New Year Resolutions
Only two resolutions I have this year:
- Wake up early.
- Wake up happy.
There is no point in starting a day late or depressed.
Happy 2012!
Only two resolutions I have this year:
There is no point in starting a day late or depressed.
Happy 2012!
Few weeks ago I decided to try my first adwords campaign for The Booking Bee beta sign up. I wanted to try this MVP thing everyone speaks about and really see if I’ll get some interest for the product before I really throw myself into it and build it. It was the first time I had to deal with AdWords. Knowing nothing about it I thought it would be enough doing my usual: scan the software, try out a few commands and usually getting the hang of it (or a general idea how to operate it) quite soon. Ad Words is a different beast, though. It is quite complex and it has a whole lot of terms that one needs to learn. It is not an afternoon job – it is more like a week (or two) project by itself. Not to mention the whole SEO thing (if you really want to do a good job). Here was my plan of action:
The first two bullet points were no brainer for me. Third and fourth are turning out to be a bit harder than originaly planned.
I got a really nice template and tweaking it was not really a problem. Even completely changing the icons for features list was easy. Writing the copy, on the other hand, turned out to be harder. Specialy if you want to say something meaningful and would like to avoid the usual selling buzzwords. I am not very well versed in that, unfortunatelly, thus i spent a great deal just staring at the screen with a blank head.
On to setting up AdWords.
I found a great blog by Octoclick helping me to understand what all the major options meant. Still the biggest problem I had was to find the right keywords.
What do people search for when they want to find a software helping them manage bookings and expenses for their vacation rentals? No idea. I set up some basic words and phrases that i thought would bring users to my site and make then sign up: vacation lettings, landlord, booking calendar, vacation expenses … How wrong I was! Yes, majority of them did bring traffic to my site, but they weren’t relevant enough! All they did was eating up money from my day limit so the add stopped showing after few clicks! And I only realized that three days into the campaing. As soon as I removed them and added more relevant set to the campaing i was paying much less for a bigger click through rate (but still very low). No sign ups, yet, though.
Another mistake was to set only one version of the text ad. No! You want to have different variations of it so that different sets of keywords trigger the display of the most appropriate add. Again, it took me 6 days to finaly correct this.
Third mistake: The title of the add. Initially it was the name of the web app – The Booking Bee. This meant nothing to anybody. When I changed it to something more relevant to the search (Vacation Rental Software) my keywords started to have much bigger quality score, meaning that i could also drop the bid price. Too bad it already cost me more than a half of my budget for this experiment and one week was wasted.
Sumary so far:
Why is inertia so difficult to overcome?
Everything would be so much easier:
Instead? Nada. Zip. I've done nothing.
Oh, i have to-do lists long to the moon and back, but actual stuff done? Err .. ok, I've started some ... but not finished anything yet. And the most difficult part? The paradox? The insurmountable mountain? One fights inertia with "just start doing it". Yeah. To actually go somewhere, you have to start walking.
Yet again I managed to neglect my duties towards Heroes Never Panic. I always seem to fall into same patterns of procrastination. I am hopeless :)
I finally let go of a relationship that, even though the person meant everything for me for the last 4 years, it was not meant to be and I am starting to feel happier and lighter again. The hardest part is to prevent yourself from thinking about it. And force yourself to get busy.
While I was fighting against myself, some projects have piled up on my desk so I need to sort myself out and start working on them seriously.
The Booking Bee
Oh, my dear little bee. I was so excited when i started working on this project and look at it now! It has been months since I touched it! Yesterday I rolled up the sleeves and started fixing bugs and polishing code. And before you know it, it was 11pm!! Where did Sunday go?
Still a lot of features (critical ones) missing before I can open up the beta for the public, but I was surprised to see that it was not THAT bad after all. And I am all hooked up again!
Tag Penny
Well, as you could observe, I wasn't able to finish it last November. But i did finish the mockups, bought the domain and set up a blog (that nobody updates). If i really get myself to start working on it, I think it has potential. Maybe even more than Booking Bee.
E-Book
Got this idea that maybe I fancy to try writing. It was always a thing at the back of my head but never really thought I'd do it. Well, up until now. I know few people that are starting a business (or have a business) and feel lost when they need to hire or deal with a developer. I guess I could do worse than writing a little ebook guide about it. What you need to know, how to manage the project, how to communicate with developers, traps that you can fall into... I set up a survey over at Wufoo.com and got some replies back (not many, but enough that I could see the common pattern). Trying to figure out a structure of the guide now :)
Hey, it is still up and I am always glad to get more input: http://bit.ly/ffBJuN
Mongolia
Don't ask me why or how, but this summer I go to Mongolia. Somehow friends persuaded me to just dive in and join them on this adventure. I know it is something I desperately need, something completely different and unknown.
It's going to be just for 12 days but I know I'll come back revitalised. I already have an idea for a web app! See, we are now group mailing among us about all the stuff that needs to be done and organized before the trip. I looked online and yes, there are few group trip management apps out there, but none of them is particularly suited to what we need. So i thought that it could be a nice opportunity to build something quick. And as I was trying to find something to build to learn node.js, this could be the right thing to do.
It is November. This means long nights, rain and wind (at least in Scotland). But it also means that the HN November Launch Pad has started.
I decided to join in with a little idea that popped into my head couple of weeks ago - just around the time when i resigned from my current job.
The problem: I need to be as frugal as possible and have a simple tool to track my expenses.
The solution: Tag Penny.
The name is not finalized yet. Well, to be honest, it is still all mostly at the idea stage. But i got two domains that I just bought and now I have this dilema: which name is better? Expenseplan.com? Tagpenny.com? None? Anyway, I will just continue with the development and maybe the perfect name will crystalize as I go along.
For attractive lips, speak words of kindness.
For lovely eyes, seek out the good in people.
For a slim figure, share your food with the hungry.
For beautiful hair, let a child run his/her fingers through it once a day.
For poise, walk with the knowledge that you never walk alone.People, even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. Remember, if you ever need a helping hand, you will find one at the end of each of your arms. As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands; one for helping yourself, and the other for helping others.
Audrey Hepburn
We had a night out with the company i am working for, yesterday. It was a goodbye night for one of the guys that quitted and is going to start his own business. He did exactly what my plans are. Starting my own thing on the side and then, when it starts to bring in some money, quit the 9-5 and focus on it entirely.
I spent some time chatting with another guy who was actually the founder of the aforementioned company. The company has been acquired last year and he is not working full time here anymore, just some hours a week because he likes it. He is doing other things in his life and one of them is mentoring local “problematic” teenagers (all of them coming from difficult situations within their families).
I have no idea how (and maybe the reason were a couple of beers we all had) but we ended up talking about the purpose of life. He asked me why I came here, what is my drive, what i want from life. I said that coming to Scotland was just a coincidence but my main purpose is being free and independent and doing stuff that fulfills me.
“What do you want end up doing?”
“I have no idea but i guess it has got to be something with music.”
I really don’t know why I said that. I have given up the idea of a career in music long time ago. Yes, it was my child dream. For a long time. But along the way I somehow gave it up and turned the hours I was spending on the computer making music into hours spending on programming. Both have something in common - the feel that I am playing and not working. Both have the power to completely absorb me and make me forget about time.
Then he asked me one thing that made me think: “But what is it going to give to others? What is it that you have, that you want to give to others? You need to know why you are doing what you are doing. And your drive must always be to give value to people. It is the most important and rewarding thing.”
I guess he is right. We do our best work when we do it because we want to make someone feel good. Giving gifts is rewarding but we tend to give them rarely because we are tought to be greedy.
Today I spent all day thinking about how to find a way to give something valuable to people. And i realized that it doesn’t have to be some multimillion-dolar goverment-funded organisation type of service. No. It can actually start on a very basic, day-to-day interaction. You start by listening to people. Really listening and giving them your full attention. And no, not the type of listening that we usually do. You know, when we kind of listen but internally we have this monologue going on and judging what they are saying to us. I mean real, unconditional listening. Just accepting them as they are and see things from their point of view. You don’t have to agree or disagree with them. You just accept them.
Reading Linchpin and Start With Why at the moment (yes, I always read more than one book in parallel). They make me asking myself why am I not producing more of what I believe in. The truth is, I am not sure how to do it. And I am afraid to fail. I need to fight with this fear everyday, telling myself that it is GOOD to fail. Because when you fail, you are one failure closer to your goal.
Things are certainly moving in the right direction. It is going slower than I would like, though. Maybe doing it all alone is not such a good decision. I feel (well, actually I know) I need somebody to bounce ideas off. Yes, I can do it with friends, but that is not exactly the same thing. To have somebody that is directly involved in this would help.
I would definitely feel more confident in jumping into it full time if there was another person next to me doing the same. I am afraid that if I jump into it alone I might fail quite soon. That I would be like a headless chicken doing things all wrong. So it stays as an evening project for now.
Another downside of doing it solo is that I make all decisions myself and then, due to outside distractions, I don’t stay true to them. It is so easy to come up with reasons why I did not deliver what I said I would.
I moved to Scotland in September 2009. I am slowly settling down (meaning my apartment is getting filled up with stuff that will just get in the way when i am moving again) but i miss good food. Let’s face it - Scotts do not eat well. I don’t like haggis or fish ‘n’ chips. And i cannot eat steak every day. I was using microwave and buying ready made food from Tesco at the beginning (to save time mainly) but this is not a healthy diet and you see the results on your body pretty quick. Gym alone won’t help.
I love italian food. I can make some (impepata di cozze is my speciality) but my skills are limited. Very.
After watching the movie Julie And Julia I got hooked up about cooking. And i realized that I could “kill two birds with one stone”. I could buy a recipe book about italian food and start cooking at home from scratch.
And so I did. I fired up Amazon and ordered Made In Italy. The book just arrived today and after a fast first glance I think I made a very nice purchase. The book looks fabulous! Now my aim is to cook something from it every weekend. I just need to find some quality grocery stores around here to buy the ingredients from. I am afraid that Tesco alone won’t cut it.
You gain time by being efficient. The problem is, I am anything but efficient. I need to change.
I love weekends. Who doesn’t? The opportunity to sleep in late, have breakfast in bed, walking all day around in pajamas. Hey, the only “sacrifice” you do is you brush your teeth, wash your face and put some moisturizer on. The luxury of living alone ;). But the weekends end so quickly. Before you know it mr. Monday is here and wants you out of bed before 8 am. Bummer.
The problem is, I never seem to have enough time. Time to spend on my startup. It is difficult during the week because of my 9-5 job but it is no different during weekends because i sleep until 12. What a waste of time!
I figured out that if i go to the gym and do some workout immediately after work (and just one hour is enough to recharge), I come home less mentally tired and can work again. This time on MY project. But the weekends are still inefficient. The later I wake up, the less i do.
I set a new rule. Every day I wake up at 7 am. No later. And no matter if it is Monday, Sunday, Saturday or Wednesday. Every day at 7 am i am OUT OF BED. And you know what? It is not so difficult to wake up early on the weekends, after all. I actually like it. I do more in those hours until 12 pm than during all the time put together afterwards.
My aim is to start to wake up at 5 am. But just the thought of it scares me. Yes, I know, it is the lizard brain that is complaining.
Next on the how-to-gain-time list is to reduce distractions and procrastination.
