Before jumping head first into blogging here for my website design studio, I ran a travel blog for 2 years. Rather I should say I wrote a 'I don't know what the hell I'm writing about, this is stuff I like' blog for 1 year and then narrowed to write a travel blog the next.

(All new bloggers do it. Narrowing focus and niching is a lesson we all must learn with time.)

As any blogger begins to notice, some blog posts receive crickets while others receive a roar of attention. I enjoyed having a number of posts shared thousands upon thousands of times. I'm going to let you in on what I took away from my most shared post.

40,300 shares as of mid August 2016 to be precise. 

Tell me, does this sound familiar?

You have a long list of things that must be accomplished today. You work online for your blog/biz and part of that means being active on social media.

First you start on Twitter, responding to Tweets, interacting with followers and scheduling Tweets for the day.

You scroll down to a Tweet from one of your favourite bloggers. 'My 10 secrets which exploded my Twitter following in 30 days.'

When people ask 'what is the best Squarespace template,' there really is no one, overarching correct answer. There are however answers for 'this template would be best for this type of site.'

Each template is designed with a specific type of website in mind (eg. blogger, photographer, business, e-commerce, etc), so there are some templates that lend themselves better than others to the type of website you're creating.

After using a great number of the templates between my own sites and sites made for clients, I now have a set of favourites which I'll share with you. I also have some worst/definitely don't use this template if you're looking for X, tips too.

I have a little metaphor for you. Can you figure out what I'm getting at? It all related back to listing prices, you'll see.

You’ve been working for a few years, moved on up to a cool new apartment and are in the market for a new sofa. While you’re doing better financially than in your student days, you’re still ballin’ on a budget. You currently have a DIY palette sofa you found on Pinterest but are looking to upgrade. While at the corner of Main & New Street you notice a new furniture shop. Looks trendy, why not stop in?

Let's be honest, most online entrepreneurs didn't leave slaving at their 9-5 to become a 24/7 slave to their inbox. I enjoy a relaxing weekend away at the countryside or grabbing cocktails with friends in the evening just as much as the next person.

When I first began my business I definitely dealt with an internal struggle related to managing clients expectations in terms of email. I was new, I wanted my clients to LOVE me and my customer service skills, leave raving reviews and recommend me to everyone they knew who wanted a website designed.

I tended to respond to emails within the hour, but what did that lead to? A response 5 minutes 

If you don't quite yet have the budget or a hard-in-stone direction to justify hiring a website designer, not to worry, these 10 steps will help you up your website game significantly. 

Each one is super-actionable, your site can come out looking modern and sleek by the end of the day with these simple changes.

1. LESS FONTS & COLOURS ARE MORE

Pick a maximum of 2 font styles and 2 colors. Eliminate all the rest and make everything consistent with these fonts and colors.

At some point in your business you'll realize that it's high time to have your clients sign contracts. Maybe you're forward-thinking, just starting your business and are yet to take on your first project. Maybe you've been in business for a little while now, but contracts just never dawned on you until now. Maybe you had a not-so-pleasant encounter with a client and suddenly it hit you 'maybe a contract is a good idea.'

Today I'll walk you through my oh-so-simple process for contracts. I found an online tool I absolutely love, and I'm positive you will too. While I share many online tools with you here on the blog to help take the headache out of running your business, this one is up there for an absolute ...