The Tactical Freelancer – 4 Easy Steps To Conquer The Competition

This article has been guest posted by the folks that gave you 101 Ways to Make Money Online

If you are going to be a freelancer, then be a successful one! Forget this working for chump change non-sense that has plagued the freelance world for so long. Forget the constant worry of whether or not you made the right decision to work from home. Just tuck your head between your legs, jump overboard and never look back.

• Mass Market Your Tail Off
  Are you going to be a guppy or a shark? If your going to make any money freelancing, you better start thinking like a shark. If you decide to take the easy route, sit back and wait for opportunities to come to you, they are not going to. Why, because I am going to sneak in during the night and take them before you have a chance, don’t let that happen. You need to get your name out there, don’t let them know that you are number one, show them that you are the only one.This is 2008, the Internet is filled with web 2.0 marketing opportunities that can put you at the forefront of the freelancing industry. You don’t need to have a MySpace page, a blog, a Facebook account, a Twitter profile, absolutely not, instead have every single one of them plus anything else you can find. Make each one of those opportunities point back to your freelance portfolio. Everywhere someone goes they should see a page about “Mister X” the freelancer. Make yourself a household name and demand their attention.
• Create Your Own Hit List
  Spend a week or more scouring the web for targets to add to your hit list. If you are a freelance writer, write down the biggest, most popular blogs, websites and magazines in your topic of interest. Put together your master portfolio, start spreading your name around the web like magic pixel dust and then plan your attack. Put together the most impressive resume you have ever seen, with some of the best writing ever read and email it directly to the editor of each individual publication. Allow one week for response, if you don’t hear back, fire off a follow up email. If they reply with no interest, move on to the next source on the list. Once you get to the bottom of your hit list, re-write your original articles and send another resume to the publications that passed on you. Don’t give up! Sometimes persistance is what will land the gig.
• Knock Out the Competition with Past Clients
  Have you worked for big clients in the past, use them as wow tools. Let people know that you have done work for “Client B”, impress them a little bit. If a future client knows that you have worked for a large, or larger client, they will want to use you for their team. They instantly feel that you are more credible and will perform the job better.Don’t have any past freelancing experience? Sure you do, the clients just prefer to remain undisclosed, right? Let’s face it, you don’t want to stamp “haven’t done this before” across your resume or people won’t want to hire you. If you feel that manufacturing a couple of clients is to unethical, then build some clients. Dig up a couple bad looking websites and offer them your web design services for free, if you can use them in your portfolio. Or contact blogs like this one your reading that allows you to write for them, and write a couple of articles. Now you have Carl Ocab, the Kid Blogger on your resume.
• Avoid the Filler and Fluff
  Listen, no matter how hard up you are for money, your time is better spent promoting yourself to larger clients than bumming around in the forums and freelance exchanges working for milk money. Avoid them at all costs, the majority of your competition are spending their days on those sites trying to low ball each other to get the work, so let them have it. Why make $5 when you can just as easily make $50 with the steps above?

There is a lot that goes into being a successful freelancer, but these tips should give you a place to start. Its an extremely busy market so you need to be aggressive(not overly) and get the job done. Marketing yourself is everything in this business so the quicker you can build your name, the quicker you can build your bank account, enjoy!