, stable and secure. It has thousands of free extensions and templates allowing users to customize their site easily according to themselves. It is built on a model–view–controller.

Joomla is supported by a large internet community who are always ready to help new users with their problems. Joomla had more than 30 million downloads in 2012 and is growing.

It can be downloaded at from its official website https://joomla.org/ .

Drupal-

Drupal is an open source content management system (CMS). When compared with WordPress and Joomla, most developers agree that Drupal is more difficult to master, but much more powerful and flexible.

Drupal is no ordinary CMS. By design, Drupal is the perfect content management solution for nontechnical users who require simplicity and flexibility. Through a modular approach to site building, Drupal offers its users both. For this reason, Drupal can be described as having the strengths of both a content management system and a content management framework. With Drupal, you can build almost anything. It’s just a matter of combining the right modules.

It can be downloaded at from its official website https://drupal.org/ .

Shopify-

Shopify is a premium, customizable, and easy to use e-commerce platform for business owners and online marketers.

You can access all the tools and applications to build and maintain your own online store. It has gorgeous themes and useful 3rd party apps, which can be customized, automated and increase revenue easily.

Its not a marketplace like Amazon or eBay. Anyone can build their own marketplace with it and there is no profit sharing with the platform.

Hope I covered everything related to CMS.

So keep updated with us and subscribe and follow for getting more such kind of posts in future.

Hope your journey in Web Development be fruitful for you.

Want to start Freelancing? Register and start getting Clients on Freelancer or Upwork.

what we do

“You are too expensive.”

“Really! Is it too Expensive, compared to what?”

1. The client is trying to justify the purchase to themselves. 2. The client isn’t aware of the cost genuinely as they are new to this. 3. The client is comparing you to someone else. 4. The client isn’t interested in buying and is using “You are too expensive” statement

This statement will shift the sale from a seller-trying-to-convince-buyer to buyer-trying-to-convince-themselves situation.

Bonus Materials

Email Scripts You can use to reply to your clients:

Option One – Tell them why you are awesome

Why this script works –

Option Two – Offer a Little Less

Why this script works-

1) “That’s not my problem” or “It’s not my job” or “I am not getting paid enough” –

2)”But I have always done it that way” –

3) “It’s impossible for me” or “There’s nothing I can do” –

4) “This will only take a minute” or “That’s very easy for me” –

5) “That makes no sense” –

6) “You are wrong” –

7) “I am sorry but” –

8) “I just assumed that” –

9) “I did my best” –

10) “You should have” or “You could have”

11) “I may be wrong, but” or “This may be a silly idea” –

12) “I haven’t had time” or “I am too busy ” or “I don’t have time for this right now” –

13) “Don’t you think?” or “Okay?” –

14) “You guys.” –

15) “I think…” –

16) “No problem.” –

17) “I’ll try.” –

17 things you should never say at work

Protocols for Freelancing

Always get your Advance Deposit –

Get 100% sure what the client want –

Decide whether you want to get paid on hourly or on project basis –

Have a fixed mode of communication –

Set a Deadline –

Get paid in steps –

Don’t settle for pay lower than your value –

Always charge extra for extra work –

Never ask for referrals –

Always update your clients –

Let your client know if your extra services cost you as well –

Always Be Honest-

Always keep your business and friendship separate –

Be flexible –

Have good client management skill –

Learn how to say no-

Always provide a world class service –

Now its time for some Startup Motivation.

It’s too late to start now

I am too lost in life to know what to do

I have failed far too many times for success to be a possibility

Now lets address How to never give up on Becoming an Entrepreneur

Persistence is the key :

Lower your Expectations :

Be Strong :

Trial and Error is the key :

Fake it Until you make it :

Don’t Compare:

Expect to hit the dip:

1. First learn how to install XAMPP on your computer

2. Creating a WordPress website locally using XAMPP

Adding WordPress files

Running WordPress Installer

Here are the Top SEO benefits of Responsive Web Design –

1. Increases your Website Usability

Dwell Time

2. Site speed –

3. Improve Mobile search ranking –

4. Decreased Bounce rate –

5. Stronger building of link –

6. Less duplicate content –

7. Social sharing becomes easy –

8. Improves conversion rate –

9. Recommended by Google

CONTENT IS LIKE WATER

1. Static Page Layout

2. Liquid Page Layout

3. Adaptive Page Layout

You might have wondered what is breakpoint in media query while working in responsive design.

How breakpoints are defined in code –

1. The client is trying to justify the purchase to themselves.

2. The client isn’t aware of the cost genuinely as they are new to this.

3. The client is comparing you to someone else.

4. The client isn’t interested in buying and is using “You are too expensive” statement