Finally, think of your blog as a stepping stone to all the various parts of your business. One piece should be your network. A blog can be an excellent way to build a network of other industry professionals who are interested in your business.
Turn on comments for your site so visitors can share their thoughts on your content. Respond to those comments, making sure you take the opportunity to provide value by answering their questions, offering more help, or linking to your resources.
As the last piece to your content strategy, consider Content Syndication. Content Syndication means republishing the same piece of content — an article, a video, an infographic, etc. — on one or more different websites.
Here are some examples of how content syndication could help you maximize your outreach:
Republish your latest or best-performing content on bigger websites, with more readers and higher authority than yours. If your main goal is to increase your brand awareness, then syndicating on major publications is the way to go.
Syndicate old content on websites that have roughly the same audience and authority as yours. It’s a great way to let their readers discover more content on your blog and generate new leads.
7. Grow your outreach with email marketing
Email marketing might not be the first thing that comes to mind when you’re thinking of marketing your freelance services, but here are some reasons why you should consider it:
You’re able to appear more professional in the eyes of prospects since you appear more like a brand yourself. This lets you command higher rates because you can present yourself as the go-to expert.
When you start email marketing as a freelancer, it may open some new doors for your business. For instance, many freelancers have gone the route of freelancer-turned-consultant. Others have decided to offer passive income courses and products that bring out their expertise.
Having your own email newsletter as a freelancer lets you capture prospects who may hire you in the future. When you send them high-value emails that show off your industry knowledge and your clients’ results, you’ll likely be on the top of their minds when they have a need.
When you’re first starting to build your list, get clear on your goals. Set targets for the number of new subscribers you might want each month, then determine what outcome you want from your list.
These are some questions you can ask yourself to set your goals:
How many conversions are you aiming for?
What do you want people to do after they sign up?
What should new subscribers know about you right after signing up for your email list?
By how many people do you want your list to grow every month?
How many discovery calls do you need to book each month to sign your target number of clients?
Freelancer drafting an email on their laptop
If you’re already running a portfolio site or a blog, then you’re primed and ready to create a custom email. By using a custom email, you appear more professional, especially when you start sending out emails to your list.
Next, focus on personalizing your email content. This can be as simple as calling subscribers by their first name in your emails, or even mentioning their company names, or sending them highly targeted content from your blog. You can take this personalization to the next level by crafting user journeys for your subscribers.
A very useful email marketing automation for this purpose is sequences. Sequences are a great tool for busy freelancers since they guarantee regular emails and newsletters for your email subscribers, all on autopilot. You can stay connected with potential clients and nurture them enough before sending them through a sales funnel.
So after a user opts into your email list in exchange for a lead magnet, you can take them through an email sequence with the goal of nurturing your relationship with them.
In this sequence, you can provide exclusive tips they can’t find anywhere else, as well as case studies and testimonials from previous clients who loved working with you.
Other ways you can use sequences in your freelance business can include limited-time offers and promotions during off-peak seasons, or testing out a new client package or program. These sequences can be a series of emails that are designed to help you book more calls or instantly make more sales, whatever your goal may be.
Last but not least, pay attention to your email marketing analytics to see how you’re doing. Over time, you’ll see ways you can improve your campaigns, your lead magnet, and your overall marketing strategy.
A/B testing, also known as split testing, is a marketing experiment wherein you split your audience to test a number of variations of a campaign and determine which performs better.
In other words, you can show version A of a piece of marketing content to one half of your audience, and version B to another.
Make the most of A/B tests to determine subject lines and templates that do well. Check which send times get the most open rates. Test different CTAs to see what gets the most clicks and conversions.
Parting Thoughts
That’s a wrap on freelance marketing strategies to grow your business!
Your biggest takeaway should be that your client’s journey doesn’t really end after you’ve delivered your services. It is not every day that a person hires a freelancer, but the likelihood of the same client coming back to you is fairly possible. Additionally, they will refer you to other people in the meantime – this is the loyalty you want your marketing and subsequent services to lead to.
Following up and keeping in touch is key to retaining customers. Doing this will make sure you build long-lasting client relationships, and your business will continue to grow bigger and better. Keep in mind that there is no one size fits all strategy for this. The client landscape is extremely dynamic, which just means your strategies and plans have to adapt to them.
And what better way to keep up with the time, than to use technology made exactly for that? bookmytime is one such online scheduling software that has inbuilt tools that will help with marketing in the freelance industry along with other features that help with your daily admin tasks.
With a booking page set according to rules that you specify, your clients can view your availability in real-time and self-schedule meetings with you. The appointment is visible in the calendar app of your choosing, complete with a Zoom link for added efficiency. Join our community of 55,000+ professionals who trust bookmytime all around the world!
We hope these freelance marketing ideas help you grow your business and foster long-lasting client relationships. All the best!