At Snipply, we believe that if you want to see where freelancers are making their living all you need to do is follow the money! We looked at the skillsets most sought after by those employing freelancers and compiled the top ten categories for 2020.
Powerpoint & Presentation Creation
For many industries and occupations, presentations are a way of life. Unfortunately, we aren’t all presentation designers — and for most of us, our time is better served performing our actual roles than spending hours designing presentations. Hiring out presentation designers that can take raw data and bullet points, and put them into a beautiful set of slides can save time and ultimately deliver a better end-product.
Accounting & Bookkeeping
If you run a small business then you know how much of a pain accounting and bookkeeping can be, sifting through excel files and spreadsheets. While we tend to do this ourselves when starting out, getting to a point where we’re bringing in enough revenue to hire this out can feel like a true milestone. A common theme you’ll see is by hiring out a professional to do these tasks, management is able to focus more on revenue-driving activities.
Copywriting, Report Writing & Content Marketing
We’re lumping these all together, and while they can require different skillsets they all fall under the commercial writing professional’s skill set. Ecommerce companies need to produce copy for products, service businesses need the right copy to set their businesses apart, and pretty much all companies today rely on steadily producing high quality and easy to consume content for their audiences.
Graphic Design
If you run a small business or startup this is probably one of the first areas you look to get help. From logos to websites, freelance graphic designers are and will probably always be in-demand. In fact, freelance graphic design jobs are estimated to grow 13% in 2020, with the digital freelance segment set to grow by an incredible 61%.
Website & Product Design
All businesses have a website in the modern economy, from law firms to health professionals. When you factor in the number of legacy industries moving into the digital space, you can only imagine the need for competent web designers. Not only that but as companies look to productize their businesses even more over time, the need for web and mobile app designers increases as well.
Photography & Video
This is for both content creators and editors. While we used to think of freelance videographers and photographers as those who catered towards weddings and other events, the need for high-quality content across industries has created a heightened need for freelance content producers and editors. Whether we are talking about fashion products or office shots for the hiring page, photo and video freelancers will continue to be in-demand.
Virtual Assistant
While a bit generic, these freelancers provide support services to other businesses remotely, and usually to an executive or business owner. Whether it is managing calendars, billing, social media, etc. virtual assistants are on the rise specifically with startups and smaller agencies and service businesses.
Sales, Marketing, and Operational Admin Work
Differing than a virtual assistant, many companies are now outsourcing basic tasks related to sales, marketing, and revenue-generating activities as opposed to hiring in junior talent. This allows executives more time and freedom to focus on closing business as opposed to generating and working leads.
Social Media Marketing & Community Management
Every business understands the value of community and how social media can help build and maintain that community. The problem is we aren’t all social media experts — and we definitely don’t all have the time needed to build and interact with our communities 24/7. Platforms like Cloudpeeps have even built entire businesses out of helping companies build and manage their communities via social.
Web & Software Development
We all knew this one was coming. As all industries move into the age of the internet the fact remains there are still more open opportunities for developers than there are developers to fill.
If you loved the list make sure to head to the Snipply blog, where we’ll be doing a deeper dive into everything future of work and freelance related. We’ll also be putting out our ultimate guide to freelancing in 2020 so make sure to follow for upcoming posts.
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