Freelancing is a great way to make a little extra money online, either along side your normal job, or even as a full time income. It can be hard work, but if you are prepared to put in the work, there are a lot of up sides too; The ability to work from home, pick your hours, be responsible for your own lively hood and be able to work from anywhere to mention a few.
If you have a skill which can be done remotely you can be a freelancer. Typical roles can include any of the following:
- Web designer
- Web developer
- Internet marketing consultant
- Business consultant
- Graphic designer
- Translator
- Virtual assistant
- Proof reader
- CAD (computer aided design)
- Telesales
- Social media consultant
- SEO
- Content Writing
The first step to becoming a freelancer is figuring out what you are good at and what you can do for people. It needs to be something you are truly passionate about, and in all honesty, freelancing isn’t a job for everyone.
Just like with an Adsense or Affiliate business, as a freelancer it is best if you find yourself a niche to focus on. Certainly you won’t want to turn down any work that you can do – not when starting out at least – but if you market your services to a niche audience you stand more chance of getting yourself off the ground in the first place.
For instance, you might be a keen web designer, but web design is a truly competitive niche, so you might decide to position yourself as a Drupal themes developer – this way, to your target audience you are going to seem like a better choice than someone else who offers themselves as a general web guy.
How To Get Freelancing Jobs
The hardest thing about getting started as a freelancer is getting your first few jobs – but after that, keeping the ball rolling is a key skill too. There are a lot of people out there who call themselves freelancers and it is hard for your potential customers to know who to trust and who is up to the job. For this reason, word of mouth and referrals are of key importance. But how to find those critical first punters?
Freelancing websites
Sites such as rentacoder and elance are geared toward helping connect freelancers and customers. Unfortunately, by the time you have paid the site a commission and tried to compete with a multitude of Asian competitors you probably won’t earn a whole lot. That said though, these sites can help you find clients who will later send you more custom and referrals – you need to invest the time to build your reputation and these sites might back out long term.
Have a website and push it
You need a website, even if your business isn’t all that techy, people will expect to see samples of previous work and general info about you. Make sure your site is simple, well designed and add some examples of previous work; At first this can be your own projects or anything you have done for free. If you have no previous work to show off, go do some for charity or something… Oh, and add a blog, they’re trendy.
Be social
Use Facebook and Twitter as much as you can. Don’t market yourself, but be sociable and make connections. You need to establish yourself as an expert and build some credibility and make friends. You never know when one of your new friends might know someone who needs something doing. As a freelancer networking is your secret weapon, use it. Remember to tell people about your blog every now and then too.
Join forces
If you do web development, find a designer and offer a joint venture – you can pass customers back and forth and you can offer to pay a kick back for any work passed on.
Lead generation networks
It depends what exactly you are doing as to which network will work for you, so I recommend you spend a little time on Google and find a good one. Many networks exist who’s purpose is simply to find qualified leads for you and other freelancers and businesses. Generally they will require some sort of validation before letting you sign up, but after that, they send you leads for a set price per lead, you then have to close the sale yourself. Most times you will be competing with 4-6 other companies or freelancers, but if you can set yourself apart well, you should have a good chance to get at least a few clients.
Newspapers
It may sound odd advertising your services off line, but many of your clients may not be as tech savvy as you are. In certain niches there is a lot less competition off line and you might have an added advantage if you can appeal to a relatively local audience. The ability to go and see people really sells – although of course this will tie you to a location to an extent.
Business cards
Get some, it’s simple and can be effective. Hand them out all you can, whenever you network or meet people who may need your services at some point… You never know.
Oh and one final thing
Make sure you treat every customer well and once you have finished a job, ask if they need anything else, or if they know anyone else who might. Never miss an opportunity to sell yourself and you will have a full calender soon enough. Freelancing isn’t like other money making strategies, you need to be constantly thinking about where your next sale is coming from.