How To Become A Freelancer In 3 Simple Steps
If you are reading this, chances are that you want to make money as a freelancer. This is great! I want you to succeed! Because I know what kind of freedom it gives you over working as an employee for someone else.
However, it's not going to be easy. In fact, it requires a lot of hard work and dedication in the beginning before any results start showing up. So if you're ready for that challenge then let's get started!
1. Pick A Skill & Niche
You need to follow your passion when deciding on a niche. This will make you happy as well as give you a competitive advantage over other freelancers in the same field.
There’s no point in picking something that doesn't interest you or that doesn't pay well, because it would be hard for you to stay motivated and keep working on it. I picked social media marketing because it was easy for me, but also because there’s always work available for us and we make good money.
2. Dedicate 6 Months Of Your Life To Learning
If you want to become a freelancer, I'm afraid you have a lot of work ahead of you. You'll need to dedicate six months or more of your life to learning about your industry and improving your skills. It may seem like a long time now, but trust me: it'll fly by!
I know what it's like when the going gets tough. Sometimes it feels like all those hours spent working on something aren't paying off as quickly as we'd hoped. In those moments, we need to remind ourselves that everyone makes mistakes and that our hard work makes us better at what we do every day.
Some people think that being good at something only comes with experience—that there is no shortcut around this process—but this isn't true! I have seen plenty of examples where people learned new skills much faster than others simply because they were willing to put in their time and effort into learning them properly first rather than just guessing how things worked.
3. Start Finding Clients Within First Two Months
We often learn from our mistakes. Don't be afraid to get into your first call with half-ass knowledge and skills. First, get the job and you can figure it out later. Your should start reaching out to clients as soon as you start learning the new skills.
Otherwise, you will never be ready and stuck in a learning loop. The best way to learn is by actually doing it, making mistakes, and correcting them. The evolution from a rookie to a pro freelancer will not happen in one day. And it is definitely not happening if you don't put your learnings to the test.
How To Find Clients?
There are several ways to find clients, and I will highlight some of them below:
Friends & Family: The best way to find clients is by word-of-mouth. That means asking your friends, family, and acquaintances if they know of anyone who could use your services. This may not work always and you are better off without them but it never hurts to try during your initial days.
Freelancing Websites: The most obvious way of finding clients is through freelancing websites like Upwork, Freelancer and Fiverr. These sites have a large pool of employers who are looking to hire freelancers for their projects. But it's tough to get your first gig for a high price because there's too much competition.
You can also use these websites if you have no idea about what kind of work you want to do or where you want your career path to go in the future. Just start by taking on small jobs until your portfolio grows enough that it becomes easier for employers and clients to see how good you really are at this sort of thing (and then negotiate bigger pay).
Cold Emailing: It's 2022 and cold emailing works. I have found some of the biggest clients from sending emails to the people I want to work with even if we never talked before. Find out which companies or businesses need your skills and send them a mail to get on a call. You can get free templates from the internet and start personalizing them for your potential clients.
Social Media: Content creation is the best way to get clients. You can teach others what you know and even charge from them for exclusive information. When you have a large following, let's say 10k or 50k or 100k followers, the client knows that you mean business. It increases your credibility as a highly skilled professional. Once you achieve that mark, clients will come to you automatically and they will be ready to pay top dollar.
To make things easier all around, consider finding a mentor: someone who's already successfully done freelancing in your industry and has good working relationships with other professionals in it. You can even work as an intern to gain knowledge and build credibility.
Freelancing Is Rewarding
Freelancing is a great way to make money, but it takes a lot of hard work to become successful. You'll need to learn new skills, like how to market yourself and manage your client relationships, so you can sell more services. You'll also need to find clients and get them through the door. If you can successfully do all that, then freelancing will be very rewarding!
Mainstream freelancing is quite difficult and like you said when people pick what does not pay it becomes very difficult to stay motivated to work. I think the learning process and making headways towards getting a client is one aspect you've stressed well. This one is good for SEO.
I agree bro. It's quite tough! But once you have a steady stream of clients, you can do wonders! That's where the real hustle is. Freelancing supplementing with content creation is a great way to diversify your income.
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Nice article finguru. I tried freelancing before but I realised sales is not for me. I am not good convincing people with my words. Very difficult job. You blog has potential . It would helped me if I got it then.😭😭 Now I am not thinking about freelancing now.
Hey bro, I had the same problem. You have to brush up on your soft skills, especially sales because ultimately all of us are selling something. xD The more you do it, the better you get at it. Just need to be strong enough to face countless rejections during the process.
Thank you so much for this.
It's really helpful. 😇
You are most welcome Stella. Cheers!
Yay! 🤗
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One of the most difficult things to do with freelance jobs is to stay motivated. It requires quite a rigorous learning process that just has to be followed if one desires to stay at the top.
Nonetheless, I prefer freelancing. I am very much a beginner, and these tips are not just helpful, they are golden.
I agree that motivation is the key. But it comes and goes. I try to stay disciplined with whatever I do. Just don't stop and keep pushing everyday even if you are not motivated.
All the best bro. Just pick a niche and start working! That's the best way to go about it. Most of my initial clients were kind and even helped me with their tips and feedback. That's why you learn more while doing rather than learning or watching endless videos about it.
After some time in my job sector I really got the whole idea of me doing a job will not precisely be ok with me. But soon enough I got introduced to crypto and a whole new journey slowly started. But I must admit there has been hiccups along the road.
Over the years among many lessons, one lesson which I still try to remember everyday is that I need to be better than myself. Which is improve myself in any sector of my expertise. For now I have been trying to get with coding and so far it is not really going anywhere. But this is something which I definitely need to acquire as time passes by. As I want to see myself fully dedicated to blockchain in the next coming years.
Being a freelancer is the easy part but the real battle begins when the survival instinct starts to knock on the door and how long we can survive as a free lancer. But either way consistency and motivation is indeed the key out in here.
Thanks a lot for sharing your story and valuable learnings bro. I think it's better to freelance while having a job. Do it as side hustle and then build a solid base of clients. Once you have that luxury, you can choose to leave your job and move on. Build assets with the money you earn and fire your clients completely one day. xD That's the dream of every freelancer. It's not easy for sure but worth it.
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Freelancing was once my gig before the pandemic but since majority of my clients are students and classes has been suspended, my freelancing also comes to a halt.
I market my skill through referrals. It is just one person (a casual friend) at first and then became 2, 3, 4 and so on. I don't have much skill back at that time so I accepted very low fees as I am learning at the same time.
Once I have gathered experience and skill, I tried freelancer, upwork and even fiver. But as you have said, the competition is very tough. I sent numerous applications but those who are old in the platform are usually the ones being hired.
Freelancing has its own difficulties but it is rewarding too at the same time. One of the attractive benefits of freelancing that I've experience is that I can work whenever I want as long as I will finish the work on time.
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That's okay bro. Even I have worked for free or for pennies during my initial days. It's better to spend some time building your portfolio and making connections. Once you are in there, you are in there.
If you want to be back again into it, then pick up a skill that won't get affected by the pandemic. You seem like a good writer. Digital writing or copywriting is the perfect profession to be in!
I am now thinking of trying it again.
Nah... I wanted to be but it seems I'm still far from it. It is actually one of the weakness of mine that is why I prioritize writing here in Hive. I can see a big improvement but not that close to my aim - I still write like a tortoise on land. 😁
I am more of the tech side of things - my previous gigs are all about mobile, web, and automation. 😊
Did you try No Code Development? It's an upcoming skill that's worth billions xD
I prefer to do some coding as I find some joy in it. Some of this days, I may code a No Code app. 😁
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for the first step, I have found it, but for the second step, it is still very difficult for me. to be able to (at least) take a few hours or minutes to practice skills or look for additional knowledge about the field I want to master sometimes I forget to do it. my mind is distracted by Social Media and various info that is not related to the field I want to master.
But after I read your post, maybe I will rearrange my schedule so that I can take the time to hone my skills and spend less time on social media.
I have found it too difficult to be freelancing .. I do too many things and have expanded my knowledge to the point that I find it hard to 'excel' in something at the moment.
I think I best excel in expanding :) But I am not sure anyone would pay for that
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You are a generalist like me Kat. Jack of all trades, master of none. xD
True & !LOLZ
I get excited with everything and settle with nothing :)
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"How To Become A Freelancer In 3 Simple Steps" while reading this title it looks so easy and simple but when we put our hands to execute then we get to feel the real struggle hidden in the journey if we can survive through those struggles and stay focussed then success will come for sure.
I do highly agree with all the steps and things you mentioned but I would like to focus on the second step because I am kinda struggling with this stage. I have put my hands on different things and later I found myself on some unnecessary things that were NOT FOR ME and then found my niche still I couldn't be a successful freelancer/person in that field just because I couldn't stay determined and focused on what I was learning and doing. Seen many fellow students reaching their goals just because they were focused and determined on what they aimed for.
So whoever reached here with the aim to be a SUCCESSFUL FREELANCER and noticed this comment of mine, I would request them to be focussed on the second step as much as they can. There is no way around it, without this, the whole journey would be spoiled as I have experienced.
Great advice brother, that's one of the most important steps. Honestly speaking, 6 months is nothing. It will fly!
Also, it's okay to try hundreds of things before you stick to one or two for 5-10 years. Whatever you do, think long-term. If you notice, on a 10-year timeline, 6 months of initial learning is the bare minimum.
Exactly, I guess I should prioritize this point more to ease things.