How2Freelance

What kind of freelance work should I go for?

Posted on 26. Mar, 2009 by Amod in Freelancing Info

This is one of the most common questions people ask me. It goes like this: “I am a diligent worker, I have HTML and Photoshop skills, I write articles for my school magazine and I own a Canon EOS 500D. Should I try data entry or web design or blogging or photography or all of them?” Good for you, I say, what kind of a person would YOU hire if I had the same skills? Did you say, wherever my expertise lies…? Yes, you got it right.Ask yourself these questions before you decide to take freelance gigs:

Do I have really good skills for this? It seems like an obvious thing, but surprisingly this is the trap most freelancers on the web fall into – you can verify that by taking a look at the blurb these people post on their profile on say rentacoder.com. Employers are not impressed by your jack-of-all-trades skillset, but whether you can really complete their project as required, in time and without any hand-holding. So if you have excellent HTML skills just offer that. Ofcourse, there’s nothing stopping you from acquiring skills in say PHP and MySQL programming too…

What value can I add? Related to the point above – you are among the vast multitude of people offering web design services – what is your USP? Is it great price? or references? standards compliant code? Something to make you stand out from the crowd and a afford much higher chance at landing the job.

Do I enjoy working on this? So you are a good photographer with the right kind of equipment. Would you go out and get that perfect shot the client wants from the top of a TV tower? Which is located about 30 miles across the town? On a rainy day? Yes, I know it doesn’t have to be this extreme, but you get the point – if you can drag yourself out of the bed for the job, and work on it with zeal, that’s good enough.

How much compensation will I really get for my work? Or in other words, just how big is the market? Some scam sites will have you believe that their “system” enables you to make $5000 per month for data entry. Please – You know better. Before you bid adieu to your fulltime job, just ask around, look at profiles on various freelance sites for the skill category you plan to provide services for and look for stats like highest earned, average earned in a year, average earning per job etc. You must allow a certain period (usually between 2-4 months) before you can land a job that pays you satisfactorily.

Do I have the requisite infrastructure / equipment / software? Another obvious one, but again, you will see a disconnect between what most of the freelancers offer and say, software they really have. So if you plan to offer virtual assistant (VA) services, you should have (besides a PC, printer and an internet connection) a fax, a headset, Skype connection, a land phone, a cellphone, office suite, organizers, yellow pages etc. So if your ISP has some tech problems, you can assure the client using your cellphone.

How easy is to expand or scale? After impressing your boss with great sound effects in the PowerPoint show, you think of creating jingles for adverts and then you would like to fish in the ringtone market. And perhaps you would want a tie-up with the cellphone service company. Good thinking. Just check out the big guys and the available market before that.

I recommend these questions before you take the plunge to avoid heart burn and headaches later. Even if you have begun, it is not too late to reconsider – after all everyone desires to sleep peacefully and wake up without dreading the day ahead.

Tags: freelance gigs, Freelancing Info