Today on September 23, 2011, as we are observing International Freelancers Day, Greepit! is sharing a few useful ideas for freelancers and solo professionals.
The inspiration for this pose came from observation that most of the freelancers (very talented and creative) tend to work as ‘invisible professionals’ who deliver a lot of superb work but forget to establish their own identity. Ideas shared in this post are for all those modest freelancers to help them grow professionally and established their identity as visionaries, entrepreneurs and creative individuals; not just as ghost developers.
#1 Build your own product(s) – Since you have all the skills to design and develop creative products, why not build one for yourself. Who knows you could be the next Zuckerberg?
#2 Make full use of social media – While you work solo in your attic room, perhaps the only window that opens towards the outside world in the social media that keeps you connected with your friends. Why not use it to establish your identity as independent professional? There are 101 ways to market yourself on facebook, twitter, Linkedin etc.
#3 Share your knowledge – The knowledge and skills that you have acquired while working on several projects is definitely an asset. Why not share it with other? You can start a personal blog to share your knowledge. It could contain anything like short articles on the latest trends in the industry to video tutorials and useful code snippets. This would also help you establish your online identity. For inspirations and ideas, see Shahbaz’s blog.
#4 Review scrap, contribute to the open source – Freelancers often produce a lot of stuff (small applications, UI prototypes, plugins etc.) for their personal learning. Most of this stuff remains buried and gets deleted someday. Why not take some time, review all that stuff, modify it and contribute to the open source world?
#5 Manage your finances – Learn to manage your finances. Get rid of spreadsheets and manual invoices. Get hold of some invoicing application (there are a lot of free invoicing software available online) and start managing your invoices professionally. Also make it a habit to review your finances (credit and debit) occasionally to stay updated on your expenses, income, savings, liabilities, and profit.
#6 Improve soft skills – No matter how skilled you are in your profession, you must have good skills of communication, negotiation, dispute resolution, and people management to success as freelancer. Resolve to improve and learn these skills.
#7 Update your portfolio – If you have a portfolio online, you must keep it updated with the latest work. Also get testimonials and publish them online. If you do not have an online portfolio, get one as soon as possible. No marketing effort, awesome business proposal or killer pitch would be complete without some real samples of your work.
