Reflecting on 5 years as a freelancer: how I got my first gig, scope of that project and what I was paid.
This is the story of my first gig! What I thought was a one-time project to help me survive unexpected unemployment became the spark for my freedom lifestyle.
After 5 years as a full-time freelancer and self-employed entrepreneur, I'm sharing 3 lessons I learned from my first gig that still apply today.
Takeaways:
Additional Resources:
About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
Reflecting on 5 years as a freelancer: how I got my first gig, scope of that project and what I was paid.
This is the story of my first gig! What I thought was a one-time project to help me survive unexpected unemployment became the spark for my freedom lifestyle.
After 5 years as a full-time freelancer and self-employed entrepreneur, I'm sharing 3 lessons I learned from my first gig that still apply today.
Takeaways:
Additional Resources:
About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
Last month I celebrated my five-year anniversary of being free. It was five years ago that I broke free from the traditional work environment and became a location independent freelancer. Now I would really consider myself an entrepreneur. All of this was made possible by having a very distinct aha moment. And it was actually on my birthday, no less where I was offered a one month freelance project. And after receiving this and doing the work and having the life experience. I realize this style of work could be my ticket to freedom. Today, I'm going to share the story of getting that first gig. Everything from how much I made from it, what the project itself was. But most importantly, how I had unknowingly set my life up prior to this moment to now leverage the increasingly popular freelance economy and how you can tell. Many of the tactics I was using five years ago, still apply today in terms of how I secure my freelance projects. However, I'm also going to share some more modern ways that you can go after freelance opportunities That way, whether you're a seasoned freelancer listening to this, or you're someone looking for your very first gig and just starting out, you'll leave this episode with a couple of key actions you can take for your own journey. It's also just a really amazing story. So picture this it's September, 2017. I am living downtown Toronto. My now husband, then boyfriend is living a five hour flight away from me in San Francisco. And just a few months prior to my birthday. I have been completely blindsided by an employer. Definitely go back and have a listen to episode 21 from season two, where I share in detail my freedom lifestyle, origin story. It's juicy AAF, but what you need to know for today's episode is that at this point, I'm unemployed. I did not plan to be unemployed. And I see no end in sight towards my goal at the time of being able to move to San Francisco and work from there in order to be closer to the love of my life. Also it's my birthday and I'm turning 28. Something I still do to this day on my birthday. Regardless of how financially successful my year's going is I spend my birthday collecting my free birthday gifts, Starbucks, the body shops, a fora boost, your juice. These are just some of the companies who offer you a gift on your special day. So I was at the mall, the Eaton center, downtown Toronto, and I ran into an old boss of mine. So one of the jobs I had had earlier in my career, was actually helping to launch an entrepreneurship center for university students at Western, Where I studied business. I had amazing relationships with my colleagues and my bosses during my time there. It really wasn't incredible job. However I ultimately quit when I wanted to move to Toronto. Still I had a great relationship with my previous boss and I really respected him. In fact, I had just reached out to him about six months earlier when I was trying to move to San Francisco and look for a job there. I had asked for his mentorship and helping advise me on some of the companies that I had been looking at. And getting his opinion on which route he thought I should go. So he had an idea that I was looking to be making a change in So when we ran into each other at the mall, He of course lasts at me when he realizes I'm there collecting my birthday gifts and have a venti dairy-free Frappaccino of some kind in my And he asks me how the move to San Francisco is going. I briefly share with him that it didn't work out. I'm now unemployed because I had quit my old job for the new San Francisco one. I got, and I was now starting from scratch. At this point, I think that I'm about to just restart this whole four month journey that I had just been on, where I'm going to be evaluating startup companies and tech companies and figure out which one I'm going to join. Of course there'll be evaluating me and that whole song and dance. So this is what my plan is. I asked him what he's up to and why he's in town. And he's actually in Toronto because our university Western, where I had previously Is now expanding the entrepreneurship center and they're looking to have a presence in the city of Toronto On the spot. He says, actually, having a launch event in about a month and we could really use some help pulling off the event. Why don't we hire you for the month and you can help organize and host the event and reach out to past entrepreneurs and just get people excited to come to this. I told them it sounds amazing, but unfortunately I'm heading to San Francisco and just a couple of days celebrating my birthday with my boyfriend. I'm going to be gone for a couple of weeks. So it's probably not going to work out. He didn't see an issue with this at all. He wasn't going to be in Toronto either. So in his mind, we'd have to be collaborating from different cities regardless. Plus. Well, okay then. That sounds amazing. He follows up with me over email offers me a thousand dollars to help coordinate and host the event. I hop on a plane. I go see Jared and I spend the next couple of weeks working on this project from the Uber office. This is where Jared was working at the time. Neither of us had really pursued the freedom lifestyle yet. So he has this office job. I'm now working from the common area, enjoying their free coffees and all of their epic snacks and getting paid to complete this project. Thinking back now at how much my mind was blown by this concept is quite comical. This truly has become my everyday norm of just grabbing my laptop, picking it up, working from anywhere I need to be, or I want to be, this is just how I do life now. But back then, I was so limited to what I thought was possible based on what I had seen. And experienced myself. Long-term employment, one boss, one salary, their terms. Freelance. However, is really for someone who has expertise, but isn't seeking long-term commitment. You get to set your own terms. So I now get to set where I work when I work and how much I get paid to do that work. It really is as simple as that. So, this is what kicked off this aha moment of this as possible. I actually ended up still interviewing with companies. It's funny. The first time I pursued it, I was crushing it. I was getting all of these offers from these amazing companies. I was so excited. I was so into it and it was like this second time when I tried to do it over again, they knew. They could feel my vibes that I wasn't into this. I had already had this aha moment of this freelance thing could actually be this way to have it all where I could be in San Francisco, but also. Not have to give up my life in Toronto, which now I wasn't really ready to do that yet. I had an amazing group of friends. My whole life was there. My family was there. And so I was just going to give it all up for love. You know, this was kind of an idea where I could still have it all. And so when I go through the interview process with the new companies for round two, I don't get anything. Nobody wants to have a second interview with me. It was so wild. Like, I don't know if it was the vibes I was putting off or fade or the universe, but. It was a completely different experience. The second. Time around. And it just goes from one freelance project to another freelance project, to another freelance project. And in a future episode, I'm going to talk a lot about how I actually built my freelance roster and really moved from a freelancer to more of an entrepreneur who has freelancers working with me now. But what I want you to know today are the lessons from this story. So I've got three lessons for you. One relationships are everything. When it comes to freelance. People literally create jobs for people that they like. So, how are you nurturing your relationships? And I don't want you to be transactional, right? You don't want to just use people because a that's growth and B it's obvious. But you really want to see people in your life as being there for the long haul. Our lives and our careers, they are long. So your current colleague, your current boss, they're not going to be in the role or the company or the industry they're in right now forever. So you want people to think about you wherever they go next, and you want to make sure that he will have a good impression of what it's like to work with you and what you I'll be honest. There's a lot of people who don't have a good impression about what it's like to work with me and will not hire me again, because sometimes I was quite difficult to work with under conditions. I didn't like I'm okay with that because what I've done is I have cat room for people in my life who value the same things I do, and the working conditions that I do. And there's enough of those to go around There really are enough people now and opportunities. To pursue more flexible work. So there isn't a need to be fake or people please, in order to build these relationships, I definitely didn't do I wear my emotions on my sleeve. I'm pretty brutally honest and upfront about how I feel. Sometimes that serves me amazingly. And sometimes, you know, it's hurt me. but really when it's hurt me was, the wrong opportunities. And so you can be yourself, you can work in a way and work your relationships in a way that your personality it's natural and authentic and figure out how to nurture those important relationships in your life. Whatever that looks like for you. I just want to plant the seed. Okay. The second lesson here. Was that I didn't get paid per hour. So a lot of freelancers get really hung up on this hourly rate piece. What's my hourly rate. How much am I worth? How much should I charge for this project? And in my experience, there is way more money to be made. Once you get out of that trap of trading your time for your money. And instead think about the value you're bringing by completing a project and setting a price So you want to get paid for completing a project for having milestones that you execute on. And that's how you want to set your price. And it's actually a lot easier because if a company has a project that they want to make happen, they have already decided that this project is valuable. It's a priority and it needs to be done. So instead of you trying to convince them that this is your value per hour, that you bring in setting a price on You want to set a price on them? Having a project that they want to see come to fruition, being completed successfully. And done in a way that they're going to be really excited about and you want to put a value on that. So it's a lot harder and a lot more limiting to put a value on yourself and trading your time for your hour in that way. And as you evolve in your freelance career, especially as you start to maybe find some different niches and maybe you get paid to do things over and over again, you are going to get better at completing certain tasks. You are going to have processes and templates and. Quick fixes and work arounds. And so you want to be incentivized to work smarter and you want to get paid for, you know, completing your project scope, You don't want to be dinged for getting it done quicker. Right. And so you really want to focus on the value. Another thing you can do that I didn't do then, but I do very often now is ad performance based We're essentially, there's an additional bonus that you can earn for hitting specific targets. So I now do that with a lot of my clients. I'll say here's the value for me completing the project. And then if I do it with these results or within this scope, or I get this type of feedback or I, you know, get this rating from other people, then I get an additional bonus. Learning number three, the quickest path to freelance and project-based work is to monetize the skills. You already have another hurdle and like a time suck. I see people spinning their tires on when they want to pursue freelance is deciding what is their expertise going to be and how to position themselves and like, who am I? And what do I want to be known for? To be honest, I find it quite boring to do one thing over and over again. And I actually have a ton of different skills. So why not monetize a number of them and have a lot more variety in your day and be able to say yes to lots of different types of projects. In this scenario, I never saw myself as a professional event planner. And in fact, if I thought that's what I was going to be doing, like if someone said you could be a freelance event planner, and that was going to be my, thing and my niche and what I would be known for, and I would be an event planner. I would have been really hung up on the association of, am I an event planner? Is that what I want to be known for? And you know, not wanting to be that. And the truth is, is I know how to host a pretty damn good event and what a cool project this was with a team that I had loved. And I'd worked for, with a mission. I had believed in. And they just happened to need an event. So in this case, I already had this skill I could monetize and I was happy to monetize it in this way without worrying. If this means that I'm now only an event planner. A really great modern resource. I always advise people to check out is Fiverr. F I V E R R. They have a marketplace connecting freelancers with people who need freelancers. And so yes, you can go and you can create a profile on there and I'm Fiverr pro seller. And it's where I. You know, bring in a lot of new clients and attract a lot of new work. However, what you could even use it for at this stage of your journey is to just get inspiration on what are some of the skills other people are monetizing and kind of seeing it as a bit of research, like how much are people charging? And make a list of all the skills that you already have, that you can monetize check. I can do that. Check. I can do that check. I can do that. Or, Hey. I would love to be able to do that. How cool would it be? If I could offer that as a freelance service. And if that was my day to Don't underestimate how quickly you can become an expert in something and start getting paid for it as a freelancer. I taught myself how to start a podcast five years Two years after that, I was teaching people how to do it with workshops and in my online course, Five years after that. I'm charging$250 an hour for people to learn from me and to have a one-on-one. So you can become an expert in something very quickly. In fact, you can take an online course to literally learn how to do that. Skill. Fiverr also has something called Fiverr learn where you can take various courses specifically focused on teaching you how to become a freelancer. So. That is a great option for you too. And another good practice to always be thinking of is, you know, who is in my network, who do I know that's in some type of position of power. So whether you're just starting on your freelance journey, or maybe you want to pivot, or maybe you want to take on more Really think about your own network, that's the quickest way to get hired. And really can't stress it enough that people create jobs for people that they like. So think back of people, maybe you can go through your LinkedIn and look at what jobs people are at right now. See if there's someone who's in a director role or a VP role, or started a company of some kind, someone who's in some type of position of power. And start to really think about who in your network. Could be a resource for you, someone who has a good impression of you that. Likes you knows you trust you. That you can now reach out to them with a very simple message. Right? I think we. Over-complicate how to actually pursue this work and we make it up and to be a bigger deal than it actually is, but it's literally as simple as sending a message just saying. Hey, Sharon. Hope things are going well on your end. So great to see you're still at this company or you're now here. Than watching the project looks really awesome. As for myself, I'm currently looking to take on a few more freelance gigs over the next six months. So anything that you're working on right now that you can use some extra help with. Here's some examples of past projects I've been involved in bullet list, three different things, three different examples of work that you've done, each example should showcase a different skill. And in each example, it should also show the results that you had with that. So, you know, don't just say planned an event for the entrepreneurship center, say, planned an event for the entrepreneurship center That was sold out with over a hundred guests, three different sponsors and received an NPS rating from the followup survey of 9.0. I don't know something like that, but this is what I mean. You want it to be results driven in your examples as well. And the email or the note, but just saying, Hey, can we have a call to explore any of this? And it's literally that. Reach out to a few people in your network like this plant, those seeds, even if they don't have something for you right away, you've now put that dream in their minds and the magic of the universe and all the energies that come with it will now be working for you. It's truly my belief and my experience that there are endless opportunities for freelance projects that you can get involved And it's going to be a lot less to do with, can I get someone to hire me as a freelancer, but more about how am I going to manage my time when I have this many opportunities and this many. Companies and projects and exciting things that can be getting involved in it's so much more about saying no. So, you know, I didn't have that mindset. When I first started five years ago, I still had more of a scarcity mindset where I did think that these types of opportunities were more of a favor. Things have changed quite a bit, especially since 2020 has really revolutionized. Work and remote work and we've received, you know, mainstream adoption now of the concepts of freelance and working from anywhere and even the gig economy. So. It's a really great time to either pursue your first freelance project. Or double down and take the leap and make it your full-time thing. So. That's my words of advice. That's how it started for me for modest beginnings to where I am now fully free. Multiple revenue streams, multiple clients. And truly feeling in control of my schedule, my location and my finances. So until next time, freedom seekers enjoy your freedom.