CategoryIncome

September 13, 2016 — It is often easy to overlook the underlying principles that compel people to take action. Instead, we tend to obsess over minute details — things like button color, pricing and headlines. While these things can compel users to take action, it is worth considering the psychological principles that influence users’ behavior. Read more…

April 13, 2016 — There are over two million iOS apps and almost as many Android apps in the growing app economy. However, for every Flappy Bird app that gets lucky and goes viral, there are thousands of apps that take time and hard work to launch and persistence to maintain, grow and avoid the app graveyard. While we typically hear about overnight success stories, this article explores the more typical experience of an appreneur, or app entrepreneur. Read more…

March 11, 2016 — Desperate times call for desperate measures. In attempts to fight back against the growing adoption of ad-blockers, many publishers and ad-dependent websites adopt all kinds of techniques from introducing “light” paywalls to limiting access to the site to fully blocking ad-blocker users from accessing the content altogether. Read more…

March 9, 2016 — The idea that designers are bound to be servants of other people’s and companies’ products is extremely pervasive. Sure, you may build your own design agency but, in the end, that agency is simply a collective effort to serve someone else. From my perspective, though, the world is waking up to the idea that designers can be founders of a product and not just create the beautiful wrapping around some engineering core. Read more…

August 7, 2015 — If you’re a developer, you know how hard funding and traction are to come by. Most software startups try crowdfunding and fail — they’re doing it wrong! To crowdfund your app, and supercharge your business, let’s look at what works, what doesn’t, and get started right! Read more…

October 23, 2014 — In March 2014, the Baymard Institute, a web research company based in the UK, reported that 67.91% of online shopping carts are abandoned. An abandonment means that a customer has visited a website, browsed around, added one or more products to their cart and then left without completing their purchase. A month later in April 2014, Econsultancy stated that global retailers are losing $3 trillion (USD) in sales every year from abandoned carts. Read more…

July 29, 2014 — Selling your services as a freelancer or a small shop is tough enough as it is. Selling to a small-town business that might not even see the need for a website adds an extra level of difficulty in turning a profit. I’ve provided web design services to small-town businesses for the past few years, having had many happy outcomes, but also a lot of negative experiences from which I’ve learned hard lessons. One of the most important things I’ve learned is how to sell the value of the web. Many of my clients needed to be convinced that a website would actually be good for their business. A lot of them were almost naive about the web and about the impact and reach that a professional website and online strategy would have for their small business, even one whose target market lies within a 15-kilometer radius. Read more…

July 16, 2014 — This is the second and final article on how to sell and profit from digital products. In part 1, we covered many of the benefits of digital products over physical goods as well as the marketing philosophies to help you build an audience for your products. Today, we will be discussing more of the tactics required for a successful digital product business. Read more…

July 10, 2014 — At the end of 2012, I was talking with a good friend of mine who runs a small custom woodworking company. We were discussing business over the last year and a few things we learned. While his business did about double the revenue that mine did in 2012, I made considerably more profit. Read more…

February 10, 2014 — When I realized I had written what seemed to be a course (i.e. not my usual article or book), I was left with a sense of panic. There are so many options for running an online course, and all of them seem slightly confusing or time-intensive to set up. Read more…