5 Ways To Find Your Next Client

Please note this is an automated transcript

00:00: Hello, welcome to this very short training, which will share with you a few ways that you can find your next client. So this is for you if you are new to freelancing, or if you’re established and you’ve hit a bit of a roadblock and you’re looking for some ideas on how to find that next client. So before we get in to all of the juicy ideas, quick introduction. My name is Emma Cossey. Welcome. I’m a coach for freelancers and a mentor.

00:27: I’ve been freelance since 2009 and a freelance coach since 2015, and probably since about 2010, 2011. I’ve been creating content for freelancers, whether it’s the very basics of getting started, how to find clients, to the more in-depth sides around imposter syndrome, values, limiting beliefs, all that kind of thing. But my real drive is to make freelancing as accessible and easy to enter as possible. I want as many people as possible to be able to have freelancing as a career option, if that’s right for them.

01:04 : If you have a bit of a background, I’ve worked for a wide variety of clients, including Macleans, where it tended to be a toothpaste when they were sponsoring Dancing on Ice. This is Discovery Channel, where I had to tweet about car programs. My husband was very on board with that particular gig. I worked at Reading University Students Union doing a lot of their social media, online content, web updates.

01:29: Aigua Media was a wonderful time where I got to write for and edit one of the online fashion blogs there. This was the first wave of fashion blogs that were allowed to go to Things that Fashion Week and things like that. So that was incredible. I was even a wedding blogger for The Times. And outside that, I’ve worked with lots and lots of small businesses, initially doing their social media, online content, digital media. Now I tend to work primarily with freelancers and women bands, helping them with their business. I am a freelance mum, so I’ve been a mum since 2015. I fall under the umbrella of neurodivergent, as I was diagnosed with ADHD inattentive in 2022. I have to think about that now. I’m recording this at the time late November 2023.

02:18: So I’m about just a year and a bit over diagnosis. I’m an introvert, so none of these things are going to require you to have huge amounts of confidence or be really outgoing or anything like that. If you are, fantastic. That’s really good. But I just wanted to let you know from the off that this is sometimes a more gentle approach or flexible approach. And I’m also a blogcaster and a podcaster. If you like podcasts, come listen to the freelancer’s Tea Break, I share a lot more tips there as well. So we’re not going to faff. We’re going to get straight in. Right. So the first two ways to find your next client as a freelancer. Now the first way might not seem like an obvious way.

03:04: Creating packages is one of the easiest things that you can do to help you find your next client. I’m a big fan of packages in general. When you charge by the hour, it means that as you get better at what you do and you get faster and more efficient, it means that you essentially are charging less because you’re doing the job faster. So you get it done in less time. So charging hourly doesn’t actually make a lot of sense when you’re a freelancer.

03:31: And the great thing about a package, so it’s bundling together your services or giving people a really clear idea of how they can work with you, is it’s much easier for the client to see how much it will cost. An hourly rate can be quite confusing for new clients. They might not understand how many hours it would be or be a bit overwhelmed. But knowing how much a monthly package would be or a project package works really well for that. So they’ll be able to see your prices as well, which makes it much easier. You don’t have to have the awkward conversation, but you can bolt things on if necessary. So it doesn’t have to be a very strict package.

04:05: You can have some flexibility and it makes it much easier for you to work out what you need to sell and what you’re going to be sharing out there. I always think it’s much easier to use marketing for packages than for an hourly rate. So to be able to say in this amount of time or with this project, I can achieve this amount is so much easier to market than that.

04:28: So my first step for you would be if you haven’t already got packages to have a look, you don’t have to. There are some people who are going to be very niche or very bespoke, but I still think it helps to give some idea of how much it is or what they might be looking at. The other beauty with packages as well is if somebody comes to you and you’re not quite sure what their budget is and you’ve had a conversation with them and you’re still not very clear, you can go back to them with two or three packages at different rates and that gives that flexibility to the client.

05:02: But they can also see what they could achieve with your high-end product package and the other ones as well. So it gives you a bit of flexibility. Once you’ve got your packages, there is the scary email. And I’ve really badly marketed this because the scary email is not that scary at all, but it can be the concept of emailing your friends and family and telling them about what you do and asking for their support can be very scary, especially if you are someone that doesn’t necessarily like to share your business side on, say, Facebook and things like that. I do have a template on the website. It’s a free template. Just search for the scary email and that will really help get you started on it.

05:45: But it is essentially an email saying, Hi, everyone. I don’t know if you know, but I’ve just launched this package or I’ve just started doing this business. I’m a little bit nervous. I’d really love your support. If you know of anyone that would be interested or if you wouldn’t mind sharing one of my social media posts, I’d really appreciate it. And then you’ve got the option you can offer a little discount if you want to for a short amount of time or refer a friend bonus where you might send them an Etsy voucher if they refer somebody.

06:12: We all assume that people will automatically send them away, but a people don’t always know what you do. They might have missed your posts on social media or they might just not be aware at all of what you do or they don’t go on the social media at all. And then B, it’s just really useful to be able to remind people and ask people for that referral. People won’t automatically do it. You need to ask sometimes. So first two things, create packages and send the scary email. The next one is run a webinar or a workshop, which is kind of what I’m doing here. And it’s a great way to build up your reputation as an expert in your field.

06:50 Speaker: It helps you reach a larger market by sharing your knowledge and it can be saved to be a lead magnet like I have here. It’s also just a really nice, easy way to create content that will bring people in and it really develops that no-liking trust factor. When people know that you really are understanding what you’re talking about and you have a real area of expertise around here, that will really help them want to look into working with you. And as you’ll see at the end, I’ll give you an example. You can offer something that will incentivize them to want to work with you. So running a webinar or a workshop is a great way to do it. And it doesn’t have to be long.

07:30: I’ve purposely made this short because I don’t want people to think they have to make two hour workshops or they have to go in and do a pop up somewhere that’s four hours long. It doesn’t need to be that difficult. And this lead magnet. So I’m rerecording it in November 2023, but I’ve had it on my website for many years now and it still gets the most signups out of all of the freebies I offer. I have it as a opt-in as well for my Facebook group. So if people join my Facebook group, they have the choice of getting access to this. This so you may have got this when you join the Facebook group. And it’s a really good way that way of adding extra value to people joining your community. Next, networking.

08:14: I know it can be an intrepresentable worse nightmare. But actually, networking is fantastic as an introvert because you can go in, you can meet lots of people in one or two hours and then be done for the week. You’ve met loads of people, you’ve really developed the relationship. And actually, I find for introverts and extroverts, there are pros and cons for each how they find networking. Introverts are usually really good at questioning and asking questions and listening. So actually, there’s a lot more opportunities for them there. Extroverts are fantastic at pitching and marketing and sharing what they do. So there’s pros and cons, but there’s nobody that’s better or worse than each other. And there are so many ways to do it now.

08:55: So you can do networking, which is the sort of traditional breakfast meetings, lunch meetings, evening sessions. There are networking, which is where you go up and meet with other people and you all go walking together somewhere, usually somewhere quite pretty or around popular towns. And you chant a network as you’re walking, which is great if you don’t love the whole eye contact, face to face thing, because you’re walking alongside each other. Virtual networking has grown and grown, especially since lockdown. Current time, I’m running free networking sessions with Miau on demand. I can pop the details of that somewhere around here. But at the moment, there are Tuesdays, 1pm. And all of their networking sessions are free anyway. But you can come join that if you want to give it a try. Really friendly.

09:46: The groups are only four people in each Zoom call type thing. So it’s a really good way of trying it out without being overwhelmed by people. And there’s just so many different ways that you can network it nowadays. Have a look on Facebook events, have a look on Eventbrite, even just Google them. There are so many different ways for different people. And the fifth one is use PR for your business.

10:11: And this is something that I see so many people overlook, or they think it’s just for the larger brands. But PR should be a part of every freelancers marketing plan, whether it’s applying to be a guest on someone’s podcast, doing a guest spot as an expert in a Facebook group, commenting on a trending topic for a blog post or a news paper piece or a LinkedIn piece or contributing to someone else’s mastermind or membership.

10:35: I would also highly recommend having a look at local radio stations, magazines, newspapers, let them know when you’re doing something of note or getting contact with them and say, Hi, I’m an expert on this. Do you have a look for people who can come in and talk about that? Especially if you’ve got a national awareness day coming up that’s relevant. They will be looking for guests for their radio shows and even local TV shows and things like that. It is always worth reaching out. And again, this is building on your no lighting trust factor.

11:05: Now, in my original one of this, I think I probably mentioned Twitter, which is now X and which by the time you watch this is probably, I don’t know. I don’t know what it will be. It used to be really good for using the general request hashtag and it still does have some benefits of that. We can go on and see journalists who are looking for stories. But I think we’re going to see that move on to. Tools like threads. I think there’s a couple of others coming up at the moment. Or even Instagram. It’s worth having a look on there as well.

11:37: But if you’re not already using PR for your business, I really highly recommend having a look at it. And you can do it from your phone without having to go out and meet people, which is glorious. So those five ways. But I also wanted to share with you five ways you might want to create passive income just because it does help to have something passive coming in for those rockier freelance months. And so here are a few things that you can do. Online courses are still really strong. Prices are still there a bit more.

12:13: I think prices for online courses are going to start to drop a little bit or they’re going to be certified. So we’re going to see higher prices for those. But online courses are a great way just to have a think about accessibility. So how can you make it as easy as possible for people to use the content? So with my courses, I always offer audio feeds now so people can listen to them or podcast them and trying to add transcripts to everything.

12:37: I try to avoid video where possible purely because it’s less accessible to some people. And the audio still gives them that option of being able to listen on the go. So have a think about that if you’re thinking about an online course. But again, it don’t have to be long. They can be nice and short. They can be, you know, they can be mini courses and I will tell you a bit about some of the ones I’ve done recently because sometimes people are really time poor.

13:05: So a bite size course that help teaches someone something quickly and they haven’t an easy win straight away is really good. Patrons and subscriptions now in 2023, the nine pound subscription has just blown up. There are so many memberships now that are that kind of micro membership, nine pounds. A lot more based on accountability. Content is still important, but I think people are realising that we don’t want to overwhelm people with content.

13:36: It’s more important to have the accountability to actually put these things in place. And Patreon, I’ve seen some incredible patrons which are being used for memberships and creating content. There are other platforms as well that you can do. Patreon seems to be the biggest one at the moment. Your third way is templates, whether that is so I do a bundle of email templates. Other people do. So my friend Alexis Bushnell now does notion templates. You can do journals, even that sort of thing.

14:09: You can do all sorts of different clever things with templates and you can bundle them up and sell them either directly through your website, PayPal, Etsy. You just got to be careful of the how much they cut for that really. But templates are a great way to do it. Affiliate income is great. So this is something I gently weave in to my content. It’s not something that’s a huge part of what I do.

14:31: But if there are tools I love, I will share the affiliate links or make sure that I’ve got access to the affiliate links for them. So affiliate links income, by the way, is where if you’re sharing a link to someone, you have a special link that has a tracking cookie in it or code. And it means that they can track back that you referred them and you can make a small amount.

14:54: It’s usually a small amount, although some courses and providers and tools and things can do as much as 40, 50 percent. So it can be quite useful. I also really like it when it’s a membership I’m a part of. If I share that, I then tend to get that kind of drip feed monthly income that comes from referring them. And then finally, advertising is a really good way.

15:20: If you have a newsletter, a podcast, a YouTube channel, anything like that, advertising or a blog is a really good way to bring in some income. You can have a featured area of your newsletter that people can buy that kind of space or you can talk about a product on your podcast. If you have one, just make sure that you’re declaring that it is an advert or it’s sponsored or it’s gifted. That is really important. There’s lots of information you can find online about that. All message me and I will help you with that. So. We’re at 15 minutes, nearly 16 minutes.

15:59: And if you want to know a bit more, I’d love you for you to come check out the resources in the Freelance Lifestyle School. So I have my main website, FreelanceLifestyle.co.uk. But I also have the Freelance Lifestyle School, which is based on podium. And that has all of my courses on there. And. You will find probably underneath this page the link to it, but I’m giving away 20% of any of my courses or anything I offer.

16:25: So you can use this code and that is for 30 days to go Freelance, which is my kind of my very first course, which takes you through all the steps to go Freelance from business planning to registering your company to finding clients to contracts. And all sorts of different things. There’s just so many, there’s 30 steps, but there’s quite a lot in there, but it’s not overwhelming. You do it at your own pace.

16:53: I also then did a graduate Freelancer, which actually goes into even more depth, but that’s very much aimed at those who are students or graduates who want to go Freelance. I’m a big driver for that for me, was that it wasn’t taught to me at university. And I’m really passionate that graduates and students are aware that this is an option. Freelancing is an option. My How to Find Clients bundle has my training and I’ve got in there Notion templates and Trello templates to track how people can find clients and what works and what doesn’t and where they’re at with them.

17:25: And all the things that I do, because although I’ve touched on five here, I actually look at four areas with finding clients, which is social media, networking, referrals and pitching. And I go into a lot more depth with all of those. There is also the tricky client conversations bundle, which is full of email templates and guides for how to deal with various different tricky client conversations, whether it’s raising your prices, dealing with a client who hasn’t paid, dealing with a client that goes AWOL, lots of different things in there. And then there’s the 10 templates for £10, which has got 10 email templates. And I think terms and conditions in there as well for £10. Plus this year, I’ve been doing quite a few nine pound mini trainings.

18:12: They’re called the Freedance Lunch Club trainings, but they are 30 minutes of training and 30 minutes of recorded silence. Essentially, it’s not all silence because at the end we it’s designed to be co-working or body doubling and you can implement what you learned in the first 30 minutes. So I cover topics like how to set up your freelance pension, how to nail your networking pitch and what to do with networking, planning your creating a business plan, pitching and writing in your first pitching email and creating a freelance funnel. So all of them are designed to be bite-sized but full of really useful information. So that’s taken us up to about 19 minutes. So I told you it would be quick. It doesn’t have to be a long thing that you do.

19:01: I’ve managed to tell you a little bit about how you might be able to work with me in the future. If you’re doing this, you might want to have a bit about your services or packages, anything like that. This is just the easiest option for most people. I hope you found it useful, but I would love it if you could drop me a message and you can either reply to the email that this got sent out with or confirm me on Instagram. I’m at Emma Cossey and tell me which of these things you’re going to implement. I’d love to know how you get on. Have a wonderful freelancing week.