The Importance of Self-Promotion as a Freelancer

When it comes to freelancing, many people struggle with self-promotion and finding their niche in the market. However, having a unique value proposition and being able to stand out from the crowd is crucial for success. A key aspect of self-promotion is showcasing your skills and expertise through various channels.

One way to do this is by creating a strong online presence. This can include having a professional website or profile on freelance platforms such as Upwork or Fiverr. However, many people make the mistake of just posting their resume and a generic description of their services without adding any value. To stand out, you need to show that you're more than just a freelancer - you're an expert in your field.

You can do this by creating high-quality content on your website or social media platforms. This could include blog posts, videos, podcasts, or even courses. The key is to create content that showcases your skills and expertise, and demonstrates how you can help clients achieve their goals. For example, if you're a web developer, you could create a tutorial series on building responsive websites using HTML and CSS.

Another way to showcase your skills is through personal branding. This includes creating a unique visual identity for yourself, such as a logo or business card, that reflects your values and personality. It also means being consistent in how you present yourself online and offline. This can include having a consistent tone of voice, using the same language and keywords across all platforms, and being mindful of how you come across on social media.

Personal branding is not just about creating a unique image, it's also about building relationships with potential clients and partners. Networking events, conferences, and meetups are great ways to connect with other professionals in your industry and build relationships that can lead to new opportunities.

However, having a strong online presence and personal branding alone is not enough. You need to be able to demonstrate value to potential clients and show them why you're the best choice for their project. This means being clear about what services you offer, how you work, and what results you can deliver.

The Problem with Wannabe Freelancers

One of the biggest challenges facing wannabe freelancers is that they often lack a strong personal brand and are unable to differentiate themselves from others in their field. This can make it difficult for them to stand out and attract clients. Many people think that simply having a computer and being able to type fast enough qualifies someone as a freelancer.

But being a good freelancer takes more than just technical skills - it requires communication skills, soft skills, and the ability to work with human beings. According to statistics, 80% of success in your career comes from soft skills, such as being likable and having good communication skills. While 20% of success comes from technical aptitude, this is especially true for programming.

To succeed as a freelancer, you need to be able to work with clients remotely, communicate effectively, and understand their needs. This requires more than just technical skills - it requires emotional intelligence, empathy, and the ability to build rapport with others.

Freelancing: The Business of Getting Paid

When it comes to freelancing, many people think that it's just about getting paid for your work. However, this is not entirely accurate. Freelancing is a business, and like any business, it requires planning, strategy, and execution.

The first step in building a successful freelance career is to define your niche or area of expertise. This can include anything from web development to writing to graphic design. Having a clear idea of what services you offer and who your ideal client is will help you target your marketing efforts and attract the right clients.

Once you've defined your niche, it's time to start building your portfolio. This should include any relevant work experience, skills, and certifications. Your portfolio should showcase your expertise and demonstrate how you can solve problems for potential clients.

Next, you need to develop a pricing strategy that takes into account your expertise, skills, and the value you can deliver to clients. Pricing is not just about how much you charge per hour - it's about creating a pricing structure that reflects the level of expertise and effort required for each project.

The Importance of Small Projects

When starting out as a freelancer, many people are tempted to try to land big projects from the start. However, this is often a recipe for disaster. Trying to tackle a large project without sufficient experience or skills can lead to burnout, missed deadlines, and poor quality work.

Instead, it's better to start with small projects that demonstrate your capabilities and help you build a portfolio. This could include anything from writing articles to creating social media content to building simple websites. By focusing on smaller projects, you'll be able to develop your skills, gain experience, and attract clients who appreciate your abilities.

A Smart Way to Get Help

One of the biggest challenges facing freelancers is finding help when they need it. Whether it's a new skill or a complex problem, many people struggle to find someone who can assist them.

To overcome this challenge, consider working with other freelancers or experts in your field. This could include hiring a virtual assistant, contracting a freelancer for specific tasks, or collaborating with another business owner on a project. By leveraging the expertise of others, you'll be able to deliver high-quality work and attract clients who appreciate your abilities.

Conclusion

Freelancing is a challenging but rewarding career path that requires self-promotion, marketing skills, and a strong personal brand. By showcasing your skills and expertise through content creation, networking, and building relationships with potential clients, you can establish yourself as an expert in your field and attract high-paying clients who appreciate your abilities. Remember to start small, build your portfolio, develop a pricing strategy that reflects your value, and leverage the help of others when needed. With these strategies, you'll be well on your way to building a successful freelance career.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en- Hey you, how's it going?This is Qazi from cleverprogrammer.comand this video, this is gonna basically bethe ultimate guide on how to becomea successful Python free lancer in 2019.I sat and I thought a lot about whatwere the exact steps that I tookto be able to get there and how a lotof other successful developers wentfrom complete zero to being ableto even make six figures and beyondas a Python free lancer,and I tried to put them in this videofor you in a step by step process.So this video hopefully will serveas like a manifesto thatyou can refer back tofrom time to time on your journeyto becoming a developer.Now, this video will be really helpfuleven if you're a complete beginnerwith let's say zero monthsof experience coding,the zero the three monthsof experience coding.I will also show you howto improve your incomeand become more successfulas a free lancereven if you're more advanced.All right.This video will also answer some reallyimportant questions that people asklike people often ask me, Qazi I am abeginner, or intermediate,in Python programing,I have no prior work experience,how do I actually startearning an income from coding?So I wanna address thatquestion head on as well'cause I think that's very importantespecially a lot ofpeople, a lot of peopleare students in collegesso they don't havework experience how do they get theirfirst internship, howdo they get their firstfreelancing job, when people wannasee prior experience?So this video is gonna help you obliteratethat excuse and help you start earningan income in your firstthree months of coding.Now this is not like someget rich quick type of thing,this is gonna be a very detailed processthat I'm gonna lay out for you.This is gonna require a lot of hard work,but this is the cleareststep by step processthat I've seen anyone ever explainso I wanna do that for youand put it in this video.Now before we jump in tothe content of this video,please do me a favor because we put a lotof time and effort intomaking these videosfor you guys so the best thing,the best help you can get is if youeven like the video andsubscribe to the channeland make sure you hitthat bell notificationnext to the subscription button,so then anytime we make a new videoit'll come straight to you.Also, I have something really incrediblefor you at the end of this videoand I'm gonna reveal to you so definitelyyou wanna stay tuned in this entire videobecause that gift that I have for youyou're really gonna love.With that said, let's jump right into it.Hey this is Rafeh Qazifrom cleverprogrammer.comand on this channel we help people becomea successful Python freelancerand we help you go from zeroto earning your first six figuresas a Python freelancer.Now this channel we help you break outof your nine to five job, work remotely,and live life on your own terms.So if that excites you, again,click that subscribe buttonand jump on this journey with us.Now let's jump into this video.So I'm gonna actuallybreak it down in four stepson how to actually becomea Python freelancer.Step number one, masterthe fundamentals of Python.What does it look like tomaster the fundamentalsof the programming language Python?I look at it like this, you don't haveto have, you don't even have to be ableto solve like super complex problems,but you wanna have somelevel of competency.So what are the things required thereand how long does that actually take?So let's break that down.What that looks like is you start offby learning coding, all right?So you spend, let's say 30 to 60 dayslearning programming and you learn thefundamentals of the programming language,for example the basicstructure in a syntax,what are variables, what are strings,how do if conditions work,what are conditionals,what are functions, what are classes?So like object orientedprogramming as well.Now once you cover most of the basicsof programming, you should be ableto solve problems likethe Fizz Buzz problemwhich almost every interview will ask you,this challenges your, a little bitof your critical thinking but it alsochallenges you in terms of, okay do youknow how conditionals work in programming?You should also be able to make gameslike tic tac toe, or rock paper scissorseven if you can't makethem from complete scratch,that's okay because most developersaren't making anything, almost ever,from complete scratch.You are actually referencing materialfrom online, butbasically can you actuallyuse every resource in your brainto put together this app by yourself?So you should be able toput these apps together.Now, once you can do these types of tasks,I believe it generally will take youone to two months, andthe reason I say thatis even if you havejust a few hours a weekto spend, you can actuallylearn these skills really well.I have a free Python course,I'll pop that up over here,it's call learn Pythonprogramming by building projects.And in that course we actually teach youhow to actually learn programmingfrom complete zero andit's a five day courseif you go really intensely into it.So you can actually shorten your 30 dayor 60 day cycle in as little as five days,but that does mean that you're putting inprobably five hours or 10 hours a day.Now if you can't put infive to 10 hours a day,then just understand that it will take youprobably 30 to 60 days asa realistic time frame.So within 30 to 60 days you should be ableto understand the fundamentals of Python,master them and be able tobuild simple applications.Now, once you've learned that,let's move on to steptwo where you actuallystart earning an income.So what does step two look like?Now let's break it downinto something tangible.Now this actually camefrom when people keptasking me, and I also kept asking myselfwhen I was starting tofreelance in my days,I kept coming across this problemwhere I was a beginner in programming,or an intermediate, I hadlike a few months experience,but I couldn't get freelancing jobsbecause they were really fricking hardand required a really difficult high levelof expertise like if you go on upwork.comand you try to look up freelancing jobs,and if you're a beginner, or intermediate,you're gonna have a lot of difficultybeing able to actuallycomplete those tasksor complete those jobs.Also, even some that Ithought like maybe I could do,those people didn'thire me because I didn'thave relevant workexperience to show them.So, I'm a beginner, I don't have relevantwork experience whichmeant that I couldn'tactually go on to land these jobs.That was a huge problem.I thought how can I actuallystart earning an income.Is the only way that I have to wait threeor four years of college, get a degree,and then start earning an income?However, when I actually looked around,a lot of my friendswho had gotten degrees,even they weren't landing jobs.And a lot of my otherfriends were quittingtheir CS majors because professors wentfrom teaching you hello worldand the next week you were makinglike a fucking stock trading app.So the jump in the level of complexitywas way too difficultso most of the peoplewho were even graduating from collegeare essentially self taught developers,they're teaching themselves.So first I thought okay,I can't rely on collegeor the educational systemto teach me programmingbecause most of the people who graduatedare actually not relyingon the school system,they're teaching themselves and thenjust come and ace classes,and then other people cheatoff of their homework.So that's what's happeningmost of the times, right?So I thought, okay if thesepeople are teaching themselvesI gotta start teaching myself,but I gotta be able to find a wayto earn an income before I actuallystart applying to places like upwork.com.And then I thought, I came up withwhat if I start teachingpeople what I know so far?So in my 30 to 60 daysof experience codingwhat I realized wasmajority of the people,by definition, are beginnerswho are trying to learn.Most of the people havevery little knowledgeof coding and there's a mass marketlooking to learn programming.And if you have 30 to60 days of experienceyou're like one or 10steps ahead of most people.Most people who would pay you anywherebetween $25 an hour to$100 an hour or morefor you teaching them programming.So that's where I actually started.I went to a platform called wyzant.comand I actually made a profile on there.And I also went to a platformcalled takelessons.comand I made a profile on there.Once I made a profile on there,what ended up happening was over timeI actually got clientsright from wyzant.comand takelessons.com thatstarted hitting me upand started scheduling lessons with me.I set my hourly rate at $35 an hourand my first lesson Ibelieve I got in 2016,December, something like that,I'll try to put a screenshot hereso you guys can see and follow along.And that was actuallyfreaking mind blowing.I'm like, okay this is insanebecause this is possibleand people are paying me that much.When I walked into that lessonto teach this person programming'cause he said something like,he's working on a final exam for coding.So when I came in I was actually reallyintimidated, I thought Icouldn't help this person,but then I thought, okay if I can't helpthis person what I can do at leastis I can try to help this personand if I really can't,at the end of the dayI'll just refund him.So that's what I did, I just went in,the lesson took place at Starbucks,and we just casually sat thereand I helped him with his assignmentand there were some partswhich I could figure outso I told him I'll actually work on itin my own time.He thought that lesson was super helpful'cause we were trying to figure out thingstogether at the same time.And then once I left, Iactually figured out the restof the problem on my own.And it ended up being not so complicatedwhat I realized was those 30 to 60 daysthat I actually spent learning on my own,most people aren't ever learningprogramming on their own, they're justdoing the college assignments,and they're spending bare minimum amountof time learning coding, which meansthat most of the times they canregurgitate information,they can regurgitate like,or just get throughtheir homework assignmentbut they don't actually understandhow most of these things work.Whereas when you teach yourself,you're really able toactually do these projects'cause you learn how to think critically.My mind was blow that I was actually ableto help this person, charge $35 an hourfor my first student in undertwo months of experience.Then I asked myself the question,can I repeat this process?I started repeating this processand I started landing multiple clients.So if you do the math, ifeven one student is doingtwo hours with me everyweek, that's $70 per studentand me actually learning programming.Over the course of a month that comes outto be $280 per student, okay,over the course of the year nowthat comes out to be over$2,000 with just one client.And then I thought, okay what aresome levers here that I could change?One, I can get one client, that meansif I can keep them for a year,that's $2,000 plus, maybe even $3,000.The second lever that I could changeand play around with is increasing myhourly rate with each client.So if I doubled my ratewith a particular client,or I got a new client at double rate,then that would mean I double my incomeby the end of the year.So I'm like okay, let'stest some of this stuff out,so the first thing I decided to dowas instead of doublingmy rate with a client,I got a new client at $50 an hour.So now I had two clients,one at $35 an hourand one at $50 an hour, sowith the two of these clients,now my income went close tolike $400 or $500 a month.Then the next client Igot, I got for $75 an hourbecause at this point now I startedto get reviews andtestimonials on my profilewhich make you look awesome.I had a great profile as well,and more of these clientsstarting working with me.So over the course of a month,my income ended up going from you knowwhen I started it was $280 andthen it ended up going to 1,000,my first $1,000 a month, I increased itto $1500 a month and now another thingthat I wanna tell youthat's really importantto understand here is that not onlywas I actually increasing my incomebut keep in mind that I was doingonly a few hours a week workingwith the people that Ireally enjoyed working with.I didn't have any boss, bye.- (mumbles)- Oh, no no, that's okay- I'll let you know where I stopped.Everything's good you didn'tmiss me at this point.- Perfect you're awesome,thank you so much,I appreciate it.I didn't have any boss,I was actually ableto work by myself.Some of the clients I would meet in placesthat I loved going to like Starbucksor some of the clients I met onlineso I didn't actuallyeven to travel for themI got to chose my own schedule,I can travel anywhere I wanted,and I was still earning an incomeand one of the most important thingsI'm gonna mention here isthat it was the fastest way togrow my skill set in coding.Because every project and every studentI was taking on, everyone had assignmentsthat would challenge me,and grow my skill set.So I was improving at a rapid pacewhile earning an income.And over the course ofsix months to a year,I actually was able toscale from just havinga few clients to haveover 20 or 30 clients,and I was able to earn over 30to 40 thousand dollars a yearand eventually I scaled just my coachingand tutoring all the way to70 to 80 thousand dollarsor beyond every year, all right.Now this took time and effortand a lot of systematic workbut it was definitely worth itand it made me go, if I want to freelance,I can choose to freelance,or I can actually be doing thisearning a great income and having massiveand deep impact in peoples lives,because there were students who were goingto coding boot camps that needed my help.There were students who were goingto high school or collegethat needed my helpor there were people who were developersthat came to work with me so they couldactually get help in their own jobs.So the demand for this was massive.So this is step number two.I know we went really deep into itbut I wanna emphasize how that this isthe secret sauce, the secret stepthat just nobody every mentions.I firmly believe this is one of themost important gaps that'll take youfrom have no experience being a beginnerto then going to that stepof becoming a freelancer.Other benefits of this I wanna mention areyou're gonna have testimonials,you're gonna learn howto reach out to clients,you're gonna learn how to land clients,you're gonna learn how to retain clients.you'll learn how to workwith clients over the courseof three months, six months, a year.These are incrediblypowerful skills that once youbecome a better and a stronger developer,and you actually startgoing out to freelance,either with local clients,or you go to upwork.com to freelance,you'll be able to leverageall of these skills.Also, you'll be able to leverage the factthat you have so many testimonialsand experience in working with Pythonand you can actually share thatand that will qualify you to be ableto work with other people, all right.You have experience nowworking on multiple projectsthat other people were working on.You have testimonials frompeople who are learning Pythonand they give you these testimonialsthat you can show off toa potential new clientor a prospect.Again, this was just step two.Now we're gonna move onto step number three.Step number three isbuild real world projects.Now before we get to step four,which I'm gonna talk about how to actuallyfreelance and earn an income.In step number three we're gonna talkabout the power of buildingreal world projectsbecause before you jumpto becoming a freelancer,you actually now need a lot moretechnical aptitude when it comes to codingand you need real worldprojects that you canthen show it to yourfuture clients, all right.So you have developed a skill setsof so far, okay, if you're followingon this journey you have developeda skill set of retaining clients,of landing clients, ofnegotiating with clients,of being able to charge premium pricing,of learning how to deliver value.You have testimonials, you have experienceworking with Python, with other people.You have all this at this pointbut now what you need is you needto be able to actually justincrease your skill setand have a portfolio that youcan show to people, all right.So this stage is actuallygonna take you quite,this is gonna be the mostdifficult stage so to speak,the transition between going froma Python instructor intothen freelancing with Python.But what this requires is for youto build practical projectsand build lots of them.So you're gonna be constantlylearning programming,so I would say 20% of your timewill be learning new skills in programmingand 80% of your time will beactually building projectsthat you can put on your portfolio.So you're just beefing up your portfolioand project base here.But what I want you to keep in mind isyou don't wanna just workon random ass projectslike going to a CS50 course and taking it,which by the way is a great courseif you wanna take it goahead CS50 is awesome.But what I mean is try notto have a shotgun approachbecause you're not gonna be ableto do really well when you transition overto freelancing because it's much betterto get really deeply technicalin a certain skill setrather than have like 50 different skillsin programming and then justbe mediocre at every one.It's better to be moreniche and more jackedin a specific skill set.So what I would recommend for example isgo on upwork.com and look at the jobsthat are there, okay?So go on upwork.com, go to the search boxand hit, type in you know Pythonand then scroll through the jobs.So go and look at thedifferent jobs that exist.You wanna look at jobsthat have a skill levelof let's say easy to intermediate,so that's something youshould be able to dowithin you know you're inyour first, between yourfour months of coding experience,four to 12 months ofcoding experience, okay.So you wanna look at those types of tasks.So what do I mean?Let's say you go online and you seesomething crazy like build a you knowapplication that has a redundant storageand it can serve to over onemillion users every monthand it has a difficulty rating of expert,for now, that's no, that's a typeof skill that's gonna take youlike five years to develop or more.So you wanna focus on something likemaybe it's a $300 freelancing taskor $500 freelancing taskthat actually requiresweb scraping abilities to go to a websiteand get all of the pdf links from there.Or it requires you to go to Ebayand get all the featured deals from Ebayand put it in an Excel sheet.Now that's a much more doable projectand that actually doesn't takethat much time for you.You could literally go toone of our YouTube videoson web scraping, learnthat specific skill set,practice it over the course of a few weeksor days and be able to land a clientyou know with a freelancing job.You want to make surethat as you're in thisphase three of buildingreal world projects,research on upwork.com what are the typesof projects that youcan see yourself doing?What are the ones that you could seeyourself doing in a shorter period of timeand then plan your learning aroundwhat's actually relevant and whatpeople paying for right now.So if you constantly seethese web scraping jobsand it's interest to you,then what you wanna do is you wannacome back to the drawing boardand you actually want to spend your timelearning web scraping skills.So you wanna developdeep web scraping skills.Go through web scraping tutorials,build a web scraping project.So when you go to thatspecific client in the future,on upwork.com or anotherclient on upwork.com,that requires you to do web scraping,you can just refer them back to your workon web scraping and be like lookat my portfolio, I'mawe a web scraping expertand I can help you with your task.If you're interested in doing stuffwith regular expressionsor you're doing stuffwith data mining, oryou're doing Python stuffwith web development, youknow you're interestedin the web development jobs on Upwork,then go back to the drawing boardand practice all of yourlearning around web development.We even have a coursecalled Profitable Programmerthat teaches you how to be a full stackweb developer with Python.So practice and go through learningthose web development skills.And then once you developthose web development skillsand you build let's sayPython projects using Django,then you host those projects with Herokuand you learn how databaseswork like postgres and stuff,now you're becoming betterat web development, right,and you're building a portfolio.So then in a few months you could goright back on upwork.com and actuallyapply for that job andshow them your experience,show them your testimonials on let's saywyzant or taklessons.comand go look at this,I can offer you the skill set I haveof building these projects and lookat what my clients say about me.That's everything a person who's lookingto hire you needs to know.Once they see that,it's a much easier sellon your end and youcould position yourselfin a really premiumway and charge anywherefrom $50 an hour to $300 an hour, okay.If you're more advanced than 300going from 50 to $150 an hour mighttake you two years, okay.It's a doable step by step processspecially if you laserfocus on the skill setsthat are in the job marketcurrently right now.So this is very important in termsof you look at the relevant marketand then you go and planyour learning around it.Spend a lot of fucking time around lookingat what kind of jobs exist,'cause think about this,how backwards is school?Think about the school system,the thing that determines your whole life,your major, they onlyspend a few days on it.When I was going to college,I had meetings with my counselor likeprobably once or twice a whole yearbut those meetings determined three monthsor six months of my life.How absurd is that?That the thing that's gonna determinethe three to six months of my lifeis essentially just one hour longor a 30 minute long quick meetingwith the counselor thathasn't figured their own lifeand are here and are handing out adviceto every single, likethousands of studentswith back to back appointmentsand they're determining your life overthe course of like a 20 or 30 minuteor an hour long meeting with you.And that's all the timethat gets spent on it.But then all the other time is spentactually going to classes andputting in the grunt work.Where I think it shouldalmost be the opposite'cause your future is the mostimportant thing to plan for.It's almost like you'reon a conveyor belt, okay.There're multiple conveyor belts,one belt leads you intothe depths of hell,the other conveyor beltsleads you into heaven.Now if you actually spend a lot of timethinking about, okay thisone leads me to hell,this one leads me to heaven,you quickly do a quick Google researchwhich one is more pleasurableand you find out it's heaven,then you get put on the conveyor beltand then you keep going, right?But you have to put in thework to do that researchbut often times if you don'tdo the research correctlythen you actually mightget put on the trackthat's gonna put you inhell and a lot of painand you know a major thatyou never really wantedand that's where you're gonna geton the conveyor beltand start going, okay?And then it determinesthe rest of your life.So the school system is really backwards.I think they should spend like 20 or 30%of the time planning your futureand showing you specifically what kindof jobs will you be doing.What kind of skills doyou need to learn nowto be able to get the jobs you want.They don't actually focus on the jobswhich is the ultimateoutcome that you want,so you need to focus on them.So how can we fix that broken school modeland fix it in the Pythonfreelancing world?Here's what I would suggest, okay?Here's what you need to actually do.You need to look at the relevant projectsand spend 20 to 30% of the time,you know on your fricking iPhone, okay,I don't have my iPhone with me,but on your fricking iPhoneget the app upwork.com,put it on your fucking home pageright next to like the text messaging appthat you have or the phonecall icon that you have.Put it on your home page,make it something fun,make it something exciting,so then you click on it and while you'rein the bathroom or you're waitingfor someone in line, oryou're just hanging out,you click on the upwork.com appand you just see what kind of projectsand things that people areoffering real money for.So once you develop that habitand you get excited by it,automatically you'regonna be spend 10 to 20%of your time actually looking at whatskills you need to develop andthen wrap and map your skills,the skills that you need to develop,around, right, around the real worldjob market on the things thatyou need to be able to do.So this makes your learning hyper relevantand it makes your skillset hyper relevant.Whereas for example if you goto a college for four years they havean outdated curriculum,they don't focus onwhat's in the job marketand so often timeswhen people graduate after four years,they have $60,000 or more of debtwith outdated skill set that you can'tget freelancing jobs for, and you oftencan't get full-time jobs for either,because in the softwaredevelopment world things move fast.So wouldn't it be cool if you werejust on top of it, right, by being ableto see what's happening inthe market all the time?So that is step number threewhich is massively massively important.Just to wrap it up, step number threeis build real world projects aroundreal world market.Now, we're gonna get intoour really exciting part.Step number four, how tostart earning an incomeas a Python freelancer.Up until now, what have we done?Step number one was masteringthe basics of Pythonso you can get ready for tutoring.Step number two was tutor with Pythonand you can actuallyscale your income from,and you can actuallybe a complete beginnerwith less than two months or three monthsof experience and you canstart scaling your incomefrom zero dollars an hour to $60,000,oh sorry, zero dollars a yearto $60,000 a year or more.I know tons of tutorsmyself, well one is me,one is my friend Tenzin who actuallymade over $100,000 a yearjust tutoring, all right.And I know other tutors online thatare making over $100,000 a yearso you can make sixfigures from just tutoringif you really wanted to.Again, it's not easy,it takes a lot of work,it takes discipline andeffort and consistencyso please understandthat it's not somethingthat's easy but it's simpleprocess if you follow it.All right, now, so those thingsyou did in step two, right?Step three was aboutbuilding real world projectsaround real market.Now step four is this stepthat we're talking aboutright now, freelancing with Python.So now that you've doneall of those thingsyou have the testimonials,you have the reviews that you need,you have completed the real world projectsand put them on your portfolioand you've niched down so insteadof like doing a web scraping projectand a data mining project,and a data science project,and a tic tac toe project,instead of spreadingyourself thin like that,you've actually worked on likemaybe let's say all webscraping projects, okay.So you've specifically went and tookweb scraping courses on let's say courseraor Udacity or whatever,you specifically wentand learned web scraping techniquesfrom you know YouTubeand now you are readyto go and start as a web scrapingusing Python on upwork.com.Now I'm gonna give you guys tipsthat are gonna be helpful for peoplewho are getting their jobs the first timeand these skills are also gonnabe massively helpful for anybodywho is a more advanceddeveloper who is readyto actually start freelancing right now.So please pay attention to this'cause this could be a gold mine for you.All right so number one, you needto have a solid profile.Now I'm not gonna go too much into detailsabout profiles, I'm just gonna hit onlike the top parts of the profile.One of the most important thingsyou need is an epic headshot.Now I'm not giving thisto you as some bullshitgeneric blogging one onone advice, all right.This is coming from experienceand this is coming from lookingat some of the bestdevelopers in the worldand I'm trying to share this with you'cause from of a position of pain too'cause when I didn't do this rightit literally cut my income in halfand I doubled my revenue byjust having a right headshot.What does a right headshot look like?This what is what a not rightor a wrong headshot looks like, okay?Most people's picturesare gonna be like thator they're gonna be like something weirdlike only their forehead is showingbut like the rest of the thing is blurry.You have no idea how many potentialclients are gonna turn off by thatbecause people are tryingto work with human beings.They don't just want the job donethey want to work with a human beingthat they like who can then do that job.So your skill set is almost secondary.The first thing they'll see is a humanthat they like or not, all right?So this is a pretty important step.So a normal like,that's it all right,that just a little smile,okay, or you can even have like the personwho's taking your photo with the iPhoneokay, on a iPhone you can actually usethis mode called portrait modewhich is fantastic.Just have a little bit of light on you,you could take your own photoor you can give it to somebody else,they could take your photo and done,you have a professional headshot.Just go outside, you have thesunlight hitting your face,take a fricking headshot, okay?This is one of the craziestmost important thingsfor a freelancer, seriously.Okay, now that you have that headshot,that's important, otherthings you obviously needare what value you can provide to people.So have portfolio and your projects thereand have your testimonialsthere if you can,if you can bring them fromwyzant and takelessonsor some people who've met in real lifeif you can get theirtestimonials on this platform,that's gonna be phenomenal for you.Okay, let's say your profile'scomplete what's next?When you reach out to people one thingto never ever ever do which I see almostevery freelancer out there, a lotof freelancers out there doing.'Cause I have a lot of experiencehiring freelancers I've worked with,or probably 20 or 30people in just the last oneor two years of running mybusiness Clever Programmer,so I've hired lots of software developersto do consulting or to help build stuffat Clever Programmer, I've hired peoplewho do our Google analytics,our Facebook analytics,who run Facebook ads, graphic designers,virtual assistants, video producers.So I've like worked with a facetof people so I have experience lookingthrough resumes, who do we need to hire,who do we not need to hire.And I can tell you frompersonal experiencethe biggest turn off is when I geta generic response that I knowsomebody's copied and pasted.So often times onplatforms like upwork.comit'll look like, Dear Sir, blah blah blah,maybe they'll just have your nameand then they'll be like, your projectseems very interesting and then they justrant about what they do, okay?And it'll be like okay why are you tellingme that you do WordPress and Squarespaceand WICS and all this when I specificallywanted help with Googleanalytics let's say,or I specifically wanted helpwith this Python project.Don't copy paste ever,it is not a numbers game.Let me just fix that for you right now.Reaching out to people isnot a numbers game, okay.You are an idiot if you thinkit's a fucking numbers game.It's not, so let me justsolve that problem for you.You can reach out to a hundred thousandhigh level people withjust some copy paste answeror somebody else can reach outto like 10 people with areally solid customizedand personalized message and they'll getback more responses that'llactually lead to something epic.So please don't do copy pasting,big big mistake as a freelancer.What you wanna do instead is actuallysend a personal message.Let's say somebody's project is,and I'll give you something specificright here on the fly'cause I do this a lotand I do this in my business a lotand I personally sendout email newslettersto you know 70,000, 100,000 peopleand I know what gets more opensand what gets less opens.I reach out to prospectsand I reach out to peopleand I know what they likeand what they don't likeso we're doing a lot of testing here.So for example, here'ssomething you could tothat would be helpful.Say somebody's project isweb scraping pdf links.You wanna reach out to them use thisthing called useloom.com,this is a epic resourceso write this down or goand install it right nowin your chrom, it's called useloom.comand you can just clickit and it allows youto make a video right away.If you send a video message to someoneyou're automatically like 90% more likelyfor them to actually see it.If you send a written message,which is totally fine as well,but automatically your chances are justso much lower of thatperson speaking with you'cause in video you can tell so muchabout that person, likeI can immediately tellwhether I like you or not,I can immediately tellyour level of reliability,if you are a person who I would like,if you're humble maybe orif you know what you'retalking about or how friendly you are,I can immediately see those things.So use that to your advantageand it also requiresless work on your end.You could sit there and write this letterthat'll take your forever or you couldbe like hit the useloom buttonand just go, hey my name is Johnand I can help you with your, I sawthat you have a web scraping projectwhere you wanna get pdf links,that's really cool because I've actuallyworked on a project like this,let me show your real quick.And then while your screen casting,you just quickly show them your projectsfor 10 seconds and just be like,yeah it seems similar, I can definitelydo this for you sirand it would be awesomeif I could just have 10 minutesof you time and we could just chat,looking forward to it, thank you, John.All right, now this video message, okay,you could link it to them in yourinitial outreach to the prospect, okay,so you could say, in terms of typing'cause the first thing they're gonna seeis a written message.So you could just say those things,hey I put this, I saw your project,the web scraping project you havefor getting all the pdf linksand I've done some similar things to thisand I've actually put together thispersonalized video just for youand whatever the clients name is,let's say the clients name is Bob,I've put together this personalized videohere for you Bob, putthe link to the video,and then just go, andif you have 10 minutesto speak, I would love to chat with you,but here's my resume,here are my testimonials,I've done similar projects,I can definitely help you with this.So make it very precise and then dosomething with low commitment, right?If you do five minutes or 10 minutes,that's really easy for somebodyto get on a five minute or 10 minute call.Personally in my experience,I hire usually, like almost every like twoor three or the fourthmax almost interview,that person I'll just hire,'cause otherwise it justtake way too much time.So most of the peoplethat even posting jobson upwork.com are usually thesesolopreneur business ownersthat are trying to hire a contractorto get shit down and move on.They're not actually going throughthe regular full hiring processthat you know a company that's lookingfor a full-time developer goes through.That's gonna be a much more rigorousand a systematic process as it'smaybe gonna require multiple interviews,there's gonna be a technical screening,there's gonna be a culture fit screening,then there's gonna be a negotiation phase,that is what big companies will do.But somebody who's looking foran independent contractor, they just wannaget on call with you, they just wannasee your face and quickly make a decisionwhether you're gonna beable to their job or not.So the more you show of yourself,the more personalizedyou make your messageand if you put a video in thereand you show in relevant way,you're gonna fucking kill it,but it's not even gonna be closethe amount of responses you're gonna getversus some other randomperson, all right,somebody else who's justdoing the same thingevery other freelancer is doing.This is also what's gonna allow youto be able to actually charge a muchhigher income andcommand much more premiumpricing than every one else, okay.Because people constantly ask,how do I compete with somebodyin Indonesia charging 69cents an hour for coding?That's how you're gonna competewith somebody in Indonesiacharging 69 cents an hourby being more premium, by being reliable,by being somebody who theother person can look atand go, this person will actually helpme complete this project, right.You can also show yourcommunication skillsbecause most other developers they'recommunication skill lack, okay.And I can't emphasize the soft skills partof development enough, that's the mostunderrated part which is actually gonnabring you the most amount of value.Even if you look at statistics onlinethey say 80% of yoursuccess in your careercomes from your soft skillsand how likable you are because you'reworking with human beings.And 20% of your success in your careeris actually gonna come from your technicalaptitude in any given field,especially in programming.So those are some tips on how you canactually get these peopleto respond to you, okay.And if you've completedthe first three stepsthat I've outlined foryou, then going intostep four freelancing phaseis gonna be much easier.Other tips I'm gonna giveyou on freelancing isstart with smallerprojects and then build up,so don't immediately start doing,trying to do like a $5,000 contractor something like reallybig challenging projectthat you're like, ohman maybe I can't do it.Start with $100 project or a $300 projectthen move onto $500 project,and a $1,000 project.And then something really smartthat you can do is let'ssay you are workingon a project where are making $50 an hourand it's a really challenging projectthat you don't think you can do.Now this is gonna be themajority of the scenarios.When it comes to freelancing,and all this type of job related stuff,especially when you're not as advancedas fricking Raymond Hettingeror you know Rossum Guidothe guy who made Python,if you're not as advanced as them,or really high level developers,most projects are gonnabe a challenge for you.What you can do is ifyou're making $50 an hourand you feel like it's gonnabe a challenging project,you could hire somebodyon let's say codementor.iowhich is a great platform where youcan hire developers ondemand to mentor you.And you could pay thatdeveloper 25, 30, 35, 40,or even $50 an hour tohelp you on certain tasksand for you to understand how it works.So maybe you will workwith that other developerfor the first few hoursor maybe even a weekand for the first week let's say you don'tmake any money of working on this projectbecause all the money you're makingyou're essentially givingit to this other developerto learn these skill setsand to internalize them.But then a week, twoweek, three week, fourand over the course of a few monthsor a year working withthis particular clientnow you're just making fullon profit of $50 an hour.You see what I'm saying?So initially you're making an investmentto hone your own skills,the company's paying you,you're putting that money into a developerwho's then teaching you these skills,you're breaking even, andthen after a few weeksof learning from that developer,now you can help themcompletely on your own'cause now you haveinternalized those skills.So understand how toactually use help, right.That's what made Henry Ford so incrediblehe was in a court onceand the lawyers wereasking him all kinds of crazy questionsto make him look really stupid,like trivial questions, like when wasthe United States created,or who was the presidentat a certain time, or what's the capitalof some other country?And he got fed up andfrustrated at one pointand then he just looked at themand he said, \"I can'tanswer these questions\"for you, but I can pick up the phone\"in five minutes I'llfind somebody who can.?That's the level ofresourcefulness you want to havebecause one of the ultimate formsof procrastination isactually not asking for help,trying to do everything yourself.Most developers fall victim to this.They take some weird kind of pridein doing everything from scratchnot leveraging help, and this is very veryselfish and this the highestlevel of procrastinationbecause they're doingthis to build their ownlow self esteem that theyhave about themselvesso they actually can do somethingfrom scratch completely,then it will fulfilltheir very low self esteem and theirvery low self image, all right.Whereas if they think about the clientand the results thatthey're bringing the client,you shouldn't give a fuckabout how you end up doing itas long as you can getyour client the resultsthat they need, right?So if your client needsa completed project,I personally don't careif I had the abilityto complete it from scratch or not,I can hire like adeveloper from Philippine,I can hire a developerfrom fricking Indonesia,I can hire a developer from America,as long as I'm profitable,I'll put them togetherand made them complete the projectand I'll deliver it to my clientor I'll get help from them to learnthese skills myself andthen be able to do itand then deliver theend result to my client.Ultimately that's all that matters,nothing else matters, the end resultfor your client is what matters.So understand that you're not as alonebecause what will stop you almost alwaysyou'll look at eachproject and you'll be likethis is too hard, I can't do it.Every project is going tofeel like you can't do it.That's why you have toapply for it, get accepted,and then if you can't do it, hire helpfrom platforms like comentor.ioor even Upwork or even wyzant,you can hire a tutor for yourselfhave them teach you the skills on the joband then be able to complete the job.So this is some really deep level stuffwhich is gonna help you break pastthat barrier of I'm a beginneror I'm an intermediate, how do I actuallystart getting clients as fast as possible?How do I start earning an income?What's the path for me?Because if you startearning an income quicker,it'll allow you toactually spend more timelearning the skills and then you caneventually get a full-timejob, if that's your goal,or you can actually become a reallyhigh level freelancer or areally high level consultant.And eventually you could even turn itinto your own freelancing businesswhere you have other developers under youand then they work for the clientsthat you have and you're the middle manand you keep the profit, they do the work.So you could turn it intoa freelancing businessfor yourself as well butthat's a really reallyadvanced level step.We covered a lot, allright, in this video,I'm gonna stop right here.Now let's just come back, come backinto our bodies and come back here.So we covered a lot,I hope that you reallyenjoyed what we covered.I do hope you leave acomment letting me knowkinda what you thought about this videoand maybe what were your biggest takeawaysand if this was even helpful to you'cause I honestly don'tknow if this is helpfulbut I try to give it my heartand give you guys everythingyou would really needstep by step to get to this process.Please also, if you haven't already,like this video and subscribe to channelso you can get more tips on howto become a six figure Python freelancer.With that said, thank you so muchfor being on thischannel, I love your faceand as always, this isQazi and I'll see youin the next video.As you know the Python FreelancingBusiness Crash Course live trainingwith me and John Sonmez has been launched.We recently opened the doors,maybe you didn't get a chanceto join Profitable Programmer,maybe it was too expensive,maybe it was too big of a course.The first time we've ever done this,it's a live training program with me.Four week training program that's goingto completely transform your careeras a Python freelancer, where you getto watch over my shoulder of how Iactually did $20,000 with one clientso it's a real casestudy, its' very specific,one client $20,000.Show you my exact invoices and exactlywhat I did to land this clientand the exact ad that I ran.If you have considering it, definitelyclick the link below because enrollmentfor this program will be closingvery very very shortly.I put together a video for youthat you're gonna find very valuableand is gonna share a lotmore details of this.Click the link belowand I'd to see you in...\n"