Nick Usborne

Build a better freelance business, and love your message.

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love your messageBased on my experience as a freelancer over the last 30 years, and as a coach, I believe there are two key elements that separate freelancers who do OK from those who are hugely successful.

For a start, you need to get in the driver’s seat of your freelance business, take control and be assertive about the companies you work with, the work you do, and the fees you charge.

In other words, replace your freelancer mindset with a business-building mindset.

Second, you need to market your freelance business with absolute focus and confidence. This is where so many freelancers fail. They have too little confidence in themselves, and don’t know how to market themselves effectively.

I address both of these issues in what is essentially a combination of two of my programs – Profitable Freelancing and How to Love Marketing Your Freelance Business.

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Monday Spark: Seek out the best, and then remix [VIDEO]

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dylan creative remix

In the early stages of their careers many freelancers try to totally reinvent the wheel when it comes to building their websites or doing their next project for a client.

It doesn’t have to be that hard.

When it comes to writing and designing your own website, why not print out the home pages of the 5 best freelance websites you can find, and then make yours a remix of the best of the best?

If you are writing a sales page for a client, why not find some really good sales pages for similar products or services, take the best from them, and then remix?

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Freelancers: It’s not about what you know, it’s about the message you share.

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I coach a lot of freelancers, many of them just starting out.

More often than not they are concerned about their level of knowledge, or perceived lack thereof.

In other words, they don’t feel ready to approach prospective prospects, because they feel they need to learn more about their craft first.

“I need to learn more about SEO, and writing emails, and social media, and A/B split testing.”

No, you don’t.

Your value in the eyes of your prospects is not tied to the sum of your knowledge, it is tied to the power of the message you share and the story you tell.

Let me use myself as an example.

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Monday Spark: To get to where you want to be, you have to pass through the scary part.

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skydiving freelancerMany of us have wild and exciting dreams for our freelance businesses and companies, but don’t do what it takes to make those dreams come true.

Why not? Because taking the leap is often downright scary.

Well…you’re right. Doing something new is always scary.

A couple of weeks ago I went skydiving for the first time. It is something I have wanted to do for a while. I put off actually doing it for a few months, because as much as I wanted the experience, I found the prospect of jumping out of a perfectly good airplane downright terrifying.

But…to get to the good part, you first have to get past the scary part.

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4 Bad habits to avoid when writing web content.

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web content bad habitsSince the arrival of Google’s Panda update in February of last year content writers have been working hard to do the right thing, and either avoid being mauled by the Panda, or the mend the damage already done.

However, to be sure you doing things right, you not only have to follow best content practices, but also need to avoid some of the bad habits it’s so easy to slip into.

Here are four of those habits.

Bad Habit #1: Making it just good enough

As web content writers we are often under pressure to get more work done, faster. This means we often end up writing just enough text for a page, with a quality that is just good enough.

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Monday Spark: Place the oxygen mask on your own face first.

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help yourself firstAs infants we are expected to be self-centered and selfish. It’s the nature of childhood.

Once we are in our teens, people around us begin to lose patience with that self-centered part of our personalities.

Once we enter the work force and commit to our first serious relationship, things begin to change. Hopefully.

And by the time we have a family, we can only wish for those days when we had the time and resources to spoil ourselves and put ourselves first.

This is a natural progression. It’s what we expect of ourselves and of those around us.

But there is a downside, and a danger.

There may come a time in your life when you realize you are devoting yourself entirely to your work, your family, your friends and maybe one of two causes you support.

But what about you? How much time do you devote to yourself?

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