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I wanted to give you all a quick rundown of what’s happening behind the scenes as we merge Ad Astra Traffic with Article Wrangler.
We’ll service existing clients during January 2010, but will not be actively marketing services until we’ve resolved all aspects of the merger. I’ll be contacting Ad Astra Traffic team members as work becomes available. I’ve already discussed this on an individual basis with a few of you–I do anticipate a few new projects entering the system within the next week. Stay tuned for updates.
With respect to the actual merger… We expect to be fully operational as of February 1, 2010. We’re ironing out transition details and how we want to brand/name the combined enterprise. I can give you some definitive information regarding our plans, though.
Today, I’d like to share two of the improvements on the horizon.
Custom Project Management Site
We will be making changes to the project management system. The forum-based system used at Writer Wrangler (the team-facing element of Article Wrangler) required a great deal of maintenance and hardening against the always-present onslaught of would-be forum spammers. The project management site for Ad Astra Traffic was more secure, but there was room for improvement with respect to ease of use and a few limitations that we’d like to address.
We want to create a full-featured project management system that will make working with us extremely convenient for administrators and team members. I think we’re well on our way to doing that. The new system should feature live chat options, an upload tool for content delivery and a number of additional refinements.
Improved Job Offerings
The old Writer Wrangler forum made it easy to share new job availability and to even limit access to specific job types via the use of project-specific passwords. Unfortunately, it also created an opportunity for inactive members to gather information about individual projects. While client names and other key details were never revealed, we’d like a slightly more controlled method of announcing and offering jobs.
At Ad Astra Traffic, we handled that process by admin–>writer emails. This definitely kept things under wraps, but it was clunky and inefficient. It also created some administrative disincentives to bringing new team members into the fold just in terms of operational convenience.
We’re not working on a means by which we can meet all of our announcement/assignment objectives. We’re working from a newsletter model–new job notices would be delivered directly to team members’ mailboxes–with more detailed information being available via the new and improved project management site. We’re building this in a way that will allow us to target some projects to specific writers while making more work open to new contributors.
Those are just two of the operational improvements you’ll see by February 1.
I’ll try to keep all of you in the loop until then!
Oh… One last thing…
I hope all of you had a great holiday and we look forward to partnering with all of you for a remarkable 2011!
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We’re still servicing existing client accounts and we do plan to have a new and improved website (and some team member-friendly new policies) in place by January 1.
I’d like to thank everyone for their patience and I’m excited about starting 2010 with an exciting BANG!
I’ll make a point of setting aside some time this week to give you all a “behind the scenes” look at what we’re doing. I think you’re going to like it!
–Carson
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If you haven’t read Diane’s Letter, please start there…
Before I start talking about the direction in which Ad Astra Traffic is heading, I’d like to share a few remarks about Diane’s work on this project and her departure.
I’m sorry to see Diane leave Ad Astra Traffic, but I’m wholly supportive of her decision. I wish her well as she pursues new goals.
I’ll resist the urge to get all sappy here. Instead, I’ll just say that I wouldn’t have been able to get the Ad Astra Traffic ball rolling without Diane, that I have always enjoyed interacting and working with her, and that the “bittersweet” feeling she referenced in her letter is shared here in Kansas.
Okay. I think I avoided getting too mushy/sappy/sad/etc.
Let’s talk about what happens next.
Diane didn’t spring this on me without warning. There is a plan in place.
TODAY THROUGH JANUARY 1, 2010: We’ll be maintaining existing client accounts, which means there will be new work. I’m going to slam the brakes on new client acquisition until after the holidays to make sure that we’re not overrun. I’ll be spending a great deal of time over the course of the next four weeks ironing out the details of the next phase of Ad Astra Traffic.
AFTER JANUARY 1, 2010: I’ve reached a general agreement with Corena Golliver, whose interests include ownership of WriterWrangler.com. Corena is an experienced content broker and WriterWrangler.com occupies the same market space (basically) as we do with Ad Astra Traffic. We plan to merge on an operational level, bringing her considerable project management experience and client connections to Ad Astra Traffic.
We haven’t worked out all of the details, but I am thrilled about the prospects for growth.
I will keep everyone updated as we make progress.
WHAT I NEED FROM YOU: I look forward to working with all of you over the next few weeks as we continue to service our existing clients. As we move toward 2010, I’d love it if you would provide me with any ideas, recommendations, etc. about how I can make the “Ad Astra Traffic experience” better for our team members.
I’d appreciate any and all input. You can always drop me a line via the contact form or by email.
I’m sure I’ll be writing much more over the next week. I’m going to wrap things up for now.
Yours,
Carson
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Hi. I promised big news today… Here we go… Hold on tight…
I have a few follow-up remarks that I’ll post within the hour.
–Carson
A Letter from Diane
Hello everyone,
It’s a little bittersweet to announce that I am no longer partnering with Carson Brackney and Ad Astra Traffic. This announcement probably comes as a surprise to most of you, but those of you who know me well will no doubt understand why I must leave Ad Astra Traffic. I simply don’t have the time needed to fully commit to the business any longer.
During my time working with Carson on this business, I enjoyed managing a growing team of writers, handing out assignments to them and making sure they were paid in full and on time. Shortly after the business launch in October, we began growing quite quickly, and it was exciting to think of where Ad Astra Traffic might be headed.
However, in the couple months since the official launch, life has thrown me and my personal goals in a completely different direction from the goals of Ad Astra Traffic.
The time required to run such a successfully growing business began to take away from a newly found passion of mine: working with children. I have been spending increasing amounts of time away from home, volunteering in my church’s preschool and with local families with younger children. I am hoping to re-enroll in college soon so that I may pursue the degree required to work with special needs children in a professional setting.
Writing continues to remain my number one passion, and I will no doubt continue freelancing for my various clients and colleagues. In fact, I also have several new websites in the works that I hope to launch after the New Year. For now, however, the plain truth is that I no longer have the time required to commit to Ad Astra Traffic.
Carson has some exciting plans to continue running the business with the help of another wonderful entrepreneur, Corena Golliver, and I’ll let him announce those plans to you. I hope to continue provide my writing services to them both when time allows, and they will undoubtedly continue to grow Ad Astra Traffic into a well-known and respected content provider.
Writers: Your information will continue to remain in the hands of Carson, and I am under the belief there will be little to no changes with regard to the writing team. I will let Carson address you all in his blog post, but I want to give a huge “Thank You!” to all of you for your continued quality writing and professional ethics.
I will miss working with all of you involved with Ad Astra Traffic, though I will no doubt find myself working alongside you at some point in my continued freelance writing career. I wish Carson and Corena all the best success with the business and all of the writers continued prosperity along with them.
Sincerely,
Diane
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Just published at CarsonBrackney.com:
Content Mills, Angela Hoy, Search Engines and the Quality of Online Writing
I thought many of you might find it interesting.
My position remains consistent. People need to recognize economic realities and the forces driving prices for various forms of online writing. Those who can’t find a way to make cheaper markets work for them should find something else to do with their time. They certainly shouldn’t waste their time and energy griping about so-called “content mills.”
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I have some really big and exciting stuff that I can’t wait to share with all of you.
However, we’re just short of being ready to make the announcements.
I hope to be able to spill the beans no later than tomorrow.
–Carson
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We just listed three new projects at the project management site. They’re travel-related “city profiles”. Each project consists of five individual city profiles (550+ words per profile).
Please don’t “claim” them in the comments of the site if you have PM site access. Use the contact form and let us know instead.
–Carson
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Okay, we haven’t listed the previously-mentioned new project on the system yet, but we were able to find the right people for the job. So, basically, it’s taken.
However, there will be several additional components to it that will warrant separate entries and I’ll keep you all posted.
Additionally, we reached an agreement today to do approximately 30 travel-related “city profile” pieces–the first round of a much larger project. As soon as I receive the client’s deposit, we’ll get those up on the system.
I hope everyone has a great weekend.
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Wow. What a CRAZY week. I lost a substantial chunk of time due to some unavoidable emergency commitments, but everything seems to be back on an even keel.
Today, I’m going to be listing the articles previously-mentioned here along with 6 other projects.
I’ll announce it here.
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Due to circumstances beyond my control, we’ll be forced to list the previously-mentioned new project tomorrow. Just didn’t want to leave you hanging.
–Carson
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