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A Simple Formula to Grow Your Freelance Business As Coronavirus Drags On

Do you want to grow your freelance business through the Coronavirus pandemic instead of merely “surviving” it? Here’s the harsh reality… In every kind of world event like this (pandemic, recession, depression, war, etc)… in business, there are winners and losers. These events tend to separate the wheat from the chaffe. And, there’s often no middle ground. No just “getting by”. You either grow and come through it stronger or your business withers and dies. But, there is a way through it that I will show you in just a moment. But, before I do, in case you wonder how

John Morris October 18, 2020

How to get more clients hiring you

There are three reason people don’t buy: They don’t want what you have They don’t believe you They don’t believe THEY can do it And, what I find is many freelancers get caught up on that 2nd one. So, they spend all their time conking potential clients over the head with “credibility”. Reviews, ratings, certifications, portfolio, etc. It’s all important. But, it’s NOT how clients decide who to hire. You’ve likely heard the saying: “People buy on emotion and justify with logic.” Credibility is logic. You don’t decide what car you want to buy by going to J.D. Power and

John Morris October 30, 2020

These Clients Desperately Need You

I’ve been a freelancer for a loooong time (15+ years). And, in that time, have gotten to know several CEOs well enough to have had serious personal conversations with them. Truth is… many are a train wreck. I know two, in particular, who whenever there’s any dip in sales or any adversity, they completely check out. Will literally disappear for a week — right when they’re needed the most. I never understood it. I wanna scream at them… “What the [email protected]# are you doing!?” That’s the time to check IN, not check out. I really do believe it’s how I

John Morris October 29, 2020

Hack Culture Needs to Die

Anybody else tired of “hack” culture? “7 Hacks to Triple Your…” “A Secret Hack to Instantly Double Your…” “52 Little-Known Hacks to…” I asked my little brother this the other day: “How many ‘8 tips…’ type blog posts or videos have you read or watched in your life?” His response: 1000s. Then I asked: “How many of those ‘7 Steps’ were actually seven steps and worked how you were told they would?” His response: Very few. Sound just a teensy-weensy bit familiar? Business is like diet and exercise to me. The “secret” to getting healthy isn’t some “ultra-secksy” secret, at

John Morris October 28, 2020

Most Freelancers Are Too Selfish and Self-Centered

Was just watching an episode of Bar Rescue. Highly recommend if you’ve never watched. Entertaining as hell AND lots of business lessons that can help you be a better freelancer. Anyway, this one was about Fairway Golf and Grill. And, there’s this scene where Jon Taffer is explaining how the theme of the bar didn’t match the demographics of the city they were in. The average age of golfers in America was 55-62. The city they were in had grown by 66%… But, the majority of that growth was people 21-29 years old. So, they were marketing themselves to a

John Morris October 21, 2020

How Much You Should Charge As a Freelancer

No, I’m not just going to tell you to switch to fixed-price projects like everybody else seems to do. Don’t get me wrong… they’re right. But, changing your pricing model is only ONE way to start charging more. Let me show you how to figure out what to charge and then some ways to increase your rate — beyond just switching to fixed-price projects. How Much Should You Charge As a Freelancer? One approach is to take your income goal and use that to break down what you need to charge to hit that income goal. For example, let’s say

John Morris October 17, 2020

$12,000 Per Month Side Hustle With No Experience

If you’re brand new to freelancing and don’t have any past client work or experience to lean on, then you’ll want to devour this email… Because I’m going to show you… How you can STILL get clients… Even if you have ZERO past client work or experience. And, create a 6-figure income with just two small projects per day. Quickly, some context… I’ve now taught over 26,000 freelancers through my classes… and the vast majority of them focus solely on Credibility when it comes to getting clients, charge more for their services, etc. Thing is… Credibility is only ONE of

John Morris October 9, 2020

Upwork Just Made a Big Move and You Should Pay Attention

There ARE still people who believe the future of work is NOT freelance. Hard to believe, but it’s true. They’re the people who put air quotes around “work” when you say you work from home. And couldn’t tell you what Zoom is. They’ll also be the people asking you how you did it in a few years. Try to be nice. I experienced something similar when I told people, way back in 2004, that the internet would be the future of business. “The Yahoo chat thing? Bahaha. Okaaaay.” they scoffed. We know how that played out. Meanwhile, big companies see

John Morris July 31, 2020

How Do You Convince Clients to Hire You?

Ever had a client you were just sure was going to hire you… never pull the trigger? Or, bid on a job on a freelance site and the client disappears without hiring anyone? Or, worse, you never even get those “bites” to begin with? I had an almost client once that did this. We went back and forth for almost a month. He asked me, genuinely, close to 50 or 60 different questions about my services. I got very frustrated. And, ultimately, he ended up NOT hiring me. It was incredibly annoying. But, it did make me take a hard

John Morris July 23, 2020

A deal with the devil

Been binge-watching the show Lucifer on Netflix. Before that, it was season 5 of Legends of Tomorrow, which had a hell-centric storyline. And, I noticed an interesting theme kept popping up in both. One that’s a splash of cold water for most freelancers. But, when done right equates to consistent, long-term success. It’s the idea of making a “deal with the devil”. It seems no matter how vile you are. No matter how much you personify evil and treachery and all the dirty misgivings we humans are capable of… there’s one thing that’s still strictly off limits. That even the

John Morris July 8, 2020

Looting From Your Clients

I once had a client who was reluctant to work with me because he’d previously worked with a developer on Upwork and caught that freelancer watching porn when he was supposed to be working and tracking time for the client. I’ve had clients whose freelancers took their money and never delivered on the project. I’ve had clients who’ve worked with different developers for up to two years to try and get their site built, paying thousands of dollars, and still had nothing to show for it. I could go on and on with the horror stories I’ve heard from clients.

John Morris June 26, 2020

Yes, IT degrees are still dumb in 2020

“Yeah well that’s just your opinion, man.” Sure as hell is. Of course, I could be preaching to the choir here, but it seems like this time of year these questions always crop up. “Is said dumb thing from last year still dumb?” Yes it is. Incidentally, I came across an article that laid out the numbers and it’s horrifying. Check this out: “According to the College Board, the average cost of tuition and fees (fees may include the library, campus transportation, student government, and athletic facilities) for the 2016–2017 school year was 33,480 at private colleges, 9,650 for state

John Morris January 6, 2020

The WORST freelancing advice

Of all the freelancing advice I hear the Instagurus throw around, this is by far the worst and most devasating. If you’ve ever heard this or worse believed it, go get a scrub brush and scour this out of your mind forever. It, without question, is hurting your business and costing you clients: “Freelancing is a numbers game” The idea being you just have to blast your name and your pitch out to as many people as possible and eventually you’ll get some clients trickling in. And that’s exactly what happens. Instead of a fire hose of new clients banging down

John Morris December 30, 2019

Two Words That Radically Changed My Freelance Business

Another gem from the infamous Dan Kennedy: “Financial efficiency”. Sounds simple enough, but as Dan puts it… these two words are the “guarantor of business sustainability and wealth extraction”. Not views, retweets, Twitter followers, subscribers, etc. Why? Back to Dan: “If for no other reason, this is vital so that you can greatly outspend all competitors in investments in new customer acquisition and in customer retetention. This is the secret of growth.” “They are 4’5″ 98-pound weaklings trying to play pro football. You really don’t want to be that deficient little guy lined up across from a 6’3″, 340-pound, drooling,

John Morris December 17, 2019

The Den of Thieves Conspiring Against Your Freelance Success

“Change your math, change your business, change your life.” Those are the very first words in Dan Kennedy’s book, Almost Alchemy… which I’ve been reading lately. Highly recommended. In the section that quote precedes… He talks about the “den of thieves”… “media, agencies and related ‘professionals’” who were “engaged in a grand deception, if not outright criminal enterprise at the expense of deliberately confused clients.” There’s a similar thing that happens in our little freelancing world. If not intentional, still false and counterproductive. A “gaggle”, as Dan puts it, of experts out there who will lead you astray, in all

John Morris December 13, 2019

How to Seduce Potential Clients Into Hiring You

Towards the end of my deployment to Iraq, my first wife and I decided to get divorced. That’s a story for another day, but I suddenly found myself back in the dating world after four years of being off the market. Older. A young son. And, a lot more insecure given the divorce. So, I did what most introverts do when faced with a problem… I googled it. Makes me chuckle now, but this was the mid-2000s and the whole PUA (pick-up artist), online dating and “seduction” industry was booming online. And so, I found myself tumbling down the rabbit hole.

John Morris December 12, 2019

The Next Time a Freelance Client Bitches About Your Rate

This is another Reddit thread. The post is actually just a link to this quote: “If I do a job in 30 minutes, it’s because I spent 30 years learning how to do it in 30 minutes. You owe more for the years not the minutes.” This seems to be the quote du jour for freelancers right now. Eh. I appreciate the intent and it’s certainly better than being timid about your pricing and undervaluing yourself. But, it still leads you down the wrong path. That’s why I want to talk about this comment on the thread: “Yep, skill doesn’t

John Morris December 11, 2019

More Non-Secrets of Success From the Jolly Old Saint

To the uninitiated, these kinds of posts will feel like dirty lumps of coal in their stockings. “What? No fizz? No bubble gum [email protected]#. No hype. No sizzle. Nothing to get me wet in the shorts! How DARE he!” But, to the savvy… They recognize the truth in them. Take this from Jerome: Very few people/”masters” are good at explaining the why. In my opinion it’s because either they have a high IQ but never figured out the why for themselves(laziness?) or it’s because their IQ is too low to actually get to that level of understanding. You have mastered

John Morris December 10, 2019

I’m Finally a Full-Time PHP Developer

There’s no magic to this developer/freelancer/make my living writing code thing. Persistence. Hard work. Enthusiasm. All boring, “yeah, yeah I already know that” non-secrets to success. Yet, the very things most of those who are still struggling lack. And, those who make it… finally get right. Take this email I just got from Ryan: You might remember this story from a while back, I had been offered a promotion to a jr. dev role and by the end of the day I the offer was revoked. I had been working towards this goal for a couple years at this point

John Morris December 9, 2019

How to Have the “What’s Your Rate” Talk With a Freelance Client

This one comes from Reddit. A back and forth on raising rates and negotiating rates with your client. This comment, in particular, is what I wanna rap about, today: “I really recommend this free ebook from the makers of Freshbooks, Breaking the Time Barrier, which is about how important it is as a freelancer to break away from the time model. If you’re only ever selling your time, you’ve set a fixed upper limit for earnings. Instead, realise that people hire you because you add value. If you add 1000 value to a company, through increased sales, reduced costs or

John Morris December 6, 2019

The simple secrets to high-paying freelance clients

What makes clients willing to pay $5,000, $10,000 even $20,000 and up for your services? Download and install my mobile app and I’ll show you. It’s free. Just click the button below:

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Thabo Motsoahae

John is one of the best instructors I have come across, I learned a lot from his online tutorials.

Lori Grant

John did an outstanding job on my project. I highly recommend him and look forward to working with him on future projects.

Ray Edwards

I recommend John every chance I get. If every person I worked with were as committed to excellence, punctuality, value, and unquestionable integrity… the world would be a better place. Highest recommendation.

Sukh Plaha

John is a fantastic and patient tutor, who is not just able to share knowledge and communicate it very effectively – but able to support one in applying it. However, I believe that John has a very rare ability to go further than just imparting knowledge and showing one how to apply it. He is able to innately provoke one’s curiosity when explaining and demonstrating concepts, to the extent that one can explore and unravel their own learning journey. Thanks very much John!

Jim DeJonge

John has a relaxed and engaging manner. His advice is solid and the explanations are well thought out.

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The simple secrets to high-paying freelance clients

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