Guest post: Smart Money: Time Management Tricks

Guest post submitted by Doreen Martel; syndicated courtesy of Freelancing and More

We need to be honest with ourselves when we are self-employed and make sure that we are making the most of the hours that we invest in our business. There are some tasks that simply do not provide a good return on our investment of time and in some cases, they will never provide a good return for the time that we invest. In order to make the amount of money that you need to make, you need to make sure that you are managing your time well and investing the hours that you have well.

First set income goals

One of the first things that you need to determine is what your monthly income goal need to be. If you need to earn $1,000 a month and someone else needs to earn $2,000 then your time management techniques are going to be significantly different. If each of you is working 40 hours a week, your “hourly” earnings have to equal $6.25 (net) hourly for $1,000 a month but $12.50 for $2,000 a month. This can be problematic if you have to scrape around for assignments to meet that goal.

Set your hours

Clearly if you need to work 40 hours a week, you need to have some sort of schedule. There are so many things that can distract you during your typical work day including social media, email, Skype calls and so much more. You have to set your work hours and make a plan to stick with them in spite of any distractions that you may encounter. Do not forget to include time for sensible breaks, social media and other interruptions.

Pick your poison

There are countless ways to make money online, if you are careful, you can do fairly well. Make sure that you watch out for work at home scams and people who will take advantage of you. Find writing assignments that match with your own personal style of writing, participate at revenue sharing sites where you can write and earn ongoing revenue and find personal clients or use freelancing sites.  If you find the right “mix” of assignments between content farms, revenue sharing sites and micro tasks, you will be able to earn steady freelancing income.

Do not put all eggs in one basket

Too frequently, writers find themselves lulled into a false sense of complacency and think they can make all of their income from one or perhaps two websites. Do not do it!  If you do not take the time to expand your horizons, chances are that you are going to run into problems. Many writers suffered at the hands of Demand Studios when the First Look program went into effect, others took a beating with Suite 101 and still others lost out when Helium stopped paying up fronts. Try to make sure that you plan your time so that you have a steady stream of income coming in at all times. Your schedule might look like this:

       •  Monday – Private Clients
       •  Tuesday – Revenue Sharing Sites
       •  Wednesday – Blogging
       •  Thursday – Paid to write sites
       •  Friday – Micro sites

Using this type of a mix will allow you to keep a flow of income for both long and short-term needs. Using the micro-sites at the end of the week will allow you to play “catch up” if you have fallen a bit short on your other earnings goals or will allow you to make a few dollars to go out and play on the weekend.

Remember that only you can set your own time frames and schedules, you are going to have to find out what works best for your individual time and earnings needs.

About Doreen Martel

Well-rounded freelance writer who contributes to various blogs, paid to write sites and revenue sharing sites. Doreen is legally blind and has worked at home for more than 10 years. She uses the lessons learned from this experience to enhance her writing and share information with others.

Money management tips

Money management is the way daily financial events are handled in step with financial goals. The reason money management is important is because if it is done properly, there are potential benefits or at least less monetary problems that may crop up.

Money management is an essential ingredient to growing wealth, controlling costs, keeping cash flow under control and maintaining proper credit, debt to income ratios and so forth. A few key areas of money management are savings plans and budgets, personal money management, money management programs and money management software.

Creating a savings plan and budget

Savings plans are for money that shouldn't be used for anything other than saving. It is essentially a financial faux pas if not bad financial form to use money allocated for savings for anything other than transfer to a potentially better savings product. Savings plans could be a corporate pension, an Individual Retirement Account, a brokerage account, money market account, life insurance policy etc.

In other words, there are many places to save. Choosing the right savings instrument depends on personal factors such as time-line, risk tolerance, rate of return, tax benefits and accessibility. Savings plans may also include weekly, monthly, biannual or annual contributions depending on the individual savings plan.

Budgets compliment savings plans in the sense that a good budget keeps costs under control and when adhered to, can allow one enough extra money each month to be able to save. This is often easier said than done as people often experience unexpected bills such as car repairs, medical co-pays, or higher than anticipated travel expenses. For this reason budgets should also include emergencies and unanticipated expenses. For example, 7% of one's monthly income is a reasonable amount to contribute to an emergency expense fund every month. What isn't used can be carried over to the next month.

Personal money management

Personal money management is the application of money management principles to one's individual or household finances. This may involve balancing check books, filing taxes, record keeping, paying bills, juggling accounts, overseeing investments and expenses and so one.

There are several ways personal money management can be achieved such as a customized money management system, pre-designed money management program or computer software money management. An important note to consider is personal money management plans should serve individual goals and be practical. Some discipline is required to effectively implement all the steps in a money plan, examples of such steps being the items listed above.

Money management programs

Money management programs are plentiful and can be found high and low. Some of these programs may be better than others but one may often see a common thread of reasoning behind them all i.e. save, budget, lower costs, and invest. These are the only four words one really needs to know to manage money but putting words into action isn't always easy.

One example of a money management program attribute is the Three Account System. The three account system facilitates a money manager's intent to save, budget and invest by channeling funds. Since Income-Expenses=Profit, one must have more income than expenses to save money. For this reason establishing the three account system in the beginning is the hardest part.

The three account system uses one account for paying bills, another account for buffering and balancing cash flow and a third account for saving and growing money. Ideally all three accounts will be increased in size every month for a net growth however, if the expense account never grows that's not necessarily bad because that is its designated purpose.

While the above system helps in the allocation of funds and cash flow, it still requires additional money management techniques such as record keeping, budget balancing, debt management, asset management etc. In other words, a money management program ideally includes all the steps, tools, and information necessary to successfully manage money.

Money management software

Money management software can be a very helpful tool for managing money if one has the discipline to use the software as one's financial information hub and portal. That is to say, for the software to be most effective, every transaction and piece of financial information should be entered into the software on a weekly if not daily basis.

Such financial information can include expenses, investments, allowances etc. in addition to accurate entry of total assets and liabilities, creditor account information, banking information, tax deduction information such as interested expenses, capital gains and so on.

The financial software processes the information and can then create up to date spreadsheets, financial scenarios, interest rate calculators, retirement forecasts and so forth. In other words, money management software helps organize financial information through a software program. However, for that software to be effective, the software must become a primary money management tool.

Money management is fiscal discipline translated into monetary action whether such monetary action be utilization of financial software, a money management plan or an individualized money management system. The goal of money management is to keep finances under control, organized and increasing in worth to the money manager. Bad money management might include bank overcharges, bounced checks, decreasing net worth, and poorly archived financial records such as previous years tax filings.

Good money management can be considered to be generally the opposite. Additionally, what makes good money management effective are fiscal discipline, savings and budget plans, and successful implementation of money management programs and/or software. Money management is more than just making sure what goes out is less than what comes in, but it is also what happens in the time between money coming in and it going out.

Essential Money Rules to Live By

Essential money rules are often based in the common sense notions of conserving money through saving, monitoring money use with budgets, prudent investment of money through financial planning etc. Life makes it very easy to lose money with cost of living, surprise expenses, family, taxes etc. This is due to the way the economy is structured, but is also determined by personal financial decision making.

Maintain positive cash flow

Positive cash inflow is the net gain after the subtraction of cash outflow. Furthermore, in order to retain and grow what money one receives, one must also save. The rest is easy provided one has fiscal discipline, which is the next rule after that. Fiscal discipline covers a wide range of money management areas including keeping a budget, paying bills on time, spending within financial means etc.

• Generate income
• Spend less than is earned
• Save and budget

Exercise fiscal discipline

Fiscal discipline can address some of the major areas of personal financial management such as debt management, investing, retirement planning, budgeting and spending and saving. Finding an order to these events is not as important as the primary rules but can be a good idea depending on one's unique financial situation. That is to say, if one has a lot of high interest debt, that may be a good place to start not only for increasing positive cash inflow but also in improving one's personal financial stability. Money rules that reflect fiscal discipline are listed as follows:

• Avoid high interest credit cards
• Shop prudently
• Invest wisely and in accordance with personal goals
• Create an Emergency Fund
• Save for retirements using a tax deferred financial instrument ex-IRA
• Maximize legal tax deductions for optimal taxation

Why money rules are important

Money rules are important because without them financial life can become haphazard, chaotic, unprofitable and perhaps even insolvent. Managing finances is a part of life as is hygiene, shelter, and sustenance. We may be trained to not consider personal financial management to be high on the totem pole of needs, but in one of the essential ingredients to acquiring and sustaining a fruitful and balanced life in which needs are met is money. Therefore money is important and money rules can help achieve life goals and needs.

To understand the nuances and importance of money rules, one need only look to eminent financial managers and fiscally savvy individuals such as Peter Lynch, George Soros, Warren Buffett, Richard Branson, and the historical Benjamin Franklin, Adam Smith, and John D. Rockefeller. All these people are current and past financial gurus who create or created financial success using money rules of one kind or another. To glean some of their wisdom one can read some of what they have had to say about money.

"I believe that thrift is essential to well-ordered living." -John D. Rockefeller

"Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship." -Benjamin Franklin

"All money is a matter of belief." -Adam Smith

"If all the economists in the world were laid end to end, it wouldn't be a bad thing." -Peter Lynch

"And obviously, from our own personal point of view, the principal challenge is a personal challenge." -Richard Branson

Everybody's life and financial situation is different, and because of this money rules may be best thought of as methods, ways and techniques that point one in the right direction rather than show one the exact path to financial success. The money rules in this article are intended to assist one in gaining financial control and direction rather than demonstrate how to become rich in a step by step formula. 

Money and its behavior in people's lives and economies is a fluid and dynamic medium and instrument. In other words it is subject to a wide range of economic, psychological and commercial forces. In light of this, finances have the ability to not abide by fixed rules, yet still abide by the truths of underlying principles.

Source: http://www.bainyquote.com (Brainyquote)