8 Questions for New Entrepreneurs
A couple weeks ago I was on a panel called “Entrepreneurs of Atlanta: Stories of Success” for the Technology Association of Georgia. We were asked some really great questions, and I think we have some solid, honest advice for other entrepreneurs out there. Since this...
Why I Hate Invoicing – A mini-essay on the social anxieties of a freelancer
Laura recently told us "Invoices. Loathsome, vile creatures. I hate doing invoices more than anyone I know." At that moment, I realized why we had not received an invoice from her in a while. So we asked that she write an article on this that would perhaps help her...
Leaders in the Trenches Interviews Jason Long
Gene Hammett from Leaders in the Trenches interviewed Jason Long last week and here is the podcast. They discussed the stress of running a business, growing your people, learning how to niche your business, and letting go. See the full article here!
Base Salary Expectations For Sales Team Members
This is how I felt when I finally figured out how much I was going to end up paying a good sales person. And then I remembered a scene from one of my favorite Simpsons episodes. LOU: Gee, chief, all those gears and motors must have cost a fortune! CHIEF WIGGUM: Well,...
How to Avoid Client Conflict – Interview with Zach Alig
Other than pricing, probably the biggest concern for a freelancer or studio is the question of how to manage clients. I had a chance to sit down with Zach Alig, a veteran Production Manager at JH Media Group, in Athens, Ga., about his approaches on managing...
5 Resources to Hone Your Design Skills
This post on Quora on the best resources for bleeding edge design has been making the rounds. Some of the answers are awesome, and I want to highlight a few of them here for BrainLeaf beta users. These resources will help small or one-man design studios get their UX...
How to Pay Your Sales Team
How to Pay Salespeople: Base Plus 7-and-7 Formula I get it. You do design, not sales. Now we could talk all about how you never stop doing sales; how you’re always your best salesperson; how it’s extremely hard, if not impossible, to own a studio and not be involved...
Better Design & Development Through Cooking
People in our industry spend a lot of time in front of the computer. It's part of our job, but all that sedentary time needs to be offset with a reasonable amount of activity and healthy food. So, this week I want to share one of my favorite recipes that you can cook...
Three Important Expectations To Set In Web Design
First, a quick quiz. What is a custom designed website? A) A PRODUCT B) A SERVICE If you picked B, you’re on the money. There is a big discrepancy in the web and app design and development industry between what a lot of clients think they are buying and what you guys...
Random Thing of the Week
As BrainLeaf beta re-launches, we plot our next venture. This week we re-launched beta (huge sigh of relief). While we sent the email inviting everyone into the system, the Tangent Solutions New Business Team was busy at work putting together research and a prospectus...
What exactly are we doing here?
Time for another release! Time for some of that critical feedback and commentary that can be both vindicating and sometimes disappointing. I read a blog the other day about start-ups, funding, failure, dreams, and resilience; this a quote really stuck with me: "And I...
How to scope and price a web project #2
Last time we wrote about the basics & essentials in pricing and scoping projects. The real goal of that post was to provide a foundation so that we could get here. (If you haven’t yet read last week’s post, I encourage you to do so now and then come back to this...