James and the team over at the WPMU blog were wonderful to work with, and I still work with Vladimir and the team at ManageWP nearly three years later (as the blog’s editor).
How did I land those first two clients? I scoured the ProBlogger Jobs Board twice, submitting about 5-7 pitches each time. Each set of pitches landed me one quality client.
But regardless of the quality of my pitches, my writing skills or anything else, I was fortunate to be able to pitch two quality clients.
In my experience, “good” clients are generally harder to find than that on job boards – you have to sift through a lot of less-than-stellar opportunities across multiple job boards to find the diamonds in the rough.
But it wasn’t just luck that got me off to a decent start. Luck was certainly a factor, but it wasn’t the factor. The factor was something we are all capable of: hard work.
Hard Work Explained
When I began to see the potential of freelance blogging, I was a dog with bone; I wasn’t going to let go.
I sifted through a lot of job listings in the hope of finding something of worth, even though I doubted that decent opportunities were actually available. (I was of course wrong!) I sent multiple pitches out, even though I didn’t really know what I was doing. I chased up those pitches, and when I got the opportunity, I spent a long time crafting what I thought were worthwhile trial posts for prospective clients.
When things didn’t initially go to plan with WPMU (see here), I didn’t roll over and die. Instead, I clearly communicated an eagerness to deliver exactly what the client wanted, at their convenience. I tried my best to portray an air of confidence, when I was anything but confident.
All of this was the product of hard work, and in my experience, hard work is often the difference between success and failure.
I’ve spoken to a lot of would-be freelance bloggers in my time, and of those who haven’t succeeded, the key ingredient is (more often than not) a lack of hard work. Conversely, those who do succeed have their work ethic to thank.
What Else Do You Need?
But it’s not just about hard work. If you work hard on the wrong things, you can be lauded for your efforts, but you’ll have nothing else to show for it.
Hard work aside, your efforts need to be augmented with direction and efficiency. You need to be working on the right things in the right way, to make the most of your undoubtedly limited time.
And that is why I created Paid to Blog Jobs. Beyond my informational course, Paid to Blog, I wanted to create a practical tool that would enable you to turn your hard work into results through direction and efficiency.
That’s what Paid to Blog Jobs does. With it you can access a carefully curated list of only the best freelance blogging job opportunities from across the web, and you are given all the resources you need to effectively pitch for those jobs.
It’ll help you apply your work ethic in the most effective way possible, drastically cut down your time spent browsing through job listings and give you the tools you need to send compelling pitches.
PBJ has been in development for many months – we already have over a hundred beta members – but now it is time to launch officially. Monday 11th August is the date to put in your calendar. If you want to be one of the first to sign up as an official PBJ member, just enter your email address below and you’ll be amongst the first to know when the site goes live!
If in the meantime you’d like to know more, head over to Paid to Blog Jobs now and check it out!
Photo Credit: Nikkorz