Doomz’s posterous

Doomz tackles a major challenge. A year at a time with daily updates!
 

The 2010 20K: Day 51 - {SPONSORED POST} Guest Post Secrets!

Hey all! I came across an interesting link this week - Guest Post Secrets! The entire premise behind the site is that there's a simple thing that one can do in order to become better "known" in the blogosphere - and that's by writing a guest post for someone that's better entrenched in the culture than you are! But, as you can learn from the site itself, this is far from being an easy feat! In fact, there are rules and regs, steps, do's and don't's, etc. that one should do in order to make sure that they do it CORRECTLY. Getting Guest Post Secrets, from the research I did, looks like a pretty solid way to get the knowledge needed in order to do so!

If you want to see what a satisfied customer from the site looks like, please read below:

I greatly enjoyed the videos in Guest Post Secrets. Not only did they sound and look professional, you have a very good speaking voice and a great way of breaking things down step by step. 

I especially liked how you called out specific resources and provided cut and paste email templates.  You made it so easy to start guest posting; all the tools were right there for me.  In the 6 days since I bought your product, I've already sent out one guest post (will be published Monday), received a request to guest post from a second blog, and queried a third site and been accepted to do 2 for them.  (I offered two possible topics and the blog author liked them both!)

Thanks for taking the time to make up such a helpful product. It was just what I needed."

-Unsolicited email from Katrina McQuarrie, who runs Kick-Ass Genealogy

I think it's pretty awesome. I can see myself checking it out - any other bloggers out there might want to think about it too :)

And I got to see this all because I'm part of a site called Pay Per Post where you can put up your blog as an adspace for others so that you can write a blog on their behalf for payola! I know, cool, right?

Get your blog on, baby!

The 2010 20K Running Total = $192.14

--case p.

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The 2010 20K: Day 50 - Sleep is for the smart

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"Sleep is for the weak" - I've often heard this and lived by it for many years of the life I've lived so far. SO not true, as yesterday proved to me - sleep is really good to get, and as you get older (I know, I know - I'm only 26...), it's something you come to appreciate a whole lot more. Yesterday was a good example - me, feeling tired as hell, decided to take a trip to the nearby mall after work to get some jeans, since all of mine are either too baggy, ripped in the wrong places or just not my style anymore. So all was well until I needed to get my butt home - ONLY TO NOT BE ABLE TO FIND MY SUBWAY PASS.

Well this was a problem. With the fact that I already pay $111 monthly for the pass, I wasn't too keen on paying extra fare in order to correct my mistake. But my mistake it was, so extra fare I did pay.

$20 and one spent token later, I eventually made my way home, and emptied my bag of the day's contents. And what was at the very bottom? That's right. My April subway pass. Joy: Finding it. Not so joyous: Having bought tokens that I didn't need!

Do I chalk it up to fatigue or am I just the idiotic victim of my own disorganization? I leave that to you to deci...

Nah, here. Let's see what the magic poll says!

However, I did not write this just to whine and complain - I do come bearing gifts! Simple ones, but I hope they help some of my readers out there. I tend to skim through the main free papers in town day to day, and they're full of tons of info. The problem, though, is that they're placed in locations that're more convenient for commuters to grab and read while on the go - but the people who're looking for work tend to be home, trying to figure out the next steps that they need to take so that they can find another job. I've been there - I know that going outside wasn't a priority - in fact, it often took quite the effort JUST to get out there if the motivation wasn't there on a given day. So I'm going to try and get some of this material to the people who can actually use them. Today's material will focus on using the web as a means to find that next job!

Using the Web to Find Work

The PDF article's source: t.o.night newspaper (who've finally started getting their articles online!)

http://www.metronews.ca/toronto/learn/article/501010--take-your-job-search-to-the-internet

And for those of y'all who ARE working - are you using that money wisely? Alison Griffiths just might disagree with you. In fact, I could likely take some pointers, but that's not what this blog is about, is it ;)

http://www.metronews.ca/toronto/comment/article/501220--what-exactly-are-we-spending-our-money-on

Anyway, thanks for reading yet another of these fantabulous posts. Coming up soon:

  • My very first sponsored post - yes, I will write posts for money! Watch me do it!
  • The video post of Doomz! What's he up to and what does it look like?
  • My move from PC to Mac and how the heck it affects what I do!
The 2010 20K Running Total = $192.14

Until next time, mi lectors!

--case p.

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The 2010 20K: Day 49 - Casey, where have you been?

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Q: How do you juggle work, side projects, a girlfriend, friends, sports and social time?

A: Not very well, apparently!

Let's not kid ourselves, folks, I definitely haven't been as attentive to this blog as I'd like to be - in fact, my performance has been downright dismal at times. But I still haven't quit. Originally I was just going to put up a quick sound clip for today to talk about what I've been up to and whatnot, but I felt like it would be doing my readers a bit of a disservice as to what they might expect from this blog.

Work's been busy, to say the least. There's a lot of expectations for a lot of deliverables to land correctly, and I'm at the helm on a number of them. Unfortunately, and this is something I should have taken into consideration, it's affected a good load of my extracurriculars as well. I make an effort to fit in at least one day of sports per week, biweekly Bible study sessions, time with Sarah, hangouts with friends and other obligations that require my attention - but due to this, it seems that too many projects fall by the wayside. I know that some of my friends are experiencing much of the same when they try to balance their lives as well with the projects that they're trying to accomplish on the side.

It's not easy at all, but there is a way that one can approach it and hope to obtain any success from their endeavours whatsoever.

Discipline.

I haven't been disciplined enough, and I'll be the first to admit it. When I started this blog, I aimed to do it daily so that everyone could keep updated on the progress that was being made - but then progress wasn't happening. Things were taking longer to get done than I'd like and I was getting discouraged.

But that's far from a good reason to bow out. Do parents quit when their children make a mistake? Did some of the greatest entertainers in our history throw in the towel when they made one bad song, movie, book, etc.? I think not. It requires a paradigm shift and the dedication to get where one wants to be.

But do I have it in me? That's an entirely different question. One can always try, but this world will quickly tell you that trying is often far from good enough. I have a backlog of content to share and projects to attack, so I hope you'll walk with me this week as I try to wade my way through it all and hopefully save the 2010 20K from the gurney!

Running total = $192.14

Thanks always,

--case p.

P.S. Attached the sound file for posterity.

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1538 Views // Posted April 21, 2010
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The 2010 20K: Day 48 - The Dance Continues

"Umm... okay... yeah..."

--Casey Palmer as quoted by Chris Raymond, referring to The 2010 20K Day 47

Thank you, my friend, for the jackassery :)

Today's Agenda:

Forgive me for sounding nasal. I'm tired and apparently I need breathing exercises.

--case p.

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1639 Views // Posted April 8, 2010
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The 2010 20K: Day 47 - Getting Back in the Game

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My bad, y'all - it's been a while, I know. Here's my formal apology and promise to get back to doing what I do... well, maybe not best, but at least what I was doing before :)

Give it a listen and feel free to give me a piece of your mind!

The 2010 20K soon-to-be-changing running total: $192.14

--case p.

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1889 Views // Posted April 5, 2010
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The 2010 20K: Day 46 - The Dry Spell

So as you can tell, not much has been up as of late! Not that everything's come to a dead halt, but too much in the pipeline without enough progress :)

Since last post, which seems like it was ages ago, there've been talks about

  • Designing websites
  • Making logos
  • Tutoring in Excel
  • Drawing commissions
And what am I doing? Sitting here trying to get my groove back. Yeow! That's not good at all, is it? I need to get back in gear so I can handle this business!

Also, the last post seemed to suffer from a bit of poll fail since I forgot to allow for people to answer the poll online. So here it is again, and I hope you'll give me an answer :)

Wish me luck and send some good vibes!

2010 20K Running Total = $192.14

Thanks,

--case p.

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The 2010 20K: Day 45 - Even More Job Tips

I can feel it - the PHP flowing through my fingers as my templates come to fruition - it's good times over here in Caseyville as "the plan" starts to show a bit more of its true colours! I'm really glad that I have coding gurus like Kev and R.T. who can help steer me right when I make rookie moves like not declaring values in an array or forgetting to close a brace when declaring some properities in CSS. But I'm better for it, and things are progressing because of the helping hands, so thank you guys!

As usual, the t.o.night paper has plenty of good tips on landing that job you want, for all my seekers out there. Et pour vous who're currently employed, please note that it's never a bad idea to keep your skills honed and make sure that you're always marketable - you never know what nasty surprises could be around the corner!

References and how to answer "What is your greatest weakness?":


Standing out in phone interviews and setting "SMART" career goals:


Otherwise, just working in the lab. Though, earlier this week, my dreams of making my dream MacBook Pro system actually affordable were shattered by an old friend who informed me that I was completely incorrect in thinking that the student discount for Mac systems is at 10%. In fact, and I'm sure that everybody but me knew this - they take a fixed amount off of the full price for a system - about $100 or so. Factor in how much the upper level systems are and include tax, and BAM! That's about 3% at best. So, Stevie boy, I can wait. You're forcing me to be patient, and I don't like it, but for the sake of me buying a computer and not throwing a fit of rage when I find out a newer, faster model has come out the next month, I'm going to wait. I may as well get the other components I'm looking for while my discount's still valid, though...

I hope the posting less frequently, but posts with a point system is helping you guys out there - I want to make sure I'm giving you info that's both relevant and useful in your lives. But I guess the best way to really figure this out... is with a poll!

Righto, the bed's a-callin'. Drop me a line! Let me know what's on your mind!

The 2010 20K Running Total = $192.14 (as the dust's a-setllin' on the number)

Later all,

--case p.

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The 2010 20K: Day 44 - The Costs of Doing Business

A certain poll informs me that one of the things my readers would like to see is more interesting stories...


...so ask and ye shall receive - I've got one for you.

Sometimes a business deal just doesn't go how you think it will. I'm posting this because I anticipate that there may be some stories sent around that paint a situation in hues that may not be entirely accurate. If the parties involved happen to come across this, I hope this will provide a better understanding of what went down.


So, a month ago, Rami and I were hipped to a potential opportunity - a restaurant that wasn't doing all that well and could use a boost in order to get it up and going again. Sounded interesting. The owner was giving himself two months to get it up and running, or else he was going to call it a wrap. Hm, challenging.

So, after getting the details from a mutual friend, Ram and I went to the restaurant to pay a visit and get a feel for the place. It was interesting - roomier than I'd expected and in a prime location. The food's prices were low and it offered a good variety of lunch items. A good mix of factors for a successful venture if handled correctly!

So we chatted with the owner, briefly going over what it is that Team R&C could do for his business and how we could go about helping him get where he wanted to be. He introduced us to his chef, we exchanged digits, all seemed well. We even sent out an email that night to thank him for meeting us and to say we were looking forward to discussing things further with him at a later time.

This is when things took a turn for the worse, though we wouldn't know it at the time.

HIS BAD: He didn't reply to our email.

That's fine, I guess - but after spending the time to send out a courtesy email, if you were actually interested in pursuing a business opportunity with someone, you'd likely try to keep the channels of communication open, no?

OUR BAD: Taking too long to get in touch with him,

To give us a little credit, we'd originally stated that we'd get back to him in two weeks - which we did. It was on Family Day, however - a statutory holiday up in these parts - and didn't realize that his shop would be closed, as most restaurants are open every day except on Christmas. Also, there was no voicemail so that we could let him know that we'd tried to reach him and would get back to him later. Past there, our paths wouldn't manage to cross again until this week.

In the time that had passes, Ram and I had generated a plethora of ideas that could be customized accordingly to whatever amount of money was available to him for marketing and promotion. I think I remember us working about 4-5 hours straight just blue sky braimstorming and getting all of the ideas down into a document that we'd be able to provide if the client was genuinely interested in moving forward.

HIS BAD: His reaction to the situation at hand.

Since both members of Team R&C weren't able to both be present to contact the client through a conference call, I decided to touch base last night to see how he was doing and whether or not he was interested. After reminding him who I was, he was a little miffed that he hadn't heard from us in a bit and to pitch him whatever it was that we'd come up with. I informed him that it would be better if we could discuss further with him the next day - either I would come in or we could give him a call together to sort it all out, to which he rather curtly agreed.

When we called today, he was pretty dismissive. Perhaps it was the way we worded it or perhaps he had already made his mind up, but when we brought up the ideas of wanting to sit down with him to go over the business and how it operated to make sure that we were giving him the best possible solution and that we'd prepared ideas at different costs, he somehow interpreted it as that we were unwilling to share our ideas unless he put some money on the table first. He quickly dismissed us and hung up, obviously wanting nothing to have to do with the entire ordeal. I don't know if he was having a bad day, or if his money was even tighter than I'd speculated, but it was a quick end to a brief discussion.

LESSONS LEARNED:

  • If someone wants to cut to the chase without wanting to sit down and have a decent conversation over things, they're likely far past the point where they want to deal with any niceties and you're already facing opposition. You can't MAKE someone listen to you if they're making an active effort NOT to.
  • Keep your content from falling into the wrong hands. You worked hard on it, it's yours. This could easily have turned into a situation where content was provided prior to a contract being signed, an idea gets used without consent, and then it turns into a battle of the client's word vs the consultant's, and that's a sticky and possibly expensive legal situation that no one wants to get involved in.
  • Never see a defeat in one area as the be all and end all of a situation. For every 10... every 100 people who shoot you down, that's experience. That's content that you're developing that with further work and diligence can be used in another situation. You did your research. You've seen what doesn't work. That only means that you're one step closer to finding something that does.
All in all, I'm not pleased that it turned out the way that it did and I'm happy to shoulder some of the responsibility for it all, but no matter how it turned out, it's off of my plate, and I'll just move forward as I always do - one task at a time.

The 2010 20K Running Total: $192.14

--case p.

 

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The 2010 20K: Day 43 - February Wrap-Up

Alright, so let's start this entry with a shout-out to Sharon for keeping me accountable on the 2010 20K by asking frequently if I'll be posting an entry on any given day. Rain or shine, she's always checking up on me to make sure that I'm not losing my edge :) Much appreciated!

So another month down, some more dollars made, but still a long way to go. The 2010 20K is an idea spawned from a random plan made near the end of 2009 - it can be said that without proper planning, a plan is doomed to fail. If I went with that perspective, I wouldn't keep at the 2010 20K like I have. You may not always see it in blog posts, but there's always something going on behind the scenes. With two months and $192.14 down, there's just over $1,980 to be made monthly over the next ten months in order to hit my goal. That's a lot different from the $1,667 I'd originally stated on January 1st - almost as if I need to pack in almost an extra week of work into the remaining months. The slower I make progress, the harder the journey will be - I totally accept that.

Some of the stumbling blocks I've been finding include:

  • My aversion to the cold - I'm a real wuss when it comes to the cold to the point where I haven't even cut my hair in five months (or more) just to keep my head warm. The sooner the spring comes along, the better. Eventually, it's either I adapt (and yes, I've lived in Canada my whole life, so you'd think I should've got this covered already), or I hold out until I'm ready to have the world face more Casey, more of the time :P
  • Keeping too busy - I've touched on this before - work, friends, girlfriend, commuting - all important factors of my life. They take up a lot of time, and while money isn't everything, it really doesn't leave too much time outside of work to make extra dollars. However, I'm not above juggling as much as necessary to do so, and as the days go on, it seems that this is a skill I'm going to need to figure out how to master :)

For example, I didn't really find enough time to enter the Toronto Star Short Story Contest - I did start fleshing out my ideas in order to really get the stories down...

 

...but just didn't find the time to get everything done. Maybe I should blame the Olympics on this one, but really, it's all on me :)

With that said, February definitely wasn't a total bust. I have been learning new things, working on different projects and trying to just keep improving and developing things for what I anticipate to be a massive upswing in 2010 20K activity as the months continue on. Things I've been up to include:

Time management - an area in which I'm sorely lacking. Too many deadlines have been missed this year (so far) due to not being able to find the time to get things done. It's unfortunate, because I think there are several decent ideas I have for contests, side jobs, etc., but it's really a question of how much I can realistically manage with my current workload taken into consideration.

Web design and architecture - we're in a day an age where having a solid set of web skills can ONLY be seen as an asset. Companies need better websites to communicate information to be public; individuals seek to better express themselves and what they do - and often, the standard templates from cookie-cutter sites just don't... well, cut it. At the moment, I'm learning more for my own purposes and sites, but eventually I'd love to get good enough to offer services to and collaborate with others. Currently I'm refreshing and refining my skills and understanding of PHP, but I'd love to eventually get into AJAX, jQuery and ActionScript (unless, you know, Flash dies off or something due to CSS3/HTML5...)

Wordpress - okay, Kev? In some ways I think I was better off designing my websites with Notepad++ and a self-compiled reference book - it was easier to figure out how all the pieces out when I do it from scratch. However, I'm still trying it out, though some developer friends are whispering Drupal in my ear...

Networking - Still chatting away with anyone who cares to listen! Some client projects have fallen by the wayside, others I need to aggressively chase after and yet others are developing more and more as the days pass! I've still got the fingers crossed and the brain cells humming while I keep working away at the hush-hush projects (so that I can finally announce them and you can all be impressed)!

The week has flown by so far. Not insomuch that it's been overwhelmingly busy, but just that the first few days seem to have gone by in the blink of an eye. I've had a blog post sitting on the burner since the weekend - I just never seemed to getting around to wrapping it up so I could post it. Now I have, and I hope that there will be far more quality posts to come in the next while!

So guys, it's late and I need to hit up the sack, because I'm hammering away at my day-to-day workload like a jackhammer, granted that I have enough energy to do so :)

The 2010 20K Running Total = $192.14

Thank you and keep reading!

--case p.

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The 2010 20K: Day 42 - Things I'd love to be doing with the blog // Cover Letter Tips

Hey all, hope your Wednesday was good!

I hope you're enjoying the blog that's more laid-back and pensive for the time being! I've been keeping myself occupied as of late with life in general, and it's been good :) On top of just networking and keeping the contacts buzzing in order to build the foundation to achieve the 2010 20K, I've been trying to do other things like:

  • Make more time for creative pursuits
  • See friends I haven't seen in a while
  • Commit to the weekly/biweekly things that I say I'll do
  • Purge the excess in my life wherever possible
The hustle's been hard, but not impossible. There's been a lot of pro bono work too as of late - especially with the resumes, tax advice and whatnot, but maybe this is all part of a practice round to get the word out about my missions and the skills I bring to the table. I'm starting to ask my clients to refer me over to other people needing help for a nominal fee, and then I'll just build it up as time passes. I think I have a market that I can really grow with services that cater to the economy we're in right now.

So from the title, you can guess that I've been doing some thinking about the blog :)

  • Seeing what penny stocks can do for the 2010 20K
  • Getting involved in a lot more design contests, such as the ones you see here: http://en.guerra-creativa.com/
  • Listening to the advice my friends give me and trying to figure out ways to make money that're quick, fast and exciting. Oh yeah, and legal.
  • Using more of the online opportunities to get paid for blogging and networking like a madman
I came across this article in yesterday's t.o.night newspaper - a small publication designed for the people commuting out of the city - and I thought it touched on a lot of key points of how to make your cover letter better. I use the tips below in how I go about improving the voice used in resumes and cover letters. Some would say I'm shooting myself in the foot by sharing something like this, but if no one has money, no one gets paid, right?



So yes, the hustle continues a day at a time :) I've had people make promises to donate if I do certain things, I have projects on the go and I have moves that I've yet to make to really start pressing forward. Thanks for the support, and I hope that:

You keep reading
You pass the blog's link on to your friends
You help a brotha out with ideas, cash, advice or whatever if you feel so inclined.

The 2010 20K Running Total = $192.14

Peace out, homefries,

--case p.

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