Getting the Freelance Gigs to Come to You - Other Smart Strategies
June 25, 2008 |
Get Testimonials
You see them on TV all the time — customers extolling the virtues of one product or another. The reason why you see so many is because testimonials work! People are naturally skeptical when it comes to claims about how good something is. They have been disappointed before by salespeople making claims about their product or service.
A way advertisers have found to overcome this is by soliciting average consumers to talk about their positive experiences and recommend the product or service to others. This is known as a testimonial. There are those who will blatantly “buy” the testimonial by providing free product, discounts, etc., but truthfully, it’s not that difficult to secure legitimate comments from satisfied customers if you’ve done well by them.
The best time to ask for a testimonial is when you have done something extraordinary for the client or have gone beyond the call of duty. They are likely to be very receptive at that point. Also, if they have made an unsolicited effort to complement you, ask them if you can put that in writing (or better yet — audio or video) and use it as a testimonial in your marketing materials. They may actually be flattered! As an added incentive, tell them that you’ll also provide a link to their web site.
Be sure to include your testimonials in your portfolio. As you build up a number of them, categorize them as to the service you performed and then you can just include those when you’re pitching a prospect for a particular service.
Leverage Your Connections
Going back to your sphere of influence, you should be sure that the people who know you always know what you’re up to. If you can, suggest that you become referral partners, especially if the nature of their business is complementary to yours. For example, if you are a freelance photographer, you want to make sure you meet as many wedding planners, interior decorators, landscape designers, and florists as you can. While all of these people may not be in a position to hire you at the moment, they likely are in constant contact with people who are. The idea here is to not only use the people you know, but also the people that they know too!
Another way to leverage your connections is to set up a profile on social networking sites like LinkedIn, Plaxo, or Ryze. You begin by inviting people you know to join you on the site. Once they become a member (and hopefully, start seeing the benefits), they too will start inviting their business associates to join. You will then be given the opportunity for those people to connect with you also. The key is to have an engaging profile that people will find helpful in determining if they need your services.
Kathy Austin, an Internet marketer and Google Adwords professional, has written an article at PromotionWorld that details how to increase your connections on LinkedIn.
More Strategies for Success
Okay, so you’ve set up your freelance marketing plan, built your resume, established your portfolio, secured some testimonials, and leveraged your connections to the hilt. What else can you do to get prospective clients to call you?
- Well, one big one is to post your profile on the freelance job boards. By doing that, you’re not searching for clients, they’re searching for you! Some clients would rather not reveal what they’re up to and prefer to seek talent discretely. So they will scour the job boards looking for profiles that match their requirements. If yours is not there, they’ll never find you, so it pays to set up a profile on the major sites like Elance and Guru, even if it costs you a little. Chock it up as marketing expense. You’re running a business, remember?
- This was mentioned in Getting the Freelance Gigs to Come to You - Your Resume and Portfolio, but it’s worth repeating — you need a web site to promote your services. Here, you can post your resume and portfolio in one place and perhaps link to a blog you write to express your ideas and philosophy about what you do. This puts a more human face on you as a potential provider and gives your prospect more to go on in their decision to hire you. In building it, gain a general understanding of how search engine optimization (SEO) works, and include keywords within your site that your customers would use to find you.
- If you’re expert at something, write about it! Create articles that present useful information or solutions to problems that you find your clients often have, and submit them to the article web sites like eZineArticles, Buzzle, or Helium (where you might make some money too). If your piece is good, it will continue to refer customers to you consistently, even years down the road.
- Participate in online discussion groups, forums and blogs. There are groups for every topic under the sun — just Google your area of expertise. Share your knowledge freely and soon you’ll be tagged as an expert, and people will seek out your advice, for which you can charge them. If permitted, create a signature that points to your web site or online profile.
- Whenever given the opportunity to speak in front of a group — grab it! If you can talk about what you’re passionate about, people see you as the expert and will seek you out when they need services like yours. The barrier of unfamiliarity is already gone because they have seen you in the flesh. If you can get paid as a speaker, all the better because you will benefit from both ends. In fact, many freelancers make the majority of their income from speaking engagements.
How to be a Rockstar Freelancer