What is taking the Inside Out Approach When Starting Freelancing?

Weekly Newsletter for The Freelancers: Here is the latest newsletter of the week starting on 1st April 2019.

If someone said you should check what “the inside out view” is when you are considering starting out freelancing, would you know what this means?

It is an important idea that will help you start out successfully and can save you a lot of time and frustration.

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The idea is very simple really. It means that you place yourself in the position of a prospective employer and do the research that is necessary to understand what they are looking for.

Once you have determined what is required, you can start building your website profile so that you can look professional in your presentation.

It will help you tick the boxes in answering on your profile what your research has shown is required.

Freelancing platforms have a vested interest in your being successful and they will help you with your research. One of these platforms is Upwork that provides you with guides.

The guides are under Hiring Resources by Upwork. You have to understand that is what you are researching because it is easy to think that you are not hiring.

So, why would you be interested in Hiring Guides! Not so, you are very interested in what prospective employers are looking for so that you can meet the market expectations.

You can read Upwork’s Hiring Guides here.

If you want to work more closely with Upwork, which is one of the largest freelancing platforms, by clicking on the icon below you can check out Danny Flood’s Kindle eBook: Hack Upwork. How to make Real Money as a Freelancer:

Motivate Yourself!

“The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that
changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed
to fail is not taking risks.”

– Mark Zuckerberg

The Ultimate in Motivation: The Future of Work is changing, are You?

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Lucy Karinsky is a software developer from Sydney, Australia and has written an article on this topic entitled The End of an Era: Will Programmers Become Obsolete?

This is why the article should be an important source of motivation to all freelancers:

In Australia, we are feeling the effects of a revolution in retailing as Amazon.com has opened their full facilities in Australia. This is having a significant impact on retailing in Australia where I live. To a large extent, we have been sheltered from this type of competition.

Amazon.com is now the largest retailer in the world. Mercer Bell has written an article entitled How Amazon will change the Australian retail landscape in 2019 for www.adnews.com.au and you can read Mercer’s article here.

Why should I be telling you this, you may well ask, but there is a very good reason. The retail stores in Australia are rapidly upgrading their services to cope with the increased competition that Amazon.com’s innovations are bringing.

These changes are unstoppable and have provided their motivation to change. Freelancers are like the Australian retailers. They have to watch out for future innovations and competition that will change their business model.

Having read the story about Amazon.com and competition it is time to read Lucy’s article in the Freelancer.com Blog which appears here.

When you have read Lucy’s article ask yourself, “Will my skills still be required in five years and what can I do train myself to broaden my skills and keep ahead of technology changes?” It is a great article from Lucy.

Productivity Tip Of The Week

Do You Belong to a Freelancers Community Group that Discusses Productivity?

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Being a member of the online digital new age workers, it is important that freelancers belong to groups. The reason for this is twofold. It engenders the sense of community and also allows you to share ideas which will make you more successful.

You do not have to be a member of a freelancers’ Flash Team working on a project to share ideas.

Freelancing platforms recognize that freelancers need communities. One of the bigger platforms is Upwork and they naturally have a Facebook page where their users can share ideas and tips.

They will often feature their Upwork Blog posts on their Facebook page so it is really very easy to participate in their community and get some good tips.

Melanie Feltham is the Social Media Community Manager at Upwork and she has written an article entitled Setting Goals for Your Freelance Business. You can read Melanie’s article on their Blog here.

Melanie, being a Social Media Manager, uses Twitter as well so you can follow her on Twitter here. If you find some tips you would like to share with other members following Freelance Work Guide you can do so on the Facebook page here or send us a tweet here.

Work-Life Balance Tip Of The Week

What to do When You Have a Top Client Deadline to meet and a Family Crisis Happens?

Whether you are a freelancer working at home or a 9 to 5 employee, family crises happen and they have to be managed.

However, it is different when you are the boss of everything. You can’t just say to your employer, “Look, I’m sorry, but I have to go and look after my daughter. She has been in a car accident.” Of course, you will still go to help your daughter who may be in a hospital.

When you have your immediate crisis sorted, you can’t help thinking about your top client’s urgent job you were doing. What can you do?

There is a freelancing platform that has thought about situations where you need to outsource, but really have no time to find a freelancer who can take on the gig that you have to leave.

It is a top work-life balance issue that can cause a lot of stress because families come first, but you still have to pay the bills! Freelancer.com has come up with a solution for those situations where you don’t have the time or skills needed to find the right freelancer.

Freelancer.com calls this service Recruiter and you can read about it here. Of course, there is a cost to use this service, but when you measure the cost against the relief of stress and the work-life balance benefits, it is a top service.

Naturally, it can also be used in many ways to help you find the right person for outsourcing a gig and if you are smart, you will incorporate the cost into your overall quote for a project. It can also be used to put together a freelancing team for a major project.

Financial Tip of the Week

A Free Webinar: How to Land More of your Ideal Clients!

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If you know what your income goal is, the next logical step is to know what your ideal client is to achieve that goal. It seems pretty straight forward, doesn’t it? That is what strategic thinking about your freelance business is about.

Knowing where you are going! Your goal is essential before you start looking at how you are going to get there. There is another strategic thought that can help you on this journey and that is to whom you can turn for help in planning to land more of your ideal clients.

The Freelancers Union recognized that this process is an essential part of being a successful freelancer. They have put together a video that you can watch to support you in this planning.

Nathan Bransford has written an article that goes with the video: How to Land More of Your Ideal Clients. He wants you to succeed in marketing yourself so that you can put all the parts of the jigsaw puzzle together to make you a successful freelancer.

You can watch the video and read the article by clicking here. I think that Nathan’s tip number three about targeting a niche is a top financial tip! Can you target a niche?

Freelancer Skills Development and Inspiration News

Freelancer Skills Development and Inspiration News
Freelancer Skills Development
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We are constantly researching for news articles and videos on skills development and inspiration for freelancers.

Each week we have decided to bring you the links to what we consider are the top three articles or videos. Here they are for this week:

www.themuse.com: 9 career change success stories that will seriously inspire you

www.truelancer.com: 7 people whose stories are definitely inspiring

www.cnbc.com: Stephane Kasriel The future of work won’t be about college degrees, it will be about job skills

I will maintain the links for my opinion of the New Economy and that skills and job focused training is one of the possible solutions for long term structural assistance to rural communities.

This article sets out the reasons: Training choices matter for freelancers and career changers. You can read it by clicking on the link here.

There are now 5,000 skills in 90 categories that the digital economy can offer, according to Upworks 4th quarter 2018 Skills Index which you can read here.

Articles now on our website that are relevant are listed here:

The latest one is here:

https://www.freelance-work-guide.com/retirees-freelancing-medical-hospital-ancillary-insurance

Amazon News

The weekly AWS news video link to acloud.guru is here. They are the leading trainers globally for AWS freelancers.

Amazon Associates Website Case Study

We are focussing on the niche website in the future because it is producing better results i.e. sales.

Here is a recent article: Best Tool Backpack: Top 5 Recommended. There have been 25 sales in the past month due to the keyword research and skills of Mamun, my virtual assistant.

Freelancers And Cyber Security

In view of the recent hack of Reddit we have decided to link to the Australian Bankers Association fact sheet entitled Small Business – Protecting Your Business Information Online which you can access here. We urge you look at other Fact Sheets that are available from the Association as well related to business and personal security.

We have gained approval from Robert Siciliano to bring you extracts from his books related to cyber security for freelancers. Robert Siciliano is an identity theft expert and consultant. He also runs a cyber security and fraud prevention website which you can see here.