Congrats. You’re here. It means you want to succeed as a freelancer. (This will make sense somewhere in the article).
So freelancers, you want to succeed. Good. I mean you should be, why not you?
For those who aren’t very clear about freelancing, let me explain it to them because I want everyone on the same page. Freelancing is a business model in which freelancers don’t choose full-time in-house jobs but rather work full-time on the projects they get directly from their clients. They work pretty much like entrepreneurs. As entrepreneurs are their own bosses, similarly, freelancers have the liberty to choose the project or walk away from it.
If you want to learn more about it, do checkout my complete guide on how to start freelancing, trust me, it’s gonna help you a lot!
Why Freelancing?
- Belief as a Freelancer
- Finding Passion in your Freelancing Career
- Your Thirst For Knowledge
- How Social Connectivity Can Help You in Freelancing?
- Impact of Portfolio
- Formula behind the Perfect Portfolio
- Your Part & Conclusion
Actually, This article will teach you exactly what your approach should be as a freelancer. Because approach makes a mental condition of any struggler to keep going. Without the right motivation and push, things could be shaky for many of us.
The purpose is clear.
Don’t let freelancers on their own. Instead, go and rescue them.
I’ve done in my past webinars and free training over the course of time and I will keep doing it.
Things We Need to Succeed as a Successful Freelancer
Here are the traits that will help you grow and succeed as a freelancer. Don’t miss out a single one of them. Take a look:
Belief
Don’t forget the quote of boxing legend the late ‘Muhammad Ali‘:
“I am the greatest. I said that even before I knew I was.”
This is what I was talking about at the beginning. That’s why I congratulated you for opening this article. You opened because you have a thought to know that you can. You agree or not, you were interested in learning something about freelancing. We human beings don’t think of our own actions sometimes but we’re subconsciously obeying the orders of our will.
Just believe it. Believe that you will succeed because you want to.
When a freelancer takes a leap of faith, he has every reason to stop and quit it, but the only thing that keeps him on that track of keep going is that believe. If you don’t believe that you can, then you can’t.
Now it’s not easy to be there and face the realities.
You need three things to keep fighting and have the courage to be there:
1. Small Success Celebrations: Always try to value your small achievements because they are going to help you motivate yourself.
2. Motivational Pats: Whenever someone admires your work. Take it as a motivational thing to boost your energy and caliber.
3. A Strong Will Power: If you don’t have this third thing, the first two won’t matter at all. Be the one who strongly believes in his/her own success that may be far away.
Passion
Alone belief can’t do the job. One has to find the passion as well. The good part of finding a passion is that you never get bored of your work.
Have you ever heard of people that hate their jobs?
According to a Gallup survey discussed in a Forbes.com article, 71% employees were not happy with their jobs.
Another shocking survey came forward. According to Deloitte’s Shift Index survey, 80% employees aren’t happy with their jobs. This was revealed in a Business Insider article.
The thing is, passion is something leadership and entrepreneurial experts taught everyone.
Teri Trespicio’s popular TEDx Talk is one of my favorite talks on this topic. She described her point on following the PASSION very differently but, of course, amazingly. She believes that you should stop searching for passion, instead, you should feel it and try to find it inside yourself.
As a freelancer, it’s quite important to IDENTIFY your passion because you would have to spend a lot of time doing what you have to do. There will be tough times when you may not be financially stable when you may not some clients to work with, and you might feel that your freelance career isn’t thriving.
I still remember the late Steve Jobs saying which was :
Dear freelancers, let me tell you one thing.
Those who kept standing in such tough times are the ones that will be enjoying freedom and success in freelancing.
Never ever thought that it will be easy.
Your passion will be your raft, the difficulties will be the thunderstorm, and you’re the sailor who wants to catch the surface.
Be persistent and never think that the situation will remain the same. Consider every moment while pursuing your passion as a gift of nature because many of the people haven’t had that courage to choose their passion.
You’re lucky. Don’t miss the chance that you have already taken.
Thirst for Knowledge
This could be your game changer. Whenever you’ll meet someone great and you try to dig into his/her starting days of struggle. One thing you might find common in all of those greats that world doesn’t forget even today.
They were learners.
They loved to learn something new and get better.
As a freelancer, you marketing strategies won’t make you incomparable or your money won’t make you any better, it will be your passion to learn that will do that part.
Your badges at the freelancing profiles might help you in convincing one or two clients but after that…
Always be a learner who never stops learning.
One of the good examples of learning is the professional tennis.
You will always see every pro tennis player has a coach. Even world no. 1 tennis player Novak Djokovic has a coach to help guide him through the process and make his mental strength better.
AJ Agrawal talked about this in his article last year. He is a firm believer that learning should never be stopped.
Bud Bilanich considers lifelong learning as a first step in becoming an outstanding performer. “In today’s fast-paced world, if you don’t keep learning, you’re not standing still, you’re falling behind.” he added.
Do this as a freelancer.
I’ve seen freelancers and entrepreneurs getting success on being keen learners.
Social Connectivity
Your social connectivity doesn’t mean you’re on Facebook and sharing pictures of every pizza you eat and every shopping mall you’re checking in. The social connectivity refers to building a long-lasting relationships with the people around you.
As a freelancer, it’s extremely important to have social connections. You can’t survive as a freelancer without your social media contacts and real-life friends.
This article asks freelancers to help others. The idea behind being helpful is that you manage to get a chance to make a connection. Once you build a connection, you don’t build just one, in fact, you build many others connections at once too.
Understanding the art of using social media could do wonders for you and your freelancing business. I talked about social media relation building in one of my previous articles. In that article, I described some of the essentials of getting social media success in 2016 and the most important were “be a giver” and “keep the engagement process on”…
This shows how important it is to have a strong relationships with others around you.
Freelancers need following things:
- Helpful Mentors
- Useful Resources (to learn)
- Good Friends
- Socially Connected Audience
- Professional Peers
Once a business expert was asked about the success secret. He told that he has two things that made him successful.
- 1) Resources,
- 2) Relations.
In fact, he added that if, in case, you lose resources, if you have relations (with the right people), you can build your resources again. That was deep.
The identification of the right people to hang out is somewhat gets you closer to the success. Because if they are motivated, the chances, you will get motivated too. And they are on drugs most of the times, you might end up trying it out one day, which will be disastrous.
Portfolio
Portfolio is the last but not the least thing. The portfolio is your chance to attract and convert your lead into a customer. It is something that normally people normally related to graphics designers or web designers, which is quite unfair. Everyone who produces any kind of product even in terms of service can use the word portfolio for showcasing his/her work, whether it’s artwork, articles, graphic designs, web samples, or anything else, depending on the rights of displaying or showcasing the ownership.
Formula Behind a Portfolio
There are basically steps involved in Portfolio management. This secret has to be revealed now. Take a look at this:
- Attract: At the beginning, any artist or creator displays the products (online or offline) in order to show it off. You assume it as an online portfolio. So anyone who has created any kind of product can display it online via a blog or website. It gives a chance to meet the newer audience and attract them to further build the relationship.
- Engage: Of course, whenever someone reaches to a product that is being displayed even online as a picture, if it interests him/her, it will surely begin the conversation. So, the portfolio can help you start the engagement process.
- Convert: There is a good chance if you keep on adding your work to your portfolio and more and more people are coming across it, you might end up getting more successful leads which could be converted to your paying clients.
As a freelancer, whether you’re an article writer, graphic designer, motion artist, film editor, 3D designer, web designer, or even software designer. There is always a way of creating an online portfolio. If you’re in today’s world of social media and internet, and you haven’t developed your online portfolio, then it’s a shame.
Don’t worry, if you have no idea where to begin in this situation.
You can build your portfolio using the most popular content management system WordPress. This guide on building a website can help you create your first WordPress based site in a few minutes. Then, you may learn a lot over the course of time. Also do check the 9 Steps which can help you in winning your first freelancing client!
Your Part on Freelancing
It’s your turn now.
I have tried to give you some motivational doze, plus with a roadmap to get started and keep moving.
You can’t learn everything in this article. Not even today. Not even this year.
It’s a process. A long process.
What you can do today is decide to MAKE MORE MONEY ONLINE or get a freedom of being your own boss.
As a freelancer, you decide which project to take and which to refuse.
Once you start getting clients, you build relations, and when your clients come back to you, that’s the sign of your quality work, just don’t forget to make these 15 freelancing mistakes!
With so much fields to choose in freelancing, from vlogging to blogging to article writing to video editor, what’s holding you back?
Just to begin at freelancing, make sure you identify your passion clearly because you don’t have to pick something you are not at. Don’t copy your best friend in freelancing.
Be you. You will be fine.
You have to tell me something.
Did this article help you understanding the concept of freelancing?
I can’t wait to listen to your voice. Let’s get the conversation started below.
