There are many online resources that will tell you the skills you need to be a freelancer, and that will teach you many of them. There are lots of jobs for freelancers and many sites offering the work.
The key to being successful is that you have to be prepared to work hard for long hours, but there are some skills that can make it an easier task.
There are advantages to working freelance. As long as you meet the deadlines and do exactly what the client is asking for, you have the freedom to work whenever you want and from wherever you want.
Many freelancers work from home, but they could just as easily sit on the beach working or in the park, as most freelance work is done remotely online.
Coding
There are more than 3 million apps available on Android and Apple, and someone has to write the coding that makes them work.
There are free courses online that will teach you to write as many computer languages as you want, and then you can develop apps for yourself or for other people.
Excel Consultants
Excel is a brilliant tool if you know how to use it properly. For some people, it is too confusing though which is why there is a call for a specialist excel consultancy.
Learn all the ins and outs of how Excel works, and the hundreds of applications it can help with, and you will never be short of freelance jobs in this area.
Translating
You may be surprised at just how many people cannot master a second language fluently.
There are always documents to be translated, letters and many other things that need someone to understand two languages.
For instance, if you speak Spanish and English, you will be able to offer your services as a translator for local lawyers, hospitals, and many other organizations.
You need to speak both languages fluently, or your work could end up sounding like Google Translate. Although this is a very good tool for day-to-day things, it is not good enough for legal documents.
Graphic Design
If you enjoy designing, then graphic design work could be for you.
There are so many online tools to help you that you do not need to be good at drawing, they will help you all the way from start to finish.
There is a huge amount of graphic design work available for freelancers, as it is needed for so many different things. From websites to social media, design logos and brands can be a very lucrative form of freelancing.
Building Websites
This is one of the areas that is a mystery to most people so they will gladly pay someone to do it for them.
There are many thousands of new online businesses starting every week, and they all need a website.
Their two alternatives are to have a go at the do-it-yourself options, which many people won’t do as they fear they will not look professional enough, or pay someone to do it for them.
A large number of them will approach an agency for help, and who do agencies use – freelancers. You can also, of course, offer your services direct if you know where to place the adverts.
This is one of those areas that will grow quite quickly if you are good at the job, and you could soon find yourself having to find other freelancers to work with you.
Like most freelance options, there are plenty of online resources to teach you website building without you having to spend any money.
Copywriting
Copywriting is a skill that can be learned, as long as you know the basic rules and punctuation of the language you are writing in.
It is hard to find work to start with and is an ongoing fight to keep the clients happy. Because Google and other search engines are constantly changing the perimeters of the things the like and don’t like, something you write one month could be no good at all the next.
This means you have to be aware when Google decides it wants keywords more or less often, or when they alter the size of the Meta description on a WordPress site. There is more to the job than just writing the piece, and often there is a lot of research involved.
This type of work can also include editing and proofreading other peoples writing. For that, you need to have a keen eye to spot their spelling and punctuation errors.
Understanding Analytics
There are some really clever online tools that analyze where your viewers have come from, how many times they visit your site, how long they stay there and so much more.
They will turn out reports all day for you, but as good as they are the reports are not much use unless you understand them.
The problem is that people who have not been trained to read the information correctly usually do not know what it all means, and that is where the work comes in for freelancers who understand analytics.
User Testing
You do not need any special skills to do this type of work. When developers want apps or websites tested, they get other people to do it for them.
The idea is that the freelancer may spot glitches that the developers have not noticed, and it is only by using them that they show up.
You have to be prepared to trawl through the website or app you are testing and speak your thoughts out loud as you work through it.
This is unlikely to become a full-time job as most of the suggestions above could though, as there is not so much of this type of work available.
Other Freelance Work
Almost any work can be done on a freelance basis, and from a business’s point of view, it is often a better option.
They only have to pay freelancers for the work they do and do not have any of the legal duties that come with being an employer.
This is exactly why more businesses are starting to use freelancers for bookkeeping, managing social media and many other things. Technology has also helped, as now most of these jobs can be done remotely.