Hey — It’s Temidayo.
Last weekend, I accidentally closed my Upwork account—can you believe it?
The moment I saw what had happened, I felt like crying.
In fact, I’ve been disturbing Upwork support since then, begging them to reactivate my account. And that is why I’m staying positive and hopeful they’ll sort this out for me this week.
That said, let’s jump into what I cooked up this week.
#1 – Treat freelancing as a business
Lately, Upwork has been increasing its fees and even rolling out some unnecessary new fees. I see a lot of people ranting on Twitter about this.
It’s funny, yet equally frustrating, I get it.
However, one insight I have gained from this is that at the end of the day, Upwork is a business looking to maximize profits and growth.
You may not like it, but they have to survive.
The bigger lesson here is that you need to start viewing freelancing as a business if you want to win in the long term. You have to stop thinking of yourself as just a skilled worker selling services.
You have to think about revenue, costs, raising prices, growth, etc. The sooner you start operating like real businesses, the more in-control you will be
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#2 – Focus on helping solve problems first
Speaking of adopting a business mentality, here’s a big distinction I’ve learned: Successful freelancers focus on providing solutions, not just selling skill sets or services.
Too many freelancers get caught up in listing their skills and showing their portfolio, expertise, testimonials, and packages.
While those are important, they often miss the critical first step: deeply understanding the client’s pain points and desired result.
Once you really understand the problems they need solved, you can then position yourself as the right solution for that problem.
This builds trust and shows you have emotional intelligence. In fact, it makes clients happy to give you all their money.
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#3 – The freelancer with the most advantage
You see what I’m getting at here?
The freelancer who wants to help a client has an edge over the one who wants to sell a service to a client.
Simple truth, but read again. 👍
— Temidayo 𝕏 The Unfxcked Freelancer (@temidayoxyz) March 20, 2024
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That’s all for this week.
I’ll text you again, next Monday.
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