Blogosis

Chevrolet put together an interesting advertisement made out of 20,000 pennies. The ad could have been found on London’s New Oxford Street, that is, if it wasn’t stolen by those greedy Londoners.

Chevrolet’s Les Turton commented: “There have been some great car adverts before, but none that has stopped traffic and actually put money back into the motorist’s pocket so this is certainly a first. We’re glad we’ve topped up lots of people’s wallets, purses and, in some cases, rucksacks, but it would have been nice for the billboard to last a little longer than 30 minutes.”

20,000 pennies in just 30 mintues. That over 6.50 a minute being pulled off that ad a minute. I wonder if they had to use the sticky glove from Home Alone.

The creative ad was produced to show off the inexpensive 769,500 pence Aveo.

If you are in charge of hiring your company’s, or your boss’s company’s employees, then you know the importance of hiring an excellent employee. Checking a candidates background by getting in touch with their references is an excellent way of knowing whether or not this employee is the right man (or woman) for the task. Instead of asking how long have they worked for you, and how did they do, try to mix it up by asking questions that could really help your investigation. Here are just a few questions we can suggest to you when asking references questions.

1. Did this person ask you to be their reference?

2. When said person was at your company, what do you feel they learned?

3. What type of suggestions would you give to this person if you wanted them to extend their career deeper.

4. Were there circumstances that made this employee upset or easily frustrated, and if so, what were they?

5. How did this person happen to handle busy or stressful circumstances in the office?

6. What was their reaction to the management style in your place of work?

7. If this person were to ask for their position back, would you hire them again?

8. If you were in my shoes, what questions would you ask yourself before considering this applicant?

9. Which character from the movie Office Space is this person?

10. Is this employee good enough to be placed in a higher position than they are applying for?

11. Was their anyone at the workplace this person didn’t like, and could you refer to me their contact details.

These are just a few of the brainy questions you can ask a reference. Stay unique and catch them off-guard to avoid the regular answers of, “Yes,” “He was good,” and “I like her.” The more you know about this applicant, the better equipped you will be to decide who gets the job and who has to move on to the next interviewer.

Breaking into the freelance field is an amazing feeling. You are loosened from the deadly grips of your boss, and free from the closed-space known as your cubical. Being a freelance writer myself, I get a lot of questions asked about my career. Some come from those that are outside of my field amazed that I make any money, while most are other freelancers searching for some tips. I love to hand them out, too.

One of the things that most new freelancers fail to do is communicate right off the bat. I used to jump into projects without knowing what direction the client really wanted, and I always regretted it. I found that proper communication is not only neccessary for you to get the most out of that project, but it is essential if you want that client and referrals.

Know what the client needs

Not all your clients may be writing geniouses, like you (if you are a freelance writer), so you need to make sure you have all the project details with you before you start. Call the client, email them with further questions, and don’t leave any questions in the back of your mind unasked. Thinking you know the direction they want with their project, and knowing what it really is are two different things.

Repeat it concisely

Once you get that long detailed report of what your client needs are, memorize it, write it down, and then summarize it. Send a copy of your summary of the project back to the client. This will let your client have a better idea of whether on not you two are on the same page.

Stay in constant contact

I keep my clients up to date with the projects they have for me. If it is a short, one day project, I may send them an email every few hours. If I have a freelance writing project that could take a week or longer, I make sure my client stays in touch with me on a daily basis. I’ll send early copies, ask if I am headed on the right path, and let them know when I expect to contact them again. Clients love to know whether or not you are actually working on their project, and this lets them know that you really are.

It doesn’t end when you are finished

Even once a project is clear, you shouldn’t just ditch a good client. I send weekly updates to my freelancing clients. This gives them status updates on me, my work schedules, any new major projects from major clients, and then I give a short appreciation message for having them as a client. This just keeps them coming pack to me for more. They love the attention.

This is a story straight out of my home-state, and a pretty entertaining one at that. My mother hates anything with the name “mart” in it, although she doesn’t hate Wal-Mart - or is it Walmart* now? - as much as the big K-Fart. Anyways, I’m sure this will please the hell out of her.

A Minnesota judge ruled that Walmart may have infracted Minnesota labor laws over 2 million times in the past 6 years, calling what Walmart did “dehumanizing”. The infractions include not allowing workers to take break, making employees work through lunch, and working them off of their time shifts involuntarily and without pay. Each infraction is chargable, by law, with up to a $1,000 fine.

2,000,000 x 1,000 = … Add the zeros… (I was never good at math)… oh 2 BILLION Dollars!

Walmart is in some deep doo-doo now… just like Nancy Braun, one of the 4 named plantiffs in the suit:

In several instances no one came in time for her to go to the bathroom. “I would end up soiling myself,” said Braun, now 53 and living in Rochester. “Sometimes I’d have other clothes with me in my locker, or they would say to me, ‘We have clothes in the store you can buy.’”

Sounds like Nancy could use some Depends, or this. All joking aside, you can’t help but feel sorry for the woman and the rest of the people working at Walmart. Besides being labeled as hicks and sillies that aren’t good enough for the real working class America, they’ve got to put up without any food. God forbid no lunch break! Damn you, Walmart (star)!

Can you believe this, though? Walmart may be considering an appeal! How? They are reviewing the Minnesota labor laws and Walmart rules to find any loop holes. Chances are they will find one, and Nancy will be left with her good ol’ Depends (aisle 17), unfortunatly.

[via star tribune]

Here are some of my favorite posts from January 2008.

• 40+ Adsense Alternatives That Will Make You More Money! - I got the lovely “Google Slap” to my Adsense account for “invalid clicks.” After being screwed by that, I needed to find a way to make money on my blogs. I foud over 40 of them, and here they are for your enjoyment.
• Your Time and Effort Towards Blogging Means Nothing - This was an interesting post. A lot of the reasons a blog is successful is because it is polished towards its subscribers. This is also the first post I introduced my girlfriend to you.
  
• Blogging: The Next Olympic Sport - I think this is really where I started to write differently than everyone else. Anyways, find out why and and Olympians are the same.
• 6 Ways to Make Your Blog as Big as Cloverfield - Cloverfield was a great movie. Their marketing was amazing outside of the film, and inside of the film. I took hints from that, and show you how to make your blog bigger by listening to what Cloverfield had to say to us bloggers.
• No Passion? 20 Reasons Why You Should Blog with Passion - Another big, interesting list. If you are are blogging in a certain niche just to make money, you shouldn’t be. Blog for your passion.
• Your Blog and ‘Rabbits’ - I have rabbits. At first, I hated them. I’ve learned to love them, just as I have Blogosis. Learn the ways in this post.
• Blog Subscribers are Selfish Little… - Kitties! Haha. Using a little classroom knowledge I pieced this blog article together. Basically, you need to be blogging for others and not yourself.

It was Blogosis’ start up month, and traffic here has literally exploded past what I thought I would be getting. I was thinking I would be lucky to get 20 subscribers in one month. I not have 55 (Just got updated to 65!!) amazing readers. I estimated I wouldn’t make any money from my blog last month. I realized an amazing way to profit from my blog, and I now make about 40 dollars a day from it. If that is constant and comes everyday, I will make around 1200 dollars next month! Alexa has kept bumping us higher and higher. Statistics as of now say Blogosis is ranked at 477,700. I believe 2 weeks ago we were well over 1,000,000. Lets see if we can’t move up to 200,000 in the coming month.

So once again, thank you subscribers. Stay subscribed and help keep Blogosis alive! It is you guys that really make this community, I just provide the space for you to do it! Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!