What "Robert Janelle" learned after 2 years of Freelancing

Written on July 25, 2008 | Filed Under Interview | (0) Comments

Robert Janelle, a successful freelancer, has his own experience about how to go about cementing one’s position in this field of freelance working. This article will discuss about some tips that he thinks are invaluable when dealing with the growth of freelance career for past 2 years.

Working Over Weekends

Though it might seems awkward to work in weekends, this is what many start-up entrepreneurs do to keep their business alive. They take up other jobs for the time being and majority if them ends up some weekend jobs. Thus any freelancers thinking he has to work on weekends to pull his freelance career, and it may feel boring and listless. They should think that that’s the way to go if required.

Do Not Overlook the Job Opportunities

The motto is, do not throw away any job opportunity listings, be it on the web or on the old college board. You never know, your dream freelancing assignment can show up anywhere and you may well profit from that. In fact you may end up having a permanent source of assignments if your performance is good enough. Thus always keep looking and be through.

Do Not Hesitate

If you feel like something you can contribute to the growth of some freelance web portal or freelance corners, then do not hesitate and just contact with them with your ideas and propositions. You have nothing to loose. If your idea really hits the jackpot, you will surely be valued and will be given a greater opportunity in the future to work with them. Thus you must try otherwise nothing will happen.

An Important Thing to End Off

If you do not find a 9-5 regular job even after spoiling your entire shoe-sole, do not be disgusted. Market yourself directly to the client, you will be benefited. In fact at least it is better to rely on never ending strings of interviews that leads to nowhere.

Thus being courageous and passionate enough will lead you to a successful avenue.

10 Points To Keep In Mind When Starting Out As A Freelancer

Written on July 23, 2008 | Filed Under Tips | (0) Comments

Working as a freelance professional gives you great freedom over your own work and as such you can really excel if you put efforts. But before diving straight in, you should bear the following points in mind, which can really help you to have a smooth startup:

Do Not Stop Your Regular Job So Soon

It is always better to start off with a well calculated plan and expectation. Thus if you are really confident that leaving your 9-5 day job will not hurt your initial stagers of freelance career, you may chose to do so. However, if you have any doubt or uncertainty, it is better to continue working for couple of months. Then leave when you have really understood the mechanism of freelancing and started to generate good sustainable revenues.

Prepare Yourself to Work Hard

Freelance job gives you many amenities but it is also true that you really have to work hard and often more than then usual regular job. Thus don’t be taken a back when the workload is more than you expect and of varying category such as marketer, accountant, writer etc.

Time Management

Time management is something that is challenging to every freelancer. In the world of freelancing, time management is the single most crucial aspect. It is better that you plan everyday ahead of time and try to stick to that schedule as far as you can. However, there will be many distractions which can make thing harder, thus take necessary amount of free leisure too.

Avoid Procrastination

Do not get over confident and maintain a calmness and self-discipline in your work and everyday life. As in the end of the day, you still have to deal with Client’s project.

Spend Wisely

It is better that you be careful with money matters in the initial days of your freelance career. As you need to have money to invest in your business and to do marketing.

Networking

Having a strong network of clients and friends is the basis of getting continuous work. Thus you should really focus on building a strong and long term relationship with fellow freelancers, clients and blog readers. Try to make friendship with other freelancers, distribute your business card, send emails, read blogs and comment on blogs and do anything you deem will help you to spread words about your work and skills.

First Project

First project is always important and you should complete it with good effect and given project deadline. This will surely impress client and an admirable testimonial from him will surely help to get more clients in the future. Perhaps, the same client will give you more freelance jobs in the future.

Do Not Stress Yourself

This is vitally important to remember that you do not stress yourself buy working overtime in a continuous manner. As the saying goes, “Health is Wealth”, and thus you should never really compromise on your health issues as at the end it may cost you a lot in terms of money and reputation.

Enhance yourself

Always keep on enhancing your skill sets. This really opens up many other opportunities and helps you deliver quality product.

Forget Useless Stuffs

As you progress along, you will see many things are different than what you have though. So be prepared to unlearn those stuffs and move along with the ones that benefit you the most.

Thus before taking off, every freelancer should have a thought about these points and make decision accordingly.

This post is summarized from 10 Things To Keep In Mind When Starting Out As A Freelancer.

How to Get More Job From Your Existing Freelance Clients?

Written on July 21, 2008 | Filed Under How-To | (0) Comments

Marketing is one of the key aspects in freelance business. You really have to spend some good amount of time on thinking and planning about how to market your work and skill set. However, many freelancers actually spend their valuable amount of time on marketing in a view to get new clients, and completely overlooking the existing client base.

This article will shed lights on 3 Steps that will lead you to get more work from your existing client base instead of looking for new clients all the time:

Ask for 10/15 minutes of Consultation

The general trend is, most of the time freelancers get clients though referrals. It is the clients who contact the freelancers with a specific job in mind and hands that off to the freelancer. Once the freelancers finish the project, it is handed over to the client and in most cases we will never hear anything from that client until he is faced with a similar kind of projects to be done.

To prevent this from happening, instead just letting the client go, try to discuss about his business and functional mechanism of his business. Just ask politely for 10/15 minutes. Most of them will be more than happy to have a discussion. The main objective is to find out where, and what kind of bottleneck that the client is having and trying to solve them. This can lead to a long term satisfactory relation being develop and you may end up having a continuous steam of work.

Prepare a Questionnaire for The Client

It is the best advice to have an open-ended question for the client during the 10/15 minutes discussion. Questions such as “Is there any service that they used to offer but not offering now because of staff shortage”, can really open up opportunities for you.

Submitting a Proposal

Once you have finished the discussions and though about it, you will be able to figure out which way you can help them, if any. Then it is time to prepare a proposal where you specifically ask for the work. You put forward your idea and method in a simple plain word so that it sounds both lucrative and beneficial to the client; and it really soars up you chances of finally getting the work.

Thus, if we can concentrate a bit on our existing client base, then with a little plan and patience, great benefit can be derived. Take these advice seriously and gain your client base.

This post is summarized from How to Get More Work from Existing Clients?. Photo by NWSD.

Top 10 Must-Know Tips for Salary Negotiations

Written on July 19, 2008 | Filed Under Tips | (0) Comments

Asking for a better salary that we all hope we could get it done as per our will, but the reality is different. You boss will not be at all that interested to uplift your current salary status. In fact, pressuring this may in the end hurt your work relationship. This article will focus on some points that you should remember when you turn comes up to negotiate for a higher salary:

Aim High and Be Realistic

It is always good to hold a high ambition, in fact, it has been found that people with higher ambition deals more successfully when comes the factor of negotiation, but you should also be realistic and propose something that makes sense.

Be Persuasive

Deal diplomatically. NEVER say that you want higher wage for your own benefit. Instead, try to be persuasive and make your boss understand that paying you higher is actually for company’s benefit. Iit will only betterment the company’s output.

Deal with a Right Tone

Keep your tone to moderate. Do not argue over anything in the middle of discussion. Make your boss believe that you are willing to listen and in return you also expect the same from him when comes to discussing your issue. Avoid threats and ultimatum of all kinds.

Plan Properly

Your compensation should include not only salary but also other benefits as well, such as greater work responsibility, a bonus, profit sharing etc.

Listen to Your Boss

Just like your own interest. Your boss will have his own points of views and interests to look after, so you should be patient enough to address hose as well.

Create Varying Options

Always think up new plans over how to improve the company’s performance and share the ideas with your boss. In fact also take part in joint brainstorming in which different people of your company are discussing the future events. In that way you can prove your worth and your boss should have no problem satisfying your own needs.

Make Your Claim a Strong One

When you claim for higher compensation, you also must put logics that are firmly grounded on objective criteria. This way you can persuade them a lot easier.

Backup Plan

It is always better to think up a back up plan in case you have to walk away from the table, i.e. your boss turns your proposal down.

Plan Thoughtfully and Carefully

You have to invest considerable amount of time and energy to really draw an effective plan for the overall success.

Take Note

Learn from the experience, even if it is a successful one, try to pinpoint which side you could have done better and which approach you should modify to suit the condition more effectively.

By following these ten tips you can really enhance your chance of being successful a great deal higher than average salary.

As a Full-Time Freelancer, Are You Ready to Go Back to 9-5 Job?

Written on July 17, 2008 | Filed Under Freelance | (0) Comments

It is true that though freelancing is really a lucrative proposition, but it is not really for everyone. In fact, many freelancers happen to start it, then either fail to cope up with it or just find himself just perfectly suited for it. However, there are few in the market who will suggest that freelancing is really a safe option as even when you come to realize that you will not be able to meet the standards, you can always return to a 9-5 regular job. However, from my point of view, it is not always the easiest as the following points will tell you why:

Lack of freedom

With freelance work comes an unbounded amount of freedom. In fact this is one of the major reasons for which people goes for freelance. However, when you revert back to a regular work, it is hard to concentrate back again. You may not feel at home with your work and thus your overall performance can go down drastically.

Sincerity

Well this actually can vary from one employer to another, but the general idea is that the employers may find it difficult to entrust you with responsibility as you really were out of regular work for quite some time. They may think that you will again fall for it when you will have enough work contacts.

Ill Feeling

Some people will not want to be back in salaried work because they themselves wanted to be a freelancer but couldn’t do so for the lack of courage. They will try their best to hamper your effort to come back.

Skill Evaluation

May be you are really disappointed over freelance work faster than you should. Because you may never know, your skill set probably best suited for freelance environment. And you can profit really good from this field. So before throwing the possibilities out, make sure that you have tried enough and you are just not suited for it.

Thus once you have passed some good number of months in this field, it is not always so straightforward to revert back to your old 9-5 regular job. It will be a good idea to consider the above point before making any decision a final step.

Photo by PN.ORG.

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