A lot of freelancers focus on the wrong things when starting out. Most focus on chasing clients and that makes them waste a lot of their precious time. Instead they should focus on delivering value to their clients.
As a freelancer you need to act like a business to avoid landing on your face until you figure the path to success. You need to see your freelancing career just like starting a business. You are the owner of the business and the product of your business is the service you provide. Just like any successful business you will need customers which are your clients. The better you are at managing the key areas of your business, the better your business will be.
There are several things you can do to improve your business to never worry about “feast or famine”.
1. Focus on providing value
The quality of the services you provide establish the quality of clients you will work with. Simply put if you always deliver mediocre services you will always land mediocre clients. Improvement is an important aspect of any business so focus on improving your craft. Schedule time every day to work on side projects since they are a great way to exercise and improve your craft.
Read blog posts of established professionals from your industry, listen to podcasts, read books. Create a blog and write case studies of different solutions you solved for your clients. Never assume that your client’s problems are unique, most certainly there are others facing the same problems.
Work on improving yourself and improving the quality of your work rather than wasting time chasing leads.
2. Ask for referrals
What if your clients can do marketing for you for free? Wouldn’t that be great? What if your client says that he will land you your next gig and you just need to relax, focus on your work and stop wasting all those hours on chasing leads. Sounds great right? Referrals are the Holy Grail of freelancing and you can enjoy this too.
The first thing you need to do is ask for referrals. Sounds simple right? Next time you land a client before starting work ask for at least one referral. Explain that your focus goes on providing quality value to his business and you don’t have the time and energy to focus on chasing leads. Most clients will give you a referral right there. This is a nice have way to have your clients do the marketing work for you. If they do not give you a referral just focus on providing value for them and they will eventually either throw more work towards you or throw more clients.
It is important to note that if you do not provide great value this method will not work, but if you do provide oh boy you will see a great boost to your freelancing business.
3. Ask for feedback
Before you start to optimise your fancy project management tools, invoicing tools and payment tools know that you have the best tool for freelancing success at your disposal. The best part is that it’s free. This tool is a valuable one and it’s called the feedback.
The feedback should be your number one metric for your business because it’s so valuable and a lot of freelancers discard it or do not consider it at all. To improve and grow always ask for feedback from your clients. Most freelancers acknowledge negative feedback as criticism but you need to acknowledge it as a positive thing because it’s so valuable towards improving your business. I always ask clients for feedback and keep a list of all feedback I received from my clients.
Receiving feedback is only 50% of your path to success, the other 50% consists on acting on that feedback.
If your clients tell you that they are unhappy with missed deadlines you need to act on improving and deliver on time. The feedback is one of your best tools you have but remember that you also need to act on the feedback you receive.
4. Deliver great support and communication
Communication is an important part of the freelancing business but most often this part is neglected by many freelancers. Great communication is important for business growth so you need to make sure to provide it. Aim for no more than 24 hours response and also don’t neglect your prospects. Give them quick and detailed responses for inquiries.
Schedule time during your day for emails, but avoid doing it first thing in the morning since it can force you to focus on the wrong things throughout the day. Schedule calls with your clients and don’t let them interrupt you when working because that will create chaos on a daily basis. You need to have allocated time for support and communication. It’s a good idea to send your clients daily or weekly updates, don’t let them guessing what you are working. Even if you use a project management tool it’s a good way to build a good relationship with your client and they will be happy you keep them informed.
I send my clients a weekly newsletter with everything that has been worked on the project during the past week. That keeps them engaged and happy, but you don’t need to use fancy stuff, a short email explaining what has been done goes a long way.
5. Set goals
Success is all about setting the right goals and knowing your endgame. As a freelancer you need to have a list of goals to take it to the next level. How do you want your freelancing business to look like in one year? How about in 6 months? Set your top 5 goals for a year, for 6 months, 3 months and 1 month.
Setting goals is just the first part, you also need to stick to your goals and plan ahead.
What do you need to do in the next month to take your freelancing business to the next level? Write it down and break down what you need to do each week to reach those goals. Goals can be anything from increasing revenue to sending an email to a past client or writing a new blog post. Goals help you beat procrastination and keep you focused on the path to success. One tiny habit that I taught myself early is reviewing my progress.
I do a 5 minute daily review of everything I have worked on in that day. I ask myself if I provided value and great communication to my clients and if not what are the actions I can do tomorrow to improve that. This is a simple system that works and will surely improve the value you provide to your clients.
If you focus on improving these 5 aspects of your freelancing business you will guaranteed have happy clients and increased revenue. Even if you are just starting out “feast or famine” doesn’t need to be your business model.
What is one aspect of your freelancing business that you are struggling with? You can email and let me know.
