You finally got the project and are getting ready to get started. Little do you know that working from home will present its own sets of problems.
Don’t worry, these problems are really not a big deal, but they are common problems that every freelancer faces.

Let’s see how we can tackle them.

Read Also: Roadmap to Freelancing – Part I, Part II

Time Management

This is one of common main issues for freelancers, and I’m sure most freelancers have experienced it.

One day in the morning, you’ve set your time tracking and you plan to work only for 8 hours on the project that day, but when you are busy with your work, you look at the clock and suddenly it’s already 8 pm. Rats!

(Image Source: FreelanceSwitch)

Self-discipline

In my experience, there is no way to overcome such a problem except with self-discipline, which means you should be able to control yourself, divide the time for work and for life.

Unlike at the office where the working hours has been specified generally from 9 to 5, as a freelancer you won’t have working hours, so you have to make your own work schedule and strictly obey it. When it’s time to rest you have to rest, when it’s time to work then get up and start work. I know these things may sound cliché, but I think there is no other way around it; it’s just one of the common consequences of being a freelancer.

(Image Source: FreelanceSwitch)

Distraction

Another problem freelancers may face when working at home are distractions.

Unlike at the office where the environment has been set for Work, the house is still a house with its daily ins and outs: loud music or the sound of the TV, your mother screaming at your siblings to pick up after them, the sound of your father or uncle fixing up the kitchen, the broken toilet, clearing the garage or mowing the backyard. You can probably imagine the whole scene in your head now.

To overcome this situation you can renovate your own home office for a bit more privacy like most freelancers do, or you can work at cafes or at coworking spaces, but make sure your project budget is sufficient to pay for the cost.

The point here is to overcome the distraction by finding your most comfortable environment to focus on finishing your project ― without distraction.

(Image Source: FreelanceSwitch)

Subcontracting

Being a freelancer does not mean that you will work alone 100% of the time. If you feel that your skills are not as good as a friend’s, then you can offer him or her the opportunity to carry out parts of your project to deliver a better result for your client.

In addition to helping your friend financially, you can also reduce your workload and focus more time in finishing other aspects of the project or even work on another project.

(Image Source: FreelanceSwitch)

Invoicing

Sending an Invoice may vary depending on the contract. Let’s say the project is estimated to be accomplished within three months. In this case I usually will send two invoices. Work starts once the client has paid an agreed downpayment amount after signing the contract.

My first invoice will be sent when the project has progressed about fifty percent of the way. The second invoice will be sent when the final work is ready to be delivered. Your case will probably differ greatly from mine, so make your own rules on how you want to update your clients on the progress and invoice them accordingly.

For more on the matter, I suggest you read these articles, one from Kevin Harter on how to send invoice to clients professionally, and another from Smashing Magazine that has also shared some practical tips on how to invoice your clients like a Pro (beautiful invoice templates included).

Just do it

And that’s abbreviated version of the path towards becoming a freelancer. All the examples mentioned above are only a few of which I have ever experienced when I first started as a freelancer. Every job and profession has its own challenges, whether you work at an office with its strict rules or work from home where you work by your own rules, each situation has its own advantages and disadvantages.

When you have decide to go freelance, you should be aware of the consequences ahead, but don’t make it stop you from being a freelancer or achieving the dream you wish to achieve. You wouldn’t know if you can be a freelancer or not if you don’t try. Just do it.

After some time when you are already used to the situation then I’m sure you will enjoy the freelance work style. Thanks for reading the whole series. I hope you enjoyed then and found them useful.

Related posts:

1. Roadmap to Freelancing: Getting Ready (Part 1)
2. Roadmap to Freelancing: Getting the Deal (Part 2)
3. 20 Reasons To Say “No” to Freelancing
4. 5 Reasons Why You Should Try Freelancing

Modern consumers don’t buy cr*p. We see more and more free products made available on the Web since businesses make the move from the material economy to the bits-and-bytes economy. Physical things are much more expensive compared to virtual ones and that is the reason why the free business model is becoming more and more popular.

(Image Source: Lukas Troup)

As more businesses adopt this model you may have to rethink your business strategy because people may just stop buying your products if they can get the same for free.

Learn all you can about the free business model in order to stay ahead of your competitors.

Read Also: Handling The Business Side Of Design

Types of Free

Yes there are different types of free, namely:

1. Buy one get one free – This type of free exists with traders who want to clear their stock inventory. This sort of free sells because people think that they get more while buying less even though the fact is that they are spending money for free stuff.

2. Someone else pays – Via advertisements. People buy AdWords from Google and that’s why we get to use free mail, powerful search engines, great productivity features and more products for free from Google.

3. Cross-subsidy – Product X is free but the customer pays a hefty price for sub-product Y which covers the cost for both items, for example, you get a free razor but the blades are going to cost you for the long term.

4. Freemium – Quite popular these days. For example the basic account of the product is free but if user wants more features, he or she has to pay for premium services. Premium customers subsidize the free for products like Flickr, Dropbox, MailChimp. Critical mass is vital.

5. Gift Economy – The price for the product is not fixed, e.g. Wikipedia is the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, people usually help by donating. Lost Type – you can pay as much as you want for the fonts you download but it is not obligatory.

6. Free for real – giving things for free without expecting anything in return, e.g. charity.

Who’s using free business model?

Numerous companies. Most of new start-ups offer something for free, for example Spotify, SoundCloud, Rdio, GrooveShark, Evernote etc. The same applies to older established brands like Twitter, Skype, Vimeo, YouTube, Google, Yahoo who all implemented something from this business model and successfully grew with that.

How it works

Michael Woloszynowicz explains how the freemium business model works and uses Dropbox as an example. To be successful with freemium you need massive amounts of traffic and a continuous flow of new sign-ups.

At the beginning, freemiums is a loss of money but a point where you reach a certain number of premium users, you will start making money. At that point, profit becomes bigger than cost and this freemium model will start to pay off. Both bad and good scenarios are explained in the charts below.

In order to succeed you have to make sure that you have good enough features to achieve better conversion rates. This freemium model works very well even with small conversion rates. Only 3.5-4% of Dropbox users pay for everyone. You can accomplish this by testing your concept within your target audience. Another important point to consider is the visibility of pro account and benefits users will get by choosing premium. You can achieve better visibility by effective usage of reminders.

Free Games: Angry Birds

Angry Birds is free for Android, Chrome and Facebook. By letting people play this game for free they are building the fan base and spreading brand awareness. When the brand becomes well known, they start selling merchandise, apps for iPhone or the iPad, and special editions of Angry Birds like Angry Birds Rio, Angry Birds Space etc.

How to implement

You can easily implement the free business model in your current business by following good practices used by other companies. Here is a list of some paid services you can offer your users.

• Upgrade features
• Premium services
• Support
• Add-ons
• Pay for commercial use
• Product giveaways for promotional purposes
• Membership
• Product trials

burning Questions

1. What are your user communities?

If you are creating something for everyone you’re creating to nobody then. You have to narrow down your target audience and address specific types of people segmented by interest, needs or income. You have to define your target audience and test your business concept with the people from your target audience to make your business successful.

2. What problems do they share?

To be successful with this free business model you have to listen to the people you’re creating products for and try to help them to solve their problems with your products. Nobody wants to fork out money for something that doesn’t help them solve problems.

3. What can you monetize once you have the traffic?

You have to decide what you are going to monetize when traffic is big enough. You can offer premium upgrade features, memberships, release free products and offer paid support. For example WooThemes, the leader in the market offers high quality WordPress themes; some are for free but with these free themes, you don’t get any support. If you want support you can buy a membership and get an access to the forum to get the information you need.

4. Pros and Cons

One of the pros is the small conversion needed in order to succeed. Only 3-5% of users pay for the rest. That means you don’t need a lot of users who actually pay for the product to be successful. Also, having a free product is easier to promote as well as build a community around it. For sustainability, huge amounts of traffic and users is needed, which is really hard to acheve if your product is very new and cannot compete with big competitors in terms of discoverability and originality.

Money is not everything

You might think it’s not true but in reality it’s not just the money that counts. To get a good reputation for the company is a hard and long process. Everyone from the company should be involved. If your company values differ from the values of your employees, you have a problem.

Everyone is connected to the Web via social media platforms and they can say whatever they want after working hours so you should be aware of this and make sure your employees understand that how they behave online will affect the direction of their product and organization.

(Image Source: Fotolia)

Reputation is one of the things that is really hard to build and very easy to lose. A single wrong message or mis-directed campaign can destroy all your hard work. By giving things away for free, you can build a reputation as a good and caring company, and if the things you are giving away are really good, people will consider supporting your organization by buying other products from you. If your products are too expensive, give something for free to show them that your products are really worth their attention. This is the chance for them to get to know your company and products without spending money.

Every company is unique

You should analyze your company and current market in the niche you’re targeting, to choose the best way of implementing the free business model in your business. Every company is unique and while what worked for the companies mentioned above might not work for you, it strengthens the argument that you should conduct your own analysis and find the best way to use free economy in your business to put your product on the map.

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3. [Freebie] “BiZ” Business Website PSD Templates
4. 5 (More) Tips to Getting More Design Projects