[Mr McGillycuddy]

Here's the deal: I've been giving a lot of thought to freelancing lately and was just curious to see what experiences the guys here had with it.

My situation is this: I currently have a remote work agreement and let me tell you, while being miles ahead of being stuck at a desk in some office, it is still far from ideal. I am still tethered to email and IM and get scolded when I disappear for too long, I can't really travel internationally, I get pulled into bullshit conference calls that do nothing but waste time and often at shit hours due to time zone differences, and I am still at the beck and call of my manager. I am 100% grateful I was able to pull it off. I moved out of DC and am sitting in my apartment in Honolulu as I write this but I am thinking that I am going to use the summer to save a bit more money and educate myself on freelancing in order to go to work for myself 100%.

So I suppose my questions for the guys here are: what type of freelancing are you doing? How much are you pulling in monthly and on how much work? Is is relatively stable/easy to find new clients? Those types of things.

I am leaning heavily towards branding myself as a copywriter. I have a marketing background and I have always really enjoyed and excelled at writing in my current consulting gig, no matter the subject, so that seems like a natural fit. I've also had two guys who are pretty established in the online world tell me that its the best skill to have because it can't be outsourced too well due to language barriers and it can't really be automated with templates and apps like web design or programming have been. But if anyone else has any opinions on high-demand skills that lend themselves to freelancing and could potentially be learned on my own, I'd be happy to hear it.

Thanks guys/

[Rah]

You have any copywriting samples?

Areas that are relevant to my line of work (online advertising): copywriting for SEO, ad copy for paid search campaigns, landing page copy. Maybe look into those for ideas. There's books written on this stuff.

Basically, in the digital world everything can be tracked and measured, including the effectiveness of copy. If you can get good at writing copy that consistently performs and increases conversions, you will be valuable.

[Deb Auchery]

I do a mixture of stuff. Freelance sales and marketing, trading in various goods, outsourcing, financial services etc.

I live in Eastern Europe, so living like a king. I have become too lazy though.

Check out freelancing job sites, there are companies that will pay you $20 an hour plus to make sales calls for christ sake. If you're living in Eastern Europe for example, you'll be living like Mick Jagger. Even better outsource it and sit on your ass and do f all

My mobile office consists of a laptop, a smartphone and a Skype account.

It's important to have multiple revenue streams in case the shit hits the proverbial. I've been there.

[Blunt]

(05-30-2012 05:08 AM)Deb Auchery Wrote:  

I do a mixture of stuff. Freelance sales and marketing, trading in various goods, outsourcing, financial services etc.

I live in Eastern Europe, so living like a king. I have become too lazy though.

Check out freelancing job sites, there are companies that will pay you $20 an hour plus to make sales calls for christ sake. If you're living in Eastern Europe for example, you'll be living like Mick Jagger. Even better outsource it and sit on your ass and do f all

My mobile office consists of a laptop, a smartphone and a Skype account.

It's important to have multiple revenue streams in case the shit hits the proverbial. I've been there.

Do you have any recommendations for top freelancing sites? There seems to be a lot of them.

[Deb Auchery]

Odesk.com, Freelancer.com, Elance.com, Guru.com, etc

[RichieP]

That's cool. Looking into the same myself. Im facing the hard truth that my interests over the past 20 years dont lend themselves well to freelancing online, lol. Oh well.

Yeah with a background in marketing and a desire to write, copywriting sounds like a great fit for you.

The best book for all of this is "The Wealthy Freelancer". Absolutely awesome. It's written by three successful copywriters so it should be right up your alley.

Another good option IF you have good second language skills in a european language - german, french, italian, spanish - is translation. You'd translate from your 2nd language into your native language. The industry is growing fast and wages should also stay fairly immune to global arbitrage, as it requires target language skills and excellent writing in your native language - so you arent going to find any german-to-english translators from India, for example.

It should also be fairly immune to technological developments, for a while at least but not forever. Even Ray Kurzweil thinks machines wont rival humans in translating documents until 2029, so there's money to be made. Im considering really improving my german and then getting on this.

[Mr McGillycuddy]

Thanks for the replies fellas.

(05-30-2012 05:08 AM)Deb Auchery Wrote:  

Check out freelancing job sites, there are companies that will pay you $20 an hour plus to make sales calls for christ sake. If you're living in Eastern Europe for example, you'll be living like Mick Jagger. Even better outsource it and sit on your ass and do f all

Do you get all of your work off the freelancing sites or are you getting clients in other ways?

Quote:

It's important to have multiple revenue streams in case the shit hits the proverbial. I've been there.

I agree 100%. I guess the way I am approaching this is to establish myself with the copywriting, which is something I can always fall back on or hit the pavement with to earn much-needed cash. But also, once that is paying the bills (and my rate is going up), to start working on other stuff, perhaps building other skills to freelance or starting other projects with an aim on passive streams of income. I see the freelancing as always being a viable option when the rest of those projects dry up or run their course.

(05-30-2012 09:12 AM)RichieP Wrote:  

The best book for all of this is "The Wealthy Freelancer". Absolutely awesome. It's written by three successful copywriters so it should be right up your alley.

Another good option IF you have good second language skills in a european language - german, french, italian, spanish - is translation. You'd translate from your 2nd language into your native language. The industry is growing fast and wages should also stay fairly immune to global arbitrage, as it requires target language skills and excellent writing in your native language - so you arent going to find any german-to-english translators from India, for example.

It should also be fairly immune to technological developments, for a while at least but not forever. Even Ray Kurzweil thinks machines wont rival humans in translating documents until 2029, so there's money to be made. Im considering really improving my german and then getting on this.

I will check that book out for sure, thanks. The translation thing is interesting. A big reason I am doing this is because I would like to spent several months in Latin American and finally polish my Spanish, which is OK but dying every year it is not used much so that could be another viable option once I get conversational.

[Deb Auchery]

No you can also just contact companies directly the same way as you would looking for a regular job, let them know you are interested in working remotely

[muc]

I am a freelancer in IT.

In my case it makes sense to simply contact recruiters. I google one or two recruiters in a city I fancy (now f.ex. I am looking for sth. in London) and send them my resume. The offers start coming in.

If my next gig is remote, I will probably also move to Romania for a month or two. It's 50% of my living costs in Germany over there.

[RichieP]

muc, thats really cool, what specifically do you do? network admin, or something similar? what is it that can be done remotely?

[muc]

(05-31-2012 06:15 AM)RichieP Wrote:  

muc, thats really cool, what specifically do you do? network admin, or something similar? what is it that can be done remotely?

I am a software developer. But most gigs are not remote. However, I guess if I specifically looked for ones that are, I bet I could find some. But I get paid very well right now, so I don't mind going to their office.

[Saladin]

(05-31-2012 03:09 AM)Mr McGillycuddy Wrote:  

Thanks for the replies fellas.

(05-30-2012 05:08 AM)Deb Auchery Wrote:  

Check out freelancing job sites, there are companies that will pay you $20 an hour plus to make sales calls for christ sake. If you're living in Eastern Europe for example, you'll be living like Mick Jagger. Even better outsource it and sit on your ass and do f all

Do you get all of your work off the freelancing sites or are you getting clients in other ways?

Quote:

It's important to have multiple revenue streams in case the shit hits the proverbial. I've been there.

I agree 100%. I guess the way I am approaching this is to establish myself with the copywriting, which is something I can always fall back on or hit the pavement with to earn much-needed cash. But also, once that is paying the bills (and my rate is going up), to start working on other stuff, perhaps building other skills to freelance or starting other projects with an aim on passive streams of income. I see the freelancing as always being a viable option when the rest of those projects dry up or run their course.

(05-30-2012 09:12 AM)RichieP Wrote:  

The best book for all of this is "The Wealthy Freelancer". Absolutely awesome. It's written by three successful copywriters so it should be right up your alley.

Another good option IF you have good second language skills in a european language - german, french, italian, spanish - is translation. You'd translate from your 2nd language into your native language. The industry is growing fast and wages should also stay fairly immune to global arbitrage, as it requires target language skills and excellent writing in your native language - so you arent going to find any german-to-english translators from India, for example.

It should also be fairly immune to technological developments, for a while at least but not forever. Even Ray Kurzweil thinks machines wont rival humans in translating documents until 2029, so there's money to be made. Im considering really improving my german and then getting on this.

I will check that book out for sure, thanks. The translation thing is interesting. A big reason I am doing this is because I would like to spent several months in Latin American and finally polish my Spanish, which is OK but dying every year it is not used much so that could be another viable option once I get conversational.

If you're a copywriter you can make a fair amount of extra cash on IM forums like Warrior Forum, BlackHatWorld, Wicked Fire by opening your own service thread. There are lot of people buying those sort of services, enough that you could make an extra 1k a month from each forum.

[Catch 22]

Congrats on escaping DC! Is it not-DC everything all of us DC guys imagine?

Curious, why Honolulu?

[Mr McGillycuddy]

(05-31-2012 07:31 PM)torontokid Wrote:  

If you're a copywriter you can make a fair amount of extra cash on IM forums like Warrior Forum, BlackHatWorld, Wicked Fire by opening your own service thread. There are lot of people buying those sort of services, enough that you could make an extra 1k a month from each forum.

I hadn't though of that. It seems like between those three and the major freelancing sites, I might actually be able to get some extra income going pretty quickly.

(05-31-2012 07:50 PM)Catch 22 Wrote:  

Congrats on escaping DC! Is it not-DC everything all of us DC guys imagine?

Curious, why Honolulu?

Haha, actually I didn't mind DC all that much. But I had spent most of my life in the area and had very deep, diverse social roots. I had a pretty good stream of quality girls coming in as a result and a lot of really cool friends from all sorts of circles. I do feel a bit bad for guys that aren't well established there and have to cold approach, that's a brutal proposition.

Honolulu: I fell in love with it a few years ago. Consistent surf, cool people, decent sized city, plenty of things to do both in and out of the water. It reminds me of Rio in many ways to be honest. My plan is to be here full-time but travel several months out of the year; hence this thread.

[Catch 22]

True, social circle "game" isn't that bad in DC. Glad Honolulu is good though.

[Andy_B]

Some general thoughts on freelancing (no comment on location-independence, as I have not travelled since becoming a freelancer, though I'm strongly considering it):

1. Working on freelancing sites is probably the easiest way to get clients. Set up a profile on elance or odesk, take some skill tests, upload some work samples, and start sending out pitches.

2. Creating promotional threads on paid forums can also be good.

3. There are well-paying clients online, but you need to look for them. They're generally buried in the pile of low paying jobs. A lot of people complain about how jobs on freelancing sites pay poorly, but I think they're just offended that people don't value their skills or something. In terms of supply, there's enough well-paying work to go around; but as a percentage of all jobs posted, yeah, the low-paying jobs are more prevalent.

4. Half the game is keeping yourself motivated to actually put in your hours. You can do okay just billing 15 hours a week, but do you really want to do that?

5. Now I'm going to contradict myself: if you're really big on "lifestyle," the ability to just work a few hours a week can actually be one of the main advantages of freelancing. You need top-notch skills to make this work though, cause you gotta charge top dollar.

6. It's really easy to become a hermit as a freelancer. You need to put diligent, earnest effort into getting out of the house regularly (this might be a hidden advantage actually; the lack of built-in social outlets might motivate you to work on your game, just out of sheer necessity).

7. You should set goals for yourself as a freelancer. There's no set pay raise schedule or promotion for freelancers, so to feel like you're making progress, you need to steer yourself in the direction you want. Examples include raising fees, learning new marketable skills, etc.

8. Lifestyle point: if you're into drinking or doing drugs, it's a good idea to get this stuff under control before you get into freelancing. Wrecks your motivation to work.

[Mr McGillycuddy]

Thanks for the reply bro...a few follow up comments/questions...

(06-09-2012 04:00 AM)Andy_B Wrote:  

2. Creating promotional threads on paid forums can also be good.

Any particular forums you recommend?

Quote:

4. Half the game is keeping yourself motivated to actually put in your hours. You can do okay just billing 15 hours a week, but do you really want to do that?

As I mentioned in the OP, I have a remote work agreement right now so I typically work out of my apartment or one of the two Starbucks that are within a couple blocks of my place, so I hope I have learned the discipline to stay motivated and do the necessary amount of work without being in an office. Of course, right now I am still accountable to my superiors so freelancing will certainly add a level of needed discipline.

Quote:

5. Now I'm going to contradict myself: if you're really big on "lifestyle," the ability to just work a few hours a week can actually be one of the main advantages of freelancing. You need top-notch skills to make this work though, cause you gotta charge top dollar.

By the time I wrap up this remote work arrangement in 2-3 months, I should be sitting on a pretty good amount of cash, so working around 20hrs per week is my goal, gradually raising my rates as I get better (and also pursuing some more passive, recurring income streams as well).

Quote:

6. It's really easy to become a hermit as a freelancer. You need to put diligent, earnest effort into getting out of the house regularly (this might be a hidden advantage actually; the lack of built-in social outlets might motivate you to work on your game, just out of sheer necessity).

I've experienced that with the remote work arrangement too, especially since I have only been here in HI for four months and knew essentially no one on island when I arrived.

I basically work about 5hrs each morning and then force myself to either go surf or go to the gym then I come home and finish up any work I have remaining. And I also make myself go out at least once during the week, plus I am out constantly most weekends.

But yeah, I too can get lazy and end up breaking from that "schedule" on occasion.

Quote:

7. You should set goals for yourself as a freelancer. There's no set pay raise schedule or promotion for freelancers, so to feel like you're making progress, you need to steer yourself in the direction you want. Examples include raising fees, learning new marketable skills, etc.

I think this is very good advice. I am a pretty goal-oriented person which is actually one of the reason freelancing appeals to me. I see things like being able to charge more, getting more business, becoming "recognized" as the types of things that will keep me motivated.

Quote:

8. Lifestyle point: if you're into drinking or doing drugs, it's a good idea to get this stuff under control before you get into freelancing. Wrecks your motivation to work.

I used to be a big boozer but I've cut that out aside from the occasional big night. Definitely makes working a real drag when you are hungover and tired and morally bankrupt.

Thanks for your input dude.

[Mr McGillycuddy]

Also, Andy, what resources (blogs, books, courses, etc...) do you recommend?

[AntiTrace]

Already good input here, ill put in my two pennies.

I used to freelance a bit as a Business Consultant. I played the role as the general adviser and would give my input on basic questions. I was really just another brain that a business owner could bounce ideas off and get some input on. I answered all sorts of questions about marketing strategies, loan proposals, expansion ideas, business plan help, etc. For the questions I didn't have an answer, I would just google and get some basic information and then tailor that to my clients needs.

I was about 17-18 when I was doing that. I charged $100 a month per individual client for email support, with another $20 per hour for skype/phone conversations. At the height of that plan I had about 25 clients and was spending about three hours a night answering emails/researching unknown questions.

The only business experience I had at that time was selling playboys to kids in my class in middle school. There was a vacation house next door that I ordered twenty subscriptions to monthly, would leave a not on the door telling the delivery guy to leave it around back and then take them into school and sell em at 20 bucks a pop.

It really boils down to fulfilling a need and then maintaining your client relations.

This was about 8 years ago before freelance starting becoming real popular so take it for what it is worth, I don't think my model would work too well anymore.

On a side note, copywriting would be a good path to pursue. I just recently took on a copywrite for $150 an hour because I couldn't trust the cheap injuns working for $15 to an hour to provide me with the original high quality results I need. I will pay decent money for a good programmer. I will damn near clean my bank account out for an amazing copywriter.

[Andy_B]

(06-09-2012 10:32 PM)Mr McGillycuddy Wrote:  

Also, Andy, what resources (blogs, books, courses, etc...) do you recommend?

You want to do copywriting, right?

I have three recommendations for you, for building the skills, building the business, and using freelance sites.

Building The Skills: Dan Kennedy's "The Ultimate Sales Letter." Sales letter writing is generally considered the most lucrative form of sales copywriting; The Ultimate Sales Letter is widely considered the most important book on the topic.

Building The Business: Peter Bowerman's "The Well Fed Writer: Financial Self-Sufficiency As A Commercial Copywriter In six Months Or Less." Most respected book for starting a copywriting business.

Using Freelance Sites: Hayden Jackson's "72 Tips For Elance Writers," a great book written for Elance writers. Advice applies to odesk and other sites as well.

[Mr McGillycuddy]

(06-10-2012 01:37 AM)Andy_B Wrote:  

(06-09-2012 10:32 PM)Mr McGillycuddy Wrote:  

Also, Andy, what resources (blogs, books, courses, etc...) do you recommend?

You want to do copywriting, right?

I have three recommendations for you, for building the skills, building the business, and using freelance sites.

Building The Skills: Dan Kennedy's "The Ultimate Sales Letter." Sales letter writing is generally considered the most lucrative form of sales copywriting; The Ultimate Sales Letter is widely considered the most important book on the topic.

Building The Business: Peter Bowerman's "The Well Fed Writer: Financial Self-Sufficiency As A Commercial Copywriter In six Months Or Less." Most respected book for starting a copywriting business.

Using Freelance Sites: Hayden Jackson's "72 Tips For Elance Writers," a great book written for Elance writers. Advice applies to odesk and other sites as well.

Thanks dude. Those have just shot to the top of my reading list.

How much time per week would you say that you typically spend doing billable work vs. building your business/prospecting/pitching/searching the freelance sites, and also continuing to build skills, if you are still educating yourself?

[Andy_B]

(06-11-2012 01:40 AM)Mr McGillycuddy Wrote:  

(06-10-2012 01:37 AM)Andy_B Wrote:  

(06-09-2012 10:32 PM)Mr McGillycuddy Wrote:  

Also, Andy, what resources (blogs, books, courses, etc...) do you recommend?

You want to do copywriting, right?

I have three recommendations for you, for building the skills, building the business, and using freelance sites.

Building The Skills: Dan Kennedy's "The Ultimate Sales Letter." Sales letter writing is generally considered the most lucrative form of sales copywriting; The Ultimate Sales Letter is widely considered the most important book on the topic.

Building The Business: Peter Bowerman's "The Well Fed Writer: Financial Self-Sufficiency As A Commercial Copywriter In six Months Or Less." Most respected book for starting a copywriting business.

Using Freelance Sites: Hayden Jackson's "72 Tips For Elance Writers," a great book written for Elance writers. Advice applies to odesk and other sites as well.

Thanks dude. Those have just shot to the top of my reading list.

How much time per week would you say that you typically spend doing billable work vs. building your business/prospecting/pitching/searching the freelance sites, and also continuing to build skills, if you are still educating yourself?

It really varies, but in the early months, definitely spend at least half your time pitching.

You can eventually get to a point where *very* little of your time is spent marketing yourself though.

Like, last week, I pulled in $800 just from previous clients coming back to me with new jobs.

[dulst]

I'm starting a freelancing project soon to keep me busy over summer. http://earnontheroad.com/ is the free resource I'm learning from.

[Deb Auchery]

(06-16-2012 01:07 PM)dulst Wrote:  

I'm starting a freelancing project soon to keep me busy over summer. http://earnontheroad.com/ is the free resource I'm learning from.

Just took a look. Guy claims Ebay is a shit way to make money online and you can't do it while travelling.

Seen enough

Good luck with your project though.

[dulst]

(06-16-2012 01:11 PM)Deb Auchery Wrote:  

(06-16-2012 01:07 PM)dulst Wrote:  

I'm starting a freelancing project soon to keep me busy over summer. http://earnontheroad.com/ is the free resource I'm learning from.

Just took a look. Guy claims Ebay is a shit way to make money online and you can't do it while travelling.

Seen enough

Good luck with your project though.

Yeah I didn't like that post either, but I'm talking about his free ebook that you can get from his site.