Welcome To 2017!
Happy New Year to you all.
You’re probably out having fun, or nursing a headache from last night. That is, if you didn’t read my advice from Friday.
Regardless, let’s talk about some of the stuff you can do to ensure you have a great 2017. This list is mainly focused on skills you can learn, and links to some (in my opinion) pretty great material.
A List Of Great Skills To Learn In 2017
Copywriting
Copywriting is how I make my way in the world, and it’s something that I’ve written about pretty extensively. It’s fantastic because it’s scientific in nature, yet still allows for creativity and artistry. You can earn money with it, and there are clear blueprints to succeed.
- How to Start Copywriting
- How To Get Copywriting Clients
- Which Books Should You Read?
- The Gary Halbert Challenge
- Beginner Copywriting Questions
Building Websites
Building websites – small websites, that is – is an easy affair. When I built my first website, you had to hand-code everything in HTML and even then your site was probably pretty rubbish. Nowadays, you can install everything with a click, there are massive marketplaces where designers, programmers and other geeky-geniuses sell you everything you need.
You can – once you’ve mastered the basic web building skill, do all kinds of things with it. That’s why it’s so valuable.
I’ve written a few articles on this:
- How To Start An Online course (this is the first in a series)
- How to Build A Niche Site
- Authority Site Project
- User Experience
From those articles, you’ll be able to browse around until for ages if you want, but the thing with website building is that it’s something you need to do to get good at. I wrote an article here about what you need to get started, and you’re best off following that and getting your hands dirty.
Personal Finance And Boring Business Stuff
The above points have all been about making money. What do you do with it once you have it? How can you be more effective at getting it, keeping it flowing and storing it?
All of these are – if you’re like me – boring business questions. Finding new business stuff is much more interesting than learning about savings rates or even worse spending time bookkeeping for your business.
However, all of these things add up. Savings accumulate. Costs accumulate too if you let them. The more efficient your personal financial arrangements are, the more time you have to concentrate on business and life. The better you take care of the boring business stuff, the better your business will perform.
Two Or Three Weird Hobbies
It’s hard to be a good writer if you’re a boring person. I’ve found this – what with being slightly obsessed with writing and online business and the like – you can find yourself lacking anything novel to say.
If you’ve also experienced this, then you should take up some weird hobbies. Preferably hobbies that take you well out of your comfort zone. Also, physical activity and adventure are bonuses… which we’ll talk about now.
How To Look After Your Health
This is going to be a big one for me. It’s easy to get complacent with your health – especially if you’re a fellow internet-business nerd who spends all their time sat at a computer screen.
I’d be a hypocrite if I started talking about bodybuilding and posting those stupid viral photos with captions like “TAKE IT TO THE EXTREME” but I’ll be concentrating on improving my health this year. I imagine that like most things, you get most of the possible results with only a little effort. We’ll put that to the test – though I’ll probably only talk about it here in a limited capacity.
Still, looking after yourself is a great skill to concentrate on and it’s probably one of the best returns you can get on time invested – especially if you live in a country with private healthcare.
Final Thoughts
Happy New Year!
Let’s make 2017 great.
P.S. for those of you who read regularly, you might have noticed the “what’s going on in the future” style posts and anthology posts. We should be back to regular planning tomorrow, with articles about what I’ve been doing and lessons learned from those activities.
P.P.S. I’m starting the Gary Halbert Challenge tomorrow… many lessons will be learned, and you’re all invited to join in the merriment.