Give Your Freelance Business a Boost With More Marketing

I know many freelancers who would love to skip over the marketing and self-promotion part of this business and simply write and edit all day long. And I’ll be the first to admit that I used to fall into that camp.

But unless you get the word out there about your services and what you have to offer to clients, editors, and publications, no one will know about you and your business. And especially in an economy like this one, you want to make sure your name is the one that clients and editors think of first when they need quality work done on time and within budget.

Now, I was lucky in my first year of business because I had to do very little marketing. Why? Before leaving my full-time job, I had established some regular anchor clients who supplied a nice, steady stream of work. And while I did seek out other assignments, I had enough work to keep me busy without having to spend half my time marketing and hunting for work.

Fast-forward a year or so, and all of a sudden I found myself in the uncomfortable position of having to ramp up my marketing campaign in a hurry. Work slowed down to a trickle with one of those clients (due to budget issues), and my other anchor client also began experiencing budget problems that resulted in less work and less pay. So suddenly, I was forced out of my comfort zone—I had to find income from other sources to replace the steady stream that had flowed into my checking account from these two clients for so long.

And let me tell you dear reader, I was very uncomfortable. Unlike some freelancers I know, I did not find the transition from relative anonymity to self-promoting freelancer comfortable at all. And depending on the day, I still find myself a little uncomfortable at times. But the more you exercise your marketing muscles, the easier it gets—and eventually, it simply becomes part of your daily business routine.

Here are a few things from my experience that might help you:

1) Make marketing a daily priority. Don’t make the same mistake I did and wait until your work slows to a trickle before marketing. I don’t care how busy you are or how regular and steady you think your clients are—work dries up for a variety of reasons. Your best clients may love you and may want to continue sending work your way, but they may not have the budget to hire you as often anymore—especially in this economy. In my case, the bulk of my income dwindled considerably within a very short period of time (less than 6 months). So make sure you’re protecting yourself and your business by marketing all the time—even when you’re swamped with assignments, set aside some time every day to market your business in some way. Send out LOIs, follow up on old queries, send out new story ideas to new markets, make some cold calls. Do whatever it takes, but make marketing a daily discipline. In fact, pencil it into your calendar every day so that nothing else gets scheduled during that timeframe.

2) Establish an online presence. I’ve mentioned this before, but in my opinion, no freelancer should be without a Web page these days. Gone are the days of the paper résumé and hard-copy clips. In fact, I can’t even remember the last time a potential client or editor asked me to send them a hard-copy résumé or clips via snail mail. It’s just not how business is done anymore, and if you’re going at it in this way, you’ll appear dated and out of touch. And guess what? You might destroy your chances of getting that gig if you insist on old-school marketing techniques. Publications want to hire Web- and tech-savvy freelancers who are comfortable with new technologies—because online is where the future is in this industry. Besides, a freelance business—or any small business for that matter—just doesn’t seem legitimate without a Web page these days. And it’s possible to build a nice-looking Web page by yourself without having to shell out a lot of cash with push-button publishing platforms like WordPress. Once you have a Web page you can include some information about yourself and your services, a copy of your résumé, work samples, and even a blog. And if you don’t have one already, I’m a firm believer that every freelancer also needs to have a LinkedIn profile. It’s a wonderful networking tool, and it allows you to build what amounts to an online résumé with recommendations from current and former employers and colleagues.

3) Explore social media. Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, MySpace . . . all of these social media tools are invaluable when it comes to marketing your business, finding new clients, staying in touch with current and former colleagues, finding new assignments and gigs, and alerting existing and potential clients to some of your recent work. I know some freelancers view these social media sites as a waste of time, but in this day and age, there is an increasing focus on interaction with readers and building online communities. So if you’re simply viewing your writing assignments as static stories that sit on a printed page waiting to be read, you probably need to start shifting your focus and vision for your business. On the other hand, if you start focusing on all the ways that you can communicate that same story with your readers (e.g. pictures, podcasts, video, blogging), then you’ll start tapping into where I think we’re headed in this industry. The opportunities to grow your business through social media channels is endless. So if you’re not utilizing these tools, you’re literally cheating yourself out of potential business. And why on earth would you want to do that?

Here’s something else to keep in mind. Many businesses have a tendency to cut back their marketing efforts during tough economic times. But the smart businesses (a.k.a. the ones that survive downturns) are those that continue to market no matter what the economic conditions are. Fortunately, freelancers don’t have to spend a lot of money on marketing in order to be effective.

So what are you going to do to market your business today?

What marketing lessons have you learned in your freelance business? What works for you? Drop me a line—I’d love to hear about it!

-Jenny

Photo credit: jenjoaquin (Flickr)