So if you're just starting out as a freelancer a coach or consultant you're
probably wondering whether or not you should be doing work for free. This is
one of the most common questions that comes up for me is should i do free work
to build my portfolio and the answer nine times out of ten is a big hell no
don't do it don't do it now here's why when you work for free you generally
attract clients who are not committed to your success and to the outcome of the
project right so if you go to someone and you know you start pitching your
services and they say hey you know what you're new why don't you do this for
free and it will build your portfolio and I'll give you a testimonial I want
you to tell them to hit the road because here's why they are not going to value
your time they're not going to value your work and they are not actually
going to be a very good testimonial or portfolio builder in order to do really
good work with clients they generally need to be committed to your outcome
right because you need to be interviewing them you need to be doing
research getting their feedback and you know putting in time with them to make
the project really good this applies to just about any kind of freelancing so if
the client doesn't really care about your work they kind of say oh yeah it's
free help me out you know we do this for me do whatever you're not actually going
to end up with very good work for them the other thing you're going to find is
that the relationship will be quite frustrating you're going to go in with
the impression that hey I'm doing this free work for them they're going to be
super excited they're going to value me they're going to really you know
appreciate it they won't now you might need to learn this the hard way you
might think hey this Dan guy on YouTube not going to listen to i'm going to try
it out but trust me this is the case and i've seen it with my clients you know
when i tell them this they say you helped that's that's what i've seen to
every time i've done work for free now there are a few exceptions when free
work can actually be a good thing the first thing is if you proactively go
after the client and suggest doing it for free so why might you do this well
maybe there's someone who's well known in your
city or well known in a certain industry and you would love to have a testimonial
from them in that case you could go after them you could be the one to go
for them and say hey can I do this project for you for free it would be you
know an honor to work with you or whatever right so you're proactively
going after them to do it now if the client ever suggest doing free work run
any time they bring up free work to build your portfolio or get a good
testimonial these are not the kind of people you want to be working with trust
me it's only ever okay if you bring it up now if you are ever going to do free
work with someone make sure that you treat it as if it's paid work and what I
mean by that is have them invested so we say free i'm talking about money but you
never want someone to be working with you without some kind of investment and
commitment so if you're going to do a free project with someone have a proper
proposal have an outline and have it so that they have clear expectations about
the amount of time lead to put in the feedback they need to be giving you as
well as your expectations for getting testimonials and references from them if
the project goes well it's really important to have that laid out at the
start if you treat the free work casually and just say hey can I do this
for you then the client will treat it casually and your odds of getting a good
testimonial a good reference from them or any future business goes right out
the window so if you're just starting out and you want to be building your
portfolio and this is why you're interested in doing this free work
consider just building your portfolio finding the potential clients you'd like
to work with and if it's possible to find something of theirs that you could
do so for example if you're a freelance writer go to a potential clients webpage
and pull up one of the sections that you think is really poorly written and
rewrite that for them now of course it's not going to be as good as if you could
talk to them which is a big part of a good client relationship
his communication research asking questions but it's a chance to get
started so you could rewrite that page for them make it a lot better and then
send it to that client and say hey I just wanted you to have this I irie you
know wrote this for your site if you like it and want to use it get in touch
and maybe we can talk about doing a project together or you can buy it off
me or whatever and so that way you can be building your portfolio with the work
and then potentially get paid on it as well it's just a good way to practice as
well if you don't have other projects to practice on when people are just
starting out they think I have to be free or no one want to pay me I don't
have a portfolio yet that kind of thing that's BS if you are starting out at a
reasonable rate you know 15 20 25 an hour if your client is anyway serious
about business that's almost free for them from a financial point of view when
they're looking at it and so starting out with a low rate you're going to have
a more invested client you're going to be getting paid which is good because I
presume you enjoy money and being able to eat and stuff and you're going to
also get to build your portfolio as well free work is kind of like a baby step or
training wheels and it just slows your progress and I don't think unlike
training wheels on a bike I don't think for your work is necessary personally
I've never done free work for a client i started with paid work right off the bat
but when i talk about how to do free work here i'm talking about if you are
going to do it i think that's the best approach but in general I would avoid
free work unless it really works into part of your marketing plan in terms of
targeting specific people that you want a reference or portfolio piece from
alright i hope you found this video helpful useful entertaining or all of
the above if you did i encourage you to subscribe join me with other videos
where will cover topics such as getting your first client raising your rates and
all-round living a more awesome life thanks again for watching and catch you
in another video
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