Top 10 Vital Elements of a Successful New Freelancer’s Website
If you’ve gotten your act together and put up a website to advertise your freelance services, congratulations. Most freelancers still don’t have a website, so you’re a step ahead of the competition.
But is your site getting you clients?
If the phone hasn’t started to ring, the problem may lie in the design, layout, or content of your site. I’ve reviewed hundreds of freelance writers’ websites, and I find many make a series of basic mistakes and do a poor job of attracting and converting prospective clients.
In general, freelancers usually overestimate how much patience a prospect will have for poking around your site to find the information they want. In fact, people are massively lazy on the Internet, have short attention spans, and want everything handed to them quickly and easily.
The job of your website is to quickly get prospects the information they need to hire you.
How can you make your site into a client magnet that has prospects ringing your phone off the hook? Here are the important items your freelancer website needs:
1. Clean Design
Nobody wants to read tiny white letters on a black background, or wade through a site with three different sidebars or loud, flashing ads. All you should be selling on here is your services.
Have another site if you want to affiliate-sell Carbonite or ClickBank products, or you have classes you teach or some such. Or at least get that stuff under a tab.
Especially on your Home page, it should be clean and simple. Your home page is like your online living room. Will prospects find it welcoming and want to come in and look around?
If not, clean up the clutter, just like we do in our real living rooms when company’s coming.
If you’re not a design genius or technical person, it’s well worth getting a little help here. If you’re on a budget, try the digital-design program of your local community college.
2. Prominent, Clear Contact Information
Once you have an inviting design, this is job one. Lots of freelancers hide their contact information either down at the very bottom of their home page in teeny-tiny type, or under a “Contact” tab. Then, when you click on that tab, all you see is that evil email contact form.
Do you want to fill that out, and do you feel confident that if you do, you’ll get a response? Neither do your prospects.
Instead, put your contacts in your header or at the top of your sidebar, so they’re visible on every page of your site. You never know when the mood will hit a prospect to contact you, so keep that info ever-present. Also, make sure your email link is clickable, and try to include a phone number (even if it’s Skype or a cell phone you usually leave off).
3. Show Prospects What to Do
The key to turning prospects into clients with your website is to quickly make clear on your site what you do — and what you want visitors to do.
When visitors are confronted with too many choices, they tend to make no choice and leave.
A common mistake is to put up a big row of social buttons at the top of your site or in the header. Then farther down is your contact email and phone. You might also have a blog on your freelancer site with a big “subscribe here” box.
This means you are asking visitors to do six or eight different things. You’re saying, “Follow me on Twitter, check me out on LinkedIn, subscribe to my blog — oh yeah, and maybe call me.”
When visitors are confronted with too many choices, they tend to make no choice and leave. Your odds that they’ll make the choice you want are low.
So as you create each page of your site, ask yourself what the most important goal is. What do you want the page to achieve? Then, cut all the other “asks” from that page so prospects know what to do. Also, consider making the contact you want the largest and things like social buttons smaller to visually indicate which you prefer.
4. Descriptive Header and Tagline
What type of freelancing do you do, and where are you located? If you answer these two questions at the top of your site, it will help your site find you clients.
Many prospects would like to find someone nearby who has experience doing the exact thing they want done, whether it’s website design or yacht photography or blog writing. Spell out what you do, and you’re way ahead.
Some freelancers use their URL to do this, taking AustinHealthcareWriter.com as their site name, for instance. If you have your name as your URL as many freelancers do, you can put your identifiers in your tagline.
I have a name URL, so I’ve put my own key term, Seattle Freelance Writer, into my tagline. Do a Google search for that and you’ll see the other major benefit of using these key descriptive phrases for your type of freelancing in these key parts of your site — it helps Google and other search engines send you prospects.
5. Short Copy
It’s a fact of Internet life that many people do not scroll down on web pages. So keep your copy short, so prospects see all of what you’re trying to say in the visible browser window.
This is particularly important if you’re a freelance writer. In this case, your website is essentially a writing audition (just as the design of your site is an audition if you’re a designer). Your site is a writing sample that shows how well you write website copy. Take a look at these 10 examples for some ideas on how to write compelling short copy.
Extra bonus for freelance writers: Many companies hire writers in part because they’re having trouble being concise, so if you show you can do that on your website it’s a major selling point.
6. Interesting ‘About’ Page
Many freelancers don’t create an About page — but it’s important. It’s typically the most-visited subpage on any site.
Why is that? Because prospects want to know who you are.
The Internet is an impersonal place and there are a lot of scams out there, so visitors want to check you out and see if you appear legit.
The Internet is an impersonal place and there are a lot of scams out there, so visitors want to check you out and see if you appear legit. They’d also like to see a little personality to see if they’d enjoy working with you.
While your Home page should be all about clients and what you can do for them, your About page is where we learn why you do what you do. Don’t go back to when you first held a crayon or wrote a poem at age 5 — that’s a story to tell to your friends at cocktail parties. Clients, sorry to say, don’t care about your whole life story.
Write this so clients can see how your life experiences will benefit them. This is the place to talk about your passion for your craft, how you came to it, and give us a small peek at what else goes on in your life besides freelancing.
7. Picture of You
Somewhere on your site — ideally right on the Home page but if not on your About page — you need a picture of you. This reassures prospects that you are a real person.
Try to get a professional (but not stiff) shot taken. That fuzzy iPhone shot of you on the beach in Cancun in a bikini holding up your dog — or a drink — isn’t what you want here. Take a look at this travel writer’s site for a great example of how to visually express what you do and who you are through your personal shots.
8. Talk in the First Person
There are a couple of ‘voice’ problems that are common in the copy on freelancer websites:
- Third person. As in, “Joe Smith has been a freelance writer since 2004. He specializes in…” and so on. What’s wrong with this? It comes off pretentious and a little goofy online. We all know you wrote it. And by using the third person, you miss your chance to make a personal connection and make clients feel you are talking one-on-one with them.
- Posing as an agency. As in, “At Joe’s Communications & Design, we specialize in delivering beautiful websites.” If in fact you have a staff, this is fine. But pretending you’re an agency rather than a solopreneur only sets you up for an awkward conversation with prospects who might ask, “When can I meet with your team?”
For best results, use first person and speak directly to your prospect. Remember that one of the most powerful words in sales copy is “you.”
9. Easily Viewable Portfolio
This is the main reason prospects come to your website — to be able to see or read some of your work. Yet, a surprising number of freelancers have no samples at all on their site. Many more have only a few samples up.
Know that even if you ghostwrote it, you can post it (unless you signed a non-disclosure). If you did it while at a staff job, it’s still a sample of your work. Pro bono work you did also counts — prospects need never know you did it unpaid.
There are two good ways to show clients your samples:
- Link to where they live online on other sites; or
- Serve them on pages of your own site through html coding or a tool such as the Google Document Embedder.
What you don’t want are PDFs a prospect has to download to view. Remember that visitors don’t know and trust you yet, and are unlikely to be willing to hit ‘download’ and risk a virus.
To make it easy for visitors, identify each clip by both the market and subject. Prospects shouldn’t have to click on each one to learn the topic or client. Consider grouping samples by client or topic for quick scanning.
My philosophy on samples is the more, the better. You never know which sample might be the one that makes a prospect go “Aha! This is the freelancer I want.” So post lots of samples and improve your odds.
10. Get Testimonials
Raves from your clients are the secret sauce that gets clients to pick up the phone. Make a habit of asking clients for a testimonial when you finish a project, so that you have as many as possible.
In this age of LinkedIn recommendations, it’s never been easier to request a testimonial. I know freelancers who actually write the testimonial for the client and just ask them to sign off on it. That’s a great way to get it done quickly when you know clients are busy.
Don’t leave LinkedIn recommendations on that platform, either. Copy them to your own site. Sprinkle testimonials on all your pages, put them in your sidebar, or give them a subpage of their own — but get them.
For extra impact, see if you can get small head shots of your clients to put with their testimonials. That allows prospects to better envision themselves becoming another one of your satisfied clients.
Free website reviews: If you’d like some feedback on how to improve your freelancer website, leave your URL in the comments. I’ll give everyone who comments on this post’s publication date at least one tip to improve your site.
Photo credit: Some rights reserved by raywoo.
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We are in the process of updating our portfolio – but would still love feedback on our current portfolio. We’re on the fence about whether to include testimonials when we update our site. I think testimonials can have the tendency to feel too ‘salesy’ and insincere. We have discussed including a few Case Studies instead.
Sarah, there’s lots of study data that testimonials greatly increase your conversion rate. It’s way less ‘salesy’ to have customers talk about what a great job you did than it is to say it yourself!
And some prospects won’t take the time to read through long case studies — not saying they’re a bad idea, great to have some, but have testimonials, too.
The big thing I’d say about your current site is you’re hiding your contacts — get them visible at the top of your sidebar or even in your header. Prospects should be able to see them WHILE they’re viewing your portfolio and not have to go click somewhere else to find them.
Also, all I’ve got under contacts is 2 dead emails — they’re not even clickable. Try to add a phone and make those emails live.
Your blog doesn’t seem to have anywhere to subscribe on email, which is the point of having the blog, really. Get that going at the top and start capturing some prospect emails.
I finally found an RSS button WAAAAY down at the bottom – get that up higher where people are more likely to find it…but you don’t really want RSS subs because you can’t market to them.
In your sidebar, instead of ‘categories’ — really a useless widget — and Facebook likes and recent comments, have an email sub box and a “most popular posts” — so your best stuff stays at the top.
Your portfolio looks tasty and I love your header graphic! Very nice.
Thanks for the advice Carol!
Hi Carol, looking forward to your input. I recently joined the Den and took the Break Into Business Writing class, where I learned my old clips are still useable, so I do still need to put up those links. Thanks!
Hi Colleen — nice to see you over here!
I’d really like to see a head shot of you, if not on your Home, for sure on the About.
You’ve got a bit of the too-many-asks problem here. For instance, you don’t need both a Hire Me and a Contact tab — you really don’t want either. Just put your contacts a the top of the sidebar, where you’ve got the mini-bio right now.
You don’t need a Search bar – let your navigation tell visitors what to do. Don’t want them doing random searches.
Your blog needs photos half-column wide at the top of each post. Makes a big difference in how many people will read it.
While I like the graphic you’ve got for your header, I think with your food-analogy copy you should probably choose a food image that reinforces that theme…or go a different way with copy. Have to say I was confused when you said “through their stomach,” since there’s no context for that analogy at that point.
Your current tagline isn’t strong for getting found on search, as no one is searching “I want professional writing and editing services.” If you did “Travel and business writer” or something along those lines, especially putting your city in, that would help you on some useful key word searches.
I’m of the opinion that copyright notices on writer sites are pretentious and unnecessary. Copyright does apply, but unless you mailed this to the copyright office, putting up a notice isn’t really appropriate. Also, you’d prefer to encourage sharing of what you have up rather than discouraging it, right?
Definitely get those clips up on the site under a Portfolio tab! That’s the #1 thing prospects come to your site to do — read your work.
Hope this helps!
Excellent article. I’ve seen so many websites where designers as being “ONE” designer say “WE” who are we fooling here? What’s wrong with being just you? Why not say, I am a little fish that can compete and here I am. Who’s “we”? You and your “imaginary partner” or your dog?
Thanks for the article. Very inspiring too
I’m so with you, Alexandra. I think we all got into the habit of using this tense back in the old-fashioned days of resumes…but it just doesn’t work online.
I always want to ask if it’s the royal “we” or something…just comes off stuffy.
Carol –
Thank you so much for the feedback! I’ll definitely be making some updates to this — and I think I’ll change the copy rather than the graphic, since my graphics skills leave much to be desired. To be honest, I never even noticed the copyright bug; thanks for pointing it out!
I appreciate you taking the time!
I just put up my site recently and would be interested in your feedback. Thanks!
Hi Matt — Since you’re a webmaster it looks pretty crisp! I like how when I click the graphics it changes what it says your expertise is.
You don’t really have a tagline that could help you get found on search. Executing the Ruby/Drupal stuff graphically I think may rob you of that, so you might want it as meta words in a tagline as well.
Your contact form is that form, though. People do hate that. At least include your email above it. Ideally, kill it and put real contacts in the header.
In general, I’m not a fan of themes like this for freelancer websites, where some key stuff is below the fold and there’s no sidebar. Some people will never see those buttons you’ve put way down at the bottom. Like on your About page, the call to action is invisible as it’s not ‘above the fold.’
You probably want a sidebar to create shorter lines of copy — lots of study data on how that increases readability. You could also use graphics to cut those lines shorter.
Hey – did you used to live here in Seattle? I’m going to try to not be awed that you’ve worked on Bejeweled which is a w e s o m e…
You clearly have a heavy-hitting portfolio…a few usability tweaks and I would think this’ll get you a lotta clients.
Generally nice site — go get ‘em!
I like these ideas. Great site Matt!
Great info and good timing as I am just redesigning my site. I’d hold off providing feedback on my current site since I plan to incorporate your suggestions as I revise.
2 questions:
1.When you talk about the tag line, are you implying that it will be picked up somehow by search engines?
2.I am reluctant to publicize my phone number that freely. I do have a Skype account and am just learning the ropes. Does Skye include a phone number in their basic free account and if so where do I locate that? If not, is it available in their purchase plans? And would it be too much trouble to clarify in a nutshell how that number works, meaning is there a VM or some other way to collect messages?
Thanks for the blog entry and for these answers!
All the best,
Babington
Babington, I know folks who’re just putting their Skype handle with a clickable link to connect with them, and I’ve seen links to the Google Voice platform too — seems like there’s a widget that makes that easy to set up.
I personally use a cel phone I leave turned off. I just turn it on once a day and take a listen to see if anyone was trying to reach me. The recording says I’ll do that, that I only pick it up once a day, so they know it’ll take up to 24 hrs to hear from me. Seems to work great.
Some people just hate email and really want to call and hear your voice…so providing a phone means you don’t send those prospects away.
Sorry – forgot to address your first point.
Yes, there is meta data that makes your tagline highly regarded by search engines, so putting a key word search term in your tag can really help you. (If you don’t know how to look at that meta, get a techie to help you — it’s really worth getting this right.)
Do a search for my tagline term, “Seattle Freelance Writer,” and you’ll see how valuable this placement can be.
Hi, Carol. I’d love to see what you think about my site!
Wow Aubre — your site has a lot of visual pop!
I’d make the typeface in your body copy bigger — it’s kinda small. Kick it up to 14 pt. Especially with your cartoon-graphic design, that’ll look better.
My questions is trailer for what? Probably more people would click if it was more descriptive.
I’d say the big flaw here is hidden contact info. It’s not even a tab in navigation, and can’t be seen above the fold…it’s barely visible at the bottom only if my browser window is maxed. And then when I click it I get a hidden contact form. And no other way to be in touch. I’d bet you’re losing a lot of prospects because of this flaw.
Maybe you could get at least an email up in your header?
As you can read above I’m not a fan of the no-sidebar, long scroll-down type themes. You’re sort of OK with the jump boxes you have to take you to the right part….but gotta find somewhere prominent for contact info.
I know a lot of writers with multiple niches that are always asking how to do it in one site…think I’m going to hang onto your URL for an example of a way to do it that’s working.
I have my portfolio website online and would greatly appreciate some feedback. Thanks
Kristie, you’re switching back and forth beween first and third person — get a photo of yourself onto your About page and talk to us one on one.
I’m not a fan of rotating headers, but yours at least goes slow and is just showing your visual chops…so maybe that works.
This is yet another no-sidebar, scroll-down type theme, and you’ve got quite a lot of valuable stuff at the very bottom, where few will see it.
And you should already know how I feel about contact boxes and contacts hidden under a tab from the comments above.
Hi Carol! This is a good list you got here and I totally agree to all of them. I’m considering having small head shots to go with the testimonials – great idea!
Hi Carol, great article. I am not satisfied with my website but have looked at it too much now and would love some fresh eyes – that know what they are talking about – to give me some feedback!
Melinda, you’ve set your blog as the Home page of your site, which I don’t recommend for a portfolio site.
Instead, put the blog under a tab (and take the dates off your posts, so it never looks dated if you don’t post). Then write a Home page that is sales copy and focused on exactly what sort of clients you work for and what you do for them.
The problem with having it your blog is now, prospects see whatever post you’ve put up this week. It’s sort of random and you aren’t making it sales-focused the way it should be.
Also, between your header and tagline and I don’t really know what you do or that you’re for hire. I might go with a more straightforward hed or tag like “Austin Freelance Photographer,” so that it helps Google send you clients.
See above for my comments about hidden contacts, talking in the third person online, and themes that put critical elements at the bottom of a long scrolldown instead of in a sidebar where they’re visible above the fold.
Excellent article! I’m constantly tweaking my portfolio site so the tips here should really be helpful! I’m actually in the process of creating pages for my work instead of showing just screenshots. I figured it’d be much more interesting and informative to show my process and more images with some of the work I’ve posted.
Forgot to mention that I’d love some tips for my site!
You know, I get a great feel from your site, Corinne — nice job showing your personality without oversharing.
You know I’d like those contacts visible instead of under a tab. You have another one of these scroll-down, long-page formats, but you’ve done a good job of not hiding anything too critical down at the bottom.
Love your About page copy.
Nice!
Awesome article! I think I have all this in place, with the exception of the testimonial headshots. Great idea! I’d love to know your thoughts
Testimonial mini-headshots ROCK and convert really well. You can see them in action on the landing page for my membership community, Freelance Writers Den.
When you see those little faces, don’t you feel like you could really SEE yourself as a Den member? It really makes a difference in relatability.
Thanks for the tips, Carol! I totally agree with your critique. I’m going to talk to my developer to try to make those changes soon. Feel free to hang on to my URL to share! Thanks again!
I’d love to think what you have to say about my site! I appreciate it.
Hi Terrence –
There’s a lot of clutter on your site, and like Melinda you’ve made your blogroll your home page, which doesn’t sell your services as well as a static home page with specific sales copy would.
Also, your tagline is ‘freelance writer,’ which is a broad term that’s hard to rank for…if you can give it another modifier or two it’ll make it easier for you to top a relevant search and get found.
You only have 5 tabs, but they’re in 2 rows, which makes it look busy and confusing.
I also can’t see any obvious way to contact you…so that is a pretty big problem!
Your About page has no picture of you.
And it has some stuff on it I personally wouldn’t put if I were looking to get clients… like “I’m a perpetual starter and teeter on being a dabbler or jackass of all trades.” That does NOT make me want to hire you to be a writer! Sounds like you’re going to leave me hanging in the middle of my project.
Think about a client reading this…and make it showcase your strong points as a writer.
Thanks Carol! I’ll be making some adjustments.
Carol, I’m working on getting my website up right now so the timing of this was fantastic!
Even better, it was a pleasant surprise to scroll down and see you giving even more concrete advice in the comments. I’ve found your critiques very helpful and it’s given me more of a third perspective to judge my site on. You’ve given me quite a few helpful pointers to keep in mind. Thanks!
Hi, I am a Leeds (UK) based designer and have a passion for digital. I have an online portfolio of work showing off my design skill set and I would welcome any kind feedback on my site. Nice article btw.
Hi Richard — as you can see above, this was a one-day offer. But I bet if you scan through the reviews above you’ll find some tips to apply to your site.
Carol, the tips here are priceless. It’s what I wanted! THANK YOU FOR SHARING Carly Currna’s site. I’ll be back to read your post again. Bookmarked….
I know — isn’t Carly’s site adorable? You get her personality AND that she’s a travel writer, all in those wonderful shots.
Let me know what you think of my site! I enjoyed your post!
http://www.loveinspired.weebly.com
Thanks!
Rachel Rees
See above, Rachel — the free reviews were a 1-day-only offer that has now expired. But I’m sure if you look through my comments above you’ll find some useful tips for your own site.
Hey Rachel,
I like how you emphasised what you specialise in at the bottom of the page.
On the other hand, I would be careful using different fonts throughout the website.
wish you the best,
G
Hello everyone,
I’d love to get some feedback on my website: http://www.giacomoballi.com/apps
thanks a bunch,
Giacomo
Great list, what i’d like to add as a tip is:
Name your price or hourly rate.
Many freelancers like to keep it vague, however your clients want to know what they can expect. It can also be seen as a selling point, maybe you can compete on price because you work from home, or when you are expensive it meens you are good right
I know freelancers who do it, Tom, but I’m not one of them. Not a fan of rate sheets.
If you’re getting a lot of lowballers I gather it can save you some time by sending them away and getting them to stop bothering you.
But the problem is whatever range you put, prospects will always want the bottom of it.
And every client is different. Personally, I’d rather hear all about their project before I decide what I want to charge. Also, stating your rates usually involves revealing hourly rates, which you want to avoid if you can. Per-project bidding is always the ticket to earning more vs hourly rate.
Some good tips, especially speaking in first person and also your tip on testimonials – I’ve read up a lot on marketing yourself and know that’s very important.
Thanks
Aadil
Your insights are invaluable and I so appreciate you taking time to help each and every one of us. Would love your thoughts on my site. Thank you so much!
Hi Carol
Thanks for the article. It is very helpful to me.
Please take some time and visit my profile site and share your views.
I am thinking of redesigning it. Your views will help me alot.
Thanks.
Nidhi
Just to reiterate to all, the free website-review day is now over…but if you read the comments above I think you’ll get a lot of tips you can use on other writer websites, too. I find these issues are pretty common on most writer websites, and fixing them should help you get clients.
I came across this post of yours today, rather just few minutes back.
What you wrote makes a lot of sense, though taking advice of another one, i created content for my website. The site is yet to be fully commissioned.
Two things I immediately realised are the lengths of the pages and my photo.
I know the deadline for you offer has expired a long time back.
However, I will be happy if you will have a look at my site and make suggestions.
Thanks.
Ravindra Kathale
PS: Your site rocks!
Very good advice, must go and apply it now!
Thank you,
Thanks so much for this advice. I’m working on a brand new site at the moment and I’ll be referring back to this article as I do it.
Thanks for this article, i keep coming back to it as i transition my website over from a bit of a mixed-up blog to something i hope looks a bit more professional.
Thanks again.
Thrilled to hear how many people are using this post as a guide for fixing up their sites! Hope the tweaks make your site convert better and get you more clients. That IS the point of it all.
Hi here’s a new concept for a Freelance website: http://ezzylance.com/
We would like some feedback on:
- logo,
- concept (is it clear what the site does? )
- design (is it nice?
Thank you,
ezzy
Hi there — doesn’t look like that’s a writer’s website, which is what I volunteered to review here…but instead, yet another new platform/mill site looking to lure freelance writers into its net.
I get an invite to join a new one of these pretty much every week. Writers don’t really need another race to the bottom, $10 a post type of site…we’ve got enough of those, thanks!
I encourage you to think of another model for your business! One where writers are paid fair wages. Now THAT would really make the design “nice.”
Thank you for the reply Carol!
It’s definitely not a writer’s website, and we’re not in the mills business
Looks like we need to work on the copy to make the concept more clear.
Hi, good work but a bit confused. You state that the contact form is a negative and that 3rd person is a no no, but most example websites you list, are using this technique.
I don’t believe they are, Luke — and mine certainly doesn’t!
But in any case, I have yet to meet someone who told me anyone uses that form to contact them. People hate them and don’t fill them out. Give them a real email address they can click — trust me, you’ll get more responses.