When you enter the challenging world of freelancing, you need to put a lot of new skills into your professional luggage to make it work. Being an expert in your field isn’t enough. When you become a one-person business, you need to behave just like a well-oiled business machine. In other words, you need to develop an understanding of basic accounting, tax return, administrative tasks, marketing strategies, commercial networking, and customer service on top of your area of expertise. Thankfully you can find support readily available in most areas, from affordable bookkeeping solutions to virtual assistants. But there are still new roles that you need to take on to support your freelancing activities and that nobody can do for you. Self-promotion is the ultimate confidence trial for freelancers. How can you promote your services without sounding either fake or embarrassed? Here are a few tips to help you do just that without losing your integrity and your professionalism.
Clear up your online presence
Self-promotion doesn’t need to rely on renting all the advertising banner in town. You can start with something more subtle and yet that will gather more visibility, namely your social media presence. Indeed, as companies are now used to check social media profiles before hiring an applicant, you can be certain that as a freelancer, you’ll receive the same treatment. It’s therefore essential that you give a professional touch to all your social media accounts. Your presentation on LinkedIn is likely to be the first place companies will check to get to know you. LinkedIn gives you the possibility to add a headline which acts as a one-line summary of your skills and interests, the ideal tool for discreet self-promotion. Combined with a professional looking picture and active posting, you can attract the attention of future clients. To put all the chances on your side, you should clean up your social media presence across the board, ensuring that Twitter, Facebook or Instagram, if they are made public, don’t work against you. In other words, clear all venting post and party pictures from your feed!
No, homemade websites are not good enough
Admittedly, you can’t consider launching your business if you don’t have any website. If you’ve been reading online tutorials on how to build your own site in WordPress or Drupal, it’s time to think like a business owner and not like an enthusiastic hobbyist. You shouldn’t build a professional website if you’re not a web designer. DIY websites are difficult to customise without the necessary HTML skills, and using a premade template will only make it look average. Additionally, you’ll struggle to create an engaging design that meets SEO and UX requirements. Instead, you should treat your activity with the professionalism it deserves and work with experts such as the Cefar team. Trusting designers with the build, branding and UX of your site is key to your success.
Forget the business cards and network
As a new market player, you need to get known in your sector. And that means you need to meet people, create connections and build meaningful bonds actively. Networking is an essential part of your self-promotion activities. Not just giving your business card, but actually engaging with potential partners, clients and suppliers. Start by identifying who the critical few people to your career are; you need to maintain regular contact with them throughout the year. The next tier relates to the group of people who have the potential to help in future or who have helped you in the past. You should make sure they know about your professional moves. Finally, the big secret: To connect to someone new, you have to find a way to help them.
Okay, you still need a great business card
Admittedly, you shouldn’t ditch your business cards just now. You still need them if you want to make an impression. In fact, as most people continue to exchange business cards, you have to put your creativity to work to stand out. A good strategy is to work closely with a graphic designer to come up with creative and engaging designs that people don’t throw away. Bored Panda published a list of exciting business cards that are still relevant today. Engage with your leads at a playful level, and you can be sure they won’t forget you.
Give something for free
You can’t tell people how great you are and expect them to believe you. In fact, you want to give them a taste of your abilities so that they can decide for themselves if you’re the person they need. You could offer a free sample, for example. A great tool to leverage your self-promotion is to produce informative materials that are free to download, such as a whitepaper that provides essential tips. When you choose to give information to convince potential customers to work with you, you should make sure that you address typical problems of your audience.
Be visible and let Google work its magic
Visibility is your best take on self-promotion. There’s no need to tell people how great you are if your name keeps appearing in relation to their searches; they will know who you are. Needless to say, the secret to online visibility is effective search engine optimisation. Therefore you need to keep your SEO game up to date and follow the latest trends. The tips for 2018 include crawlable and accessible URL, active keyword research, investigation of most performing pages, and a compelling title and meta description.
Try cost-friendly SEM strategies
Finally, you could also choose to dedicate a small budget to affordable and effective advertising campaigns. Youtube ad campaigns, for instance, are shown to an engaged and active audience who reacts positively to authentic and helpful messages. Additionally, the possibility to target an audience via demographics, interests and location factors can help you to maximise your investment. People want to know your story, and a Youtube video ad allows you to do just that; unlocking new potentials for lead generation, customer retention and brand reputation.
The bottom line is that self-promotion is not about telling people how great you are anymore. It’s about sharing your professional look, authentic voice and knowledge as effectively as you can.
