110 Ideas to Get More Freelance Work and Generate New Client Leads

Credit: TheGiantVermin on Flickr

Whether they’re designers, developers, copywriters, or some other creative professional, most freelancers ask themselves the very same question: How can I find more clients?

We’ve updated our monster list of over a hundred ideas designed to help you do just that. Not all of these ideas will make sense to everyone, but we hope you’ll find at least a few to help you find newer and better paying freelance opportunities. Here we go …

Use Word of Mouth

• Enlist your family and friends to help spread the word about your services
• Send out an email to former coworkers and other contacts announcing what you do, where you are, and what you can offer
• Ask your satisfied clients for testimonials and referrals
• Offer free consultations to new referrals (consider including a time limit so they can’t pump you for too much free advice)
• Consider a referral or finders fee

Keep in Touch with Clients

• Contact past and current clients when you have a new service to offer them
• Get in touch with past and current clients when you have completed an important project
• Start a newsletter
• Take advantage of every outgoing email by using your email signature as a marketing tool
• Send promotions for services with your invoices
• Ask your clients to place a credit on your work in web, video, or print
• Make a calendar featuring your work for clients to put up in their offices to serve as a constant reminder
• Make a poster for your client to hang up on their office wall
• Suggest new projects to your existing clients, such as a blog, Twitter account, or newsletter

Talk the Talk

• Go to industry events – conferences, association meetings, seminars
• Go to events in your client’s industry
• Sponsor a client event
• Join your local Chamber of Commerce and get involved
• Socialize and always have your business card ready
• Do some high profile pro bono work for a non-profit
• Get involved in social groups you’re connected to (church, school, university)
• Join a professional association and get listed
• Contact people you used to work with and ask them to send you any run-off work they might have
• Offer to give a seminar to a local business group
• Practice an elevator speech about what you do and have it ready to go wherever you are
• Participate on online forums (using the forum signature line)
• Comment on relevant blogs to draw people back to your freelance site
• Create a blog that’s relevant to prospective clients (not just other freelancers)
• Offer guest blog posts to blogs that are relevant to your clients
• Create a buzz piece and include your URL so prospective clients can find you

Promote Yourself

• Have signage printed for your car (make sure your URL is big enough to be legible from far away)
• Get t-shirts made with your URL
• Advertise in a niche magazine or trade publication
• List yourself in directories like CreativeHotList or the one here on FreelanceSwitch
• Research sites your clients are visiting and buy advertising there
• Advertise in online directories
• Participate in a trade show
• Holidays are your friend! Send a clever holiday greeting to clients showing your work
• Have a gimmick that makes you stand out
• Give something away for free
• Advertise in an industry newsletter
• Offer branded pens and paper at industry events

Be an Industry Expert

• Host a webinar or teleseminar that would interest prospective clients
• Create your own podcast or videocast
• Pitch an article to an industry publication
• Pitch a story to a blog or resource website
• Offer to speak at industry and networking events
• Submit tutorials or how-to’s to websites
• Get on the radio
• Write an eBook or Report for your target market and promote it online
• Answer relevant questions on LinkedIn
• Enter your work into competitions and awards… and win

Use the media

• Issue a press release about a story related to your services and try and get it into a local newspaper or magazine
• Sign up as a source on HelpAReporter.com and respond to interview requests in your niche
• Run a contest which ties into your services and promote it

Job Boards

• Keep an eye on online job boards
• Check out Craigs List for your city
• Post in the services section of Craigs List rather than just responding to job ads
• Keep an eye on offline job boards
• Pin up a little advert on boards in your local area or community

Brrr – It’s Cold in Here!

• Find out how you could improve a companies business and profits and cold call them with your pitch
• Mail promo postcards to potential clients
• Mail fun promotional items to potential clients (calendars, toys, posters etc)

Help Leads Find You

• Apply SEO techniques to your website to boost Google traffic
• Have a follow up conversation with all potential leads
• Make sure you’re listed in the Yellow Pages and White Pages business section

Get in Bed with Local Business

• Contact your local internet service provider or printing house and offer them a commission if they refer work
• Establish contacts in larger agencies that can refer their run-off work
• Try location-based Google Adwords
• Take out an ad out in a local newspaper
• Keep in touch with freelancers that will offer clients a complementary service to yours and throw each other work
• Create a local business directory and use it to get to know other business owners who might later need your services
• Cross promote with other businesses
• Ask if you can put your business cards or brochure in local stores
• Join a coworking space shared with other businesses or freelancers

Industry Specific Ideas

And here are some ideas that are tailored to certain industries…

Photographers

• Enter your work into a gallery or run an exhibition
• Submit some work to stock agencies to generate extra revenue
• Do a new series of work so you have a reason to show your portfolio to an old contact
• Send in your photography work to industry magazines to make a name for yourself
• Start a photo blog
• Photograph an event or series and pitch it to a newspaper or magazine
• Get an agent

Programmers & Developers

• Pitch your self as a developer who understands web designers, because most of them need a developer
• Write a small web app like ta-da list or jobpile and get some recognition
• Create an app for Facebook or mobile phones
• Answer tech questions on forums and use a signature that says you offer freelance coding services
• Keep your eyes open for businesses still using @yahoo or @AOL email addresses and pitch yourself as their web developer so they can get a domain-based email
• Enter a programming contest like RailsDay
• Contribute to open source efforts and get known

Illustrators/Animators

• Start a comic strip blog – e.g. QuestionableContent
• Make characters and create merchandise based on them – figurines, badges, t-shirts, etc
• Enter some competitons to get your illustrations in some famous places – snowboards, posters
• Create an awesome animation that wins you fame like Laith Bahrani
• Do stock illustrations for a site like istockphoto and have a portfolio site offering custom ones
• Write to big blogs and offer to do a cartoon strip (k10k)
• Send in your illustration work to magazines like computerarts.co.uk
• Create a promo Reel of animations or illlustrations and send it around/get it publicised
• Send your illustrations to gift card publishers

Writers, Bloggers, Journalists

• Pitch yourself at ad, design and web design agencies as a copywriter
• Find some photos on iStockPhoto, add some creative headlines, and make a mailer out of it
• Submit articles to article banks for sale
• Pitch article ideas to editors, online and off
• Sell reprint rights to articles for which you own the rights (you can do this on your own or through a syndication service like FeatureWell.com)
• Reslant an article you’ve already written for a new market
• Write a book and publish it with lulu.com

Designers

• Submit work to design compilation books and magazines
• Get your portfolio/profile listed on a site like Coroflot
• Design a great website and submit it to design galleries like CSSMania.com
• Build a great portfolio and submit it to design portals like DesignIsKinky.com
• Start a magazine, design portal or blog

There you have it! Have you tried any of these ideas? Which ones were most effective? Are there any ideas you’d like to add? Leave a comment and let us know!