I sat down with someone today who wanted to know my goals. Specifically she wanted to know the personal ones, but because I run my own business, the professional is personal. Everything is intertwined.

So I actually had to think about my goals. It’s been quite a while, due to various personal disasters, since I’ve had the time to revisit them. Because my personal life has so changed, my professional goals are a little different, too.

Originally my mid term goal was to earning as much as I did at my last corporate job, which was $45,000 per year. The long term goal was to beat that, and to earn at least $45k after taxes.

If you’d asked me a month ago, I would have said my short term goal was to earn enough for the next meal. Mid term would be the meal after that, and long term would be meals for the week.

Now I have a little breathing room, and I can set some realistic goals while still having enough ready cash to feed myself.

Short Term Goals (three months)

• Gain two backbone clients within the next 2 months
• Produce my own marketable work

Medium Term Goals (6-12 months)

• Finish my memoir, pitch it
• Create further marketable work
• Earn a set monthly minimum

Long Term Goals (18-24 months)

• Publish the memoir
• Have 5 backbone clients
• Be clearing $4000/mo (doesn’t seem like a lot, but it is to me right now!)
• Be earning predominantly through my own products

What are your freelance goals? More money? More freedom by XX date? If you’ve not yet made the leap to full-time freelancing, how are you structuring your transitional goals?

Affiliate marketing is a great way to earn passive income off your website(s). Someone creates a product, you talk about it, sell it and earn a portion of the sale – anywhere from 25-75%.

The idea is to choose products and programs that you can be enthusiastic about. You can’t just say “Buy Product X” if you don’t know a damn thing about it. Believe me, it’s an easy mistake to make, and I think most affiliate marketers made it in the beginning. I know I did!

Find products and services you can benefit from yourself, and then you’ll know how to pitch them to other people. For example, I have no trouble reselling Ali Hale’s blogging products, because I’ve used them and they work. I’ve made money off the tips she offers, as well as from the affiliate sales. I believe in the products, so I have no trouble telling you to buy them – I know you won’t be disappointed.

How do you market products?

Lynn Terry has a great article on getting started with affiliate marketing and choosing how to present the products you wish to resell. You can either set up a mini-site specific to one product, or you can choose products within your own niche and talk about them on your regular site – that’s what I do here at Girl on the Write.

Getting Started

So how do you get started with this affiliate thingy?

• Find the products you wish to represent
• Sign up for the affiliate programs
• Create an e-junkie or ClickBank account (you’ll find many worthwhile products to represent via those two programs)
• Start pimping!
• Earn money!

See, it’s that simple.

Well, ok, maybe not that simple!

Stay tuned for the next installment – Affiliate Marketing: Getting Started

See what I’m getting at? Reputation is worth money.

Here’s a personal example. I run a very successful political podcast. I have anywhere from 800k-1.3M listeners every week. I get great guests, and even had Mark Steyn guest-host my show last week. My show obtains the services of a freelance announcer. It gives us a great professional sound to have him intro us every week. But he’s expensive. Well, he’s in line with his market, but still – expensive to me.

So we dumped him for a few weeks and went with someone cheaper. We figured we would save a few dollars that could be better invested elsewhere. We were wrong. While the new guy was good, and certainly inexpensive, he wasn’t quite up to the standard we had become accustomed to.

After about three weeks, my partner and I gave in and coughed up the cash to have our regular guy do our voice work.

So freelancers, think about what you are worth when setting your rates. Are you new to the business or do you have lots of experience? Do you offer something unique that your competitors don’t? If you are a seasoned professional always at the top of your game, you will be worth paying for. People may waver, or even leave you from time to time, but chances are they will be back when they see what a superior service/product you provided.

And those of you seeking freelancers: You get what you pay for. If you are concerned about quality and professionalism, as well as how the freelance product will reflect on your brand, don’t settle for second best. I did, but I learned quickly that the extra money was worth it to my brand.

The other day I wrote about how to make money fast with SEO content writing. However, as I pointed out, you won’t make a lot of money doing it. A couple of dollars here and there will not a millionaire make!

There are e-books you can generate a tidy income from, but there’s a catch: You have to write an e-book! This isn’t something that can be done overnight. Sure, your first draft can be completed in a week or so, but then there’s tedious revisions to be done. Not an overnight money-maker.

There’s web publishing, as I am doing. But this isn’t going to make you rich, and it certainly isn’t fast. I currently run 5 websites. They all need regular attention in order for advertisers to keep paying me. One blog has been up and running for 5 years. That certainly isn’t a get rich quick endeavor!

Heck, with the economy the way it is, even day traders (who have an in-depth knowledge of the stock market from years of study) can’t get rich quick.

Freelancing isn’t a parallel universe: It is real life. And as with everything in real life, you have to work hard to succeed. All those things I mentioned above? Why not use them in conjunction with each other to make money? Of course, it won’t happen overnight…