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Putting out Content daily - let's see what happens

Andy Black

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Hey everyone,

February is obviously over which means it's time for a new update.

Had a slow start this month so I didn't put out quite as much content as last month. But still posting several pieces of content per day. I also dropped "Xing" as a plattform because there is zero interaction between users over there.

What excites me is that my daily posting seems to work, as I already secured two deals to do business with people just because they saw me posting a lot about optimizing websites (one on Linkedin and one on Facebook).
On an another ocasion I offered to analyse a website for free within a facebook group. The only condition was that I would be allowed to document the whole process on my own blog and they would get a backlink of course. A lot of people responded wanting me to analyse their website.
So I analysed the website of one company which ended in my longest blogpost ever. Next I postet my results into that facebook group so everyone could analyse their own website with the exact steps I provided.
The guy whose website I analysed was amazed and meant that he would come back to me in March to see if we can work together fixing all the errors I encountered.
Why in March? Because there is an election going on right now and he is one of the top candidates. It's a rather small election for the chamber of commerce. But still it's always valuable to get in touch in people who know a lot of other people.

Then there is another great idea that struck me. I can talk a lot about how to optimize website for search engines and all that stuff, but talk is cheap as we all know. So I came to the conclusion that I should start a new website and apply all my theoretical knowledge. The whole process will be documented on my current blog and social media channels.
This way I'm not just talking about the things that work. Instead I can show what works and what doesn't.

Moneywise this month was pretty much okay - I know I keep saying this for months now. But the good news is that I already some offers on the table for the next month. Looks like March and April are going to be a bit better as of now because I finally have some small MRR deals.
Of course I will keep posting and engaging with people to build my community.

That's it for this month's update.

Any quetions or feedback? Feel free to share your thoughts!
Well done!

How about video reviews of people’s sites too? I use Loom a lot.
 

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Hey everybody,

Another month, another update.

March was actually pretty decent for me. I decreased the daily posting activity a bit, so I'm only posting around 10 to 15 pieces per day. This amount is more managable to keep up for the long run.
Slowly but steadily I'm building a real community and more and more trust.

With the crisis going on now I'm not sure yet if there will be a lot of businesses in need of my service. I mean, they probably need it, but won't have the money or the will to invest in marketing rigth now.
On the other hand I secured two smaller jobs (~ 700 Euro) for next month. Not a lot, but still better then nothing.

The new website I talked about in my last update ist almost ready to go online. A lot of time goes into research and content creation for that website because I want to make sure it's the best information on the particular topic out there.
All the theoretical knowledge about SEO and online marketing comes in pretty handy right now. So this new website will be my own case study I can show to everybody as proof of my skills. Although I'm aware that it will take more time, patience and effort until I can truly steamroll my competition (as SEO always takes some time).

For the next 2-4 months I actually believe that it will get pretty rough getting new clients. But because everybody seems to cut the marketing budget I figured I should do the opposite. Well, at least when the "corona dust" settles and media has more to talk about than the virus.
I plan on focusing more on my google ads game because it's easiest to convert the people already looking for my service. I'm already running a small campaign (7€ per day) which has brought in a client.
But I should probably do some conversion optimisation to squeeze out as much as possible.
Would be grateful for any tips on how to attract more leads as a copywriter/seo with google ads specifically.

Anyways it's been a year now since I started this thread and I have experienced a lot during this time. Really thankful for all the things that happended - good AND bad - because they led me to this point. I don't know yet how hard the upcoming crisis will get, but I am not in the least bit scared or unsecure.
Just ready to tackle every cahllenge that comes my way and grow through it.

Let me hear your thoughts on this.

That's it for this month.
 
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Andy Black

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Would be grateful for any tips on how to attract more leads as a copywriter/seo with google ads specifically.
I started a few progress threads recently that might be of interest. All my progress threads are linked to in my signature.
 

Andy Black

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When people say "quality over quantity" I agree. But let's face it, you can figure out much faster what quality means when you're posting more often!
I agree. Quality does beat quantity, by a long way probably. And quantity allows us to increase our quality. (As per the story of pottery students tasked with creating as many pots as the could vs students tasked with creating the best pot they could. The first group created a better pot.)

Saying that, look at Valier’s YouTube thread and the phenomenal results he’s getting from quality.

@Phikey has a “120 videos in 120 days” thread that’s interesting too.

I’m inclined to have a sandpit for producing quantity, and releasing quality elsewhere.
 

Pat D. Rick

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I agree. Quality does beat quantity, by a long way probably. And quantity allows us to increase our quality. (As per the story of pottery students tasked with creating as many pots as the could vs students tasked with creating the best pot they could. The first group created a better pot.)

Saying that, look at Valier’s YouTube thread and the phenomenal results he’s getting from quality.

@Phikey has a “120 videos in 120 days” thread that’s interesting too.

I’m inclined to have a sandpit for producing quantity, and releasing quality elsewhere.

I should probably post more often in this thread as well now that I'm thinking of it.
 

Andy Black

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New update for the summer:

I know the last update was two months ago, but I've been pretty busy and wasn't much active here on the forum during this time.

I kept posting and commenting daily on Linkedin. This got the attention of some businesses who came to me and are now repeating customers. Now I focus on getting them great results and get more referrals from them.
Any ideas on how to orchestrate referrals?

I had one big learning during the last few weeks: I am much better in closing a deal in person than I am over text messages.
I know this sounds like a no brainer, but a lot of times when someone sent me a message asking for my help I just replied via text. Looking back that was pretty stupid!
Now when I get a new inquerie I instantly ask if we can talk about the projekt on the phone or via Zoom. My sales went up when I made this change.

Of course I keep putting out content daily and I also publish new articles on my website about once a week. The long articles help me to position myself better and get better rankings on Google.

At the moment some of my challenges are that I get more inquiries for one time jobs and I'm not sure how to make monthly retainers out of them. I guess I need to get better at upselling and offering monthly services.

That's it for this update.
If you have any questions or feedback just let me know.
Maybe focus on getting repeat business?
 

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Yes, that's what I struggle with at the moment.

Let's say someone comes to me and wants me to analyse his website for further optimization. After I've analyzed the website he's like "Alright, now I know what to fix." and does it himself.

Charge for the analysis.
 

Pat D. Rick

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Charge for the analysis.
Of course I already charge them for the analysis. It's just that after this they wander of and maybe come back to me in the future if they need me again.

I need to find a way to prevent this so that they pay for my services on an ongoing basis.
 

Andy Black

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Of course I already charge them for the analysis. It's just that after this they wander of and maybe come back to me in the future if they need me again.

I need to find a way to prevent this so that they pay for my services on an ongoing basis.
I'm not saying this is the case, but sometimes a service doesn't lend itself to being something people want to pay monthly for.

Now that you've got their trust and determined they're willing to pay to optimise their website, what else might they pay for to make more sales online? (Because that's why they wanted to optimise their website right?)
 
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Pat D. Rick

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I'm not saying this is the case, but sometimes a service doesn't lend itself to being something people want to pay monthly for.

Now that you've got their trust and determined they're willing to pay to optimise their website, what else might they pay for to make more sales online? (Because that's why they wanted to optimise their website right?)

You are right. My copywriting services for example are more one time projects. But I cooperate with an agency and for their clients they now use my services on an ongoing basis.

The other service I offer is SEO (more SEO content production) and this is actually great to use on a monthly basis : )
 

Andy Black

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Update for September:

This month was pretty intense.

I secured deals worth 5,135 Euros and have already worked off most of it. Some of my clients are now ongoing projects that I create content for on a monthly basis.

One client even recommended me to a befriended company and they will most likely end up working with me on a monthly basis as well.

Now I have more and more clients where I can show the positive results of my SEO and Copywriting services. These boost my credibility and make great case studies for my Linkedin profile.

One of the articles I produced even ranked on position 1 just three days after publishing, for a competitive keyword with more than 3,500 monthly searches. I’m not sure if Google just wants to joke around, but I’ll take this success anyways and the client is thrilled.

So in September my revenue was just a bit over 1,000 Euros because the invoices have been sent out at the end of the month - around 2,205 € should come in by the end of the next week.

As of now it looks like October will be my strongest month this year since there are more and more people coming over Linkedin and asking for my services and I now even get referrals.

Linkedin truly is a beast when it comes to generating leads and has been my best bet for business this year without a doubt. And that’s with only 1,600 followers (I started with ~50 followers in January).

Last week I set a new personal record when I created a post that so far generated more than 20,000 views - see the screenshot.

Not too bad for organic reach in my opinion, but still a long way to go.

Now I’m really looking forward to October and the challenges it will bring.

That’s it for this month’s update.
Great progress. Well done!

I haven’t got my head round LinkedIn. Maybe one day.
 
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Pat D. Rick

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Great progress. Well done!

I haven’t got my head round LinkedIn. Maybe one day.
I don't even think it's necessary for you to be active on Linkedin since you have this forum that gives you organic reach. Over time you became a trusted authority on this platform and I’m sure it has paid off financially for you in one way or the other.
 

Andy Black

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Update for November:

It’s been 4.108 EUR in November. Some invoices are out, but not paid yet so there will be additional revenue coming in from the November deals.
I also secured deals worth about 5k for December that I’m working on now.

Right now it’s kinda hard to manage all the work that’s coming in. I even had to postpone some deals to January because I can't work them off at the moment.

I’m starting to raise prices with every new client, but somehow they keep coming. In a Zoom meeting one client even said that I have to raise prices because he thinks I’m aiming too low. Nice thing hearing this from a client's point of view.

This month it also was the first time someone gave me negative feedback. And I don’t mean valuable negative feedback. It was more the negative attitude kind of feedback. The Guy wanted me to help with his website relaunch and writing copy that sells and also has a chance to rank well in Google.

No Problem. I made an offer, he signed it and I started to work. After a couple hours of work I sent him my first draft to get his feedback and adjust from there.

And then. Silence. No answer for a whole week.

Finally he sent me an email raging about my first draft. That somehow confused me since our initial video call was quite nice. Anyway I offered to write another version because revisions are always included. He raged again and wanted to stop working with me altogether.

But because he signed my offer and I already had put in some work I didn’t want to let it end that way. I convinced him that he would pay 50% of the amount and never have to see me again afterwards. He agreed and I had the money the next day.

My learning from that: New clients will have to pay at least 50% up front BEFORE I start working. This way there is way less risk involved.

All in all it’s starting to get really interesting. I'm excited to see how it goes on and what the next year will bring.

Next update will follow next month/year.
Good progress.

I often prefer to "refund with glee" and be done with pita clients.
 
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Andy Black

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Update for February:

Hi everyone,

February was again a solid month with 6.263€ in revenue. Some invoices from the previous month will be going out this week.

On Linkedin things are kinda getting slower since I came back from my vacation in January. My posts lately don’t get as many views as they used to, but are still performing decently.

I also met with a startup, who came to me through Linkedin, last week and they really need my service. This would be a pretty good deal since they’d need help on an ongoing basis and I’m trying to get more clients on a monthly recurring basis.

Currently I have about 3.200€ on MRR and several one time projects, although I’m trying to convince the one time projects that they’ll need more help in the future. Which is true since I’m doing mainly SEO.

I thought it might also be a good idea to start posting on other places again as well as producing more content for my own website. Especially the latter suffered in the last couple months. Because of all the work I’m doing for my clients I didn’t take as much time for my own website.

But I consistently get traffic to my website (around 500 visits per month) from the articles I published last year - it’s starting to gain traction after all. Unfortunately it’s not really relevant traffic for business since the articles have more of an informational search intent.

Nevertheless it’s good to see things moving in the right direction.

For the next couple weeks I want to try some outbound marketing. I think it’s a good idea to not be dependent on only one marketing channel (which is currently Linkedin for me). Although I’m not really an outbound type of person I’d like to give it a shot and see the results of an strategic outbound campaign.

That’s it for this month's update!
I’m posting daily on Twitter. Have you considered Twitter?
 
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I’m posting daily on Twitter. Have you considered Twitter?
I've posted on Twitter when I started out with practically every plattform last year. And to be honest I really like Twitter, but it never took off like Linkedin so that's why I focused more on the latter.
 

Pat D. Rick

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Update for April:

Hi everybody,

April is over and I made 6.084€ in revenue.

I’ve onboarded a new client for a first time project, but there is a high probability that they will need my services on an ongoing basis. And since they are a cool brand with a good network I will do my best so they recommend me and get even more clients like them.

To push recommendations forward I’ve put together a nice whitepaper which describes my services and the benefits of it. It’s currently getting designed. When it’s finished I’ll send it with my satisfied clients so they can share it with other befriended companies.

By now I’ve made almost as much revenue this year as I made the whole last year. So I guess that’s a good sign that I’m heading in the right direction. And most of it coming from posting daily and engaging with people online.

That’s it for this month's update.

See you next month.
 

Pat D. Rick

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Update for May:

Hey everyone,

In May I made 8.539 EUR in revenue so it was another pretty good month for me.
I also added a very good new client which is now going into a monthly retainer for the next 12 months. With around 1.200 EUR every month this is a good addition to my cash flow - besides it’s a very cool brand to have as a client as well.

Right now I’m the biggest bottleneck to grow the business since all success hinges on me doing all the work myself. So to level up my game I finally decided to get help from a consultant.

I did my research and talked to different people and found one that helps freelancers like me getting from one-man-show to an actual agency. Since this guy has already worked with several people I also happened to work with, I'm pretty sure he can help me get the next steps right and build an infrastructure for scalability.

This week I’ll have a meeting with another company that could eventually become a high value client for a monthly retainer. Of course I can give better insights in next month's update.

Until then see you next month.
 

Andy Black

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Update for September:

Hi everyone,

In September I made 6.499 EUR (7.519 Dollar). In addition, a few bills have not yet been paid, so a little more will come in here.

I’ve also onboarded some new clients which will increase my MRR, so the rest of the year will also be pretty strong. Now with all this more work coming in it’s hard for me to handle everything alone, so I decided that it would be best to hire my first part-time employee helping me with fulfillment.

Since this is a pretty big step for me and my business I don’t want to rush it. I’d rather take this process slow and interview and test a lot of people to find a good fit for this open role.

It’s important to me that I can get some operational stuff off my plate so I can focus more on the marketing and sales side of the business. These are also the things that are the most fun to me and I noticed that I feel somehow drained when I only help my clients with all their marketing activities, but don’t take time for my own.

Actually I’m so busy right now that I almost forgot to update this thread, that's why this post comes only now, when it is almost mid-October.

I’ll keep you updated.
Great news and update. Upgraded to notable. Keep it up!
 
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So this is my first thread on this forum, but I guess it's a good way to monitor my progress as a freelancer and at the same time give you some insights on what's going on.

Okay, first things first...

In September 2018 I started on the side as a freelance copywriter. With all the tipps from this forum I setup an Upwork account and got my first client by sending him the article he was looking for, for free. He was impressed and gave my more work for the next two months. This was a content writing gig however, so not too much money. But hey, you gotta start somewhere.

I setup another account on fiverr which was more about copywriting than content writing. When people pay you money for what you create out of nothing it is sweet. But to me the real ice cream is the 5-star reviews they left because it’s proof that they were actually happy with my work.

In November I designed my own website. Amazing what you can learn with the help of YouTube tutorials. Because it was so easy to setup a new website and I remembered Fox’s thread about webdesign, I thought that this is another chance to earn money while helping people in need.

Thankfully I have some old economy self-employed people in my family. First target was my stepdad who has 6 employees and little to no work in December. I offered to update his website because it was pretty bad at that time and drive some traffic via Google Ads to it. 3 weeks later he asked me to stop the campaign because he got more phone calls than he could handle. It’s hard to describe the feeling of satisfaction I had.

After that until now there was just another customer for a website and every now and then a small copywriting gig.

Make no mistake, I still struggle to find new customers and most of the money I still earn with washing dishes on the weekend.

Now I think weekly updates are the way to go for this thread and of course every time something cool happens I’ll post it here.

If there are any questions feel free to ask :)
Three things you can do:

1) LinkedIn is packed with people who need a good copywriter (please feel free to send me some of your work to review)
2) UpWork
3) Meet people including existing companies that offer copywriting services, but need to outsource
 

Andy Black

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Hey everyone,
I just noticed that I haven’t made an update for the last three months, sorry about that.

Of course a lot has happened during those three months. First of all my first employee started working in December and she did a really good job. Unfortunately she will leave at the end of March to pursue her own self-employment, although in a very different business, so she won’t be a competitor or anything.
Now I have to find another employee because the last months made me realize how important it is to not do everything yourself as well as have someone to talk about your work (other than friends & family).

During the first few weeks I actually felt kinda useless because a lot of things that I used to do now were taken off my plate and I even started to fill my new time with unproductive things. Not very smart!
But then I came to my senses and thought, “Hey, now I have more time for the really important and valuable things for the company.” So my clear goal for this year is to develop marketing and sales to build a predictable pipeline of qualified leads to stop being overly dependent on LinkedIn and word of mouth.

My first step for that is a very thorough white paper I’ve created that explains the pains of my ideal customers and how my services help them solve their problems. The white paper is currently being professionally designed. When it’s done it will be offered for download in exchange for an email-address (nothing new here). But I will promote the white paper heavily and send it to ideal leads directly to get their attention.
I can also take some topics from the white paper to put in my own blog posts and strengthen the inbound channel. And I can turn every blog article into several social media posts, which gets the content machine going.

My qualifying and onboarding process for new clients is already pretty good. I usually start with a foot-in-the-door-offer that is a small win for both sides and builds the basis for monthly services in the future.
I've also decided to focus much more on my SEO Copywriting services only and won't take on any more customers that need one time projects or need any services outside this focused offering (like technical SEO audits). This makes it much easier to find the ideal customers who can benefit from this specialized offering. It also makes it easier in the long run to delegate my sales process to other people, so I don't have to do all the selling myself anymore.

There is actually a lot going on right now, and sometimes it feels like putting out multiple fires at once. But it is fun and we'll see how things are going to turn out in the end.

I will do my best to not forget the new update next month.
Nice update. There seems to be a few progress threads of people building teams and/or focusing their offer. @The-J’s latest updates in his progress thread might interest you.
 
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So this is my first thread on this forum, but I guess it's a good way to monitor my progress as a freelancer and at the same time give you some insights on what's going on.

Okay, first things first...

In September 2018 I started on the side as a freelance copywriter. With all the tipps from this forum I setup an Upwork account and got my first client by sending him the article he was looking for, for free. He was impressed and gave my more work for the next two months. This was a content writing gig however, so not too much money. But hey, you gotta start somewhere.

I setup another account on fiverr which was more about copywriting than content writing. When people pay you money for what you create out of nothing it is sweet. But to me the real ice cream is the 5-star reviews they left because it’s proof that they were actually happy with my work.

In November I designed my own website. Amazing what you can learn with the help of YouTube tutorials. Because it was so easy to setup a new website and I remembered Fox’s thread about webdesign, I thought that this is another chance to earn money while helping people in need.

Thankfully I have some old economy self-employed people in my family. First target was my stepdad who has 6 employees and little to no work in December. I offered to update his website because it was pretty bad at that time and drive some traffic via Google Ads to it. 3 weeks later he asked me to stop the campaign because he got more phone calls than he could handle. It’s hard to describe the feeling of satisfaction I had.

After that until now there was just another customer for a website and every now and then a small copywriting gig.

Make no mistake, I still struggle to find new customers and most of the money I still earn with washing dishes on the weekend.

Now I think weekly updates are the way to go for this thread and of course every time something cool happens I’ll post it here.

If there are any questions feel free to ask :)
That’s awesome, I did copywriting years back with some success, and funnily enough, I’m picking it back up again to supplement my income and get some practice for my own business. It’s a hustle in the beginning until you get solid clients. Keep up the good work and hit the job boards hard and you’ll get to a good place. In the beginning my focus was finding quality clients, be careful to not sell yourself to the lowest bidder. It’s very easy in the beginning to do that as you get experience and ratings but you end up commoditizing yourself.

Good luck!
 

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Nice update. There seems to be a few progress threads of people building teams and/or focusing their offer. @The-J’s latest updates in his progress thread might interest you.
Thanks, I'll definitely take a look at his thread. I was motivated to focus more on a very specific service offering after reading Built to Sell at the beginning of this year – when I was on vacation in Ireland, but forgot to tell you @Andy Black , maybe we could've met for a coffee or so.
 
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Pat D. Rick

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Update for July & August:

Hey everyone,

I’ve realized that I missed a monthly update so I now combine the update for July & August into one update. Not a lot of super exciting things going on anyway.

Both months combined I made 20.648 EUR (20.960 USD) in revenue.

Although it was summertime and a lot of people were on vacation (like myself) I still got some pretty qualified leads in. Like one of the biggest window manufacturers in our country is getting a new website and needed our serives for it. It’s acutally a rather small project on our side because they had very tight deadlines and we are already very full. But it's definitely a good reference for future inquiries.

In addition, I have received test projects from two very large well-known companies (sales in the billions), so that a cooperation can develop on a monthly basis. Apart from that, these companies are also good showcase projects because a lot of people in this country know their brands.

An interesting thing happened just this week to me when a potential customer declined and gave me the feedback that my offer was surprisingly cheap compared to the other offers he got for the particular project. Now of course I don’t know if I would have gotten the job if I had just increased my price, but it was certainly an important point.

I also just realized while writing this that I didn’t make an update on my efforts of how much content I’m putting out. So it’s very much like:
  • 2 YouTube videos per week
  • 1 Blog article per week
  • 2-3 Linkedin posts per week
I’m also planning my first ever Linkedin Event, which will be an online free Q&A session where people have the option to ask me anything about my “craft”. This session will be recorded and then I have some more content to post online and can position myself as an expert because the users can experience me giving answers to other people.

Now I just have to get enough people interested in showing up at the event and asking questions.
But I can give a better update on how it worked out next month.

Other than that, there is nothing more to add for this update.
 

Mister

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Hey Pat, thank you for sharing your process over the years.

It is interesting to see your insights first and learn from them.
The biggest takeaway was for me that you started to publish content.

I didn't read if you are currently doing it, but I think it's worth looking in.
It's simply ranking for “SEO SERVICE “CITY”” but not for only for your hometown but also every other major/smaller city in Austria, Germany & Switzerland
Here is an example: https://www.noahlutz de/ (the point is missing between the z and the de)
 

Lucky Lu

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So this is my first thread on this forum, but I guess it's a good way to monitor my progress as a freelancer and at the same time give you some insights on what's going on.

Okay, first things first...

In September 2018 I started on the side as a freelance copywriter. With all the tipps from this forum I setup an Upwork account and got my first client by sending him the article he was looking for, for free. He was impressed and gave my more work for the next two months. This was a content writing gig however, so not too much money. But hey, you gotta start somewhere.

I setup another account on fiverr which was more about copywriting than content writing. When people pay you money for what you create out of nothing it is sweet. But to me the real ice cream is the 5-star reviews they left because it’s proof that they were actually happy with my work.

In November I designed my own website. Amazing what you can learn with the help of YouTube tutorials. Because it was so easy to setup a new website and I remembered Fox’s thread about webdesign, I thought that this is another chance to earn money while helping people in need.

Thankfully I have some old economy self-employed people in my family. First target was my stepdad who has 6 employees and little to no work in December. I offered to update his website because it was pretty bad at that time and drive some traffic via Google Ads to it. 3 weeks later he asked me to stop the campaign because he got more phone calls than he could handle. It’s hard to describe the feeling of satisfaction I had.

After that until now there was just another customer for a website and every now and then a small copywriting gig.

Make no mistake, I still struggle to find new customers and most of the money I still earn with washing dishes on the weekend.

Now I think weekly updates are the way to go for this thread and of course every time something cool happens I’ll post it here.

If there are any questions feel free to ask :)
Can I ask you how much you charge for SEO work and generate traction and conversions for a website?
 

Andy Black

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Yes, this makes totally sense, but because this is my first real estate agent I do FB ads for, I wasn't sure how to go about it as I couldn't tell how fast I would bring in results.
I think I'll go with the monthly fee when he recommends my service to other agents in his network.


This is what we (I don't create the course alone) are planning to do. We want to have about 60% done and sell it with a special early bird offer to see if there is actually demand.

By the way what experience do you - and all the other guys - have with selling online courses?
What kinds of online courses do you think work best - videos, webinars, PDFs or a mix of everything?
And do you offer a monthly payment as well? (I think this is a good idea for this particular course because it'll be more expensive.)
What I meant was create a mini course and sell that? Instead of a 10 hour course, create a 1 hour course and see if it can help people, and if you can make sales?

How will you get the course in front of people who it can help, and who would be willing and able to pay for it?

@Lex DeVille has a thread about his courses in Udemy.

I have an INSIDERS progress thread about serving my own DIY market, albeit I haven’t updated it much. I also have a progress thread about paid email newsletters, although haven’t updated that for a while either.

I’m sure there’s other threads in here about course creation.
 

Pat D. Rick

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