Hi Reader,

The value of community has NEVER been more apparent than it has been for me the past month.

As solopreneurs, we often live in a silo because we don't have a team or anyone to discuss our work with & get that very valuable outside perspective that's sometimes necessary to jumpstart us out of a rut.

Between lengthy, fun & productive co-working sessions with my business friends, to chats with other designers, and just having a place to spew all the cool & nerdy stuff I come across on (what feels like) the daily... WE NEED that connection with people who "get" us.

If you have the chance to join co-working sessions in some tool like Flown, or can make friends in one of the FB business or student groups you're probably in (aren't we all in like... 80 of those? Just me? Hmmm... I call BS. 😂) –you gotta make time to be in a (virtual) room with other people like yourself once in a while.

The hardest parts of our businesses are often readily apparent to anyone but ourselves, and that group effort really can make a difference! Forcing us to step outside our comfort zones, hear us vent, or talk through a problem...

It doesn't have to be some expensive-AF mastermind that cost as much as your car's total value each month.

Just pay attention to your fellow classmates in groups you're already in and reach out to people you vibe with who are also a step above or below where you are in your own journey. Use caution, of course, and start slow. –Ya might be excited to find some new online friends you can start having coffee with on the regular while working through some boring work stuff together & make it FUN. 🤷🏻‍♀️😃

You'll have a lot more "Ah-ha's!" and OMG–that's–genius moments of clarity which I bet you've been missing.
​Plus, who said work has to be boring & stressful?!
​

Web Design Financial Trends Survey

My friend Diane Whiddon & I have been working on a very interesting & fun (anonymous) $$ survey!

WHY? 🤭

Over the past year, a lot of our business and personal expenses have been going up, while simultaneously a lot is happening in the world around us. The price of groceries in some places are higher than normal, software subscriptions are becoming ridiculously high, and useable free plans are getting harder to find… (Markup… I’m talking to YOU.)

All of that has Diane & I (and many others, I’m sure) wondering… what can the market actually handle right now? How do people feel about all of this? The fact is, we don’t know ––& can’t know–– unless we ask some *ahem, cough* personal questions. 😬

We’re betting you want to know the answers to these general questions as much as we do!
​We’re also betting that you didn’t find the answers in this year’s Squarespace industry report…

So we are taking it upon ourselves to do the legwork!

It’s totally free, of course! We’re not selling anything or promoting anything including courses, services, products, etc.

We literally just want to know the baseline & financial trends of where web designers are in their financial-related facts & feelings this year so we can use that real-time information to make decisions in our businesses. We want YOU to have that same opportunity, so we're going to share the results with everyone!

If you would be so kind, we’d love for you to fill it out & then share it with your network/friends.

⏭️ Next steps & tips:

1. Take the survey; your answers will help us understand the market better & we'll share the summarized results!
2. Share the survey with your network & other web designers if appropriate: https://swayrisecreative.com/survey​
3. ❗Stay anonymous by NOT filling in the Name & Email fields at the end of the form
4. We will only be emailing the final report to submissions with email addresses (obviously?). 😂 We will share the final report in lots of places (socials, blog, email list, etc), but you’ll only get a guaranteed copy if we know where to send it.

Want to know more? Join us for a pop-up LIVE to talk about money-trends!

Thank you!! 🙌🏻

Today's post is PART 2 in a series on website annotation tools for web designer, because my favorite one just discontinued their free plan this year after they've had one for 4.5 years!

Find out what happened and which of the 11 options I researched first (in last week's post), before whittling it down to the top 3 I decided were worth actually testing in this week's post & video.

Then decide for yourself!

​3 MarkUp Alternatives for Web Designers 😏 ​ The Good, Bad & ...Buggy AF! 😬🫣 😯 FIND OUT NOW →

​Markup’s Free Plan Is Dead! 🤯 ​ What It Means for Website Designers... ← 😫 FIND OUT NOW

Some gems from the past couple weeks:

🎧 ⏯️ Inside the Square, on SEO Becca from Inside the Square just published a fantastic podcast episode interviewing Mariah (from @MariahMagazine) who’s an SEO Expert, on the thing many of us might be wondering: what happens to SEO when AI starts providing results FOR us? Ya might be surprised whatcha learn from this one! 🔗 Listen to the episode​

👩🏻‍🍳 ​Kitchen* Tutorials Everyone that has previously bought my Client Portal template should have access to Module 1 of the new Kitchen tutorials in ThriveCart NOW! Check your email for the invite link, or log in to start binging.

𝙰𝙱𝙲 Canva can kern?! Designers everywhere are jumping for joy!! 😂 (There's now an auto-kern setting to fix those pesky spacing issues in Canva text! Not perfect, but it's huge step forward!)

⏳ 📊 ​Rize​ I accidentally found this AI time tracker last week, so I've been using it for a few days now & even on the free plan, I'm REALLY impressed! I've NEVER been good at tracking my time manually just for business insights; feels like a full-time job! Rize does it for me. "Rize is a smart time tracker that improves your focus and helps you build better work habits," by seeing where all your time is actually going... 😬

🤖📝 ​Claude.ai​ I finally caved. Emma, if you're reading this: you were right! 🤣 Plus last week, I witnessed a friend using it during a co-working session & was truly gobsmacked at what I'd been missing... Reader, the free plan is LIGHTYEARS worse than the paid plans of these chat bots. No wonder the 'serious' users pay for them! 🤯 Claude –by far– is way better at getting my tone/voice AND I can get it to include cursewords & emojis in the copy. #justsayin I have a few big projects on my plate that require a lot of writing, which I genuinely don't mind doing, but a well-written sales page/email or blog post takes forever ––but not anymore!! $20/mo? Take my money. 😆

📘 Web Designer's Playbook™️ Everybody in the Squarespace world knows Christy Price, right? She's got such a great reputation! She finally finished her processes course, and it's open for enrollment through March 8th for $1497 $997! Why'm I sharing? Because she gave me a BTS tour of what's inside & I was so impressed that I've put my own processes-course on the back-burner, in favor of referring people to hers instead. #notevenkidding For designers that know the basics of how to run a business, but need the nitty-gritty details, including email templates for every possible situation, & how to run a 2-week process... this might be the perfect fit for you! Check out WDP*

FREE EVENT

Website Templates Masterclass

Do you ever feel like you’re basically an overworked employee of your own business?

Creating beautiful, strategic websites for your clients can be super fulfilling, but taking on too many clients back-to-back can also be a recipe for burnout… and a great way to zap your creativity. 😭

Between the deadlines, revisions, and constant balancing act between sales, marketing & client delivery—it can be a lot to juggle! 🫣

And while finding extra time to build something more scalable and sustainable isn’t easy, it’s so worth it!

Many of you often ask me how I have time to do all the things I'm doing, and it's BECAUSE of template sales and other income streams that I'm able to choose to take on less client work so I can focus on creating education-based content for you, Reader.

When you set it up strategically and intentionally, planning your template shop to actually turn a profit, there’s nothing stopping you from eventually completely replacing your salary with template sales, –alone!

If you're ready to work towards scaling beyond 1:1 work and being 'chained' to your desk in order to make money, next week my friend Kate Scott is hosting a no-BS masterclass you don’t wanna miss!

On March 10th, Kate is hosting the free “How to Build a Successful Template Shop” masterclass to help you build and sell Squarespace website templates like a pro. Here's what to expect:

• Live 60-minute training at 9am PST / 12pm EST / 4pm GMT
• 30-minute Q&A where you can ask all your questions
• Actionable next steps to map out your template shop

Whether you already have a template that needs some TLC or it’s still on your “someday” list, Kate has a ton of actionable tips and strategies you can apply right away!

If you watch this weeks video, leave a comment on it with your takeaways!
And if you take the survey, please share it with your biz friends!

That's it for now!
But like usual, –that's way more than enough. 😂

Katelyn Web Designer & Educator ​Thrivin' on coffee, community, cursing & carefully laid plans!