In the last few years, freelancing has become a popular way to make money online. Launching a freelance business might be the key to gaining freedom and flexibility in your life. While there are many advantages to being a freelancer, it comes with its share of challenges. One of the biggest challenges is marketing. Having a physical storefront isn’t required, but it certainly helps. Having a physical storefront not only lets you market your products, but it lets you take advantage of face-to-face interactions with potential customers. In a world full of digital competition, taking a more traditional approach to marketing simply isn’t enough.

Make Sure Your Facebook Page Is Up To Date

One of the first things prospective customers will see on your website or social media is your About page. Your About page should include a brief bio about you and your business. Make sure to keep this page up to date and concise. Furthermore, be sure to include a link to your website or social media accounts. With so much content floating around on social media platforms like Facebook, it can be difficult to get noticed. Giving potential customers a quick reason to connect with you is an important tactic to employ.

Find Potential Customers Wherever They Are

If you are a freelance artist, your target audience might not be restricted to one place. Your products might be relevant to people all over the world. Finding potential customers where they are rather than trying to expand your audience solely online is a better use of your time. There are many tools available today that can help you find potential customers wherever they are. One such tool is Lead Gen Tracker. The tool lets you build a list of potential customers using Google Analytics data. You can segment these leads based on their behavior, such as whether or not they have visited your website before, or whether or not they have bought a product from you before. This type of segmentation can help you target your marketing to the right audience. The more you know about your customers, the better you can tailor your approach and the more effective your marketing will be.

Use Free Online Tools To Their Full Potential

Free tools are crucial to the success of any business. Similarly, online tools can greatly enhance the productivity and freedom of a freelancer. Some of the most useful free tools out there include Trello, Slack, and Skype. Having these tools available to you on your desktop or laptop wherever you go is crucial to being a highly productive freelancer. Not having them on your device means you might miss out on important information or have to go back and look something up. As a freelancer, this could cost you valuable time.

Trello is a project management and collaboration tool that can be used for freelancing. You can use Trello to organize your work, plan your route, and keep track of your projects. Using the tool can greatly increase your productivity, as you’ll be able to focus on what’s important to you without getting distracted by unimportant tasks. Furthermore, you’ll be able to work with others to accomplish a task, as well as keep track of the progress being made on the project.

Learn The Key Skills You Need

To be a successful freelancer, you’ll need to have specific skills related to your work. It’s not enough to simply have a talent for drawing. Being a drawing professional might get you initial work, but if you want to be able to progress in the field, you’ll need to learn how to take care of contracts, how to negotiate, and how to manage your time. Specific skills related to your work can be learned via online training or through a practical experience. The more you can do yourself, the more you can save, and the more you can afford to invest in your own personal development.

Use Analytics To Its Full Potential

Every business owner, manager, and digital marketer knows the importance of Analytics. Keeping track of the number of visitors to your site and how these visitors interact with your content is crucial to being able to grow and improve your site. However, not too many people know how to put analytics to good use. If you are able to, use all of the analytics available to you to your benefit. It’s important to note that not all analytics are created equal. Some analytics tools can be more effective than others when it comes to giving you an accurate representation of the performance of your website. Take a look at Google Analytics, for instance. It’s one of the most popular and well-known analytics tools around, and it’s also one of the most effective. With Google Analytics, you’ll be able to track the performance of your website in great detail. This includes recording the number of visitors to your site, how long they stay for, what navigation methods they use, and much more.

Being able to put all of these variables into place and have a good understanding of how well your site’s content is performing is invaluable. In today’s world, the more you can do yourself, the better. Hiring a specialist to take care of all of this for you is often more expensive and less efficient than doing it yourself.

Slack is a communication tool that can be used for business and pleasure. Slack allows teams to communicate freely, without needing to worry about deleting drafts or discussing business matters online. Instead, they rely on a system of labels and quick, one-to-one chats via email, web browsers, or mobile apps. This makes Slack ideal for teams who need fast, efficient communication to carry out their tasks.

One of the main advantages of Slack is that it’s completely free. You don’t need to pay for commercial software to utilize the tool. Furthermore, with Slack, you’ll have all of the functionality you need, with no frills. The service is extremely sophisticated and comes with several features that might be of great use to a freelancer. Having all of this functionality available to you, even if you’re on a budget, is priceless.

Skype is another tool that can be used for business and pleasure. With Skype, you’ll have the ability to make calls over the internet to other Skype users for free. Typically, calls are free, but there are some calls that will cost you. Having calls cost you money is a pain as a freelancer. Knowing that you’ll need to have a pay phone available just to make a long-distance phone call can eat into your profit.

The good thing about Skype is that it’s very easy to use. While you might need a little tutorial to get started, after that, making calls and sending messages to other Skype users is a snap. If you’re on a budget, there are also some free alternatives to Skype, like Google Hangouts. You can use these tools, too, to make calls. Just remember that if you want to have a real-time conversation, you’ll need to either be paying for a premium account or have someone on the line who is also using Skype. If you are paying for a premium account, you’ll need to make sure you’re getting your money’s worth and not just signing up because it’s free.

Don’t Forget About Offline Marketing

In addition to the digital marketing strategies explored above, you’ll also need to market your business in other ways. While digital marketing is important, don’t underestimate the power of well-executed offline marketing. There are several ways to market your business offline, including:

• Flyers
• Poster Graph
• Radio
• Billboards
• Tattoos
• Word Of Mouth
• Retail
• Mailing Lists
• Events
• Online Communities
• Social Media

If you want to learn more about offline marketing strategies, check out the Marketing chapter of the DIY Marketing Kit. It’s full of tips and tricks on how to effectively market your creative projects online and offline.