My mother-in-law offered my wife and I a free stay at a hotel right outside Zion National Park for the weekend. They were going to use it but their schedule changed last minute, so I’m going on vacation this weekend and will be out of the office Friday evening (March 2^nd), Saturday , and Sunday. I’ll be getting home Sunday evening to start back to work Monday morning.

Marketing is a large part of starting and sustaining a business. I’ve read books, listened to seminars and webinars, and written down notes of observations I’ve had on how to best market Tomework. I’ve implemented a few soft approach marketing tactics thus far with advertising Tomework, but no real campaigns. This upcoming week will be my first attempt at direct mail marketing. I’ve got a piece written up, and I plan to send it out to local business owners.

I’ve incorporated a great deal of marketing principles and techniques from various marketing experts, but I really have no idea if my first attempt will be a success or failure. Sound off if you like what I’ve got, or if there is something you would change in the comments below.

All the paperwork has been wrapped up and I just received my business license this morning. As the license says, it should be placed in a conspicuous place so I’ll post it here. No place is more conspicuous than the internet.

I didn’t think getting licensed would be as gratifying as it was. I’m pretty excited over it. I guess to me it feels like the first page of a story. The fledgling years of a long adventure.

Tomework is keeping me plenty busy, but somehow I’ve managed to squeeze in publishing an eBook over the weekend. I haven’t published with Amazon Kindle before, and I’ve heard a great deal concerning it (some good, some bad). The process wasn’t too problematic. Publishing my story took me around four or five hours. This was my first time working with their system—next time I doubt it will take more than an hour. I’m also one to read through terms of agreement forms so that was where most of my time went.

My book is titled “City of Town”. It’s a short read, Contemporary Fiction with a twist of Sci-Fi. It’s priced at $0.99 so you can’t go wrong with checking it out. I enjoyed it, I hope others do too.

If you don't own a Kindle, you can still view it using Amazon's free Kindle app. get it here.

Read the story's description and purchase it here.

I wanted to give Tomework a good two month trial before going through the trouble of getting a business license. To be honest, I wasn’t 100% sure I could make an editing business work. Thankfully it’s worked out just fine so far. I’m committed to making this business grow and serve for years to come.

Basically, having this business licensed will mean that I (as Tomework’s owner) am held accountable by someone (the state of Utah). Seems I’ll be needing a business license in the upcoming tax year anyways, so I figured on getting the process out of the way sooner than later.

That’s how I understand it at least. Legalese isn’t my best hand. In fact, I really despise that mode of writing. Convoluted wording has never helped anyone understand the subject better. Regardless of my opinion of legal rhetoric, I’m done with the paperwork on my end. Now I just have to sit back and wait to get approved, which the Saint George Licensing Office said could take up to a month. I’ll update everyone when that happens.

Last week I posted two first-time customer discounts which will be running for a while, if not for good. I’ve come to realize that purchasing an editing service comes with risk. If for some reason you feel that I’m just not a good match for you, I want to make trying me out as painless as possible.

Also, I’ve had an influx of work with a variety of manuscripts of late. As I’ve taken time to weigh time spent on a job compared to the earnings received, I believe sometime within the course of this year I’ll be changing my prices.

Simply put, I’m not getting adequate compensation for how much work and effort I’m putting into these jobs. I plan to keep my prices where they are for now, but just wanted to give you a heads-up that the low prices aren’t going to be here forever. Use them while they are this low.