Day 23. Finding Clients in Blogs
Day 23. Finding Clients in Blogs
This lesson suggests putting together a strategy for surfing and commenting on blogs to find customers. My strategy would be to find blogs for local companies. If the company already has it’s own blog, it probably has it’s own website. If that is the case i am not needed. I would be better served to find blogs for companies that are looking for help with the start up phase. I will need to search out something like this.
Any suggestions?
For blog commenting, I already know how to do that professional since I have been running a weight loss and fitness blog for over a year.
Day 22. Twitter for Freelancers
Day 22. Twitter for Freelancers
This is a simple project. This is being put on the back burner. I have a personal twitter account and I rarely use it.
At this time I will not be doing this as all I would end up doing with it is retweeting articles I find.
Once I have a dedicated site and email, I will take another look at it.
Day 21. Start Networking to Find Clients
Day 21. Start Networking to Find Clients
This lesson suggests find the on-line forums you target customers hang out in.
Since I want to target local customers, I think my best marketing will be an active part of my community. I feel the Chamber of Commerce may be a great place to start. Rotary Club or masonic lodge maybe be next. Our local YMCA is solid and possible an active church.
Day 20. Make a Marketing Plan for Your Freelancing Biz
Day 20. Make a Marketing Plan for Your Freelancing Biz
Today is a daunting task- figure out how to get my name out.
I need to make a list of activities, how often I can do them, and a schedule.
Activities:
Door to Door Sales
Referrals/Word of Mouth
Community Networking (Chamber, Rotary, etc)
Facebook Page
Phone book ad
How Often:
Door to Door Sales- As often as I ID target businesses.
Referrals- Dependent on previous customers
Networking- As often as they meet
Facebook page- Once
Phone book ad- Annual
When:
Door to Door: As soon as I am set up (July 15th)
Referrals- Once I start making sales
Networking- As soon as i am set up
Facebook- As soon as I am set up.
Phone book ad- not sure when they do the next round of sales.
Once these are in place I need to monitor and evaluate how each one is working.
Day 19. Tracking Your Freelancing Income and Expenses
Day 19. Tracking Your Freelancing Income and Expenses
This lesson discussed a small number of methods of keeping track of expenses and income. At this point I have had only two expenses and no income so I am keeping notes on a notebook I keep in my organizer.
If this increases I will move to a spreadsheet, possible with OpenOffice, and then Quickbooks once I feel like paying for something.
Day 18. Make Your Client Communication Templates
Day 18. Make Your Client Communication Templates
For this portion of the project I focus on the forms that are used to secure a job and to complete it.
These Include:
Price Quote
Contract
Submission
Invoice
Receipt
Request for Feedback
One of the first things I created was a contract. It starts by listing strictly web design job pricing and then follows that with add-on services like copyrighting, editing, email set up, etc.
I have created a terms of service rough draft, but have not yet typed it up.
I have planned on using my email and the top portion of my contract for quotes.
I have a template I am using for draft and project submission. I want to retype it in order to personalize it.
I have been using a time tracking software for keeping my on point for my projects I believe it has an invoicing feature. I will see once I have someone to invoice. I was also thinking about using this feature from PayPal. I may also creat a custom invoice boilerplate just in case.
PayPal provides receipt but I should probably create one of my own too. Something to think about.
I need to put further thought into the possibility of finding a suite that can do the majority of the above tasks- all in one.
Day 17. 7 Essential Pages for Your Freelancing Website (Part 2)
Today’s assignment is to add a few more pages onto the web site.
It suggests a portfolio, resume, and testimonials page.
I have not created the about me page but will include the brief resume with it.
I have created my portfolio page, but have not uploaded any work. When I plan to do a short description and testimonial with each page.
The site so far is here. It still needs more color and images, but is still a work in progress. I will have it complete before I finish the experiment.
Day 16. 7 Essential Pages for Your Freelancing Website (Part 1)
According to the Savy Freelancer there are several pages that a good freelancer should include.
The first is a home page. I wrote mine to include a welcome, what my goals our for my customer, and a service I do. This includes a version of my USP from day 9.
I have not yet created my about page, but I plan to adapt the one from this blog.
For services and pricing, I plan to write a script that is typical of conversation asking my prices. This will explain that not all sites are equal and it depends on what needs done.
I would like to use a form based contact me page.
Day 15. 10 Must-Have WordPress Plugins for Your Freelancing Website
Although I did not install a WordPress theme on a separate host, I am still going to continue reviewing the pages that reference this portion of the project because I will do this at some point.
For this assignment I needed to review the list of widgets and add some that will make my site more powerful. I like Akismet, All-in-one SEO, cforms II, and Photo Dropper.
Akismet is available a wordpress.com widget so I do have it installed on my free page.
Day 14. Install Your WordPress Site
Day 14. Install Your WordPress Site
The intention of this post is to build a WordPress site on a third-party host. I will not be doing this at this time due to monetary constraints. The post gave step by step direction about how to install on a 3rd part host.
Once the basics of how to install are out-of-the-way you need to pick a theme. I liked Thesis, Suffussion, Work-a-holic and one more. Unfortunatly, these are not available on WordPress so after a lot of fumbling around I decided on Twenty Ten.
The next step is to customize. I removed the header image and changed the background to black. I plan to add a custom logo later.
I also added a few pages and an opening post.
I want to figure out how to make a gallery and how to make the front page a stand alone page, not a blog.
The Freelance Experiment 