With the popularity of remote work on the rise, more individuals than ever desire to work as freelancers or establish their own businesses. This leads to the next logical question… HOW DO I Start FREELANCING?

Fortunately, becoming a freelancer is now more accessible than ever before. More than 57 million Americans freelanced in 2019, and the trend is continuing, with more than half of Generation Z opting to establish their own business.

Not only is it more common than ever to work as a freelancer, but corporations are becoming comfortable with hiring freelancers rather than full-time workers.

Many tasks can be done remotely, and businesses aren’t required to offer freelancers the same financial or healthcare benefits as full-time workers.

Before we go any further, I’d want to clarify a few points.

Freelancing is a lot more complicated than it looks. Some individuals assume that everyone with a computer and access to the internet can make money online. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

How To Start Freelancing?

Let’s look at how you can establish your own freelancing business quickly and for minimal cost.

#1 – Define Your Freelance Objectives

Knowing your goals for beginning a freelancing business is the first step.

You wouldn’t get in your vehicle and drive if you didn’t know where you were going, and you shouldn’t start a freelancing business without knowing where you’re going.

It isn’t easy to know which way to go without a goal. Your goals determine the destination for establishing your freelancing business.

• Why Do You Want To Become a Freelancer?

Simon Sinek is well-known for his TED talk in which he encourages people to “Start With Why?”

Every day, you’ll have to drive yourself to discover clients and produce excellent work for them – and the first step is to figure out why you’re doing it in the first place.

What makes you want to work as a freelancer?

• To supplement your current income?
• Are you looking for a way to increase your full-time income?
• What do you expect to earn as a freelancer?

Your motive for working as a freelancer will act as a compass for evaluating whether you are successful or not.

• Begin Freelancing Career As A Part-time or Side Hustle

Part-time or side-hustle freelance work is a beautiful place to start. You may be more thoughtful with the sort of job you do and the clients you work for when there is less pressure to create revenue right away.

As a result, starting a freelancing business before you believe you need to is a beautiful idea. Trust and client connections are typically the foundations of freelancing, and these ties take time to develop.

So, if you start freelancing part-time or on the side, you’ll have more time to build the essential connections you’ll need to make a living freelancing full-time.

• Making The Decision To Work As A Freelancer Full-time

If you’re determined to get straight in and work as a freelancer full-time, it’s great. There has never been a better moment to work for yourself.

If that’s your aim, you’ll need to figure out how much money you’ll need to live comfortably. I mean everything from taxes to health insurance to retirement when I say “all of your living expenses.”

#2 – Get the Necessary Tools

The functionality of smartphone applications is limited. You’ll need a computer to run the software you’ll need to get the job done well and produce excellent results.

Before jumping into freelancing, first of all, equip yourself with the tools that you’ll need to accomplish a task. Without a Laptop or a Desktop Computer, you’ll not be able to do the work properly.

You’ll need a computer to run the software you’ll need to get the job done well and produce excellent results.

So, before you consider working online, grab yourself a laptop or even an old PC.

#3 – Identify Your Freelance Skills

The second and most crucial step is to choose a skill that you can provide as a service.

This might be as basic as transcription of a podcast or as complex as building a mobile app. Finding a skill that you are good at and that has considerable demand in the market, whatever it is, is the key to freelance success.

If you’re excellent at drawing graphics or designing product packaging, for instance, go to a freelancing marketplace like Upwork or Fiverr and see what projects are available.

If there are enough job listings for the skill you’re excellent at on those websites, you’ve struck gold.

#4 – Become ‘Guru’ In Your Skill

Once you’ve identified a desirable skill, be sure you can sell it as a service. Said, you must be competent at what you do to get compensated for it.

Let’s suppose you wish to work as a freelance writer for health and wellness websites. This is a popular category. You may have also examined it in high school or college.

That does not, however, imply that you can produce blog articles for internet audiences. Article writing styles and layout varies greatly between blogs and online media. The major objective is to appeal to a wide range of people.

As a result, you must now learn how to create blog articles for an internet audience. Learn the ins and outs of WordPress. What is the best way to generate visuals for articles? And there’s more.

It’s the same for any other type of freelance talent. You can’t just jump right in without understanding the basics first. You must first enhance your skills.

Read books, watch YouTube channels, and follow blogs that are relevant to your expertise and sector.

Taking online classes is also the most efficient approach to acquire and improve a skill.

It takes time to develop a skill from the ground up. So be patient and continue to study and practice. It might take days, weeks, months, or even years to finish. Just keep going.

#5 – Create A Positive Image

Whether you’ll be a successful freelancer depends on your ability to demonstrate your skills and effort.

It makes no difference whether you have a college diploma or years of experience. Clients will never hire you unless you demonstrate that you are competent in your field.

You should have pieces published on prominent blogs if you’re a writer. You should be able to point to a brand and claim you developed its logo if you’re a graphic designer. You must send a link to a website you have designed if you are a web designer.

In a nutshell, get your stuff out there. If you have to, do some free work first. Contact blogs that allow guest articles. Work on some idea design. Whatever it is, work on enhancing your reputation.

#6 – Build Your Creative Portfolio

Create a portfolio to save all of your published/live work in one spot as you begin to establish your reputation.

A portfolio is a web page or page that showcases your overall creative work.

If you’re a graphic designer, for example, you may use a site like Behance to establish a portfolio website where you can display all of your work. When you’re contacting a client, you may send them a link to your portfolio so they can check out your skills.

Make sure your portfolio only contains your most excellent work.

#7 – Discover The Most Ideal Freelance Website

This stage identifies how easy you’ll be able to get projects and the quality of clients you’ll be able to deal with.

Most new freelancers make the mistake of looking for the most popular freelance marketplace and joining to get started. Upwork or Freelancer.com, for instance.

These platforms are already used by millions of freelancers all around the world. They also engage in bidding wars to get jobs as a result of the competition. They will continue to reduce their prices in order to obtain the job. And it won’t help you get anywhere.

So the ideal strategy, and the approach that worked best, is to join a very new marketplace. Because there would be fewer freelancers, there will be less competition. It will also boost your job search prospects.

#8 – Select Your Pricing

It can be challenging to choose the correct pricing for your services because they will never consider hiring you if you ask for the wrong price.

The simplest method to figure out the proper pricing initially is to look at prominent freelance marketplaces and see what other freelancers in your specialty or sector charge.

Because you’re new, charging the same prices as experienced freelancers isn’t reasonable.

Instead, try to establish a middle ground where you can compete on price with more experienced freelancers without seeming cheap.

#9 – Send Proposal For Your First Project

Writing a proposal to a customer requires meticulous attention to detail.

It’s not like writing an email or making a social media post. You should give it some serious thinking and find out how to persuade your customer to hire you above the other freelancers.

When drafting a winning proposal, you may utilize a few tricks and hacks to your advantage. 

#10 – Deliver Work More Than Client Expectations

Once you’ve landed your first job, the following step is to make sure you complete the project according to the client’s requirements.

Instead, in this case, I’d like you to surpass the client’s expectations by overdelivering the work.

For instance, if a client asks for a 1,000-word article, you should provide more than 1,000 words, including high-quality graphics, and submit the work within the given timeframe. 

So figure out a way to go above and beyond in your profession. Make a concerted attempt to stand out among the crowd. That is the only way to build a long-term, self-sufficient career.

Conclusion

As a freelancer, you should have a clear understanding of the skills you’ll use. You should determine how you’ll bundle them as a service and market them to your target clients as a solution.

Begin putting together a portfolio to show potential clients. Whether you want to work directly with clients, subcontract, or use freelancing job sites, you’ll need to demonstrate your skills.

You’ll need to devote a significant amount of effort to establishing and maintaining connections with your clients. 

You’re now prepared to enter the world of freelance work. As a freelancer, you may build a successful and productive career with a lot of commitment and hard work. That is a foregone conclusion.