Not every freelancer appreciates social media as a business tool. In fact, some freelancers believe spending time on social media isn’t a great idea especially when ‘more serious’ work could be done. Consequently, many lose out on gigs they’d have gotten out of the strength of social media.
Today, I am going to show you some ways to make the best of your business using 4 social media platforms.
Pinterest is currently one of the hottest social media platforms; it hit 150 million users on October 2016. Pinterest has proven a realistic avenue for brand promotion to those who harness its potentials. As a freelancer, you can easily get more eyes on your work, more traffic to your blog, and more clients knocking on your door by using Pinterest the right way. Here are some ways to achieve with Pinterest going forward:
- Create a portfolio board to showcase your portfolio to potential clients.
- Create an about page to tell more about yourself and your business.
- Provide a link to your website.
- Create boards and pins that revolve around your industry.
- Choose appropriate keywords for your titles and descriptions so as to become more visible to the Pinterest community.
Twitter is huge, and many a freelancer report landing clients out of the strength of their Twitter accounts. Here are some ways to make the best of Twitter.
- Make your Twitter Bio informative. Write about what you do and whom you work for. Are you a writer? If yes, outline a list of sites for which you are contributor. This is a great way to keep the clients coming. (Here are 7 twitter bio ideas.)
- Share links to samples of your work and your website.
- Follow and reach out to industry leaders.
- Search for potential clients using appropriate hashtags.
- Engage in social listening by following topics that relate to your industry.
- Communicate with your followers.
- Track what competitors are up to.
Oh, yeah – there’s no leaving the world’s largest social medium out of this. Over the years Facebook has successfully carved its niche as a beneficial business platform. You, as a freelancer, can promote your business on Facebook by:
- Creating an outstanding profile including information about your business and what you do.
- Posting links to relevant content from your business blog/site. This article describes how to get likes on your posts
- Creating a Facebook Page with adequate information and calls-to-action.
- Using Facebook search to search for gigs related to your line of work.
- Using Facebook ads (how useful this is!)
- Joining and promoting your services on niche groups:
By niche groups, I mean groups whose general concern revolves around what your business has to offer. If you’re are a content marketer, your niche groups should be groups for content marketers and perhaps professional bloggers who might be in need of content marketing services.
- Connecting with the right people — fellow freelancers as well as businesses.
- Engaging in social listening.
It’s a no-brainer that LinkedIn is a super-useful business hub. To be clear, as a freelancer a LinkedIn profile is a MUST for you. I’ve had a lot of luck finding the right clients using this platform and I think it would be beneficial to virtually every freelancer who puts his or her mind to properly using it. Here’s how to use LinkedIn to get the best results:
- Create an extremely detailed profile.
Write it all out – information about your job, certifications, skills, languages, everything! LinkedIn is a professional network; so, the real way to make the best of it is to make known the most important parts of your professional life.
- Get recommendations from current or past employers, colleagues, teachers, etc. These would make for enough social proof.
- Blog
LinkedIn has a really good blogging platform with great search engine visibility.
- Write engaging status updates.
- Join niche groups.
- Use LinkedIn Search to source for jobs and clients.
The main component when using social media with success is to be consistent. Be reliable.
