I am an experience, interior designer, graphic designer, an architect by profession.
I can prepare your design requirements and needs with quality output ensuring client satisfaction
Working hard or expertise, which one gets paid higher?
We have found out that it is the expert who receives greater pay than a hard-working person. You may be wondering why this is so.
An example scenario is when I went to a salon to get my hair done. There are two people who are handling my hair. The first one is the expert who checks my hair every now and then, and the assistant who does the hard work. Picturing out the situation, the assistant is exerting so much effort. But, she will not be receiving more pay. Why is that so? It is because the assistant may have knowledge in that field but, it is the expert who tells her to do this and that. The assistant is not capable of making the process done effectively.
On the other side of the story, it is the expert who is knowledgeable and has the skill to make the process effective. It is the expert’s experience and training that made him bring a better output.
Expertise is achieved by doing the things that you want to master consistently. It’s because when you create something in a consistent manner, you’ll become an expert of that.
In doing the tasks or the job, again and again, you will learn a technique to improve it. Also, during working on those tasks, you will be experiencing struggles. Once these struggles are solved, you’ll learn how to work it effectively.
Creation is the highest form of something. Thus, when you create consistently, you’ll develop the skills in doing it.
2. Teaching others how to do it
Another way of mastering what you are doing is by teaching other people. It is because when you teach, you will see a broader picture of the situation.
Teaching is also a learning phase to everybody, especially to those who want to learn and improve.
For whatever field of career, you’re in, when you’re an expert you will receive more.
In this video, let’s check why #expertise is paid more than just working hard. I also share how you can become an expert in whatever field you want to focus on.
I hope this has been helpful to your #freelancing career.
#Freelancing is not an “overnight success” because it takes a lot of hard work to be in freelancing. The same with landing your first client, it takes time. It is because you need to show how excellent and outstanding a freelancer you are. But, how can you do it, when you don’t have any training and experience?
6 tips in landing your first client in freelancing
1. Focus and be patient
Focus is pivotal to your new career; thus, you need to change your irrelevant old lifestyle. This means avoiding poor time management and procrastination. When you’re just a newbie in freelancing, you need to build your portfolio. And, in building your portfolio, you will be investing a lot of time on it. There will be no room for laziness because your portfolio is significantly a must in landing your first client.
Patience is also essential since freelancing takes time. The competition in the market is tough. You need to learn how to accept rejections and continue to thrive. You need to embrace your mistakes and grow from there.
2. Gather your work samples and create your portfolio
Freelancing today is a portfolio based industry and so, clients always look for a portfolio. Your portfolio is a document where you put all your work samples. It must present the services that you can do and your expertise in fulfilling such tasks. In landing your first client, you need to present your portfolio during application time.
If you have too much to show, don’t display everything, instead, pick at least 5 best samples that you have. And if you have less, you can find the previous outputs that you had relating to your niche. An example of this is the designs and graphics you created during your college days, that is if your niche is graphic designing.
Or, if you’re an aspiring social media manager, you can just optimize your own accounts and experiment. This is an effective avenue to show that you know the job well, and you have the experience.
3. Be professional
In landing your first client, you need to treat your career as a business. During application, you need to have a professional cover letter and resume. As they say “the first impression lasts,” so, you need to give a professional impression to the client, especially during interviews. Choose a decent photo to your social media accounts, freelancing platforms and even your resume.
4. Optimize your Digital Presence
Over the years, online traffic is massive and so, you must boost to reach your targets. One way of reaching your targets is through optimizing your website and social media account. Optimizing your digital presence is a way of marketing your business as a freelancer. You optimized to have a “call to action” where clients will notice you. Aside from updating your social media accounts, you must incorporate relevant keywords. To do this effectively, you need to conduct keyword research. And the good thing is that there are tools where you can use it for free.
Below are seven key effective ways to optimize your online presence:
Considering you just started freelancing and no one hires you. It is normal because clients only hire those with experience. But, how can you get experience when no one will hire you? There are two ways to get experience, first is you will look for local businesses and offer your services to them. You can either serve them at a minimal cost or even for FREE for a month. And the other one is through apprenticeship, online academies have this apprenticeship programs where you will experience freelancing. All you need to do is to pay a small cost to get the actual experience.
6. Don’t give up
Freelancing attitudes are pivotal to the success of a freelancer. Bear in mind that your new career takes time and so, the right time will come where all of your efforts will pay off. And, every time you feel hopeless, think of your deepest whys, the reasons why you pursue freelancing. And, it will motivate you to stand up and fight again.
One of the important factors to land your first client is to have experience. These tips mentioned are collected from successful freelancers based on their own experiences as a freelancer. I hope this article helps.
RK DigiGraphics 