Slowly Getting to Where I Want to Be

It’s been 3 years since I started my personal college course, and at the same time doing my freelancing and intern work. And, over the years I’ve learned a few things about the business that I wouldn’t have known having not gone into it. I’ve experienced both the pros and cons to doing it.

The first thing I love about being a freelancer is calling the shots when I work. Unlike being an employee of a company, the client is hiring you to do a specific project, so you’ll be able to give them your own submittal period. Second, is being able to bring your work anywhere. Unlike having to commute from home to work and back, you can take your work with you during a holiday or even anywhere around the world. Third, you are your own business owner. You have the authority to say yes and no, to clients.

It’s important to know what you are worth if you decide to take up freelancing. Knowing your rate helps you decide when to say yes or no when the client offers you a project. If it’s lower than your regular rate, this is where you decide if the project that they are offering you is worth it. Questions you can ask yourself are, “Is this project gonna teach me something?”, “Is this a project I am excited to be a part of?” “Is this a project that I will be able to put into my portfolio?”. Having answered these questions you are able to make an informed decision.

In one instance, I had a friend who is a rising singer and she had an idea to create content for her YouTube channel. The idea was to help her story tell the creation of her EP and post them on Youtube. I was really excited when I heard the idea and said yes. She offered to pay me for the project but I knew the experience was going to teach me something and this would be something I could put into my portfolio, as I never had an “Artist” as a client before. So I told her I would do the whole project for free. The project and videos were a success and I learned a lot from the experience.

The only downside of freelancing in my experience is trying to find clients. There would be days or even weeks where I don’t have any projects. I joined many freelancing accounts hoping to apply and get clients to reach out to me but to no avail. This is where I learned from a friend of mine who is also a freelancer to be the proactive one and go out and search for those prospective clients that you, yourself are interested to work with. You can reach out to clients who you admire and offer to do a project for them for free. This becomes a win-win situation for you and the client as they get a project of theirs done and you are able to showcase your skills. I’ve done this a couple of times already and even when the client and I end up not partnering in the project, after kindly asking, they allow me to upload the work in my portfolio.

This whole experience has taught me that it’s important to know your worth as a creative, when to say yes and no to a project, and how taking on many projects develop your skills. It’s not an easy breezy work life yet, but it’s one of the things that gets me up in the morning, knowing that these are steps that are slowly getting me to where I want to be.