Jovan Cicmil's Blog - Finding Clients

How Much Do Freelance Writers Make?

January 15, 2025

So, you want to be a freelance writer. Great. Now imagine there’s an offer from a prospective client sitting in your inbox. Riddle me this: how much should you charge the client? You don’t want to drive them away. You don’t want to undercharge either. There’s a fine balance to be struck. You do a quick online search and you end up more confused than when you started. Freelance ...

SEO Lessons for Freelancers: How To Help Clients Find You

December 25, 2024

The most common pain point for freelancers is finding clients. Most of us are confident in our skills and our work ethic and our dedication. We just can’t wait to get out there and shine. And then…crickets. Not a client in sight. In freelancing, the first step is often the hardest. I’ve written a lot about finding freelance clients, but that’s not the Holy Grail. The Holy Grail is ...

How Long Does It Take To Make Money on Upwork?

December 18, 2024

When I started freelancing back in 2011, it only took me one month to find my first paying client after I started learning web development. Is that still doable? If you’re already experienced, then I’d say you can certainly find work within a month. If you’re a total beginner like I ...

Should You Use Local Outreach To Find Freelance Clients: Pros and Cons

December 4, 2024

Many freelance gurus give the following advice for finding your first clients: Find local businesses that might benefit from your services. Reach out to them offering your services. The logic is: the business owners are more likely to respond to you because you’re a local, you can visit their business, schedule a coffee chat, and so on. This approach has its pros and cons like any ...

Can Anyone Be a Freelancer?

November 20, 2024

I write equally for beginners and for experienced freelancers who want to earn more or scale their business. But, often, I get questions from those who are only starting to consider freelancing as an option. Here are some of the most common questions I get asked by such readers: Could I become a freelancer? What does it take to become a freelancer? Can anyone become a ...

How I Landed a $100k Freelance Client

February 2, 2022

Freelance success rarely comes easy. If it did, a lot more people would be writing blog posts like this one. I spent a lot of time in the trenches before I started getting quality freelance work. Starting in 2011, I spent about a year on Freelancer.com doing mainly small Javascript/CSS projects. Then I switched to Upwork in September 2012 because the opportunities were much better there. ...

How To Find the Best Clients on Upwork in Three Steps

January 25, 2022

A lot of people complain about the quality of projects available on Upwork these days. Cheap clients , ridiculous requests, impossible projects — you name it, it’s there. Well, I’ve got some news for you. First of all, none of this is new. Upwork (and every other freelance platform, for that ...

The Best Ways To Find Freelance Clients in 2021

June 9, 2021

The freelance landscape is a constantly shifting one. This is a wonderful thing for adaptable, entrepreneurial people — and freelancers are nothing if not adaptable and entrepreneurial. Still, some dangers lurk in the mists of this landscape. For instance, it is not beyond imagination that you might find yourself looking for freelance work in an ecosystem that clients have migrated away ...

How to Turn Your Employer Into Your First Customer

June 3, 2021

Imagine this. You drag yourself out of bed in the morning. It’s a rainy day and your commute to the office is hell. The soundtrack you play in your car doesn’t even come close to drowning out the sound of horns and engines. By the time you arrive at the office, you are stressed, apathetic, and counting the seconds until you can drive home again in that same rush hour traffic. In the ...

How I Went From ‘Hello World’ to My First Freelance Client in 1 Month

January 7, 2021

Back in 2011, I was a university graduate with a very foggy look at the future. The field of study that I had chosen at age 18 now seemed like a foolish choice. Even though it was an engineering degree, in my country it resigned me to office work in one of maybe a dozen telecommunications companies. This is not what I had envisioned when I left high school. I was lucky enough, however, to ...