Your Value As A Freelancer And When To Cut Your Losses

What is your value as a freelancer?

This is a question that you will no doubt ask yourself from time to time, especially when you encounter projects that may fulfill you in some way but don't quite cut it when it comes to paying the bills. So do we sacrifice our livelihoods for the integrity of work that we enjoy doing and believe in? Unfortunately, that is just not something that we can do in the state of our current economy. I'm not sure where you're located but I am writing this blog from New York City where like most places, the cost of living continues to increase. At times a clients attentiveness is focused solely on growing their business but not necessarily keeping their financial obligations to their freelancers, who are tasked daily with projects that will grow a business in the long run.

I am lucky in the sense that I have a supportive partner who encourages me to do work that I like but I am not blinded by the fact that without a basic structure and rules levied as a freelancer, my partner would be left holding the bag. Sure, it's great to do work that I enjoy and it's wonderful to have the freedom to freelance and dig my heels into work that I like and that I believe in however, by sacrificing our worth, it's possible to put undo pressure on those elements that support and sustain us on a daily basis. Either that, or the very reality is that we may actually be sacrificing the very sustenance that is required for us to live off of on a daily basis. Why should freelancers have to be concerned with how we're going to cover the cost of one necessity or another? The answer is that we shouldn't! And yet, there is not enough information out here that gives freelancers the nitty gritty, the truth and the facts about real life as a freelancer. I encourage people to freelance all the time and I recently realized that while I have provided people with tools, I neglected to mention my two strike rule. More on that later.

Does the fact that you like a client mean that you should settle?

Absolutely not! And for the record, this is something that it took me a while to understand, accept and work with. I have had clients who I have enjoyed working with but who did not quite understand how to fulfill their financial end of our business relationship. Because I work from home, my rate may be reduced compared to a full time, in-house employee. That alone is a bonus for a client, simply based on my experience and commitment to the clients work. However, in many cases you will encounter a client who is not financially astute enough to be concerned with making sure that a freelancer is paid in a timely manner. As a result the work flow wanes. There is no pleasant way of saying this but, the fact is, when you are not paid in a timely manner, the non-paying client's projects will have to be placed on the back-burner while you hustle on other projects and make sure that you are making a buck to pay your bills. In-effect, where a non-paying or late-paying client leaves a gap, another client must fit the bill.

At the end of the day, we all want the freedom to dictate our work schedules, freelancers understand the scope of an entrepreneurs place in the world and where exactly we fit in. In fact, we understand these business clients more than they can comprehend, because in essence, we are entrepreneurs ourselves. We are our business: our time, our skills, our commitment and expertise all happen to be our business, and therefore we are the entrepreneurs that entrepreneurs come to-to facilitate their businesses' daily operations no? We are the transportation system that runs their productivity and many times as a result, their growth.

So how do you value yourself as a freelancer?

As I have realized over more than a decade as a freelancer, your value as a freelancer solely depends on what you're willing to work for. If you're willing to continue to dole out work in return for late-paying or non-paying clients, your worth stagnates and your service and skill, the business of being  you, gets devalued. My rule of thumb is to allow a client to make two late payments. If I encounter a third late payment, I walk away from the client. The first two times I give the client the benefit of the doubt, perhaps their schedule was busy or they were recently overwhelmed with work. These are easy excuses to verify as in the position of freelancer, you have a pretty good gauge on how busy the client actually is. 

In other instances, you may see that the client is not so overwhelmed that they couldn't tend to their financial obligation to you. In either case, my policy is two strikes and  you're out. Just as the client doesn't have the time to count their fingers over the loss of income on one project, product or opportunity, as freelancers neither do we. My time and your time as freelancers is valuable. Value the fact that you have a marketable skill that increases or enables the client to expand upon income that grows their purpose and realize that you are worth the financial investment. At the point where a client decides that they can put off paying you for another day or time, that is a decisive choice that they are making and consciously or subconsciously, they do  not value you as a freelancer. You are just a means to an end, don't get offended and take it personal, this is part of the business model that we as freelancers have decided to be a part of. With it comes the good and the bad and we have to be prepared to look out for our own best interests.

Cut  your losses, worthy clients are on the horizon!

If you experiencing some roadblocks on the financial end with any clients, maybe it's time to cut your losses. There is plenty of work out here for all freelancers, in all fields. We might have to weed through the client pool to find those that are worthy, but they are out there. If a client is worth your time and energy, your investment and your commitment, they will be more than happy to pay you on time, every single time. An experienced entrepreneur and business owner understands that when you cultivate positive employee relationships, your productivity and business thrive and your brand grows. With that in mind, remember your worth and see to it that you do not devalue yourself because in doing so, not only do you devalue yourself, you devalue all freelancers. 

How to make a homemade Voice-Over or Song Demo (DIY)

Homemade Voice-Over or Song Demo Made Easy

So many people  have written to me asking me to post a blog about a cheap and easy way to create
your very own homemade Voice-Over or Song Demo; today I will provide you with a quick and easy rundown on how you can create your own vocals, beats and edit them to perfect your very own demo. I have included a Screen-Cast Tutorial as well as one of my very own Edited Voice-Demo's below.

Voice-Over Artists are among the highest paid work-at-home professionals and with a multitude of sites to provide your services on, the options are unlimited.  Know now though, the competition is hefty, how you market or invest in yourself in furtherance of your voice-over career at the end of this blog is up to you. Many voice-over artists that use the methods that I will show you would be very happy to have me keep these tips to myself, I suspect that many V/O Artists use similar methods and prefer to keep this knowledge tucked away for a rainy day, after all, who needs the competition.

I don't worry about sharing secrets, in fact, I like to share any opportunity that comes my way. Why? Because the truth is that we're all uniquely qualified to walk the footpath of another, no two people are going to approach an opportunity in the same fashion. So what! I share this information with you and unless you have a the very same voice that I have or the exact same vocal capability, we're really not competing. 

Audacity

First things first; you absolutely must download Audacity, after doing some digging, I found that Audacity is the best product on the market.  Not only will you be able to import audio, you will be able to remove background noise and static. During the processing of a Voice-Over Demo, I was able to remove all of the breathy and "sss" sounds to create a clean and crisp copy of my vocals. You can download Audacity from any provider however, I trust CNET and that is the link that I have included above.

Voice-Over Scripts (or Lyrics)

Once you have downloaded Audacity, pin it to your start menu or open it in a separate window.  The second thing that you will need to do is have your voice-over script ready.  You can get free voice
over scripts at Voices. If you're recording vocals, then keep your lyrics close by because you'll want
them handy.

Recording Your Vocals

The next thing that you will do is record your vocals directly onto Audacity however, because
you may not have a plug-in Mic, I'm going to show you a way around that, the instructions that follow are for those that do not have a plug-in. Keep in mind that you have the capability of
recording your vocals directly on Audacity via the "Record" button however, depending on your PC's mic or how quiet your home is, there is no guarantee that the sound will be optimal. Also, once you've recorded the vocals or uploaded them, it's important to take the time out to edit them. You absolutely MUST edit your vocals before importing the beats/music on Audacity.

Recording Your Vocals

I know that you have a Smartphone so lets put it to work.  You should already have a Recorder App on your cellphone, if not, you will need to download one. With  you voice-over script or lyrics handy, you will now go ahead and record your vocals onto your cellphone's recorder app.

STEP #1

                                                        

 Record Your Vocals And Then Share Them

     

Either by e-mail, Google Drive or any other file-sharing service that you happen to be using.

STEP #2

Once you have recorded your vocals, you have the option of emailing them to yourself or using other methods like Google Drive or Dropbox etc.

Go ahead and download that Vocal onto your computer, name it and save it. We'll come back to it in a bit.

 

STEP #3 (If necessary)

Because you're cellphone might record the vocal as a 3gp file, you may need to convert it to an mp3 before you can use it within Audacity.  

This is an easy step and you can get a free conversion over at: Zamzar.com. 

It takes two minutes to upload your saved cellphone .3gp file and the conversion gets sent

to your email inbox. See below:

Once you have downloaded your mp3 file version, you can move onto the next step.

STEP #4

Next you will need some Audio Beats/Music

You can create your own music or find free music in any number of locations, I like to use the Beat Lab, they have a great Google Chrome App that works wonders.

Beat Lab allows you to create beats/music by easily clicking on different sounds, you can load as many "sounds" or "beats" as you like, you can change genres, increase or slow down the beats-per-minute and finally, it allows you to save and download your music.

Once you have created your music/beats, be sure to name and save them after you have downloaded them. Now that you have both your vocals and  your beats ready, it's time for the next step. You will need to open your Audacity Application.

STEP #4

Load Vocals

First you'll go to the File Tab and Click on

the "Import Audio" option

Be sure to import your Vocals first!!

STEP #5

Edit Your Vocals Before Loading Your Music/Beats

Next, you need to edit your vocals; if however, your vocals are not breathy and need no editing, you can move on to Step #6 otherwise, if your vocals are breathy or you find that there is background noise or there are other sound defects, you can edit them by using the "effects" tab within Audacity. The latter can be done by using the "Noise Removal" option.  You'll have to highlight the points in which you find said defects, highlight them and then add the effect. Continue to editing, i.e., Noise Removal, Fade or Cut-Out the defects until you have a crisp, clear vocal.

 The Effects Tab will give you access to "Noise Removal"

STEP #6

You'll then want to head over to that "Import" tab and import your music/beats. You'll be able to cut them, or edit them in any way that you like with the Audacity tools and effects.

Here is a Screen Cast/Video Run-Through, the Screen-Cast sound isn't great, but I'll include my Voice-Over link below so that you can hear the sound quality as it relates to using Audacity/Beat Lab and in the meantime I'm on the hunt for a better quality Screen-Cast program. ;-)

Here's an Audacity Edited Voice-Over Demo that I created: 

Sample Edited Voice-Over Demo

Once you have completed all of the steps, you can then save your project and WALLA, you now have your demo. It didn't cost you a penny and it sounds pretty darn awesome eh? This demo can be uploaded to any  number of the Voice-Over sites that you will register for. If you're not sure where to begin, I will provide you with several links below, 

Congratulations on the beginning of your Voice-Over career or your Singing career, good luck and God's speed to you.  Please be sure to leave a comment if you found this little tutorial helpful and feel free to drop a link to your demo's, I'd love to hear them.

Until next time,

Ciao

VOICE-OVER LINKS

123Voices

Voices

http://www.voiceoverauditionsonline.com/ (scroll all the way down, bottom right)

http://www.behindthevoiceactors.com/casting-call/#project_listing

You can also provide your voice-over talent on http://www.fiverr.com or http://www.elance.com

My take on working from home-online and earning a living. How I do it and some helpful tips.

Get Rich Quick Schemes

For years you have seen these "make money from home" advertisements, most of which turn out to be a scam. Lets be honest here, there are hundreds if not thousands of "work from home" opportunities listed on the internet that require anywhere from a small investment to hundreds of dollars in order to get started.

Most of these offers turn out to be a dead end. You invest $29.95 and up to become part of one program or another and this small investment gives you access to "tools" to get you started and so on and so forth. You end up having to upsell to your friends and family and in many cases try and recruit them into your program. If you're not up-selling to your friends and family or work associates and colleagues, you yourself are buying the "product(s)" in order to meet the minimum quota to stay on board.

Pyramid Schemes

I had a friend many years ago call me and tell me to come down to a meeting in Manhattan and if I liked what I heard, she would "sponsor" me to get me on board. As it turned out, it was a Mary Kay meeting and I had to buy into it with ($100.00)! Yes a hundred bucks! That hundred dollars got me a starter kit with samples and order forms, along with catalogs.  My job was then to come to a meeting every single week. I remember thinking "what the hell do I need a "sponsor" for? If I ran a pyramid scheme, I would naturally assume that if I am "sponsoring" people, that it is a clear indication that I believe that they can sell and market my program or products and I would cover the cost of their membership right?  Is it just me or is the term "sponsor" being used very loosely within the Mary Kay program? Sponsor my shmonser.

At the time I thought to myself "because she's my friend, I'll make her look good and sign up", but once I realized they needed me to attend weekly meetings, I outright said "I don't do meetings and I will not be able to attend them, my schedule as a freelancer will most likely not allow it anyway".  My friend understood but suggested that I try to make some of these meetings anyway. They gave me my own email account and store-link online and I then began to get bombarded with emails from the individual sales director or manager (whoever she was) that was the lead on my friends team. They send you those high energy, peppy emails, telling you that such and such did so well this month and such and such reached another level or rank etc. It was all BS to me. There's no way to make money without duping other people in to signing up for this scam business opportunity and having them sell these products or sign up below you and at some point you earn some kind of residual income from this.  I didn't want a pink freaking Cadillac and I certainly didn't feel like selling makeup and cosmetics to my friends, family or colleagues. I hated the idea of selling false promises.

It's Never "Passive" Income

It's not passive income or part-time effort at all. It's on your mind 24-7! You get brainwashed and you're constantly on the hunt for new recruits and constantly trying to sell this product or that product.  I am now seeing programs like this on Facebook and it's sad how popular these MLM scams have grown. In programs like this, if you don't follow through, they criticize you for dropping out and not being a team-player. I used up my cosmetics from my starter kit and gave away a ton of other items that came with it.  I don't want to dump all over Mary Kay, maybe it's because I am more of a tomboy that this program was not for me. Who knows?  Mary Kay's products are not cheap so oftentimes someone will, out of kindness and compassion, order one or two things to help you out and unless that item is magic, they won't be ordering again. I myself liked Avon growing up. You'd order a cheap product, forget about it and then two weeks or so later, it was like a present that you forgot about when that cherry chap stick or midnight magic perfume came to your door. Mary Kay, was not for me.

Another friend knocked on my door with his Amway kit and told me that he would make us rich. He'd made the investment and now all I had to do was invite all of my girlfriends over and get them to buy crap stuff. I whooped out my Mary Kay kit and asked him what the difference was. I told him that I'd been there and tried that and that I couldn't help him because I wasn't going to be feeding a bunch of chicks every weekend to try and sell his products. So, in order for him to make a few bucks, I'd have to spend over a hundred bucks every weekend in order to host some product sales party at my house? I think not. He was disappointed and bummed out, I mean, he did drive over an hour to show me this program on a late Sunday evening, but shoot...he should have called first.

If you like to sell things, then these Mary Kay, Avon, Amway and all of the new ones out now, might be a good way for you to save money on products and also sell them along with your program. There are far cheaper ways to get discounts on products and make money on referrals (I will cover this in a future post). These programs are not for me and if you do a tiny bit of research, you can figure these MLM programs out and find a better and cheaper way to do it. For that hundred buck buy-in, I could set up my own website and spend some google-adwords dollars and sell my own items. If that's something you want to do and don't know how to do, it's pretty simple and you can message me and I will be glad to walk you through it for FREE.  I will do a blog on these very simple steps in the next week or so and you'll have all of the information at your fingertips.

I Work From Home, So Can You!

I work from home and make money all the same and I'm going to tell you how I do it. I choose to invest in myself and market my own skills in order to make a living. I've been doing it for over a decade and the only individuals that benefit are myself and the people that I do business. There is not an entire flock of upper level MLM folks above me that benefit from one penny that I make and there are no folks recruited beneath me that I earn money from, residual or otherwise. I like this formula.  I work with freelance communities online and while you do run in to a lot of competition, if you do it right, you will always have work coming in and you will feel good about the work that you do and every dollar that you earn.

One such community is Odesk.com and depending on your skills, you can earn money with a flexible schedule and keep a client coming back for more.  This won't work for everyone but if you're educated on any level and know how to use the internet, you've got a starting point.  Most people on these online communities offer Secretarial and Administrative Services as well as things such as: SEO Marketing, Graphic Design, Music and Audio Services, Art and Design etc.  If you have any kind of talent, there is a market for you online that you can tap into for less than one of your many MLM investments floating on the net.

For the above mentioned online community, Odesk.com, as it applies to me, here is my rundown-
I provide the following services:

Ghost Writing, Writing, Transcription, Research, Voice Over, Secretarial and Administrative Services etc.

You can pretty much offer any service that you are capable of offering and following through on.  Once you have established a profile with some samples of your work in your portfolio, you can either apply to jobs that are posted or you will receive invitations for work that is available within the categories that you subscribe to. Below is an example of a job that was offered to me

You then follow-up with the offer and click accept or decline (see below):

Am I going to provide 50 articles for $200 (provider's maximum bid)? Probably not because

it's not a reasonable paying gig but if I have nothing on the table, I might bid for those 50 articles 

and ask for an increase. They would either accept my offer or decline. You get the gist of it right?

Here is my list of categories that I subscribe to:

Odesk allows folks to offer a ton of services so there is no need for you to be a writer or offer any other

kind of administrative things like I do. These are some of the categories that you can provide services in:

Odesk charges 10% of the earnings which is really not that bad at all.  You can  always incorporate

that 10% fee in to your bid for each project, that's up to you. There are different levels of membership, currently I do not pay for any additional membership options. I stuck to the number of categories allowed on the basic/free membership. Imagine that! I'm marketing my skills for free and able to earn a living while doing it.

Below are some online communities that allow you to use skills that you already know. I have listed some below.I did a few music related searches for a friend but these communities cover all specialties and fields. Keep in mind that they cover more than just music, these jpegs are for illustration only on the various searches I did with "music" when I was helping a friend get started:

www.freelanced.com (music, artists, writers, painters, graphic etc.) below you will see one job that quoted up to an $8000 payment for a 6-9 minute video promo. I have many friends that can do this in a weeks time.

www.freelancer.com (in the real sample below, you could earn $269 for a transcription of a song)

https://www.elance.com (good for EVERY field, including audio engineering etc)

 (for graphic designers/artists/web designers)

www.peopleperhour.com (very good for video, photo, audio and other specialities etc. If you master music tracks or make beats, they seem to have a ton of opportunities)

http://www.donanza.com/jobs/music

https://soundbetter.com/

http://www.soundclick.com (here you can open your own music store and sell mp3's with a paypal account) this next link tells you how http://www.soundclick.com/docs/support.cfm?site=store#1.1 

There are many legitimate opportunities to work from home for writers, designers, artists, musicians, engineers and many, many more.

I got a gig on freelanced.com within the first month of my membership which was somewhere around $15.00 and I made that investment back within that same month (for ghost writing a blog).

What helps me is that I have a large portfolio and while I didn't know how to put a portfolio together at the beginning, it wasn't that hard. I created projects on my computer and either uploaded them in word, PDF or simply screen-captured them as jpg's.  For my voice over demo; I created it on my computer with audacity.  A voice over demo is pretty easy to create. You need to either create or find music and beats and then lay your voice down, after you've done these two things, you can mix them on audacity, which is free to download. Audacity also makes it easy to cancel out background noise. Shoot, by reading simple instructions and hitting youtube, I became and audacity expert via the web and now offer voice over services online.

It's really simple to get started on your own with these online communities and you can account for every dollar that you spend (in many cases the free/basic memberships will do just fine) and also have great potential to make great earnings if you take the proper steps to set up a good profile with a good portfolio (see below).

I made over $100 in one day, for one project, with one client on elance.com (for research work) (see below)

I have my paypal account attached to elance.com and therefore I withdrew the funds on the same day and then transferred those funds to my paypal debit card. It's very simple. Use what you already know, to make money that you don't already have.  Use your skills and knowledge to make a legitimate living that you can feel good about.

It takes one job to give you good reviews and then before you know it, you're being invited to take part in paying projects that you can either accept or decline.

You can absolutely make money working from home and online but in my opinion you do not need to invest in one program or another. I don't recommend that you invest in any MLM at all and that's just my opinion. Take your $100 and invest it in yourself (or start out with the basic/free memberships).  If you don't think that you have enough skills to try this or you feel that you're rusty, trust me when I tell you that you can do this, some websites offer free memberships and others start at truly  low monthly membership rates. All it takes is one job to make that money back and pay for continuing monthly fees. It's worth it!! I pay $10 for my elance membership and I have made hundreds on that site alone. In all, I spend less than $50 a month with my various web memberships and I obtain work from all of them. The work pays for my memberships, but you can start with just one of these sites.  There is a library the size of the universe on the internet for free that will help you brush up on your skills and with that same token, there are a ton of free online resources that will teach you a skill or two.  Invest your time in  yourself and use those few bucks you have to get yourself in to one or more of these online communities to get real work, for real pay.

I'm a business owner, a blogger, a writer, a researcher, an executive assistant, a transcriptionist and so much more. I am utilizing all of my skills every day to earn a living. I have built websites, worked with SEO Marketing, Started three businesses, helped start-ups and more. Trust in yourself, believe in yourself and you can use what you already know and what  you already have within your means to start your own work-from-home journey.

Good Luck,

Til we meet again