No matter what you need to do, planning is what you need to do. When you plan, you know what you need to do and you won’t miss something. You won’t forget what you need to do and you’ll know how much time things will take.

I participated in the Hundred Articles in a Hundred Days challenge through Ezine Articles. The challenge was to write and submit 100 articles in 100 days. While I really enjoyed this challenge, I’ve learned a lot along the way.

I learned that you need to plan from the very beginning. You need to check your schedule everyday to make sure you know how you’re doing and if you get behind, you need to decide what you’re going to do to get caught up again. When you’re working with strict deadlines it’s important to stay on track because it could be nearly impossible to get caught up.

I learned all of these things with this challenge. It came down to the wire with these articles and now I have to wait to see if my final article made it through. I submitted it with 2 minutes to spare and my computer stalled. The date on the article is the 9th which was after the deadline. I’ve sent them an email with the hopes they’ll accept it since it came in right at midnight.

If I had to do this all over again, I’d plan much better and I wouldn’t wait until the last minute to write 19 articles. It was way to stressful and hard on everyone. While my family wanted me to reach the deadline it made it hard on them because I wasn’t able to talk to them and spend time with them.

This is why planning is so important. I will definitely plan things better and I will help others do the same thing. I hope you learn from my mistakes and plan everything you need to do. You’ll be glad you did.

It’s a known fact that article marketing will help you grow your business. You’ll get free advertising through the bio and you’ll be come an expert in your field when you continue to publish articles week after week.

When you don’t have a lot to look forward to, it’s hard to get motivated. One way to gain back your motivation is to participate in an article challenge. There are several to choose from, so you’ll want to choose one that will work for you.

You need a challenge, but at the same time you don’t want to participate in one that you know from the beginning you won’t be able to complete. For example if you know you won’t have time to write 50 articles in 50 days, then you shouldn’t participate, but if you know you can write 10 articles in 10 days, then that’s the one you should participate in.

Most times a challenge will have a place you can go for help, encouragement, and motivation. You should participate in this because it will help you continue to make sure you write like you’re supposed to do. Another option is to ask your family members to help you continue on.

If you have a little bit of time before the challenge starts, consider doing some brainstorming for ideas. When you have a list of ideas to write about, it will make it easier to sit down and write. If you have a hard time doing this on your own, ask someone to help you come up with ideas.

During the challenge, you need all the support you can get.. It’s a good idea to publish your articles on your blog and then link the post to your Twitter and Facebook page. After the post, ask for comments and then if you can, comment on the comments made.

Article challenges are a great way to increase the articles you have published in directories, on your blog, and in other areas. The more articles you have online, the better your chances are of your target market reading them. When they read your posts, they’ll continue looking for more of your articles and they’ll look up to you.

Article marketing is a great way to become an expert in your field. Developing this status is hard to do, but it’s easier with article marketing. When you use an article challenge to help you increase your articles and that will help you with your business.

Corrie Petersen runs a successful ghostwriting business. If you need help making your articles or blog posts sound professional, she can help make it happen. Visit her site at www.ghostwritertotherescue.com

Working your business every day is important for the growth you set out to see. Sometimes that’s not possible due to other committments, but you should always try to do everyday.

One of the most difficult times to grow your business is while you’re on vacation. Most times you have down time while you’re on vacation. Down time can be during layovers at the airport, travel time to the location you’re going to, and early morning or evening time when everone is starting to relax.

During these times, you can do things to grow your business. While advertising is a good way to grow, another way is to write articles and blog posts. These take time to do, so what better way to use up your down time then to write. You can save these on your computer, use a notebook, or record them, whatever works for you.

Vacations are a time to relax, but it’s also a good time to take the time to grow your business. Most times while we’re on vacation we have time to clear our brains and do some thinking. When this happens, you should consider taking advantage of it and do the things that you can do to grow your business.

A few posts ago we talked about article marketing and how important it is for your business (read it here). Now I want to talk about how crucial articles directories are when you do your article marketing tasks each month.

Article marketing is really two fold. To make it work you need to write articles and submit them to directories. You can’t do one without the other and reach success. Don’t let your articles collect cyber dust. Make them work for you!

You need to find directories that are frequently visited by your target market. They are the only ones that will be interested in the topics you write about. Just because a directory has a category that meets the needs of your article doesn’t mean you should submit your article to that directory.

It won’t do you a bit of good to submit to a directory that is not visited by those in your target market. Search for directories that contain directories that they’d be interested in using. Use Google, Yahoo, or Bing to do the search. An example of a good search would be “Work at Home Mom article directories”. This will give you article directories that are specific for Work at Home Mom’s.

The more directories that are target market specific the better your chance will be to have your articles read by people that will be interested in what you offer and want to purchase from you. There are literally hundreds of directories for you to consider, so you need to pick and choose carefully.

Article directories are important when you’re trying to grow your business through article marketing. Do your research and find the directories that will be useful to your needs. You’ll have success with your article marketing work when you use the right article directories for your business.

It’s 2010 and as with any New Year, things change. We decide to do new things and change things. With that said, I decided to create a welcome video for the visitors of my website to watch. I hope you enjoy it.

Last Monday I attended a webinar put on by Joel Comm and Mari Smith. It’s called Joel Comm’s Social Media Bootcamp and it’s simply wonderful. The first session was about Facebook, the session tomorrow is about Linked In, the third session will be on You Tube, and the last session will be on Twitter.

Mari Smith talked about the advantages of Facebook, the rules, and how to grow your business using Facebook and it’s fan pages. I was so excited about what I learned that I put it to the test. I created a fan page and you can join it here.

I look forward to learning about Linked In, You Tube, and Twitter. I’m already on Twitter and just love it so I’m looking forward to learning how I can increase my business through my posts. You can become a friend and follow me on Twitter here.

I also purchased Joel’s book called Twitter Power and it should be here tomorrow. WooHoo! Can’t wait for it to arrive so I can dig in and start reading it to learn all I can about using Twitter to grow my business.

I look forward to learning how I can grow my business through the tools that Joel has provided. I just know these tools will help me grow my business and reach my goals!

It’s been a good weekend. I was very productive this weekend. It’s been a while since this happened. I have written one personal article, one blog post for a client, a newsletter for a client, three articles for a client and five blog posts for a client. I also published several blog posts on my Mommy blog which I have not done for quite some time.

Now there were some things I didn’t get done this weekend. I wanted two more articles and five more blog posts complete for this client, but that’s ok. I’m on track and that’s a great thing. I also wanted to prepare for February which didn’t happen, but I still have this week to get that complete.

I can’t believe it’s the final week of January. It’s so hard to believe. Where did the time go? Well, there is nothing we can do. The time goes whether we like it or not. LOL

So here’s to a great week. Full of great success and enough time to get everything accomplished!

We are well into January 2009. How are you doing with your goals? Have you reach any of them for January? You know it’s almost the last week of January and I still have not set any goals. I’ve been writing articles for clients this month and I just have not had a chance to write out my goals. I’ve calendared time this weekend to make it happen. I don’t want to get any further in the year with out them.

Has that ever happened for you? Just been so busy that you haven’t had a chance to set your goals? I’m a strong believer in setting goals and creating to-do lists. I didn’t always used to be this way, but I changed four years ago when I started working online. I found it was necessary or I would not be successful.

When I sit down to write out my goals I will be including article writing goals, goals to grow my VA business, goals to grow my ghostwriting business, and then my personal goals. One of my personal goals is to continue to lose weight.

So here is to a great 2009. One of success and growth!

What a month September has been. I added another client to my ghostwriting business. I have increased my work load with another client, and I joined a challenge. It has been a spectacular month.

The challenge that I joined was a little scary, but thanks to a new friend, I realized it was achievable. The challenge was to write 30 articles in 30 days. At first I was trying to reach that goal with my own personal articles. I realized after week two, that I may not reach that goal. I was on my favorite forum at www.WAHM-Articles.com/Forum and shared my concern. My new friend Audrey told me that it doesn’t matter if the articles are for me or my clients, it’s still writing. So with that, I am sitting at 33 articles so far, for the month. Six of those articles were my own. I have more than reached the goal. WooHoo! What a great feeling. I think for October, I’m going to set a goal of 10 personal articles for myself. I think it’s achievable. What do you think?

So here is to an awesome October!

I’m participating in a 30 articles in 30 days challenge. I started out so good. I had 4 articles done within the first two days. Now writer’s block has set in and I’m having trouble writing.

The funny thing about it is I can do ghostwriting with no problem. I think part of that is because people tell me what to write about. When I do my own writing, I have to come up with idea’s from myself.

I’m going to take some time and write out a list of topics that come to mind and see if that helps. It should. Hopefully writing this list will help other thoughts come in to my head and I’ll have a wonderful list of topics to write about.

So how are you doing with your writing goals?