Blog

Open 24 Hours Sign Photo by Fancycrave on Unsplash

Creating Productive Habits and Avoiding Procrastination

Developing and maintaining good habits to be productive can be a challenge. On the other hand, it’s easy to develop a procrastination habit. For me, I suddenly feel hungry when I am about to start working on a project I am not excited about. Since I work from home, I…

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Friends

Working with Friends: Maintain Your Friendship By Being Businesslike

You have probably read about the dangers of working for friends as clients. Yet, despite warnings, many of us have, at one time or another, discounted or donated work to friends because we are nice and we like to help our friends. In the end, this often turns out to…

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bird's nest Photo from Deposit Photos

Making Decisions in Business & Life

I am in a new phase of life, commonly referred to as “The Empty Nest.” I dropped my youngest child at college last year and am adjusting to what this means for my life and my business, and how these relate to each other. It seems fitting to pay more…

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smiling balloon Photo from Pixabay

What are Your Expectations for Joy?

“Finding Joy” in life and in business has become a trend. I am sure that 40 or more years ago, the concept of being happy in all that you do was not a prominent philosophy. Joy and happiness have become a criteria for decision making, career and job searching, and…

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Designing Your Life Book on Tara's desk

Year In Review and Website Agency Goals

I have spent the past few weeks looking forward and thinking hard about my personal and website agency goals for 2018. As part of that process, I looked at my review of 2016 to remind myself of what my personal and website agency goals were for this year. This is…

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child having a nightmare

How to Wake Up From A Professional Nightmare

Setting Client Expectations: Learning and Improving the Hard Way A couple of weeks ago, after receiving a series of hostile emails from a client, I burst into tears. I spent that night sleepless, having conversations in my head with this client who I felt had treated me badly and debating…

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Why Wait? My Struggle to Be More Patient

As the season of Advent begins, I am reminded that this is a season of waiting. As Christians, we await the celebration of the birth of Jesus. Children anxiously wait for Santa Claus and presents under the Christmas tree. Anticipation can be exciting, but it is hard. [Tweet “Anticipation can…

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Tara Claeys on her bicycle

WordPress Professionals: Are You Cycling in the Big Ring?

Let’s Go For A Ride … When I first started cycling, I was in decent shape after a few years of running. In the beginning, I felt good about my pace and accomplishments. I was riding with some other women, and true to my competitive nature, I felt a need to…

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Scene from movie Limitless

Be Brilliant! Learn Something New On Every Job

In the movie, Limitless, Bradley Cooper takes a pill that allows him to learn enormous amounts of information almost instantly. I often think about that movie and wish I could take that pill (OK, it doesn’t actually work out that well for Brad in the end … but the concept…

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Scene from Stranger Things

Are your Clients in the "Upside Down" from "Stranger Things"?

In a recent meeting where I was training a client to use their new WordPress website, I suggested they keep the “front end” open in one browser tab and and the “back end” open in another. My client was having trouble understanding what “front end” and “back end” referred to….

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