This isn’t so much a technical post but more about how important it is to set goals and the amazing payoff there is in achieving them.  For the first year or so running the business I was perfectly happy coasting through and picking up clients here and there and watching the revenue slowly increase.  I did no active new business development.  Pretty soon I realized that my numbers were kind of hovering and not really getting up to where I would need them to be to do this as a full time job.  After reading a ton of books and business blogs, it was apparent that I needed a business plan and to set some goals within it.  So in 2007 I decided to write down my business, and well as personal, goals in my business/life plan.  I didn’t go the route of the traditional business plan but created more …

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Happy days to web designers and developers across the world.  There have been quite a bit of posts lately about dropping em values as font-sizes and switching back to pixel sizes.  This will definitely save headaches for lots of us.  Cameron Moll’s article explains some of the reasoning behind this but it makes all the sense in the world to us.

I also heard on a recent Boag World podcast that this would probably be adopted for the host’s company as well in their future developments.

Yes, em values as font sizes will scale the text larger when you set the browser’s text size larger but many modern browsers have replaced the shortcuts for this with page zooming instead.  Yes you run the risk of zooming in so much there is horizontal scrolling but I think if your text size is large enough overall you can eliminate this problem.

No …

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I thought I would write a little post about how jQuery can be used for little usability enhancements and effects.  Now I would never recommend using jQuery without some prior Javascript knowledge but you can definitely jump right into jQuery if you want.  I was fortunate enough to learn enough Javascript over the past year (see DOM Scripting by Jeremy Keith) where I have really been able to use jQuery to its full potential.  For those of you that don’t know jQuery is a Javascript library that takes out a lot of the tedious coding that is required in Javascript.  The packed version is only 19kb so the added functionality is definitely worth it.  Now onto some examples.

One of our most recent clients, MVP Software Inc., wanted to make use of some scrolling and fading elements.  Now a year ago I would have used some simple …

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As always this post is long overdue but it would be quite relevant to a lot of people out there in need of inspiration in this tough time.  I have been fortunate enough to attend a few conferences and listen to a LOT of great speakers.   From designers to developers and freelancers to entrepreneurs I have picked up a wealth of knowledge just listening to them speak for an hour or so.

A couple weeks ago Gary Vaynerchuk (Host of Wine Library TV and super inspirational young speaker, @garyvee on Twitter) posted a link to his talk at the Big Omaha conference on his Twitter stream.  It was about an hour and the majority of it Q&A but after listening to it during my lunch break I felt refreshed and that I could take on any project and was itching to get back to work.  This is not the first …

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It’s been too long since my last post but I was struggling to find a good topic for a post.  I have since realized that in the last 3 years I have been able to successfully freelance and bootstrap my business into a successful web design agency.  I thought that I would pass on what I have learned over these last 3 years.

1. Do your homework
   I was fortunate that I had someone to ask a handful of questions (the former GM at my pro soccer club) about starting a business before I took the plunge but that is not the case for all of you.   Learn about the appropriate paperwork to fill out in your state.  Figure out what kind of business entity you want (LLC, Corporation, Nonprofit).  Learn about registered trademarks and copyrights if they apply.  There are tons of books out there but I recommend contacting

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