So I am going to talk to (and ask) you about how, as an entrepreneur, you can balance a full-time job without losing your clients, and still working toward building your business in the future. Oh yeah, and how to do that and STILL keep a relationship with a husband/wife, children, parents and friends in tact…  I’ve been thinking a lot about this because my present job is due to end in August, and I want to be ready to go “great guns” when I come back home to roost.

I have found many great things about working outside the home over these past months. I forgot how much I enjoy working with people face to face, and how much I love administrative work (I’m an Office Operations Supervisor for Administration).  But the really interesting thing for me is meeting so many different people, many of whom are in the exact same position as me – they’re doing this job because they or their spouse lost their job, so they’re having to take a break from what they really love and are trained to do.

I’ve tried to be open to what God wants me to learn from this experience, but also WHO he wants me to meet, because it doesn’t matter WHAT you know if nobody knows you.   I’ve realized that these are incredibly talented people in their own rights, forced into low-paying jobs due to the economy. I’m keeping my eyes open for potential partners and teachers as well as potential clients.

Also, being thrown together with a group of people from different backgrounds and experiences allows you to conduct “focus groups”, if you will, to get feedback on ideas from people outside of your normal “niche” or “industry”.  Sometimes they may have negative criticism which will help you get past hurdles you didn’t know existed.  Others may give you the neccessary encouragement you need to continue when your spirits are low.

So if you are someone in the same position as I am, I want to encourage you to make the most of your time out of your home and make as many contacts as possible.  Find people that you can rely upon as sounding boards for future ideas or even present products, and how they can be marketed or improved.  I challenge you to be less concerned with “selling”, and more concerned with “learning” during this brief hiatus (or less all-consuming period) of your business.

The other thing I have found is the challenge to continue to keep existing clients happy and satisfied, while still working 40 hours, and trying to still pay attention to my extended family of loved ones. My husband appreciates all of the work I do to take care of the family, and recognizes my need to make sure I don’t lose existing clientele so I still have a business to which I can return after this job ends. But honestly, I fluctuate between sheer exhaustion (from my work schedule) and my consuming obsession with making my business a success.  That leaves very little “together” time for family.

I am also trying to walk that thin line between trusting God to meet our needs and hold my future, and doing everything I can to be a faithful steward of what He has provided for me.  I don’t want to “make things happen” that aren’t meant to be (and will be unprofitable and unfruitful), but I don’t want to be one of those spiritual people who believes all I have to do is sit still and everything will be handed to me on a silver platter.

So as I navigate these treacherous, yet necessary, waters of life right now, I’m trying to stay clear of shipwrecking relationships, and of letting my business boat rust and possibly sink from lack of attention.  I’d love for you to tell me how YOU are handling this duality required of you at this time. 

• Are you trying to keep your original business afloat while you try to bring in a steady paycheck at an outside job?
• Are you continuing your blog, podcast, twitter or facebook updates?
• Are you taking this time to re-evaluate your business and think about ways of changing your products or marketing plans?
• Have you found that people presently around you outside of the house may possibly play key roles in the future of your business?

Please share your stories with me.  It will be such a great encouragement to me, as WELL as an encouragement to those who read your comments.

And when you comment, please make sure to put a link to your business.  After all, we’re all in this together, and I’d love to add one more link back to your business while you’re taking care of business elsewhere.

Penny Haynes, http://PennyHaynes.com

Want to stick out in the crowd of avatars on Twitter? Want to catch people’s eye as they are scrolling down their tweets, or looking at other people’s Followers? Then give an animated avatar a try!

The trick is, however, to find the line between eye-catching and annoyingly distracting. I’ve seen web cam video used as well as screen recordings. Slide show videos would work as well.

My first attempt was annoyingly distracting, and a Follower asked me to tone it down a bit – which I did. Some people will simply stop following, but that doesn’t bother me. I love looking at other people’s animations – it’s like looking through a virtual window to their soul!

Here’s a video tutorial you can watch, but below are some more detailed instructions with more options:

1. If you are going to use a video clip, pull it into a video editing program to grab about 2-4 seconds worth (Twitter avatars must be under 700 kb). Or create one from scratch, like a slide show video, web cam recording or slide show video. REMEMBER that it will LOOP over and over, so watch to make sure there isn’t a jarring jump between the end and the beginning of the video.

   Windows Movie Maker, the Commercial Creation Center (http://www.CommercialCreationCenter.com) or Camtasia are great creation and editing tools – you just decide which one is easy enough for you to learn quickly. Save the video as a .wmv if you are NOT creating it in Camtasia. You’ll see the directions below for how to “produce” it in Camtasia.

2. The most important thing Camtasia will do is produce the video as an animated GIF. If you have Camtasia (there’s a free version available), you can do the creating, editing and outputting in there as well. Choose 150 x 112 pixels as the final size, which is the standard thumbnail size.

   If you don’t want to use Camtasia, there is a site that will convert the video to GIF for you (http://www.gifninja.com), but the final file sizes are larger, so you will have to cut your video down even further, possibly to 2 seconds or so.

3. Upload your saved, animated GIF to your Twitter Account Photo. We’ve seen Firefox give error messages that Twitter is overloaded, but just keep going or switch to another browser. It will take eventually.

Get feedback from your followers about whether or not it is too busy, and refine your photo until you and your favorite followers are happy. But remember, you can’t please everyone, so don’t bother trying. If you’re happy with it, then let yourself enjoy it, and change it around from time to time to break up the monotony.

Now, I didn’t come up with this idea – I was just looking at someone else’s followers and noticed the tiny image moving. I HAD to click on it, and I checked out their site (it was pixel something – it was a screen recording). I figured that if their moving avatar made ME click on it, maybe others would click on me if MY image moved. And THAT’S how this whole thing happened!

Penny Haynes, http://www.CommercialCreationCenter.com
http://www.MarketingWithAudioAndVideo.com

Today’s video excerpt of our internet radio show talks about what branding is and is not, and what social media and social networking sites do to help your branding efforts.

“For a tech/arts story, I’m looking to receive nominations for the best tweets/texts of the year. The messages should be complete thoughts that obey the relevant length limitations, and make sense without a ton of context or explanation. I’m especially interested in original epigrams, aphorisms, and compact bits of creative nonfiction. Satirical stuff, too. Please include the author’s name and contact info.”

email to tonyDOTdokoupilATnewsweekDOTcom.

Deadline for answer is December 7, 6pm EST.

Penny Haynes, Commercial Creation Center