TLDR;
This video outlines a six-step strategy for succeeding as a freelancer. It emphasises the importance of niche selection, understanding your market, validating profitability, designing upsells, building a strong portfolio, and pricing your services based on value rather than time. The video also highlights how AI tools can be used to enhance service offerings and create recurring revenue streams.
- Pick a specific niche based on interests, abilities, money, or experience.
- Understand your market's pain points and speak their language.
- Validate profitability before investing time and effort.
- Design upsells to increase value and recurring revenue.
- Create a proof-driven portfolio, even without prior clients.
- Charge for outcomes, not hours, to increase earning potential.
Step 1 [1:25]
The first step involves selecting a specific niche to focus your efforts. Instead of being too broad, such as "I do marketing," it's better to define a clear target and purpose, like "I help fashion brands turn TikTok clicks into conversions." To find your niche, consider four angles: interests (what you love and naturally consume), natural abilities (analytical or creative skills), money-driven (highest paying services), and experience-based (areas of expertise). Choose one main guiding angle and others as minors to narrow down your focus.
Finding Your True North [0:23]
To find your true north, consider what you love and naturally consume, even when you're not trying to. Passion makes persistence easier, which is crucial for success. If you can identify a service to offer based on your interests, you'll understand your target clientele better than most competitors. However, if your interests don't translate into profitable services, consider your natural abilities.
Natural Abilities [1:02]
If you can't find a profitable service based on your interests, consider your natural abilities. Are you naturally analytical or creative? If metrics excite you, focus on conversion-related services. If storytelling is your strength, focus on copy-led services. Your innate abilities can be a secret weapon. Focus on what comes naturally to you and align it with a profitable service, regardless of trends.
Money Driven [1:39]
If you can't identify profitable services based on your interests or natural abilities, consider a money-driven approach. If money motivates you, focus on the highest-paying services and dedicate the time to learn them. While passion is beneficial, it's not as crucial as it is for those driven by interest or ability. The key is to find a service that excites you at least to some degree to sustain long-term motivation.
Experienced Based [2:45]
If the other angles don't narrow down your options, consider your existing experience. Choosing a service within your area of expertise can provide authority and confidence. Confidence comes from mastering something through repetition. If you have experience in a particular field, identify services within that field that have a paying market.
Step 2 [3:42]
The second step involves defining your market and understanding their pain points. To sell a service, understand when your ideal clients decide they need help. Look for frustrations of both potential clients and their customers on platforms like Facebook groups, LinkedIn, Reddit, and customer reviews. Identifying these pain points allows you to tailor unique solutions and demonstrate a deep understanding of their needs in your proposals.
Step 3 [6:04]
The third step is to validate the profitability and market demand before investing significant time and effort. Avoid spending months on building an offer or resume only to find out there's no demand. Validate by observing job boards on platforms like Upwork, Contra, and LinkedIn. Analyse what people are hiring for, the language they use, and the budgets they offer to ensure your chosen service is in demand.
Step 4 [7:21]
The fourth step involves designing your upsell from day one. Aim to charge more per project by using AI to build something valuable that clients will pay for continuously. This separates freelancers who survive from those who thrive long-term. Exceed client expectations by having a premium offer ready that provides additional value.
What Separates Winners [7:34]
Freelancers who scale and thrive long term don't just deliver what the client asked for; they exceed expectations by having a premium offer ready. This offer must be valuable to the client, allowing you to charge more.
How to Do It + Example [7:53]
To implement this, consider a service like funnel optimisation. Instead of just optimising a sales funnel and providing recommendations, build a lead magnet delivery portal that offers ongoing value. For example, for a skincare brand, create an interactive quiz using Hostinger Horizons that identifies skin types and recommends personalised products. This keeps customers engaged and provides recurring value, allowing you to charge monthly for updates and maintenance.
Solution + Money Machine [9:55]
Using Hostinger Horizons, you can create an interactive quiz for a skincare brand that identifies skin types and redirects users to personalised product pages. This solves the problem of lead magnet drop-offs by keeping potential customers engaged on the client's website. By offering this as a recurring value service, you can charge monthly for hosting, updates, and new creative ideas.
ADD Value to Your Offerings [10:43]
By building a delivery portal within the client's website using Hostinger Horizons, you help them keep potential customers engaged in one seamless experience. This improves customer experience, captures emails for future sales targeting, and eliminates the need for customers to leave the site. This is just one way to increase your value and earn more money by leveraging AI.
What If You Are Not a Freelancer? [14:47]
Hostinger Horizons isn't just for freelancers; it can also be used to launch personal ideas without coding knowledge. Whether it's a job search platform or any other complex idea, Horizons combines design, development, and writing skills to bring it to life. It integrates with popular platforms like Stripe and offers 24/7 expert support with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
Step 5 [15:41]
The fifth step is to create a proof-driven portfolio, even without prior clients. You don't need a list of past clients to build trust. Instead, focus on demonstrating your understanding of the problem, process, and result. Build case studies around practice projects, do one free project with boundaries for a dream client, and package your portfolio like a story, showing the journey, problem, solution, and results.
Step 6 [16:50]
The sixth step is to avoid charging by the hour and instead charge for the outcome. Hourly rates limit your income and undervalue your expertise. Outcome-based pricing gives you authority, builds leverage, and provides freedom. While beginners may need to start with hourly rates, the goal should be to shift to value-based pricing to earn more for the same work, attract better clients, and break free from the time-for-money trap.