James Lee is a promotions and marketing analyst for small businesses. James has been researching and writing for Amsterdam Printing’s Small Business Promotions for the past several years. He has owned small businesses and his work with Amsterdam Printing is focused on assisting small businesses use personalized promotional materials such as apparel, pens, calendars and mugs for marketing purposes.

Marketing. The word can rightly strike fear into even a seasoned salesperson. A guy who used to be in inside sales moves into an independent sales position selling insurance. He knows he’s supposed to be marketing himself and the business but what does that really mean? Buying print ads that appear in a paper only to be recycled the next day? An expensive direct mail campaign? Covering every free bulletin board in town with flyers? Hiring a fancy marketing firm? And what exactly is a blog anyway?

The endless options can paralyze you into taking no action or spur you into spending money in haphazard avenues that aren’t targeted enough to show significant returns.

Effective marketing, though, can start small with an investment of time, effort, and intention rather than dollars. And that time spent will not only give your business exposure, but also deepen your commitment to and understanding of your business and customers.

You’ll also be able to develop authentic marketing material that can be used to create a lasting impression and serve as a resource for your customer-base. Do a good job and clients will even pass along your message for you.

Think about the following low-cost/high-intention ways to spread your marketing message:

1. Use Social Media…ThoughtfullyThe secret to all good marketing is figuring out what your particular customers want and providing information, products, and service accordingly. Everyone seems to feel the pressure to jump into social media because it’s free and everybody’s doing it. If your clients are likely to use social media, then by all means start thinking of a relevant social media plan, but be aware not all businesses need to go that route.

For example, a social media consultant uses almost identical social media strategies for two different fishing shops in two different states. One shop’s Facebook/Twitter campaign takes off and the other one flops. The difference? The typical clients at one shop are in their twenties to forties and enjoy sharing photos from fishing trips online and commenting on good fishing spots and gear. The other shop is located in a high-end vacation area populated mostly by well-to-do retirees who aren’t plugged into social media or all that interested in sharing their experiences except with their friends over cocktails. A social media campaign may not be offering those clients what they are looking for.

If social media does seem like a good fit for the demographics of your potential clients, then take the time to do it well with your clients in mind. Instead of simply posting specials or news related to your business or products, try to provide posts that will interest or help your customers. Post links to articles your clients might find helpful.

If you launch a new product, ask for feedback and then build a relationship with those who offer comments with a sincere response. Have interactive contests to name a new product line or for the best story involving your product. Share news or funny stories your customers might find entertaining. Make connections with your customers and develop those relationships.

• Give Away Information Instead of Marketing DollarsFollowing the theme of anticipating customer needs, think of what expertise you could give away for free. In this way, you become a resource for clients and not just a vendor.

If you’re in business development for an accounting firm, consider giving a presentation about new tax laws at a networking event. If you’re a dentist give a presentation at a school about healthy teeth and gums. A sales professional can even give talks to other salespeople on sales strategies that have proved successful for him or her.

With any free talk, include something the audience can take home whether it’s a toothbrush or an information sheet with helpful tips. Be sure these materials have your contact info and web address on them. A contact of mine handed out an info sheet on Conference Room Etiquette at a trade show and more than one person emailed him that they had made copies of it for everyone in their offices.

• Blog with a PurposeA blog is a great way to connect with clients and develop a portfolio of marketing materials for your website. You can even print out these articles to use in presentations or as part of a press kit. A blog is another opportunity to develop your business and your website as a resource instead of just a sales machine.

Include topics that will interest your clients. If you have a business that sets up conferences for companies and organizations, then your topics could be as wide-ranging as What Makes a Great Trade Show Booth and How to Network in a Bathing Suit. You can also invite other experts to write posts relevant to your audience. Encourage readers to post comments and then follow up with thoughtful responses to develop connections with potential clients.

Use case studies from your business to explain concepts and offer helpful examples for your readers. Share your blog entries via Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. Do a good job and even your competitors will be visiting your site for advice.

Create Quality Newsletters

A great way to stay in touch with clients and contacts is through a quality newsletter. A local real estate agent sends out a monthly e-newsletter I look forward to reading every time.

In the newsletters she includes very little information about herself or what’s so great about her. Instead, each issue focuses on

a different neighborhood in town and lists all of the recent home sales and prices in that area. People love poring over these sales figures and learning more about events in the different neighborhoods such as farmer’s markets and amenities such as pools and green space. The home prices she lists sometimes include her listings but most times don’t.
She’s simply disseminating interesting information, and people see her as a go-to person who knows what’s happening in the market and the community.
Promote a Signature Product
Promotional products are a great way to keep your business fresh in clients’ minds. Too many people, however, spend money on products without a strategy. A mug with your logo on it might be great if you sell textbooks that you market to college professors. Professors tend to like coffee. If you sell tractors, a mug might not be the best choice. Keep in mind what your particular clients might need and appreciate.

Another tack to take is to tie your marketing message to the actual product. There’s a copywriter who passes out pens with her contact info and the message Let Me Write It For You printed on the pens. It works because a pen is directly related to what she offers and the pen directly states what she can do for clients. She doesn’t buy any tote bags, t-shirts, or key rings — just pens. She hands them out so often they’ve become her signature around town. In fact, she recently added an artistic rendering of a pen to her logo to reinforce the association.

Again, it all comes down to anticipating your client needs and how you can provide accordingly, ultimately adding a new dimension to your business as a resource that clients will enjoy, revisit, and pass along.

As we all now to become a entrepreneur it is not easy. Hard work, lots of coffee and no sleep at the beginning. But we know that it is worth. And for the start we have a great tip.

A few minutes ago our colleague Susanne found this link for “Great Books for Startup Entrepreneurs“. Just have a look and let us know if you know some other good books.

The CeBIT is just the largest fair in the IT field, where all the important companies make contacts and share ideas. We had the privilege of winning a contest, which gave our small start-up the opportunity to take part of this great event.

We presented twago very successfully at the CeBIT and by doing so aquired a lot of new freelancers and potential new customers who post projects on the platform. On a few days we had to deal with a strike of the public transport in Hannover but with a bit of walking and effort we managed to get to the central station, which brought us to the fair safely. For most of us being at a fair as a business person was completely new, but we all were very eager to transport our passion for twago.

It made us all into small ambassadors for twago for the duration of the fair.

Our commitment was well received by the visitors at our booth. We gave away a lot of vouchers for posting projects and freelancer-trials alike to experience twagos service like you had a payed membership. We also presented the profiles of some premium members on our platform.

Some of them even passed by at our booth and signed their profile cards.

We also made new friends by talking to out neighbours at the booth. On the one hand there were established companies like Ernst&Young and on the other hand new and fresh start-ups like Namerobot or Carzapp. The start-up colleagues from myTaxi even won the first price of the CODE_n award by GFT. They were one of the 50 companies who could be at the CeBIT thanks to GFT. We were also nominated and reached the top 10 of “best business ideas”.

During the fair twago got the “IT Innovation Prize” awarded by the “Initiative SME”. We as one of 2.580 companies who applied for this in the category e-Payment got the price for our twago e-payment option safePay.

The highlights at our booth were our daily aperitives with Aperol Spritz around 17 o` clock, where we chatted with potential clients of every kind in an aimable atmosphere. Then we had a very exciting panel discussion with Francesco Ascari (Freelands Network), Magnus Kalkuhl (Kaspersky Lab) und Jacint Bofias (Open Data Cities) about Cloud Working. The discussion was lead by our CEO Gunnar Berning and attracted quite some attention by the press and passers-by.

Apart from that we invited people to play table tennis with us. For this we brought a mini table tennis game with us from our office and a lot of visitors were very eager to compete with us.

We were really glad about all the positive reactions and comments at the booth and happy that we were able to talk to so many international guests of the fair and show them what we can offer them. It`s our philosophy to bring freelancers and projects from all over the world together so that everyone in the world becomes a bit closer to each other. Quality and work don`t stop at borders. Freelancers are at home everywhere in the world and can`t be confined by their home country`s borders.

After all the good experiences we`ve made in the last week we hope of course that we can be part of the CeBIT again next year. It`s obvious already that the fair and twago go very well together.

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This time we are pleased to bring you an interview with our provider of the month. She is Italian and works as a freelance copywriter-translator. Here you can read her testimonial about our platform.

Introduce yourself in a few words: who are you and what do you do?

I deal with copywriting, i.e., content writing (advertising, articles, letters, etc), mainly for websites, including the writing of SEO (search engine optimisation) textes. Furthermore, I do translation in English, French and Spanish.How did you become a freelancer?

I started doing freelance copywriting in 2008, as an external collaborator of a web agency. Later I worked as internal copywriter for another agency where I learnt most of the things that I am applying to my feelance activity. What fascinates me about this job, whether it is writings or translations, is the fact that it allows me to deal with communication in a creative way thanks to information technologies, although they do not belong to my area of expertise (I studied Humanities). It is a creative job but also of great precision: so a real copywriter, as a good translator, knows the importance of a comma in the right place, or the choice of the most effective words. Moreover, I always have the chance do deal with new and different topics: you can learn many things and certainly never get bored.

What are your personal experiences of outsourcing (remote work)?

Currently I collaborate in the outsourcing of some projects with my previous employers, and I keep track of smaller projects for some personal clients. Personally, I love this way of working that allows me to manage my time as I prefer to work from home, giving room to other activities I am busy with. Obviously there are also drawbacks: for instance, the freedom from contracts and time schedule could paradoxically bring to work overtime and being more stressed than an employee.

Who would you reccomend twago to?

twago is an excellent platform for outsourcing work, both for the management and the team´s support. I would reccomend it to everyone who is ready to put hisself at stake and is able not only to do a good job, but also to promote himself, communicate with the client and to make a suitable offer. These are all activities that in a company are executed from different people.

What advice would you give to service providers that want to win more projects on twago?

I noticed how often many freelancers in my area of interest tend to “play down”, and this, in addition to being counterproductive can in the long run show the low professionality and the scarse value that you have. Writing a translation or high quality text is a job that requires more care and time than is usually believed. An offer, that is too low, means either an understimation of the required time, or the intention not to dedicate much attention to the project. Instead of trying to get low budget projects, it would be better to make the client aware that he can expect a good service and guarantee him effective and punctual communication. Also be sure to answer any question the client has with precision and competence.

You can visit here her profile: www.twago.com/chiara

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This is a guest post from Jake Poinier. Jake Poinier pulled the ripcord on his corporate parachute to become a full-time freelancer back in 1999. He blogs regularly as Dr. Freelance and runs an Phoenix-based editorial services firm, Boomvang Creative Group.

There are lots of things to love about freelancing: freedom, flexibility, and those splendid days when you get 2 or 3 checks in the mail. But what about those times when things don’t run so smoothly? Based on the past few years of Freelance Forecast surveys, here are the four most common day-to-day problems that freelancers face…and some thoughts on what you can do about them.

Uncertainty. Year after year, this — and its kissin’ cousin, “feast or famine” — ranks high on the list of freelancer dislikes. So, how do you address it? Turn it into a positive! Think about it this way: You are fortunate enough, my fine freelance friend, to have the power to choose what you do every day. Back in your corporate cube days, you did whatever TPS report cover sheet the boss handed to you. Now, it’s up to you. If you want to improve your motivation or self-discipline, I highly recommend Rory Vaden’s new Take the Stairs: 7 Steps to Achieving True Success. Best self-help book I’ve ever read.

Slow pay and no pay clients. This isn’t just the main pet peeve of many freelancers, it’s the top reason they fire customers. So, how do you get people to find their checkbook and a pen, and put them together? A couple of steps can help:

• Don’t be afraid to ask, and don’t be too timid to do so soon in the process. If you have an invoice that’s 30 days late, a reminder is appropriate. Caveat: Nobody likes a pest, and there are organizations that simply pay slower than others; trying to rush them is counterproductive.
• Offer an installment plan, so they can pay off in 2 or 3 checks. I have found this to be a great way to de-escalate a situation that can be somewhat embarrassing for a client who’s short on cash.
• Let them know that you can’t do any further work till the payments are up to date.

Finding new business. Ah, the holy grail of freelancing! But as I comment here, I’d like to amend that slightly: Finding new business that’s right for you. Here are two thoughts on where to start:

• Personally, I love cold calling — and I know there are some people that would  rather jump out of a plane without a parachute. Pick a target audience, give it a try and you just might find, as I did, that it gets way easier and more lucrative with practice.
• I agree 100% with Jenn Mattern, who wrote a piece called “Where can I find high paying freelance writing jobs?” for my blog last year. Her philosophy is that asking “where” is actually the wrong question, because the best freelance jobs aren’t advertised. You have to find them…and that means, whether with a cold call or other warm/cold contact, pitching them directly.

Social isolation. This is an interesting one, because it definitely polarizes the respondents to the survey. Many feel very strongly that social isolation is a big-time downer, whereas others like the peace and quiet that solo entrepreneurship brings. Oddly enough, I am an extrovert but count myself among the latter. To keep the occasional cabin fever from setting in:

• I meet at least one friend, client or fellow freelancer for coffee or lunch every week, without fail.
• I play in a Thursday business golf league, which is not only fun, but has brought in business.
• I volunteer for a local rowing regatta, which meets weekly or every other week for about 6 months a year.
• I’m not a huge fan of networking groups, which strike me as fake-banana fun, but I have quite a few friends who swear by them. Your mileage may vary.

Side note: There’s one final item that ranks high from year to year, but I’m afraid there’s not a darn thing you or I can do about it: healthcare costs. But that’s a different story for another day.

On Friday 24^th February, twago took part in a startup tour of Berlin. Over twenty people took part in the tour which included a tour of our offices, a talk with the founder and a Q&A session with our founder and CEO, Gunnar Berning.

The tour started with everyone introducing themselves which revealed a lot about the participants of the startup tour. There was a very diverse range of people involved including a chinese journalist, a law student, a digital strategist and an IT freelancer, amongst others.

The attention then turned to twago CEO Gunnar Berning who explained that twago started with just three people in one office and now there is over 25 employees, the office is bursting at the seams.

At which point the Gidsy tour host and F@6 host, Derk Marseille asked if there was any news on a new office.

”Actually I just signed the contract for a new office 2 hours ago. Which will be news for my employees as they don’t know this yet”

So we can now proudly announce that twago will be moving in the near future to a location close to Hackesher Markt.

After talking the tour group through the office layout and the different departments Derk asks Gunnar if he can explain a bit about himself from a personal point of view.

Gunnar explains his engineering education and his background in consulting for Seimens but adds ”It was always clear for me that I wanted to start my own business.”

The conversation then turned towards how the name ”twago” was chosen. Gunnar explains ”We had a three day brainstorming. We knew that we wanted domains in different countries” This meant that the founders had to come up with a name that was short and easy to pronounce in several languages, but also that hadn’t been used already. One day Gunnar explains that he came up with ”teamwork across global offices” which was then shortened to ”twago”.

The questions then continued ”Is there a difference between Odesk, Elance and yourselves?”

Gunnar answers:”In general I think it is a similar concept however they tend to focus on freelancers whereas we have freelancers but we also have a lot of agencies too, at the moment we are clearly number one in Europe.”

Derk then directs the talk back to the birth of twago. Gunnar explains that they just rented a space, they had the basic concept, the layout and then they needed to find programmers. Gunnar explains that they used the twago concept from the beginning by outsourcing to find their own programmers. They looked to Russia and the Ukraine for their programmers and today twago still doesn’t have any in-house programmers.

The three founders also began by identifying within themselves their different roles and different strengths and weaknesses. They then began to aqquire their first projects from friends and family. Gunnar explains that it wasn’t a problem to get service providers to sign up, but it was more complicated to find projects but that they needed to find this balance so that it kept all users of the twago platform happy.

The participants seem very interested and eager to ask questions, the final question of the day was whether it was difficult to start a business when it’s human nature to question yourself all the time.

Gunnar explains that right from the start, all three founders had very open discussions with each other and that it’s a good thing to question yourself at all times, as you are sure to come up with the right solution in the end. He explains to the audience that not everyone can know the answer to everything, which is why twago works with a number of outside consultants to try and learn from them.

The questions and discussion session then comes to an end. Before the twago tour ends, participants then take the chance to have a look around the office and speak to various members of staff to gain a further insight into twago and life in a Berlin startup.

If you want to see any more photos of the startup tour you can check them out on our Facebook page, and if you have any burning questions to ask us, feel free to comment below.

In March, the CeBIT conference in Hanover – the largest IT and communications technology conference worldwide – will be opening its doors to the world and will be showcasing the newest trends in the industry. Around 4,200 companies from over 70 different countries will be stopping by between the 6th and 10th of March. This year, twago will also be at the conference and will be showing you what we’re made of. You will be able to find us in hall 16 at stand D.43.K3.

One of the many great things that we have in store for you is our participation in the panel discussion “Cloud Working – Möglichkeiten und Risiken des neuen europäischen Wirtschaftswunders” (Cloud Working – Opportunities and risks of the new European economic miracle”). The panel discussion will take place at 15:00 on Tuesday the 6th. Jacint Bofias, the CEO of Open Data Cities, Francesco Ascari from the Freelands Network srl and a representative from Kapersky Lab will be taking part alongside our founder of twago and CEO Gunnar Berning who will also be moderating the discussion. The focus of the discussion will be on new forms of collaborative working and the related safety concerns within the difficult economic climate. Within this discussion, the questions of how to increase payment security for projects and how to protect the data of customers will be covered.

Last but not least, we invite you to meet with us at 17:00 every evening for Aperitivo. This would be a great opportunity to relax and talk about the day’s events. Don’t be shy, just come over! We are looking forward to meeting you and exchanging our thoughts and ideas.

With a little bit of luck you can also receive a free ticket to the event from us. Just send an email with the subject heading “Tickets CeBIT” to support@twago.com and keep your fingers crossed.

"Procastinators Seal" by Alex Schultz

We at the twago magazine are delighted to welcome a guest author contribution for freelancer and all-round writing guru Candace Nicholson. Candace, is a freelance writer and editor based out of Indianapolis, where she runs her content creation studio Incandescere. When she’s not penning white papers, marketing copy or music reviews, she’s pursuing her first love of the performing arts. You can find her buzzing about the web on Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+.

Let’s face it. We all procrastinate. Even the most hardworking, tenacious freelancer with razor-sharp focus feels the pangs of fatigue from time to time.

Sometimes, the procrastination hits at the end of a large and complex assignment. We want to shake off the stress that just went out the door with our last invoice. Or worse, it happens at the beginning of a project. The client accepted our bid and it’s time to show what we can do, but a hyperactive mind and Naruto reruns distract us from our duties.

I say that not all procrastination has to be bad. As a matter of fact, you can make procrastination work for you and your business without feeling the least bit of guilt. So here are 5 activities that can make procrastinating work for you and your freelance business.

1. Update permissions or tag photos for Creative Commons use

Whether you use other artists’ images or you offer up your own for fair use, remember that it’s a courtesy that requires due diligence. If you’re borrowing photos for your website, provide a link to the original artist’s website or Flickr page. Even if the creator of the image has a standard attribution, share-alike policy, it’s always nice to send him or her a quick message or email letting them know where to find their work online.

If you’re sharing your photos with the world, make sure you have your latest and greatest marked with the proper copyright information. That way, if anyone stops by to borrow any of your images, the message will be displayed loud and clear.

2. Add projects to your online portfolio

If you’re anything like me, assignments tend to flow in peaks and troughs. When deadlines are looming, I don’t give my portfolio a second thought. But when work is sparse, I also don’t give my portfolio a second thought because I’m scurrying to find work and follow-up with potential clients.

As a result, my portfolio (online and hard copy) looks dated and ignored. If you find yourself procrastinating after turning in that last big project, why not take the time to copy, paste, crop, summarize and publish a new piece into your online portfolio? After all the work you put into the assignment, a quick 20-minute addition to your marketing showcase is simply the cherry on top.

"Creative Daydreaming" by Fritz Ahlefeldt

3. Recommend a fellow freelancer on LinkedIn

Despite LinkedIn’s proven staying power and phenomenal growth, some freelancers have been slow to embrace it. While it’s easy to treat the website like an online CV storage database, you’d be amazed at how it opens doors to new clients and networking possibilities.

One way to appreciate LinkedIn’s full potential is by completing your online profile, which includes receiving recommendations from past clients, colleagues and fellow freelancers. And what better way to receive a recommendation than to give a recommendation! Shining a light on your friends and colleagues builds on the communal aspect of social media and it also provides a link back to your profile and website.

4. Tweak coding issues on your website

You’ve been meaning to fix that sitemap in your footer for ages. You said you’d add a search box to the home page a month ago. Your sidebar has far too many add-ons and widgets and streamlining it would give your pages a much cleaner layout. – A simple code tweak might be just what the doctor ordered.

You don’t want to get bogged down in lengthy lines of endless code, but a little nip here, a little tuck there in your 15-20 minutes of “downtime” will ensure your website becomes a stronger representation of your talent.

5. Update your filing system

It may sound dull but tending to your filing system and archives in short 15-minute bursts can be the best way to tackle a growing mound of paperwork in your inbox. Remember, electronic files can become just as unruly as their real world counterparts.

Got emails unlabeled in your inbox? Have research on a prospective client lingering on your desktop? Or have unedited pieces of audio, video or code lingering in a work-in-progress file? Now’s the time to put everything in its place. It may feel like housework but it’s really you maintaining a successful business like the savvy freelancer you are.

In the end, procrastination can be an ugly word if you let it get you down. We all have our moments of weakness and distraction. There will be times when you have no choice but to buckle down, concentrate and deliver on your obligations. However, if you’re mindful of your strengths and know how to channel your energy, you can make procrastination work for you.

Other articles you might be interested in:

7 mistakes freelancers should avoid – the etiquette guide for freelancers

Tips for winning more jobs as a freelancer

10 useful online tools for freelancers and self-employed

As twago is a global online marketplace, it is useful for our readers to be knowledgeable about how the market operates in other countries, today Claudio Marai of devinterface.com tells us about the current e-commerce trends in the Italian market.

Despite the crisis, the electronic commerce market in Italy seems to be in good health.
In recent years, the spread of e-commerce sites in our country has been constantly increasing, as well as the number of consumers who have made shopping online.

Each year several market research campaigns are conducted relating to the e-commerce world. Worldwide, this research confirms that the items and services most required are; books, clothing and accessories, video games and DVDs, airline tickets, reservations and consumer electronics, respectively.

The Italian market is not different from the global trends but in our country the most required items are online reservations (for travel and excursions) followed by airline tickets, clothing and accessories, books, consumer electronics and video games.

The factors that most influence the consumer’s choice of sites from which to buy online are the previous purchase experiences (a user who made a good experience on a e-commerce very often will come back to buy again) and the tips received from other consumers. In this context, social networks like Twitter and Facebook become one powerful tools for companies to promote their products and on the other side a big community where consumers can exchange opinions and advice on online shops.

Of course these are good tools to support e-commerce, but these alone are not enough. The search engines contribution is essential and then to be well positioned and easily “findable” is the starting point for a company that wants to see his online market grow.

Nowadays there are many pre-packaged e-commerce solutions. However, not all have the same properties and not all are suitable for any industry. It is important that a company that wants to expand its business with an e-commerce relies on professionals able to adapt some of these solutions to the needs of the company itself and the target market or even to create a completely custom e-commerce.

There are a wider range of techniques, tricks and design choices that can positively or negatively influence the buying experience for consumers. As you know, a satisfied customer is a customer who likely will return. When it comes to online shopping, customer satisfaction is given not only by the final product but from the whole experience with the virtual shop. So ease of use and navigation become the key factors to find new customers.

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-How did you start work as web developers?

Javier: Well, both of us have a lot of work experience with the Internet. We met each other when studying for an MBA in Management of Electronic companies in 2003. From then on we have worked together in different companies until we decided to combine our efforts and knowledge to start our own company, Kokoaweb.com.

Elisa: We have been working in the Internet sector for the last 6 years. We started by working in top Internet businesses and new technologies from our region, Aragón. We acquired a good experience; developing websites, blogs, etc., and doing online marketing projects (web analytics, web optimization, e-mail marketing campaigns…), and we decided to start Kokoaweb.com, providing these services in a professional way but on our own.

-Which has been the most interesting project until now?

Javier: I especially liked one we did for a Swiss client from Zurich. We developed a website, migrating his present one to a Drupal platform and WordPress management system.

Elisa: Right now we are developing a website for a company from Seville. They need to replicate their present website but with a Content Management System so that they can update it and manage it by themselves. We are also developing it by implementing WordPress and optimizing it to meet their goals.

-You both live in Zaragoza. What do you like and what don´t you like about the city?

Elisa: Zaragoza isn´t yet big enough to be uncomfortable, which makes it very easy to handle. On the other hand, in a professional way, it´s more limited than cities like Barcelona or Madrid, where the market is much more active.

-Many people in Spain are worried about the high unemployment rate. What can anyone do to leave the crisis behind?

Javier: The only solution is to work more for less; to offer a better quality, bigger effort and dedication than before. We have to assume that we can earn a little bit less. But if the work is done seriously and with quality, the client will be satisfied. I think that this is really important in the long term.

-What would you recommend to other providers and friends to get more projects in twago?

Javier: A daily monitoring of the posted projects is a key issue. And also to post adequate bids related to the services that the provider can offer.