Hisham Sarwar
Freelance is upbeat, it is the future and the world is already paying close attention to the unprecedented revenue numbers fetched by freelancers all over the world in the last few years. Do you want to make decent money doing freelancing? How about making around $100k a year? Excited much?
Read on…..
Freelancing not only gives one freedom to choose their work hours, but it also aspires them to do more because the amount of money one can earn is dependent on the amount of work one can deliver.
As a freelancer who has been working on different freelance marketplaces, Guru.com in particular and has made over 7 figure revenue, I am often asked about the cookie-cutter tricks to outclass the competition and win more projects online.
Over the years, I’ve realized. Your success as a freelancer is largely dependent on your attitude towards work. The sooner you realize, there is a huge responsibility falling square on your shoulders to make ends meet, the better you are destined to work hard and work towards achieving your financial goals.
If you ask me for some handy tips that could help you with-held the tough freelancing competition pressure and win projects, I would like to draw your attention to these three things.
1- Focus:
I was making around 30-50k a year in the early 2000s but I realized, I am missing something that is not allowing me to extend my financial numbers beyond a fixed annual revenue. When I observed my routine, I realized, I am missing “Focus” in my daily freelance routine.
Freelancing requires complete focus. If you do not bid on projects daily, you are not giving yourself a fair chance of even participating in a competition, leave-alone dream of winning it.
When I began to stay true to my watch, I started bidding regularly and look for projects that matched my expertise. With daily efforts, I started winning projects and was able to turn our routine by hiring a new business development team that helped me in growing my business.
This way, I laid down the foundation of growing my financial numbers beyond a fixed point and potentially reaching $100k a year.
2- Time:
Freelancers often skip this important attribute to success. If you do not allocate some specific hours for your work and stay glued to your work, you are not able to build a swift momentum towards work.
I always try to divide my time into two directions, some hours of finding work and getting it done and an hour allocated to my learning.
Learning gives way to earning. An average CEO reads 52 books a year.
It is very important to stay up to date with new technological advancements in your field in order to stay ahead of the competitive curve.
My 4 power hours principle is helping a lot of people all over the world. It specifically focuses on removing distractions at work, social media in particular. I came across this amazing freelancer’s time tracking tool. Give it a try.
3- Managing Work:
In my 2 decades of experience as a freelancer, I’ve seen many rock stars acing the game initially but fading out of business quickly.
The reason why they could not keep the momentum going and hang on to success was “lack of management“.
Winning projects is one thing, getting them done is the real thing. Sadly, many freelancers do not understand the importance of honoring their commitments with their clients.
Delayed output, missing important deadlines results in the loss of a potential long-term client. As a freelancer, client retention is the one fundamental aspect of growth.
You can not win new projects every day, instead, by winning the trust and confidence of your clients, you can get their repeated business over a period of time.
Imagine how funny it is, you will use a computer to win a project and vow to use a computer to get a project done but you won’t and you don’t use a computer to track your work.
Using software to track work is very important. Many freelancers do not realize the importance of using software for project management and time tracking.
