5 Steps To Launch Your Freelance Project
If you’re about to graduate college, and you’re thinking about freelancing, here are 5 steps to launch your freelance project. Before we get into that, let me explain very briefly why freelancing is a great idea in 2021 and beyond.
Contrary to what your parents and professors have told you, your degree is likely far less valuable than you think. To make things worse, companies are far less loyal to their employees than in decades past. This is a self-perpetuating cycle, where companies feel less inclined to show loyalty to a workforce that’s increasingly more likely to turnover. The point stands: having a way to make your own money in the open market is the best plan for financial security.
Let’s jump into the five steps you should take in the coming months to prepare yourself to bring economic value in the open market.
Step 1 - Define your offering
You need to have a very clear definition of what you offer. Starting a freelance project may be meaningful and impactful to you and your friends, but it’s not meaningful to anyone else in the marketplace. People won’t hire you just to support your new freelance project. They’ll only hire you if you can bring value fast. Since you’re just starting out, you don’t have referrals, case studies, or a big portfolio. This means a clear definition of exactly what you offer is essential to landing new clients. If you can let people know what you do, how it helps, who it’s for, how much it costs, how long it takes, and what involvement you’ll need from your clients, you’ll be in a good spot.
You’ll discover quite quickly whether or not your offering is clear. If someone doesn’t ask more questions, they’re confused. If someone ghosts you, they’re confused. If someone stares at you with glaze over their eyes, they’re confused.
Honing your offering will take a lot of time, and some painful trial and error. Don’t let that stop you. With each pitch, networking conversation, and email, pay attention to how people are responding.
Step 2 - Do the work on your own
Clients don’t like to take risks–it’s too risky. If someone hires you without seeing a solid portfolio, that’s a risk. You have two options here. You can either hope people hire you despite the risk, or consistently do the work on your own without being hired by anyone. The latter is far better. I’ve hired dozens of freelancers for the work they’ve done on their personal projects. You don’t deserve a shot and no one owes you an opportunity. You need to create your own opportunities by doing the work you want to do and publishing it for people to see.
If you’re a copywriter, publish blogs consistently. If you’re a visual creative, do speck work for your favorite brands. If you’re a clothing designer or a florist, make passion projects on your own. If you’re able to consistently carve out time and resources to create the work you want to do for the first year of freelance, you’ll earn a massive leg up on everyone else who was just waiting around. Last thing here–don’t worry if your posts don’t gain much traction. It really only takes 4 or 5 people to see your work and hire you to make a big difference in your life.
Step 3 - Let people know what you do
At first, it might seem pushy or sales-y to tell people what you offer. But it’s not if you do it the right way. The wrong way to let people know what you do is to cold pitch friends, family, and strangers. In the internet age, people don’t like being cold pitched, because it puts them in a tough spot of either having to buy something they don’t need or having to let someone down. It’s a lose-lose. Instead, the good way to let people know what you do is to clearly explain what you’re up to with no strings attached. Everyone likes being the kind of person who is well connected, so if you let them know what you do and ask them to keep you in mind, that brings them value. Do this with 100 people and you’ll start to get some referrals in the door.
Step 4 - Spend time in the marketplace
If you want to be hired for your freelance services, you need to spend time where your clients are. This doesn’t mean you need to get on every social media platform and go to every networking event. It simply means that you need to find and interact within the most common spaces for your industry. Are you a photographer? Post on Instagram. A writer? Comment on Medium. A designer? Curate a Pinterest page. Find people in your city who do what you do and buy them lunch. If you can do this once a week, you’ll gain valuable insights and connections.
Think of it like a train. If you want to get on a train, you have to go to the rail road tracks. It’s not guaranteed that you will see a train if you go the tracks, but there’s a much higher chance you’ll see one if you do. And it’s almost guaranteed that you won’t see a train if you don’t go to the tracks.
Step 5 - Cover your bases
A big mistake I made when I first started freelancing was connecting too much of my identity to being a freelancer. I thought that since I was telling people about my freelance services, I had to be a full-time freelancer, and I was a failure if I wasn’t. It took me the better part of a year to gain real traction and start generating decent income as a freelancer. The year leading up to that point was painful. I was flat broke, extremely stressed, and I made poor decisions because of that. In the end, I realized that no one really cared how I made money, and my friends would have preferred to spend time with a healthier version of myself. All this to say: make sure your financial bases are covered. Make sure you can pay rent and buy groceries. It might seem counter-intuitive, but a version of yourself that has a bit of stability will make better freelance decisions, and get you where you want to go faster, even if you have less time due to a part-time job.
Closing
Freelancing has been the richest, most challenging and rewarding experience of my life. I genuinely think everyone should freelance in some capacity. If you know someone who is graduating college and has freelance skills, send this vlog their way. And please don’t hesitate to hit me up on Instagram with any questions.
Good luck out there.
