Freelancefolder

The Freelancer’s Pros and Cons of Participating in Interviews

Posted February 28, 2011 in Marketing

If you’ve been actively promoting your freelancing business and demonstrating your expertise in your field, chances are that eventually you will be asked to participate in an interview. The interview request could come from another freelancer, a blogger, or it could come from a member of the mainstream media.

Often, freelancers are uncertain about how to handle such requests. In this post, we’ll discuss the pros and cons of agreeing to an interview and provide you with tips that will help you prepare for a successful interview.

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Confessions from Inside of a Freelancer’s Own Family

Posted February 27, 2011 in Freelance Stories, Lifestyle

“Honey, I love you but….At times you really @#&% me off.”

At least that’s what one freelancer’s family member recently told them.

Did you ever wonder how your own family members feel about your freelancing? This guest post takes a look at freelancing from the perspective of a freelancer’s own family member.

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Are Your Current Freelancing Practices Too Boxed In?

Posted February 25, 2011 in Inspiration

You’re doing a great job of following all the freelancing advice you can find─to the letter!

You’re managing your time very well. You’re charging the right rate for your services. You’ve even selected a freelancing specialty.

You’re doing everything right, but something is very wrong! What it could be?

I’ll tell you what it could be. You may have allowed yourself to become so boxed in with advice that you’re failing to enjoy the freedom that drew you to freelancing in the first place.

Advice is great, but enough is enough. In this post, we’ll discuss the importance of sometimes thinking and acting outside of the box.

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Boost Your Freelancing Career by Making the Most of LinkedIn Groups

Posted February 24, 2011 in Social Media

As a freelancer, you likely recognize how important the Internet has become to the success of your business. Potential clients and freelancers now regularly communicate and research each other online. As such, if you aren’t yet a member of the top online social networks, this should be a primary goal of developing your freelance career.

While some social networks are hit and miss when it comes to cultivating connections with potential clients and other freelancers, LinkedIn lists this as its primary purpose. Designed as a professional connection building network, LinkedIn offers immense possibilities for advancing your freelancing career and for building more connections than you may have thought possible.

Here are four tips for effectively using LinkedIn groups to build your freelance network.

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7 Reasons Your Website Doesn’t Bring In New Clients

Posted February 23, 2011 in Marketing

As a freelancer, you count on your website as an important part of your marketing system. It is like a sales representative, gathering leads and warming them up to become paying clients, 24/7.

That is, IF your website provides the appropriate content, attracts the right readers, is properly optimized for conversion, and is a pleasure to use.

Unfortunately, after years of observation and working with other freelancers, I’ve noticed that freelancers tend to make plenty of mistakes with their websites. In this post, I’ll list seven common website sins freelancers commit.

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Should You Connect with Your Prospects and Clients on Facebook?

Posted February 22, 2011 in Marketing, Social Media

If you’ve been a freelancer for a while, you will eventually get a request from a client or prospective client to connect on Facebook.

While normally we encourage freelancers to connect with clients through social media, for many freelancers Facebook is different.

Because Facebook has become mainstream for many, particularly in the U.S., a freelancer may be connected to a wide spectrum of friends and relatives on Facebook who have absolutely nothing to do with their business. For that reason, many freelancers hesitate before accepting that friend request from a prospect.

On the other hand, some freelancers claim that a Facebook connection with a prospective client is much more likely to turn into a business relationship than other types of social media connections.

In this post, we’ll discuss some of the advantages to connecting with clients through Facebook. We’ll also look at some of the disadvantages of connecting with clients through Facebook.

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10 Tips for Saving Money as a Freelancer

Posted February 21, 2011 in Accounting/Bookkeeping, Lifestyle

Now that I’ve been freelancing for well over a year, I’ve dealt with my fair share of expenses, taxes and other terrible money sucking things we have to deal with as the self-employed. There are several ways to manage these of course, and ways to save money doing so.

Unfortunately, just because we stay at home it doesn’t mean that we save more money than someone who works outside of the home. Yes, we have to pay for less gas, we don’t have to pay to eat out, nor do we have as many car expenses. But if you’re not careful, you can actually spend a lot more than someone who does drive 30 minutes away to work.

Here are ten of the ways I’ve found to save money for everything we deal with as business owners.

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How to Spot Difficult Clients BEFORE Signing a Contract

Posted February 20, 2011 in Managing Clients

Have you ever gotten half way through a project with a new client, and then realized you never should have signed the project in the first place?

Have you ever recognized too late that this new client is a disaster to work with, and then kicked yourself for not listening to your initial gut reaction?

I’ve been there plenty of times. So much so that I finally made myself a ‘cheat sheet’ of how to weed out those potentially frustrating projects before signing a contract.

In this post, I’ll share my ‘cheat sheet’ with you and I’ll give you some tips for handling your current difficult clients.

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15 Professional Details that Can Land You More Work

Posted February 18, 2011 in How-To, Managing Clients

Congratulations, you’re a freelancer.

Now you can work from the comfort of your own home, in your pajamas, while blaring your favorite music so loud your ears bleed.

You can also take breaks whenever you want, schedule your day however you like, and take a two-hour lunch in the middle of the day to chat with your friends on Facebook if it suits you.

Meanwhile, clients are out there searching for a professional in your field who can help them with their problem–an authority in your niche that they can rely on to deliver results.

And while you were chatting on Facebook, they just visited your website’s coming-soon page, have already moved on to your competition’s completed website, and hired them for the project.

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