As a freelancer - you're telling a story, whether you want to or not. Without realising, a lot of people will go into freelancing telling a story of "Hey, I'm desperate, I'm cheap, pick me!".

Those are the people that usually end up on Fiverr, 99designs, or some other "race to the bottom" website where you don't want to be.

I'm selling on positivity

When talking to business clients you have to keep in mind that often the person you are negotiating with is not the person spending their own money, so their story is "what will I tell my boss?". So when you show up with a positive story, making sure that them hiring you will make them look good - they will be eager to work with you.

Story of gain (positivity) and the story of loss (fear)

• If you hire me - you will get ahead
• If you hire me - you will make money
• If you hire me - things will get better for your company

• If you don't hire me - you will fail
• If you don't hire me - your competition will
• If you don't hire me - you will lose money

I choose positive message when communicating my value, even though the result of both is the same, but I want the takeaway to be the excitement of working with me, rather than a fear of not working with me.

When speaking with a potential client, I am explicit in positive outcomes of partnering with me (or my company), and implicit in the negatives. But my goal is always to end up with a positive feeling.

Because, people will rarely remember what you said, but will remember how you made them feel. And I know everyone wants to work with people who make them feel good.

This is why interacting with clients on sites like Upwork is difficult, because the story from the beginning is "This is the place to find a cheap freelancer.", they came here to see freelancers bid against each other who can be the cheapest, so they can go back to their boss and say "Great news, I found the cheapest freelancer."

This is why you don't try to find clients here because you already know they don't want to pay extra for good quality, and just because these are the most accessible clients to find - quickly you will learn - they are the hardest to work with. Mostly because there are here just to take advantage.

So make sure your story is not the story of how cheap you are.

Missed previous emails?

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Cheers!

T.

Tom Kozacinski, sir Freelance-a-lot