School Days

During my early years, I would frequently take things apart. As a curious child, you can find me behind the TV taking the phone apart because I wanted to know how it worked. I feel that at was the turning point in becoming an entrepreneur; I wanted to know how the world works! One thing at a time.

Getting candies, toys, and small trinkets is every child’s dream, and it certainly didn’t pass me by either. I started to paying attention to how much things might cost and how to then get that amount to buy my own candy and toys. I didn’t want to wait for mom or dad to reluctantly buy me something.

I raided my parent pockets for coins! I raided the seat cushions, the dresser, the cup holders in the car. I was relentless.

I saw an opportunity to help my parents just give me their spare change. To them, it was low value, but to me, it was very high value. Creating a system where they could just put their spare change in allowed me to efficiently collect them. Collecting that spare change was my goal, and I made it easy for my parents to fork it over.

High School

By my high school years, I expanded my efforts to get actual dollar bills. I started to look around the neighborhood to see what we could do as kids. Raking leave, mowing the grass, taking out trash, or whatever menial job that kids could do. I wanted to start doing that for pay because I was already doing that for my parents.

So I started going door-to-door and offering lawn service to people in the neighborhood and signing up work. From there, I would recruit my friends to work with me and split some of that profit. I would keep 60% of the payment and they would be paid out 40%. It worked well that way because I was the one finding the work, locking in the agreement, and paying out my friends.

I learned from that experience that partnering up with people and taking a smaller cut can still make you money. You don’t have to take it all on yourself and think you need to take on the world solo.

Time @ INPO

INPO stands for Institute of Nuclear Power Operations. We helped regulate the nuclear power industry here in North America. Similar to how the NRC inspects and verifies the operations of power plants, INPO does that but kicks it up a notch.

INPO was during my college internship days and I worked on the help desk. I was the first level support and picked up the phones or answered the phone calls for any problem. We were the first line of defense. Then I started to notice patterns that we were having.

From there, I trained myself to become the subject matter expert for that specific problem. With time, I became the ‘SharePoint’ guy for our 400 people strong company. I became more senior and was able to sit with Project Managers and other experts to learn how to manage projects, have conversations about the budget, and direct technology in a way to meet the goals of the project.

The employees at INPO had specific roles that they performed when they went out to inspect these power plants. You had the woman looking at the chemistry of the plant because she was the “Chemistry Woman”. The gentleman focusing on the auxiliary pumps because he was the “Pump Man”. They were very specialized…..and VERY well paid..

I learned that specializing in a specific field can help you become the expert in the room a lot quicker and command higher compensation. From observation, I realized it the power of specialization.

My First Company

When I was getting more senior at INPO, I would be approached to work on personal computers and devices. This lead me to start offering that as a service on the side to work on peoples machines.

A friend of mine at INPO was in the same boat as me. We would both be approached, but we would often share customers if we could not work on them ourselves. We also both had that entrepreneur spirit with finding and acting on opportunities if we found any. His family ran and operated a public gymnastics gym in North Georgia.

We started a company installing public access points in public locations. The first (and only) location that we were able to start with was his family gym. We had an inside track with the operating team, and installed the internet, access point, and configured everything. We then started shopping this idea around to other gyms, locations, and other public locations.

In the end, we folded the company because we realized we wanted to focus on graduating more than driving around everywhere fixing issues. This was also in the time before smart phones were super popular, so WiFi was slow and unreliable. Which was a huge headache when trying to get dozens of people on a single access point.

We both learned how to create an MVP, shop it around, and what to do WHEN things go wrong. It took a lot of patience, determination, and elbow grease to just get things started. We grew a lot while we operated that company!

Setting Out on My Own

During my time an INPO, I also started to expand my Rolodex and circle of influence. I wanted to keep people around me that I felt that I could help and grow with. I knew that I wanted to eventually work for myself and felt that keeping up with potential clients and past clients would work out in the long run.

I started moonlighting on the side and slowly built up my experience and confidence in working with strangers. I used these opportunities to start saving in my warchest for emergencies and backup income for when I DO step out on my own.

That war chest enabled me to take on more risk, be patient and picky about the clients I wanted to take on and find quality work. As I grew into freelancing, I increased my rates and kept evolving. Word of mouth and Referrals started to work for me and allowed me to step further and further into working for myself.

I fell upon a W-2 job that luckily allows me to currently work both Freelance and have clients. The catch is that that single W-2 job is good bulk of my income at the moment and that makes me worry. That is a single point of failure if I am let go.

Whats Next?

These coming years, I want to focus on diversifying my income even more. I want to make sure that I don’t have a single point that is getting me the largest ‘operational’ income. I want to ensure that the load is spread out as much as possible.

In the mean time, I am enjoying my W-2 work and I am able to balance this with my clients. I want to work on a few passive income projects, course work, products that you can purchase, and maybe additional client engagements.

We shall see what 2019 and 2020 brings!

The post FHS 41 How I Started appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Create a Newsletter

A newsletter is a powerful tool. It is a direct link to your audience. Its an invite from them to start talking to them and providing valuable content. If you are a business owner, freelancer, consultant, or anything else, having a newsletter should be in your wheelhouse.

Create a newsletter by first planning what type of audience you are planning to have with your newsletter. The easiest start is to look at your industry and become someone who keeps that audience up to date with news, events, or information. You are the expert here even if you don’t feel like you are. Get rid of that impostor syndrome because you’re already kicking butt and taking names!

Take it one step at a time and you’ll be able to grow your audience to impressive numbers.

Opt-In

Worry about the platform and tool that you’re going to use to manage the newsletter later. Plan on what you’re going to be giving away in exchange for that potential customer/clients email address. You’re building a small community around your idea or product, so give something away that is related.

The Opt-In item is something that the client may already be looking for and is little to no cost for you. A brochure, booklet, how-to guide, checklist; these are all great opt-in items that you can give away in exchange for that email address. You just need to make sure that the item is related to the newsletter.

Frequency

Try for once a month for your release dates. That’s only 12 emails that you’re sending out to your audience. Slowly build your frequency to hit about once a week. That’s only 52 emails a year that is going out to your audience. Once a month is great, but if you can do once a week, you’re doing better.

Quality vs Quantity

Quality is what is going to compel the audience member to stay with you and consume your content. Don’t just churn out content just because you need to hit those numbers. Strategically plan and think of the reasons you’re sending out these emails.

Over time, your audience is going to help guide you into what type of content you’re going to be sending out.

Part of sending out quality is that you’re going to retain those quality clients/customers. You are striving for people who interact with you and your content, repeat readers, and potential customers.

It’s better to have 5 people on your list that interact with you versus 100 people that don’t even open your newsletter.

Content

Content can come from anywhere and anything. You are already the expert in your field and industry enough that you can talk about it. If you’re still stuck on where to find content, check out these two suggested places:

• Feedly.com – A multi-website scrapper that brings content to you into a single dashboard. You’re able to group and organize multiple website feeds into different “buckets”. From there, you can create numerous newsletter content sources or research. The best part is that the free version lets you add a metric ton of sites before you need to upgrade.

• Reddit.com – Reddit is a very popular website that consolidates a lot of content into a single site. You can easily get lost within the different sub-reddits and discussions happening every day. In a nutshell, Reddit is a forum where you can participate or read discussions based on a wide range of topics. Perfect for inspiration or content for your newsletter.

Tools to Use

Mailchimp [affiliate link] – Mailchimp is a free newsletter platform that lets you simply and easily send out your content. Mailchimp manages your contact list, your content, your scheduling, and a lot of the automated processes behind the scenes as well.

The delivery system allows me to queue up a few newsletters to go out in the future. I can also create rules around the newsletters that just went out, such as “if noone opens this, send a reminder”. The automation is very impressive and perfect for what most people need. It helps keeps clients and customers engaged in you and your content.

With Mailchimp, you can also create templates for each newsletter that you’re about to send out, so you’re not rebuilding each newsletter from scratch. A template is going to save you a lot of time and helps make your messages consistent.

Drip – Drip is the next level when it comes to newsletters. When you need something that allows you to take control over every aspect of your contact list, newsletter, and content, this is where Drip works best.

Drip works best for ecommerce and situations where you want to keep clients/customers coming back to your site and shop. Mailchimp does this as well, but in my opinion, Drip does that a lot better.

Prices for Drip start at $50/month, but their feature list well makes up for that price. The performance for what you’re getting, Drip is an impressive tool that lets you take minute control over your communication to your audience.

Conclusion

Create a newsletter to have a direct connection with your clients and customers. Starting one begins with planning what type of audience you are speaking to. Work on that Opt-In piece to trade for an email address. Work on the frequency of how often you will send out an email, but shoot for at least 12 to begin with. Then look at what platform you are going to be using to send those newsletters out with.

Once you get going with a newsletter, you’ll find your rhythm and voice and you’ll notice the signups going up.

The post FHS 39 Newsletter appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Know When to Cut the Cord

Its hard to know when to let a client go, but its easier to make that decision when red flags start to pop up. Those red flags can sneak up on you or be super obvious.

A few examples of Red Flags that pop up could be:

• Red–Flag 1: “I don’t know what i want, but i’ll know it when i see it”
• Red–Flag 2: Money is stressed more than the outcome
• Red–Flag 3: Why deposits are important
• Red–Flag 4: “I don’t really have a budget right now”
• Red–Flag 5: Low to no communication
• Red–Flag 6: Sporadic Payments

In FHS 17 (Click here to listen), we chat about the red flags that we come across every once in a while.

Sometimes you come to a point where you can’t provide the services that your clients hired your for. Your skills may not be up to par or your availability changed dramatically.

Sometimes you may need to go in a separate direction. Did you decide to stop providing that service? Are you evolving your business to keep with the times? Your growth is more important than holding back and pleasing your client.

Sometimes you have to raise your rates which will then price your clients out. Don’t limit your income by keeping clients that wont move with you. The goal of every engagement is to help your clients gain a positive return in your services. There will be a few clients that you’ll hold on to at your old rate, but you should slowly plan on moving them up to your new rates.

But if you’re reached a point where you need to let them go, be specific about it. Don’t beat around the bush. Don’t lie about it. Be the professional in the relationship and let that client go!

Be SPECIFIC

Don’t be timid or vague about why you’re letting them go. At this point, you should have already had communication about changes you’ve needed to implement.

Maybe the client is unaware of able to resolve the issue. You can never really know what is going on with the client and having that open communication can move things along. A lot of times in your favor. You should have had open communication with your client when problems popped up. From there you may have been able to resolve the issues.

Let the client know specifically why you have to go in a different direction. Don’t be rude or curt, but be professional and firm with the reasons.

Leave on Good Terms (If Possible)

You never know when or if you will circle back to the client. You may have a reason to leave the client because your services outgrew their budget. Or you’re taking on different types of work.

Leave with a good taste in their mouth and help them transition (as much as possible) to an alternative. You never know how they may referrer you to other work.

If you DO want to burn your bridges, make sure this is a bridge worth burning. Don’t let your emotions take over and do a “scorched earth” type of scenario.

Stop Working on Work

Regardless of how you are letting the client go, you still need to stop all work for that client. Do not drag on additional tasks as “favors” or “to help them out”. It is not fair to you or the client if you keep sticking around and working on their tasks.

If you let the client go, that also means you let the work go. There is no obligation to keep working for free….and you should not be working for free!

Don’t Be Shy About It

Being firm and assertive when letting the client go is similar to ripping off the bandage. Its gonna hurt…but only for a little bit.

The post FHS 36 Firing Clients appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Bobby Kircher – Digital Marketing Consultant

Bobby Kircher runs Papaya Internet, a digital marketing consultant that helps individuals and small business grow their business online. He has over 15 years of SEO experience, 10 of which include using WordPress! When he’s not figuring out Google, he’s collecting records, hitting the gym, and performing improv around Atlanta. You can find him at https://papayainternet.com and on most social media with the handle @bobbykircher

Website: http://papayainternet.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/BobbyKircher @BobbyKircher

Here are a few points that we talked about:

• What is SEO
• What are some basic mistakes people make
• Strategies for SEO
• How effective would auto-playing ads be?
• Difference between mobile vs desktop vs applications
• Tracking usage in a an app
• Basic SEO strategies

Quick Picks

Bobby

• WordPress Community
  • TONS of WordPress meetups around the area in Atlanta and across many other cities
  • Very helpful and open to new commers
  • Diverse skill sets and levels of expertise

Marion

• Orlando, Fl
  • OMG so much stuff to do besides Disney/Universal Studios
  • Great for families of all ages
  • Beach is 1.25hrs either east or west

The post FHS 33 Optimizing WordPress for SEO ft Bobby Kircher appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

What is a Contract and Do You Need One?

Some people shy away from the word “contract” because a lot of time it triggers that feeling of “being sued”. A contract, by definition, is a promise or set of promises that are legally enforceable and, if violated, allow the injured party access to legal remedies. In short, its an agreement between two or more people.

My favorite tool to use for creating, managing, and signing contracts is Hello Bonsai. Its an online portal that allows you to quickly and easily create and send a contract. Hello Bonsai also keeps track of when that contract was read and signed. Pretty handy when you’ve got a lot of moving parts in your project.

If you’ve ever done work for hire, the answer to ‘do I need a contract (an agreement)’ is YES! You should never do work for money unless there is something written down and agreed upon. Even if the work being done if for a friend or family member. Especially if its a family member.

A contract is NOT a piece of paper that you can bully people into doing something against reason or their will. Its a way for both sides of the table to have an understanding of what was agreed upon. We want to make clear our understandings with each other. Whether you call it an agreement, a contract, or bargain, both sides of the contract need to agree to the contract terms.

Contracts are tools used to help both sides understand the expectations from everyone when it comes to work being done.

When creating a contract you’re going to have at least 4 main parts to a contract:

• ID the Players
• Scope of Work
• Payment
• Schedule of Work

As always, please consult with a lawyer for your specific needs and verbiage for your contract.

If you want a copy of a Contract Template, click here!

4 Minimum Parts

ID the Players

You want to know what is a part of the contract for both sides. Who is doing the work and who is receiving the work. The first section of the contract should identify this and spell it out in a way that makes sense for everyone. You need to have it outlined as to who you are dealing with as well as who the customer is dealing with.

The contract needs to specify who you are actually doing work for, who is the point of contact, and what everyone’s roles are. Your goal is to remove guess work and assumptions.

An example would be

I am a freelancer in the United States in Georgia. I work through MowenWorks, an LLC, as a consultant. My client is XYX, INC, represented by Sean Smith.

Your definition of who the different players are and how they are being represented my change depending on your type of work. You will still be outlining who you are doing work for and who has authority and final say of your work.

Scope

The scope of the work should also be defined within your contract. It spells out WHAT you are actually going to be doing for your client. Where does this definition come from? Well, it should come from your Roadmapping Session (FHS Episode 22) that you did earlier in the project.

The scope will include not only what you will be doing with the project but what you will NOT be doing with the project. This can and should include things such as

• Hours of operations
• Deliverables
• Client deliverables
• Disabilities
• Your limitiations

In this section, you should also discuss what the agreed upon outcomes will be for the project. We need to spell out what they are hiring you to do and what the client will be, possibly, doing as well to help reach that goal.

You will spell out what is defined as “DONE” with the project so everyone can agree upon and have and understanding. You wont know if the project is done unless you actually define done. Never ending projects are no-fun…

If you want a copy of a Contract Template, click here!

Payment

Payment agreement is pretty important to…get paid… So we have to talk about expected costs and payment schedule up front. The payment section will outline the total cost and any milestones that will be needed to complete the project.

For example,

The Client will pay the Contractor in milestones totaling $1,100.00 (USD). The milestones will be invoiced as follows:

• $550.00 (USD) on March 15, 2018

• $275.00 (USD) on April 1, 2018

• $275.00 (USD) on April 22, 2018

Make sure to include that you will need to take a deposit before work will begin. This is important as it signals the start of the actual project. Another tactic that you should use is to require the last payment be made at the agreed upon end date of the project.

Since you’ve defined what “DONE” is within the project, you’ll also define WHEN “DONE” is going to happen. Your last payment should fall upon this date or before (when the project is done).

Include verbiage into the contract that allows for penalties and fees if certain payments are missed, late, or the project is cancelled prematurely. This helps solidify the financial commitment for both side to work on the project until completion.

Schedule

How long is the project expected to take? We need to have an agreed upon end time and milestones for the project. The Schedule section talks about time frames, deliverable, and end dates. Don’t shy away from making this section as specific as you need to be. A lot of times, the project can have scope creep and the schedule section will help rein in on what is to be delivered.

Here is an example statement for the Schedule:

The Contractor will begin work on March 15, 2017 and will continue until the work is completed. This Contract can be ended by either Client or Contractor at any time, pursuant to the terms of Section 6, Term and Termination.

The milestones of what will be done is included in the Schedule section. You need to specify what is going to be completed and when. This also includes payment milestones for the work done.

Additional Sections

These four mane section described above are not always the end of a contract. There are usually additional sections that you’ll want to include with the contract. Here are a few of them

• Ownership and Licenses
  • Who owns what and how can they be used
• Competitive Engagements
  • You agree to not work for a competitor while the work is being done
• Non-Solicitation
  • You wont take the clients customers from them while working on the contract
• Representations
  • Defines the roles of the people on the contract
• Confidential Information
  • Information and work is confidential
• Limitation of Liability
  • No one is liable for breach-of-contract damages that are reasonably unforeseen

If you want a copy of a Contract Template, click here!

The post FHS 29 Contracts! appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Roadmapping sessions, for me, are paid engagements that gives my clients a low-cost introductory to a project. It reduces risk to you and the client while eliminating ‘Tire kickers’. My session is a credit towards total cost of the project if the clients chooses to move forward.

The session is a 90-minute dive into the customers business and problems. During the session, I build that customer relation and trust by asking questions that traditional developers don’t ask or show concern about. The goal of the Roadmapping Session is to identify where they are now, where they want to be, and how you can get them there.

At the end of it all, there is a report that I create for the client. That report is essentially the proposal and blueprint that was derived from the Roadmapping Session. The client is free to do whatever they want with that report, including shop around. But 9 times out of 10, the client has already built up that trust with you and knows first hand that you understand their “expensive problem”.

Typical Proposal

A typical proposal usually involves the following:

• Cost base

• Feature focused

• Possibly hourly

• Pray and hope they accept

With the traditional route, your proposal is usually based on a ‘McDonalds’ style; menu of features and options. You are throwing in features that all websites/projects have and you already have a cost associated with that feature/solution. You may even have an hourly rate attached to the proposal. At the end of it all, after you’ve submitted the proposal, you hope and pray that the customer accepts what you’ve thrown at them.

Revised Proposals

A revised and updated proposal may involve the following:

• Anchor Price  base

• ‘Expensive Problem’  focused

• Moves away from Hourly

• Re-iterate clients problems

Your new proposals after the roadmapping sessions can take advantage of anchor based pricing. This means that you can potentially earn more and ask for more in your proposals. You’re also not tied down to an hourly fee. You’ve found what the clients “expensive problem” is; what is costing them money if this is not fixed.

Using that knowledge, you can definitely justify a higher fee.

Roadmapping Session

The session is a 90-minute dive into the customers business and problems. During the session, you’re building the customer relation and trust by asking questions about the business and eventually that “expensive problem”. These questions are generally what traditional developers don’t ask or show concern about. The goal of the Roadmapping Session is to identify where they are now, where they want to be, and how you can get them there.

You’re going to break down the session into 4 main points. Business, Demographics, Finances, and Risk & Success. With these 4 points, you’re able to get a better picture of what’s going on. AND you’ll be able justify the price you’re asking for because you’ve just identified how much it is costing if the client DOESN’T get this problem fixed.

4 Main Points to a Roadmapping Session

Business

The business part of the Roadmapping Session are questions that are designed to talk about the business overall. A few questions that you’ll want to have are these for example:

1.       How are your products cross-sold or up-sold? Do you have anything in place that increases the customer lifetime value besides customers deciding to come back for more?
2.       What are your best-selling products? Worst-selling? And why?
3.       Of the potential clients you interact with in a month, what % of them convert to purchase products or become customers? How many net new customers?
4.       How many customers do you have total? How many buy just the one-off products? How many have joined a recurring plan?  
5.       What email marketing work, if any, are you doing now? (Broadcast newsletters, subscriber onboarding, post-purchase up-selling or cross-selling, etc.)

Demographics

The demographics of a product or service is important. This information can help you identify a plan on how to target your clients customers more effectively. A few example questions would be:

1.       Do you have a defined market or industry you target?
2.       Define your ideal subscriber (reoccurring)? Your ideal customer (single sale)?
3.       For your ideal customer, what do they buy first? What leads them to your website and to buy?
4.       What resistance do people have in buying your products?
5.       For your monthly subscription product, what do you think separates these customers from the rest of your subscriber base?

Finances

During the discussions about the finances, its OK to get rounded numbers. This is where you’re going to start putting value against the demographics and products. A few examples:

1.       Without introducing any new products or getting an increase in monthly opt-ins, what realistic monthly sales figures would make this project a success? What increase in monthly sales would make this a home-run?
2.       What is the value of a subscriber? (Example: Total annual sales + revenue divided by subscriber count)
3.       What is the average value of a customer? (Easy formula: Total sales divided by number of customers)
4.       What percentage of customers buy just once, and what percentage buy again?
5.       What is the customer lifetime value (CLTV) of those who buy once vs. repeat buyers?
6.       What is the value of a subscriber who comes organically / via social media / via paid ads? (Don’t worry if you can’t figure this out just yet.)

Risk/Success

The risk/success portion is used to help your client, as well as yourself, understand what would make the project a success. As well as a failure. We’ll also want to identify what external and internal risks could be keep the project from moving on. A few examples:

1.       Define success for this project.
2.       Define failure for this project.
3.       What risks internally (e.g., untested business model) are there that could keep this project from being successful?
4.       What risks external (e.g., risky 3rd party APIs) ) are there that could keep this project from being successful?

Parking Lot (Bonus)

I include a section at the end called “The Parking Lot”. The parking lot is where ideas that are off-topic but business relate will go. If the idea does not need to be discussed now, write it down in the parking lot so we can circle back around.

Conclusion

After the session is completed and over with, both you and the client should walk away with a better understanding of the problem. You have an idea of what the problem is right now. Where the client is aiming to be. And how you can help get them there.

Mixing all that you know about the problem and how it could be costly if the client DOESN’T resolve it, you can now create a proper proposal. Take the time to compile a report that will essentially reiterate the information that you found during the session. From there, you can formulate a fee for each section of the business that you can help with.

When doing price anchoring, you will use the information from the business, finance, and demographic section to show that your higher rates are only a fraction of the money that the client will be saving/earning in the long run.

The post FHS 22 Roadmapping Sessions appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

How many times have you thought of an idea and said to yourself “I need to start a business around this!”? But you start and stop, sit and stew, or just do nothing. A lot of time we focus on how we are going to execute the idea rather that WHAT the idea is. Or if its even a valid one.

It’s very easy to get caught up in the weeds of how you plan on implementing your idea. Where you’re going to sell. What website you need to make. What the logo is going to look like.

But you’re more than likely forgetting a key step: Is this something that people are willing to pay for?

Your Baby

You need to sit down and specify who you’re wanting to sell to. Specifically, your goal is to finish this sentence:

“Oh, me? I help __________ to __(single group of people)__ which saves them a lot of time and money.”

if you’re doing services or  

“I sell __________ to _(single group of people)_.”

If you’re selling products

You’re then going to fill in the blank of one thing you do to a single group of people that helps them save time and money.

As a business owner, you’re going to need clients and customers. These are the people who are going to buy your idea from you. There really isn’t any way around it. You can’t operate on zero sales. Who doesn’t like sales?

We need to shift our mindset and take a hard look at our own product and idea and scrutinize it. Are we holding onto that idea or product because its “MY BABY!”? Yes, it’s your idea, but let’s take the time to do a little research to see if its a valid idea. Don’t be shy to modify and adapt. We’re going to do a little Market Research.

Market Research is a tool that will guide you to identifying EXACTLY who is willing to buy what you’re selling. Market research will help you find that group of people that your product may be interesting to. I generally break market research (finding and researching your customers) into two sub tasks; finding customers and reaching customers.

You’re going to want to do what is called “market research” to help validate your idea

1. Who, specifically, are you going to be facing (niche, market, clients, customers)
2. What is the problem that you’re hearing the most often
3. What are they willing to pay
4. Is it sustainable
5. Where do they hang out

I talk with Patrick Selby about how he focused on the “What” with a few pointers and what he learned from his mistakes. Check out FHS 19: http://freelancerheadstart.com/fhs-19-market-research-building-product/

Finding your customers, what their pain-points are, and understanding the value of your services is going to give you that head start that you’re looking for. It’s going to help get you out of that feeling stuck mode.

Finding and researching your customers is a shortcut to having people pay for whatever you’re selling. You’re able to accurately know what your customers and clients are willing to buy.

Finding Customers/Clients

That “group of people” piece from up above is now your identified customers and clients. Now we’re going to start identifying where your market lives.

The main tools that I personally use is Reddit.com, Meetup.com, and LinkedIn.com. This is the first step to finding and researching your customers.

Now that you know where your customers are, you can then start to research what you’re trying to sell them. You want to validate what you THINK they want to buy to what they are REALLY willing to buy. This is the second part of finding and researching your customers.

http://www.Reddit.com

Reddit is a forum style website that has millions of users and thousands of communities. One of these communities are going to be exactly your client base. On Reddit’s homepage in the upper right corner, you can search for what’s called subreddits. These are the specific communities where your clients and customers live. Within a few days or hours of using Reddit, you’re be able to identify at least 3-5 subreddits that focus on your niche. This may be one of the easiest places you’ll use when finding and researching your customers.

http://www.meetup.com

Meetup.com is a site that lists communities that line up with who your customers are. You can even find people who have similar tastes, ideas, or industries. Let’s say you’re that web developer that wants to find non-profit animal shelters. You could search “animal adoption drives” or “animal lovers of Atlanta” to find people who have similar interests. Then you can hone in on where and when they congregate. There are dozens of topics or groups or industries that meet all over the world and the States.

http://www.LinkedIn.com

You can think of LinkedIn as a social network for professionals. You can join specific communities within LinkedIn, connect with similar professionals, or target specific people in specific companies. LinkedIn has a very extensive search option that lets you find almost exactly who you’re looking for. You can pay for their premium level account and open up even more options for finding that specific client or audience.

Don’t be downhearted if you think you’re taking a while finding and researching your customers. What you’re actually doing is refining your niche and zeroing in on your customers and clients. I would honestly spend about 40-60 hours of effort to find and research your customers, and in turn, your product. If you can understand what your audience is thinking, what their pains are, and a way to help, you’re ready to position yourself as the expert!

Set Your Milestones

You may have a vague idea of what you’d like to accomplish with your product or service. And count that as good enough. But, each goal needs a plan, or it’s just a wish.

Once you’ve settled on WHAT you are going to be selling and to WHO, you can then slowly look at the vehicle to make it happen. It should be easier now because you know where your customers live, play, work, etc. You’ve gotten over one of the more difficult parts; now focus on getting your things in the hands of your customers/clients.

Create goals and milestones for yourself that can help you gauge if your idea and delivery methods are working. Don’t be afraid to change course when you realize something isn’t working. Your goals should have a something that is measurable behind it.

Say you want to sell T-shirts to concert attendees to a specific band. With your market research, you should have an idea on where those fans hang out (online, offline, conferences, etc) and you’ll be able to target them. Keep track of the performance of your sales when you sell in person, online, through 3rd party, etc. From those metrics, you’ll be able to refine HOW you are going to sell your products.

Now, this is a basic example but you can essentially track everything about your product and its performance. The HOW part. Eventually, you’ll find out a rhythm to what you’re doing and find that sweet spot.

Don’t forget, each goal needs to have a plan on how you’re going to achieve the goal and what ‘success’ will look like. One method in creating and achieving goals is the S.M.A.R.T. method.   

Focus on WHAT then HOW

Your product or service may go through many revisions before you will find if have an audience. Focusing on getting a product created and delivered before you even know if people will care will lose you a lot of time and money. Focus on the WHAT first; will people actually care about what i am offering?

If you find that the answer is “Yes”, THEN focus on How to deliver.

The post FHS 21 Figuring out the “WHAT” appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Daria Witherspoon – Piedmont Healthcare Systems Recruiter

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daria-witherspoon-74952634/

Anastasia Owen – Aspiring Consultant/Freelancer/Entrepreneur

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anastasia-owen-0ba4a855/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/dexterovna

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dexterovna/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Undefinedundrawn

Whatever your title is, you’re working for yourself. How you set yourself up and how you approach your work may require you to change you title based on the job you’re tackling. There are many different paths you can take if you work for yourself. Bringing your confidence in your skills can help differentiate you

Highlights from this episode include

• What is a freelancer
• What is a contractor
• What is a consultant
• What is an entrepreneur
• How do you become one
• Which one pays more?
• What is required to become one?
• How do you find clients

The post FHS 20 Freelancer vs Contractor vs Consultant vs Entrepreneur ft. Daria + Ana appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Book Recommendation

Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products – Nir Eyal

Why do some products capture our attention, while others flop? What makes us engage with certain products out of habit? Is there a pattern underlying how technologies hook us? This audiobook introduces listeners to the “Hook Model,” a four steps process companies use to build customer habits. Through consecutive hook cycles, successful products reach their ultimate goal of bringing users back repeatedly – without depending on costly advertising or aggressive messaging. Hooked is a guide to building products people can’t put down. Written for product managers, designers, marketers, startup founders, and people eager to learn more about the things that control our behaviors, this audiobook gives listeners:

• Practical insights to create user habits that stick.
• Actionable steps for building products people love.
• Behavioral techniques used by Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, and other habit-forming products.

Click Here for Your Free 30 Day Trial and a FREE Audio Book with Audible

• Red–Flag 1: “I don’t know what i want, but i’ll know it when i see it”
  • Scope
  • Scope Creep
  • Agreement of what the scope is going to be
• Red–Flag 2: Money is stressed more than the outcome
  • Tire kicking rather than discussing the problem
  • Always wants a discount
• Red–Flag 3: Why deposits are important
  • Incremental payments
  • Milestones
• Red–Flag 4: “I dont really have a budget right now”
  • Value based vs hourly
  • Possibly not serious?
• Red–Flag 5: Low to no communication
  • Communication is unclear
  • Communication is lacking
  • Dragging their feet, yet requires you to run and tie your shoe at the same time
• Red–Flag 6: Sporadic Payments
  • Thats what deposits are for
  • Milestone payments help reduce the long payment cycles
• Use contracts to protect yourself
• Some redflags are not valid
• Trust your gut feelings!
• If its too good to be true, then it might be

Quick Picks

Lashia

• Audio-Technica headphones
  • Great sounding headsets for audiophiles that wont break the bank!
  • Link: http://www.audio-technica.com/cms/headphones/1000c1b0c122836e/index.html

Marion

• Audible
  • Free audio book download AND a free 30-day free trial. How can you beat that?!
  • Link: http://www.audibletrial.com/freelancerheadstart

The post FHS 17 Client Red Flags ft Lashia Levins appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.

Once you’ve identified your customers and audience, you can then focus on registering yourself. This episode will be talking about registering in the United States. Why and how to register yourself can seem daunting, but with a little patience, you’ll come out alright. Registering yourself is the act of telling the world who you legally are. Then you will have a barrier between your personal stuff (like money, car, and home) and your business stuff.  

You can name your business almost anything you want but you’re going to pick something that is in-line with what you are doing and your market. Work on a name for you business that mixes creativity and the market research you just performed. Right now, we’re not going to focus on if it’s already been used. You want to just have a brain dump of possible business names.

When you have a few names that you want to use, sleep on it. See how you feel the next day. You’ll possibly eliminate a few names when you get a rested brain looking at them. Now we need to pick how and what you are going to register.

There are four different ways to register your business

1. Entity Name protects you on a state level
2. Trademark protects you at a federal
3. Doing Business As (DBA) is a “What are you going as…” type of thing. No legal protection but sometimes required based on state
4. Domain name for websites

We are going to focus on  the Business Structure and your Entity Name. Once you’ve honed in on a single name, it’s time to work on your Business Structure. A business structure is a framework for your business that can dictate how it operates, spends money, pays taxes, and how it’s protected. They vary on what your goals are for the business, how much risk you are comfortable with, and what tax benefits you are after. Most people choose either LLC or S-Corp.

PAUSE. At this point, I want you to seriously consider hiring a tax professional to talk to and get their stamp of approval. They will be able to help guide you through the different choices with a business structure and how it pertains to taxes within your specific state. You will need to already have an understanding where you want you business to physically operate and what your long-term goals are for your business. RESUME.

LLC vs S-Corp Business Structure

LLC

In a nutshell, an LLC separates your personal assets from your business assets. This is good in case your LLC faces a lawsuit or bankruptcy. You have what is called a ‘Corporate Veil’ separating your personal things from your business things. This includes bank accounts, physical items, and other assets. Don’t you DARE mix these two. You’ll screw yourself over in the long run.

There are also tax benefits, profit/loss benefits, and legal benefits that may be attractive to you. When it comes to taxes, your profits and losses are passed through the business and attached to your personal income. This can be good because you’re not taxed twice; you don’t have to pay corporation tax. The downside though is that you are considered ‘self-employed’ and will need to pay taxes towards Medicare and Social Security.

If you have more than one member (owner) of the entity, you’re automatically labeled as a partnership for tax purposes. There are no maximum level of members for an LLC while an S-Corp is capped at 100.

Most people can take care of this themselves as it’s not too difficult. Most states have a single page form that you can fill out to take care of this. You’ll have to register with your specific state for your LLC….for every state you want to operate in…. This should run you between $100 – $175 per state on average if you do this yourself.  

You will have to renew this registration yearly to ensure you are still valid. Expect to pay a smaller renewal fee.

S-Corp

An S-Corp is a special type of Corporation that has a whole different range of tax benefits, profit/loss structure, and legal standings. Similar to a LLC, an S-Corp has defined lines of liability protection. Unlike an LLC, you can have Shareholder, directors, officers, and employees. You can attract investors through the sales of stock in your S-Corp. The person who purchases a stock in your company is called a shareholder and is therefore a part owner. You can have a maximum of 100 shareholders and they all need to be US citizens.

With taxes, you are also protected from the double-taxation with a traditional Corporation. You will be filing your taxes once a year once created. After the owner passes away or moves on, the S-Corp still will continue to exist perpetually. There are no maximum level of members for an LLC while an S-Corp is capped at 100.

For an S-Corp route, I would strongly suggest consulting with your accountant to ensure you set this up with in line with your business goals. There are a lot of things to consider with setting up an S-Corp that would take up an entire article. On average, expect to pay about $100-150 depending on your state if you decide to register an S-Corp yourself.

It doesn’t matter what you choose, your own state has different registration requirements that will be slightly different from others. Please verify with your Secretary of State’s website to make sure you fall within the guidelines.

Now you’re ready to register!

Click Here to Get Started to Register

Check for a Domain Name

Before you officially register with your state, let take a look to see if your business name is available as a website. Quickly put in your business name into a search engine and see if a website exists. If you’ve found that both the Domain Name and Entity Name are available, go ahead and register! We’ll talk about how to grab that domain name and create a website in the upcoming episodes/article.

Register with your State

Open up a web browser and navigate to your Secretary of State website. Navigate to the corporation filings section to complete an online registration form. During registration, you will be notified if your name is already taken. At  the same time, check to see if the website domain for you business is already taken THEN check your state’s Entity names. If you’ve found that both the Domain Name and Entity Name are available, go ahead and register!

Congrats! You’ve just made yourself legal. You should get a confirmation email with your official Entity registration information for your state. Let’s talk about getting your finances lined up to start taking in payments the right way.

Secretary of State Websites

1. Alabama Secretary of State, 334-242-7200
2. Alaska Secretary of State, 907-465-2530
3. Arizona Secretary of State, 602-542-3230
4. Arkansas Secretary of State, 501-682-1010
5. California Secretary of State, 916-653-3795
6. Colorado Secretary of State, 303-894-2251
7. Connecticut Secretary of State, 203-566-3216
8. Delaware Secretary of State, 302-739-4111
9. District of Columbia Secretary of State, 202-727-7278
10. Florida Secretary of State, 904-488-9000
11. Georgia Secretary of State, 404-656-2817
12. Guam Government Site
13. Hawaii Secretary of State, 808-586-2727
14. Idaho Secretary of State, 208-334-2300
15. Illinois Secretary of State, 217-782-7880
16. Indiana Secretary of State, 317-232-6576
17. Iowa Secretary of State, 515-281-5204
18. Kansas Secretary of State, 913-296-2236
19. Kentucky Secretary of State, 502-564-2848
20. Louisiana Secretary of State, 504-925-4704
21. Maine Secretary of State, 207-287-3676
22. Maryland Secretary of State, 410-225-1330
23.  Massachusetts Secretary of State, 617-727-9640
24. Michigan Secretary of State, 517-334-6206
25. Minnesota Secretary of State, 612-296-2803
26. Mississippi Secretary of State, 601-359-1333
27. Missouri Secretary of State, 314-751-1310
28. Montana Secretary of State, 406-444-3665
29. Nebraska Secretary of State, 402-471-4079
30. Nevada Secretary of State, 702-687-5203
31. New Hampshire Secretary of State, 603-271-3242
32. New Jersey Secretary of State, 609-530-6400
33. New Mexico Secretary of State, 505-827-4508
34. New York Secretary of State, 518-474-4752
35. North Carolina Secretary of State, 919-733-4201
36. North Dakota Secretary of State, 701-328-4284
37. Ohio Secretary of State, 614-466-3910
38. Oklahoma Secretary of State, 405-521-3911
39. Oregon Secretary of State, 503-986-2200
40. Pennsylvania Secretary of State, 717-787-1057
41. Puerto Rico Secretary of State, 787-722-2121
42. Rhode Island Secretary of State, 401-277-2357
43. South Carolina Secretary of State, 803-734-2158
44. South Dakota Secretary of State, 605-773-4845
45. Tennessee Secretary of State, 615-741-2286
46. Texas Secretary of State, 512-463-5555
47. Utah Secretary of State, 801-530-4849
48. Vermont Secretary of State, 802-828-2386
49.  Virgin Islands Secretary of State, 340-776-8515
50. Virginia Secretary of State, 804-371-9141
51. Washington Secretary of State, 360-725-0377
52. West Virginia Secretary of State, 304-558-8000
53. Wisconsin Secretary of State, 608-266-3590
54. Wyoming Secretary of State, 307-777-7311

The post FHS 4: Why and How to Register Yourself appeared first on The Freelancer Head Start.