10 Ways to Get Your Name in Front of Prospective Clients

The most difficult part about starting out as a freelancer is finding work. If you’ve ever spent an entire day applying for advertised freelance gigs, you will probably relate to this post.

A key component of getting clients for your freelancing business is to get your name out there. You can be the very best freelancer in your chosen profession, but if no one has ever heard of you or your freelancing business, you won’t get very many clients.

It can be difficult to build a professional reputation for a new freelancing business. In this post, I’ll provide ten techniques that you can use to help establish yourself in your chosen field. I’ll also discuss some other methods you can use for finding work.

Why You Should Get Your Name Out There

Let’s face it, freelancing is competitive. There are likely hundred, if not thousands, of freelancers who offer services in your chosen field. You need some way to distinguish yourself from all of those other freelancers who are you are competing with.

Getting your name out there makes your freelancing business a known brand. This gives you a competitive advantage. All other things being equal, when choosing between a freelance who they’ve heard of and another freelancer who offers similar services, but is not known to them, most clients will choose the familiar freelancer.

10 Techniques to Get Your Name Out There

Fortunately, today’s Internet tools make it easy for freelancers to build an online brand for their freelancing business. Here are ten techniques that you can start to use today to get your name out there and bolster your freelancing reputation:

1. Create a Blog. I’ve sung the praises of blogs for freelancers before, and I’ll do it again. Sure, you can run a freelance business without a blog, but blogs are relatively inexpensive so why would you want to? Build a blog, update it regularly, and drive some traffic to it.


2. Guest Post. Whether or not you create your own blog, you can benefit from the blogs of others by submitting guest posts to popular blogs that are related to your freelancing field. Be sure to send your best content, since what you write will wind up representing your business.


3. Give a Presentation. If you get the chance to speak before a business group about your profession, take it. Giving a good presentation is a great way to establish your expertise in your field. Be sure to include handouts with your contact information.


4. Participate in Social Media. Having a social media circle is the hot new way for business people to network. The good news is that everyone can take part in social media. It costs nothing to set up a profile on most social media sites. Just remember to keep your participation professional.


5. Be Interviewed. If you get a chance to take part in an interview for a blog or with a journalist, accept it. It is usually to your advantage to share your knowledge publicly and the interviewer may have larger audience that you would normally reach. If some of your contacts conduct regular interviews, you may be able to volunteer to be interviewed.


6. Do a Webinar or Create a Podcast. Webinars and podcasts are two great techniques provide two more great opportunities for you to showcase your expertise. Just as in any other type of presentation, be professional and include your contact information.


7. Join a Group. Luckily, the world is full of professional groups that you can join (both online and offline). Joining and becoming active in a group of like-minded professionals will not only help you to network, it may also allow you to access educational and job bank opportunities that wouldn’t otherwise be available to you.


8. Take a Class. A classroom setting can often provide networking opportunities. This is especially true for offline classes where you meet face-to-face in a classroom setting. Plus, you can enhance your skills while getting to know others. Check your local colleges for evening classes.


9. Write a Book. The Internet has made it easier than ever for professionals to get published. It’s relatively simple to create an eBook that highlights your experience and expertise. And once you have created an eBook, it can continue to generate leads for your business for months (maybe even years) to come.


10. Leave Some Comments. A simple, but often overlooked means of getting your name out there, is to leave well thought out comments on popular blogs in your area. While this technique is similar to guest posting, you typically won’t have the hurdle of getting your comment accepted by the site owner. As long as you are respectful and professional, most blogs will publish your comment.

Other Ways to Find Freelancing Work

Sadly, if you don’t have a strong online brand yet, you may need to rely on others to do your marketing for you. There are basically three types of freelancing gigs that allow you to do this:

• Projects with agencies


• Subcontracts under other freelancers


• Projects listed on bidding sites

In almost all of these cases, since you are going through an intermediary and not directly to the client, your income from a project will be lower than it would normally be. Whether you go through an agency, another freelancer, or use a bidding site–remember that the other entity will need to get a portion of what is earned. That portion pays for the intermediary’s marketing costs.

Of course, if you get your name out there you won’t need to go through someone else to find work.

Where Do You Get Your Work?

Where do you find your freelancing projects?

Share your answers in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Should You Meet With Prospective Clients?


2. Seven Reasons Not to Meet with Prospective Clients


3. Top 3 Ways I Find Clients

10 Bad Habits That Are Costing You Clients

It’s surprisingly easy to be a remarkable freelancer, to stand head and shoulders above the increasingly growing number of the self-employed. All you have to do is to behave professionally and produce outstanding work.

Sadly, many freelancers have bad habits, which prevent prospects from hiring them, and send existing clients away to other freelancers.

What’s worse, these freelancers give freelancing a bad name.

Below is a list of 10 bad habits that cost freelancers clients. Are you guilty of any of them?

1. Responding Late to Communications

How long does it take you to respond to inquiries about your services? And when you’re already working with a client, how long does your client wait to receive answers to their emails.

One successful copywriter has told me she has gotten jobs, just because she was the first to respond to a query. This goes to show, being prompt–no, fast–in your communications can make a difference.

Timely response includes letting your client know you’ve received the additional information or instructions they sent, and keeping them posted every time you complete a milestone in their project.

2. Not Following Up on Proposals

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again, the money is in the follow up! Do you send proposals and then never get in touch with the prospect again?

Some freelancers hesitate to follow up, for fear of acting like a pest. However, people are busy, people forget. Your next project could be a follow-up call away.

3. Missing Deadlines

This is the top peeve of clients! When you set deadlines, make sure you can meet them. Give yourself leeway for unexpected delays or interruptions. It’s always best to deliver your outputs ahead of the deadline. Remember, under-promise and over-deliver.

4. Shabby Communications

Even if you communicate promptly, but if your emails and proposals are filled with grammatical errors, misspellings or erroneous calculations, your prospect will still run the other way. Double-check, and if possible, triple-check, everything before firing it off to prospects and clients.

5. Sloppy, Shoddy Work

Clients can tell when you don’t give your work your 100%–or more. Making careless mistakes and cutting corners are bad habits that are sure to make clients cross you off their list of contractors.

If your work is less than stellar because you lack the skills to perform it properly, then do everything you can to get up to par. Get extra training, apprentice with an expert, and practice, practice, practice until you get good.

6. Avoiding Problems

It’s inevitable for projects to sometimes run into delays, challenges and other unexpected problems. Do you give your clients a heads-up on these, or do you bury your head in the sand and hope the problem goes away?

It’s better to communicate potential and existing problems to your clients right away. And when you do, have some solutions in mind already. Don’t ask, “What do we do now?” Instead ask, “This is the situation and here are your options. Which one would you like to go with?”

7. Unprofessional Behavior in Social Networks

A VA friend of mine recently purged her Facebook friends to draw a clear boundary between her “real” friends and professional acquaintances. Why? She had posted something on her wall that ticked off a client.

Think twice, no, 10 times before connecting with clients on a personal basis in social networks. And if you use social networks at all to attract prospects and clients, then remember to always behave in a professional manner.

Also, avoid complaining about your clients in public (tweeting counts as “public”), or sharing details of their projects. Even if you don’t name names, your client will know when you’re referring to them or their project, and they will get annoyed.

8. Losing Files

Do you often ask your clients to resend files they’ve provided? Or, if your client loses their copy of your work, are you able to give them another copy… even one year later?

Misplacing documents and other signs of disorganization are a big turnoff. Get organized, back up your work files, and make sure you can retrieve anything quickly.

9. Forgetting Agreements

This is where it helps to get everything in writing. That way, you’ll have a record of agreements, decisions, or changes you and your clients have made.

An occasional lapse may be forgivable, but to be habitually forgetful is another good way to lose clients.

10. Not Going the Extra Mile

Clients want to know you really care about them and their business. I’m not saying be a slave, or work for peanuts.

However, it does pay to go the extra mile now and again. Do something unexpected. It doesn’t have to take hours or cost you tons of money. Think of it as chocolate mints on the pillow of your hotel room. They cost a few cents and only take a few seconds to do. What chocolate mints can you give your clients?

How Remarkable Are You?

Nobody is perfect, of course, and all of us are probably guilty of some of these things at one time or another. I’ve certainly made some mistakes in my short freelancing career.

The important thing is to learn from your mistakes, improve your work, and move on. When you don’t recognize your mistakes, that’s when they become bad habits–and very difficult to change.

The opposite of these habits is to be a reliable, professional, remarkable freelancer.

Have I forgotten any bad habits that cost freelancers their clients? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Image by gordontarpley

Related posts:

1. How to Get Clients to Absolutely Love Your Freelancing Work


2. Doing the Little Things to Please Clients


3. Screen Your Potential Clients: Keep The Ones You Want

5 New Social Networking Trends for Freelancers to Explore

Social media is here to stay. Twitter, Facebook, and Foursquare are a vital part of many freelancer’s marketing efforts.

But, just because these social media tools are popular today, doesn’t mean that they will always be effective marketing tools for freelancers. What’s popular today may be forgotten tomorrow. The shrewd freelancer will be constantly exploring new social media marketing alternatives.

Here are five promising new social media tools for freelancers to explore (and why I think each is worth looking at):

1. Amplify

Amplify is a social media tool that allows you to bookmark and share all or parts of what you find on the web. It also links to many other popular social media tools such as Twitter and Facebook.

The basic idea is to help you find and share better content more quickly. Let’s face it, most of us operate in an information overload state and anything that can help combat that is a welcome addition.

From my perspective, the distinguishing factor is that Amplify allows you to share information in context without being limited in the number of characters through its clip and share feature. Also notable is that within days of joining, without any real promotional effort on my part, I had several dozen users selecting me as a source (similar to a follower on other social media sites), which means that many of my contacts are already here.

2. One True Fan

One True Fan intrigues me and scares me at the same time. I definitely see potential for freelancers, but at the same time it scares me in the same way that Foursquare scared me. (As in, do I really want to share where I am at all times? Except in this case, the “where I am” is virtual and not physical.)

This tool allows you to check in to various websites and blogs that you visit. The person who checks in the most becomes “the one true fan” of the site. Like geolocation sites, there are gaming elements. Naturally, online stores and perhaps even bloggers may wish to offer discounts and incentives to the person with the most check-ins.

This application can give freelancers who own websites insight into potential customers who may not contact them through comments or email. Also, freelancers can connect with others who show in interest in a site since the interface allows you to see who else has visited a site. According to Andy Beard, One True Fan is from the folks who brought us MyBlogLog (remember them?), which was big for a while.

3. Quora

Quora seems to be a site that many freelancers are exploring right now. It’s a question answering site with a social element (see Fluther below). It’s goal is to become the best online resource. Like other question answering sites, you can link Quora to other social media including Twitter, Facebook, and more.

In fact, answering questions can be a good strategy to demonstrate expertise. Asking questions can also be a good way to get information and Quora seems to be drawing a large number of small businesses and professionals. It will be interesting to see where Quora goes in the coming months.

4. Fluther

Fluther is another question answering site with a social element. Of course, many other social media platforms have a question feature (LinkedIn comes to mind), but this company is now linked to the social media mover and shaker, Twitter through its development team (from Mashable)–which makes Fluther one social medium for freelancers to watch.

To me, Fluther did not seem as well-organized as Quora (see above). It did seem more intuitive and I found it a little easier to use. However, it does not seem to be drawing a professional community (at least not from a casual inspection of it).

5. Mobile Interfaces

While this isn’t technically a single social media tool, mobile computing is only going to grow. Mobile interfaces already exist for most of the major social media platforms. I would expect to find most of your favorite social media utilities available as mobile apps in the coming months as well as new mobile-only social platforms.

Mobile social media tools are good news for freelancers, because it allows them location independence and even greater flexibility for keeping up with clients and prospects. In fact, if you haven’t gone mobile yet, why haven’t you?

Your Turn

These new tools are definitely worth investigating. I can’t tell whether any of them will become the next big social media platform, but all of them show some promise.

What new social media tools do you find promising? What have you explored? Share your answer in the comments.

Related posts:

1. Open Thread: How Do You Choose Who to Follow or Friend on Social Media Sites?


2. Networking 101 (Plus 15 Great Freelance Networking Strategies)


3. Open Thread: What is Your Favorite Social Media Platform?

Freelance Marketing Inspiration from Famous Quotes

My computer’s monitor shuffles between motivating quotes every 15 minutes. A while ago, I found this to be quite powerful for inspiring me and getting me started on my work. However, having same old, same old quotes display on my monitor stops working after a couple of weeks, or months.

Every now and then I look around the web for new quotes to add to my personal kick in the “back” desktop wallpaper. Recently, during such a searching session I came upon two interesting, yet opposing quotes.

Both of the quotes that inspired me are from renowned men:

• Edwin Land, scientist and inventor


• Milan Kundera, Czech writer

In this post, I’ll examine the validity of these quotes and discuss how they relate to freelance marketing.

[Editor's Note: the opinions expressed here are those of the author and not the entire Freelance Folder community.]

Do You Need to Market a Great Product?

According to a quote from Edwin Land, “marketing is what you do when your product is no good.”

For example, the success of Apple’s products seems to prove this point. Apple products seem to practically sell themselves. I also personally think this statement is perfectly true.

When your product or service is very good, you don’t really have to market it a lot because people will gladly talk about it to their friends, partners etc. For example, a lot of PC users say that we, Macintosh users, are more fans than customers of Apple. And we do talk about how cool our Macs are…

Is Marketing a Vital Part of a Freelance Business?

According to a quote from Milan Kundera, “Business has only two functions–marketing and innovation.”

I personally agree with this quote too. Why? Because I am a perfectionist and number one thing I want to do throughout my life is to innovate and discover new ways of doing my job done and helping my clients in the best way possible!

But, the above quote states that there’s another side to any business, besides creating innovative products and services. That side is marketing. This leads us to a paradox–you do marketing when your product is no good, but you should also market your innovative products and services.

Why would you do that? Why would you try to market something that’s innovative unless it is no good? And then it wouldn’t be innovative, would it?

So what do you think? Who’s right? Were they both possibly wrong? Any other ideas?

Let me point out one other idea.

Let the Crowd be the Judge

Isaac Newton said the following: “If I had seen further than others, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” Impressive, right? But, how does that apply to our discussion?

To me this means that it’s best to be part of the innovation process. This way you’re on top of the wave. Don’t wait for technology to catch up to you because you’ll end up on the back side of the wave.

But, how do we stay on top of the wave? We do that by being in the crowd, because the crowd creates the ecosystem from which innovation emerges. The crowd provides the giants Newton was talking about. We need to stay focused, sharp and see what ideas pass before us, join and help others. This way we get a grasp of what people around us are capable of, or we may find a way to get to people who are capable of great things. Moreover, we can meet people that can help us improve and innovate. We can find our giants!

Innovation is hard work, requires hundreds or thousands of hours of work and we need something to drive us through our research and practice. We need to be open and share what we think and what we have even if it is our darkest secret. By means of internet and social media, hundreds, thousands, millions may help us improve. And once we have something that’s just a bit . . . great, the information about our product or service will go viral without us doing anything. People will talk about us and our services or products. They will do our marketing for free, just like Apple fans do.

The crowd will fuel our desire to innovate and do the marketing for us, so do we need marketing when we innovate by using the worldwide crowd around us? Were Edwin Land and Milan Kundera wrong and Newton right?

What About You?

What are your thoughts on the importance of marketing? Do you have favorite quotes that inspire you to work better?

Share your thoughts in the comments.

Image by ryan_franklin_az

Related posts:

1. 28 Quick and Easy Ways to Get Your Marketing Message Across


2. Solve the Common Marketing Problems that Bug Most Freelancers


3. Open Thread: How Much Time Do You Spend on Marketing?

You Probably Already Do Know Your Very Next Client

A common freelancing stereotype is that a freelancer never knows where or when his or her next job is coming from–or from whom. For most of us, though, this stereotype is only partially true.

Odds are that your next client is hidden somewhere among your Twitter (or other social media) followers, your previous clients, or your friends and acquaintances.

Time after time, whenever we’ve asked freelancers where they find clients and they give us the same two answers: through referrals and repeat business. Those answers don’t surprise me at all because that is where most of my own clients come from.

In this post, we’ll give you some tips to help nudge some of your future clients (that you already know) towards doing business with you.

6 Quick Tips to Get More Work from Your Contacts

Most of these tips are simple and easy to implement. Some of them are so simple that after you read this you’ll probably be kicking yourself and saying “why didn’t I think of that already?”

Don’t worry, in the past I’ve missed some of these tips too.

1. Make sure your social media bio profile includes your profession. Whenever I see a social media comment from someone whose name I don’t recognize I always click through to view their profile. It amazes me how many profiles tell me very little about the commenter. For example, a bio that says “loves comics, chocolate, and candy” tells me nothing. In contrast, a bio that says “a web designer who loves comics, chocolate, and candy” retains the fun element while letting me know that the commenter is a web designer.


2. Make sure that all of your social media profiles include a way to learn more about you (usually a link to your business website). It’s no good if they know that you are a writer, developer, designer, etc.–but have no way to follow up and find your portfolio or website. Even an abandoned social media profile could possibly yield a client.


3. When you tweet or update your status, occasionally include a description of what you are working on. Not everyone will click through to view your profile. That’s why it’s important to describe what you actually do to your social media friends once in a while. Tweeting or writing in your status about the coffee you need to get started each will probably get you some sympathetic chuckles. Tweeting something about how good you feel after just finishing a web design reminds your social media contacts what it is that you do for a living.


4. Pay attention to what others are saying in social media. I really mean it. I recently got a writing gig because I noticed that someone who I was following tweeted that they needed a writer. While one might argue that was an isolated case of being in the right place at the right time, I’ve seen statuses and tweets listing project work more than once. People really do talk about their project needs on social media (if you’re following the right people).


5. Keep an updated list of past and current clients. Make the extra effort to stay in touch with them without overwhelming them with communications. Most clients don’t mind if you check in occasionally to see how things are going.


6. Have a limited time sale. If things are going slow for you, why not do what the big names do? Offer a special deal. Tweeting or posting your discount in your status could be just what it takes to motivate someone to hire you now. Everyone loves a good bargain, and that includes your potential clients.

While these tips are easy, they should be used carefully. Don’t overdo it!

Why You Shouldn’t Overdo

So, the tips in the previous section are so easy that you’re going to make sure that you do all of them several times a day. Your workload should immediately go up, right?

Wrong!

The tips are simple, but if you overdo it on tips three through five–you may be taken for a spammer or perhaps others will simply look upon you as being boring. The key is to combine personality and professionalism, and that can be a delicate balance.

Tweeting about your work, for example, should probably only be done about once a day.

Relationships Still Count

At the core of every project is a client relationship. At the core of every relationship is trust.

None of these tips will work very well if your relationships with your current clients and your social media followers are damaged or weak. This is yet another reason why online reputation management is still important.

What Do You Think?

Does most of your project work come from repeat clients and referrals? What tips do you have to motivate those you know to use your professional freelance services?

Share your answers in the comments.

Image by moogan

Related posts:

1. Open Thread: What is Your Favorite Social Media Platform?


2. How to Find Your First Client


3. Is That Client Legit or Just a Tire Kicker?

Overcome Writers Block & Produce More Effective Articles - in less time

Do find yourself staring at your computer screen for long periods of time, caught in the unforgiving grip of writers block, begging for mercy in the form of a single creative idea to serve as a seedling for a single blog post or article?

Do you find it’s taking more and more time to come up with an effective article?

Whether you’re a blogger or freelance writer, you probably find yourself needing to write effective articles with minimal time available. If your writing happens to be your full time job, you really want to make full use of your time and try to write more articles in less time. Right?

Consider these tips when you find yourself faced with writers block and minimal time.

1. Close All Applications & Windows

One of the biggest time sucks can be a window open for chat, a window for Facebook, one for email, another for Twitter, etc. – talk about distraction overload! If you’ve ever installed any software program at all, you’ve likely encountered the command that requires you to close other applications before installing. The same concept should apply when you sit down to write an article. Close the chat client first. This is probably the one which eats up most of your time. Next, close your email client. I promise the world won’t end.

Don’t have any other applications open aside from the window you use to write your article. Refrain from opening any applications when you are writing your article. Make a point to only open your browser when you want to look for a reference of some kind, but close it again once you’ve found what you’re looking for.

2. Conduct Research Before Writing

It is always better to do your research before you begin writing. Quality will shine through in an article that has been thoroughly researched. By doing research, you will be able to compose your article with ease.

3. Schedule

Adhering to a schedule will help you save time. Set a time limit for every aspect of your article. Perhaps allocate 30 minutes for writing the article itself. Allow 10 minutes for searching an image. Allow yourself 10 minutes for coming up with a catchy title. Take each aspect in time segments and within an hour you should have yourself a glowing masterpiece. Don’t forget to proofread your article. So often, a masterpiece can turn to garbage with the simple oversight of a thorough once over.

4. Edit, Edit, Edit

Once you have completed the writing portion of your article you’ll want to add all the buttons and bows that wrap it up into a more attractive package. Add your carefully selected image, and take a few minutes to tidy up the formatting with proper block quotes and text styles that make your article more scannable.

Writing quality articles in short time is not the easiest of tasks but if you plan ahead, prepare yourself and stick to a more structured process you’ll be cranking out quality pieces and back to Facebook before you know it.

Image via stock xchg

Article Quickie: Freelance Writing Jargon - H - L: Headlines to Lede (Lead)

Article Quickie: Freelance Writing Jargon – A – C: From AP Style to Crib Sheet

Article Quickie: Freelance Writing Jargon – D – G From Deadlines to Ghostwriting

Headline

The attention grabber, the big bold letters at the top of the articles that stop readers in their tracks. Example: “Sixty Ways to Drive Your Man Wild” or “Top Ten Blogging Tips for Beginners” or “Why Your Kids Hate You.” Careful with the sensational ones, readers hate a content tease.

HTML

Hypertext markup language. Without getting all techie, it’s the tags that create <b>bold</b> lettering, italics, indentations, hyperlinks, etc. Some gigs – blogs, websites, content providers, etc. will require writers be familiar with how to use HTML. The good news is if you don’t know the language, you can learn it free. There are tons of sites that provide the basic, more commonly used tags along with online tutorials.

Kill Fee

It’s not a stake through the heart of a writer, but it’s close. It definitely bruises the ego! A kill fee is when a magazine says they love your idea, requests you write it for a set price, you sign the contract and then once the article is written the editor has changed their mind for whatever reason. The article won’t run in the publication, but they give a smaller payment – typically 20 to 50 percent for your trouble. The kill fee practice is controversial, with some writers refusal to sign contracts with kill fees. They argue the kill fee undercuts the value of a writer’s work and that whether the article is used or not, the writer fulfilled their contractual obligations. Editors argue that kill fees protect publications from paying full price for poor writing. Take a look at a few of FWJ’s write ups about it here and here. The wonderful writers at Renegade Writer has a great piece on kill fees as well.

Landing page

If a client asks you to write something for their landing page, they want you to write ad copy for a lead generator page. This the page that pops up whenever a potential customer clicks the magic button in an advertisement.

Lede (Lead)

A lede (lead) is one of the key parts of an article. Sure, all parts are important, but the lede is the hook. After the headline, it’s what grabs a reader and makes them sit down for a few minutes to soak in your masterful prose. The lede introduces your piece to readers. “Lede” is the original spelling going back to the great days of newspaper journalism though a lot of writers refer to it as “lead” either way works. Read about lede history and impress your writer friends at your next get together.