As the world becomes increasingly digitized, more and more people are focused on learning how to become a freelancer. Now that we know for sure that working nine-to-five isn’t the only way to make a living (hello, the Great Resignation!), going full-time freelance is a bona fide thing.
If this is the direction you’re headed, well, you’re in great Unemployable company. There are 59 million freelancers and counting in the United States as of 2020, and freelancing income alone totals more than $1 trillion — or nearly 5% of GDP — more than most other major industries.
The flexibility of the freelance lifestyle means that its value goes beyond its economic footprint. For example, 46% of freelancers say they could not have a traditional job due to personal circumstances (such as health, caregiving duties, or other reasons).
It’s projected that in 2027, 86.5 million people will be freelancing in the United States and will make up 50.9 percent of the total U.S. workforce. And that projection came before COVID-19 disrupted the economy and accelerated many related trends (namely, remote work) that support the switch to freelance.
Aside from it being able to grow a business from anywhere, the primary benefits to freelancing aren’t anything to bat an eye at:
- Financial freedom
- Ability to choose who you work with
- Opportunity to work on exciting projects
- Flexible schedule
- A digital nomad lifestyle, if traveling and seeking out new experiences is your thing
- Complete autonomy in your career trajectory
Who could blame us for choosing to forge our own paths instead of climbing corporate ladders?
In this Unemployable Guide to Becoming a Freelancer, we’re going to cover what you need to launch a successful freelance career.
How to Start Freelancing with No Experience
Any successful person was a beginner at some point. Take a bit of solace in that. I know I did when I quit my job with no clue about how to find freelance work.
So with that said, where do you start?
There are a few foundational steps you need to take in your quest for how to find a freelance job.
- Define the type of freelancer you want to be
- Launch your freelance business
- Build a new business pipeline
Of course, there are many approaches to launching a fruitful freelance career. That’s one of the best things about it; there’s no set path you need to take to find the success you seek.
If that sounds good to you, let’s keep going. In this next section, we’ll talk more about setting business goals — specifically, how to become a freelancer.
Step 1: Figure Out What Type of Freelancer You Want to Be
Now, you may already have an idea of what type of freelance work you want to offer. Popular crafts include freelance writing, graphic design, and web development.
The reality, though, is that almost any role you can imagine is now a freelance opportunity. But unless you have a defined niche carved out, there’s still work to be done when it comes to learning how to make money freelancing.
Define Your Niche
Defining your niche is essential to becoming a successful freelancer.If you want to be the “go-to” person for your trade of choice, you need to build authority in that industry or category.
Freelance writer Kaleigh Moore put it perfectly. When talking about the importance of finding a niche on the Unemployable podcast, she asks, “If you were looking to have a mural painted on your wall, would you pick an artist who creates all kinds of art, or would you pick an artist that specializes in murals?”
Of course, there is absolutely nothing wrong with being a generalist freelancer if you like providing a range of services to people/companies in different industries. However, I’m a firm believer that if you want to book repeated business and become the go-to freelancer for something, you need to establish a niche.
To find your niche, think about what you’re good at and what you enjoy doing. Do you like to write? Draw? Advise businesses on how to be profitable? Are you a bookkeeper who specializes in online accounting services?
All of these are great digital freelancer opportunities and the “what” part of this equation. Spend some time reflecting on what types of things you genuinely like doing. Be open to learning about alternative freelancing services.
For example, maybe you realize that you love the consulting element of client relationships over the implementing component. So, consider offering consulting services only and either outsource the implementation or work with clients to create a detailed plan to proceed.
It may take some time to figure out what you really like to do (for me, I used to offer social media services once upon a time!), and that’s perfectly fine.
Decide on Your “Who”
Next, once you’ve figured out what types of services you want to offer, figure out the audience you want to serve. Who do you want to work with? Better yet, who do you not want to work with? Start with either question and go from there — this is a crucial step in building a customer base. Make a list of industries and companies, and highlight any patterns you see.
Again, this may take some time. You may need to “try out” a few niches to ensure you’re attracting the individuals and companies you most want to work with. Again, this is all a part of learning how to become a freelancer, so it will take some trial and error.
Get the Proper Training and Education
If you’re starting from scratch — like let’s say you want to make a career shift to freelance content marketing — you’ll need to establish a few fundamental skills before you can strike out on your own.
Whether you want to go the traditional educational route or opt for a DIY approach, make sure you invest in the courses that will set you up for success. Don’t be afraid to shop around for the right program, and don’t feel pressured to purchase the first opportunity you see.
My advice:
- Do your research.
- Read the reviews.
- Sit on a program for a few days before committing.
- When browsing through courses, focus on the ones that will help you develop the foundational skills that you need to be successful.
If you want to take a non-traditional approach to learning, there are plenty of online resources to consider:
Plus, there are tons of courses offered by experts. For example, if you want to become a copywriter, Copyhackers provides excellent training.
It’s important to note that your education shouldn’t stop at the foundational level. The key to how to make money freelancing includes continual learning and upskilling, so you can expand your repertoire and charge more for your services.
Step 2: Get Your Freelance Business Up and Running
After you establish your niche, nail down those foundational skills, and continue to learn, take the time to get your business set up correctly.
Whether you choose to “make it official” with an LLC or not, you need to have three core things in place before you start serving clients:
- A website or freelance portfolio
- Clear service offerings
- Turnkey processes that you can use with every client
These three things will help you not only stay organized as you’re busy finding enough of the right clients, but also set you up to be an in-demand service provider as you learn how to become a freelancer.
Build Your Website or Portfolio
A portfolio that demonstrates your skills and experience is a must to attract the type of clients you desire. But how are you supposed to do that if you don’t have the skills and knowledge you want to showcase?
Sound familiar?
This is one of the most challenging Catch-22 situations for those wondering how to start freelancing with no experience — regardless of whether you’re starting from scratch or making a career switch.
Here’s the good news: There are plenty of ways you can build a robust portfolio that speaks to your ideal client even without years of experience.
One of the best ways, in my experience, is to create illustrative portfolio items. Do you want to be hired to write landing page copy for clients in the health and wellness space? Write a landing page for a brand you’d love to work with and showcase that on your website. Are you interested in writing code for a new D2C company? Show off your skills and ideas as you would with an actual client project, and add that to your portfolio.
The critical thing here is to demonstrate that you can do the work and also understand the value you’re providing. In other words, the best way to stop fretting about how to become a freelancer is to act as if you already are one — and a successful one at that.
Define Your Service Offerings
You know what type of work you want to do for your clients, but can you communicate it clearly to them? Figure out what kinds of services you want to offer and make sure your potential clients know about them.
For example, let’s say you’re a freelance writer who works with women-owned businesses. But the only writing services you want to offer are small business email marketing and social media posts. Make sure you define those items — get nitty-gritty about what is included with each service (and sometimes, what’s not included, where appropriate).
Like all things with your business, things will evolve as you go. But having some clarity around what you do will not only help your potential clients, but it may also help you figure out if a client is the right fit.
Form Your Processes
One of the core differences between a freelancer who is less stressed yet booked solid and a frantic, order-taker lies in your processes. And as you grow and learn, so will your business procedures.
If you have a reliable freelance project management process in place, your business (and mental health) will undoubtedly take a turn for the better:
- You get instantly more organized (no more missed deadlines)
- Both you and your clients are on the same page during the entire project
- You automatically look more professional than other freelancers who don’t have a well-oiled process
- You can more accurately quote projects if you know how long things will take
The secret is not that you necessarily remember what to do at each step but that you have a process in place that guides you down the path.
Every freelancer should have these processes in place:
- Client acquisition (how you go about attracting and finding enough of the right clients)
- On-boarding (acquainting your client with your work process, completing administrative tasks like signing contracts, etc.)
- Workflow (how you work through a project from start to finish)
- Wrap up (finalizing payments, gathering testimonials, etc.)
Depending on the nature of your work, you may need more steps, but those four should give you a solid jumping-off point for how to become a freelancer who’s in demand — and loves every minute of it.
Pro tip: Try using Personal Kanban to work smarter, not harder.
Step 3: Build a Freelance Business Pipeline
As with other aspects of freelancing, there are many ways to go about finding clients.
Let’s take a look at some of the best ways to do so.
Set Your Rates
There are many schools of thought on freelance pricing. You’ve likely heard the most popular rate-setting advice of all, “charge what you’re worth,” while browsing for guidance on how to approach setting your rates.
Here’s the thing: this isn’t wrong per se. It’s just not as black and white as it may sound. “Charge what you’re worth” doesn’t mean “charge whatever you want.”
When you sit down to set your rates, consider the following variables:
- The value you will provide your client
- The level of experience you have
- The price the market can hold
These three variables will help you set rates that will not only make you profitable but will also keep you competitive. Understanding the value you provide clients — like how much money you could make them or how many new leads your work could yield — alongside your experience level and what your industry can withstand will help you find your magic number(s).
Also, your rates will change over time. As you gain more experience and learn more about your craft and industry, you can justify raising rates. And you’ll become better at the hard stuff, too, like what to do when a client doesn’t pay and setting boundaries with clients.
Find the Channels that Work for You
From opportunities on social media to referrals from other freelancers,the avenues for where to find clients are far and wide. Much like finding your niche, the key nugget of wisdom here is to try a few ways and see what yields the best results.
I’m not talking about trying many channels at once, though. This part of researching how to become a freelancer can get overwhelming. Pick one or two — like LinkedIn and email marketing — and dedicate time to building those channels out completely. Show up regularly on LinkedIn. Build your email list and create thoughtful content that resonates with your audience. Fully commit to a platform or marketing-related freelancer tool and see it through.
This makes it easier to determine what’s worth your time from a client ROI perspective, and it helps you figure out what you like spending time doing. (Who said client searching had to be painstaking, anyways?)
Foster Genuine Relationships with Both Fellow Freelancers and Potential Clients
Here is some obvious, albeit truthful, advice for how to start freelancing with no experience: people want to work with people they like.
With everyone talking about personal branding and personas, the best way to show up in that way is just to be yourself. As “woo-woo” as that may sound, it’s true (and the most effective strategy to take).
So what’s the best way to do this?
Here are a few tried-and-true ways to connect with others in your industry:
- Engage with them on social media: Be thoughtful. Don’t just “like” their posts, but offer some sort of unique angle or your opinion (respectfully, of course).
- Join relevant Slack channels:Countless Slack channels exist for just about any type of group you can imagine. These channels are a great way to connect with others — whether they do what you do or not.
- Ask what you can do for others: When you’re trying to fill your calendar with client work, it’s tempting to jump on every opportunity you see. But take a step back and ask yourself, “What can I do to help others?” If a colleague asks for feedback on a project, offer your advice. If you know someone who would be the perfect fit for a job opportunity, offer to make an introduction. Relationship building is a two-way street; there’s give and take.
Whether you’re dealing with potential clients or trying to expand your freelance network, focusing on building relationships with those you meet can do a lot of good for both your career and your mental health.
How to Find Freelance Work
Once you’ve got all your freelancer ducks in a row, the final and perhaps most important one is figuring out how to get a freelance job. Because once you figure out how to get more clients, you’re golden.
Become a Freelancer on Upwork (or Other Job Marketplaces)
The rise of the gig economy is in large measure thanks to online job marketplaces that allow all kinds of clients, from individuals to giant corporations, to find outsourced talent (ahem, you!).
That said, as you find out more about how to become a freelancer, you’ll discover that not all job boards are created equal. For example, Upwork vs. Fiverr: while both of these industry leaders can be great options for finding freelance jobs online for beginners, each is quite different.
When you become a freelancer on Upwork, you can expect:
- A more traditional hiring process (you have to apply — so you need some freelance portfolio examples)
- Relatively high-paying opportunities
- Lots of different project types (i.e., per project, fixed-rate, hourly)
- Greater control over who you work with (in most cases, you respond to job postings)
- More long-term, ongoing working relationships
When you become a freelancer on Fiverr, you can expect:
- People hiring you for your skills
- Low, competitive pricing helps get you started out the gates
- More project-based work
- Easy, flat-rate package pricing (vs. having to track hours)
- A wide variety of clients
Also, keep in mind that the best freelancer sites offer more opportunities beyond finding work. There are also copious resources (i.e., articles, videos, free webinars, podcasts, white papers, etc.) on each platform to help you establish, maintain, and grow your freelance business.
Use Social Media
When it comes to cracking the code for how to get clients for a new business, why not start somewhere you already probably spend a good deal of time?
Social media isn’t just for connecting with old high school or college buddies (although they can be helpful professionally, too) — it’s a powerful tool to make authentic connections with individuals and companies that share your interests, values, and area(s) of focus.
So, make good use of the professional networking opportunities you find on social media, be it by posting and responding on Twitter, chatting in a Facebook or LinkedIn group, sharing ideas on Instagram, or participating in a Clubhouse conversation. The key is to be consistently helpful on your chosen platform. That helps you show up on people’s radar, build your reputation, and, ultimately, find freelance work.
Pro tip: Remember, it’s not about what others can do for you. It’s what you can do for them. Be polite, responsive, honest, and ready to be of service.
Get Referrals from Your Networking Circle
Don’t let worrying about where to find clients keep you up at night. You probably have all you need to score paying gigs right away by doing one simple thing: asking for referrals.
So, time to start reaching out to your “circle of trust” (aka your “networking circle”) to let them know that you’re in business and happy to help. This includes friends, family, old colleagues and bosses, and even people you work with currently.
The first step is to craft an elevator pitch (one or two sentences) explaining what you do and who you do it for. From the earlier example of the freelance writer who works with women-owned businesses but only wants to do email and social media marketing, the elevator pitch might go something like this:
“I’m a content marketing pro who specializes in helping women-owned businesses stand out from a crowd, build their customer base, and thrive through on-point, conversion-focused social media and email marketing.”
Then you’re ready to reach out. This is not about sending a blanket email to everyone you know asking them to hire you and refer their friends and colleagues to you. While you might be able to email a small group of people at once (i.e., your family members), much of this outreach should be custom and individual. Be sure to calibrate what you’re asking for and how you’re asking for it according to your relationship with that person.
Share Your Expertise with Other People for Free
When you’re thinking about how to become a freelancer, you might get caught up in all the technical aspects of how to make money freelancing that we’ve been discussing. If that’s the case, you risk losing sight of the number one reason for freelancing:
You have skills to share that can help others thrive.
Now, you might not always think of yourself as a subject matter expert, but that’s a mistake. Even a generalist has tips to share about how to add value to others’ experiences. (And, if you’ve followed my advice, you are more clear than that — you know your niche.)
Take your show on the road and share your expertise with others. There are loads of ways to do this, from guest blogging to being a guest on a podcast in your area of interest and expertise. For example, if you’re a seasoned graphic designer and your ideal client welcomes innovative visual solutions, then a perfect outlet to appear on would address the subject of how to improve creativity.
The key to this all is to choose places where your desired audience hangs out, and then be sure you get links back to your website or portfolio, social accounts, and/or email.
Become the Best Freelancer You Can Be
You will learn countless other lessons along the way as you learn how to become a freelancer. Like I mentioned above, one of the best parts about freelancing is that there is no “by the book” strategy for getting to where you want to be with your career. That means if you’re going to try something new and see how it works for your business, you can do that without hesitation.
When things get tough — and they will — remember that you have control over your business and what happens next.
Running a solo business doesn’t mean you have to go it alone …
For more and more people, running a freelance or solo business is living the dream. It’s the freedom to create what you wish, how you wish, on your own terms and schedule.
But it’s not all unicorns and rainbows.
It can be tough to find the right advice and support you need to keep going in the right direction. And despite the many perks, a solo business can get lonely — even downright isolating at times.
Fortunately, it’s possible to connect with like-minded people who are on a path similar to yours. Plus, you can gain insight into the essential strategies, tactics, and technology that helps your business survive and thrive.
Sound good?