The Freelancers' Show

On episode 236 of The Freelancers Show, Jonathan Stark, Philip Morgan, and Reuven Lerner discuss about how you can have Your First Digital Product. Tune in, and learn what it is and how it allows you to earn while you sleep.

On episode 235 of The Freelancers Show,  Jonathan Stark talks about The Difference Between Menu Pricing and Product Services. This episode is a follow-up to the previous one on productized services. Stay tuned and learn more about today's topic.

Introduction

• Productized services
• Definition

9:50: Copywriting

• Understand the problem your service solves.
• Pricing

15:30: Testing with productized service

• Draft
• Ethercycle
• Website Teardowns (Kai Davis and Kurt Elster)

19:30: Mobile Onboarding

• Blair Enns

28:30: Freelancers just starting out

• Hourly billing
• Screening out clients
• Website Rescue

38:10: Word of mouth

• Part of marketing
• Niches
• Expensiveproblem.com

45:50: Downsides to productized services

• Pricing
• Start small
• Low level of collaboration
• Minimize risk
• Give options

Picks: Building the Perfect Sales Page (Jonathan) Internet Archive Wayback Machine (Philip) Examples of Productized Services: * https://draft.nu/revise/
* http://websiterescues.com/
* https://doubleyouraudience.com/pricing/outreach/
* https://memberup.co/membership-roadmap/
* http://sessions.superspicymedia.com/
* http://uibreakfast.com/services/   hired.com/freelancershow

Introduction

• The Indecisive Carpenter
• You be the expert.

4:15: Communication

• Set goals for the project with the client.
• Don’t ask the customer’s opinion.

9:15: Staff augmentation

• Behaving as an employee
• Become a consultant or advisor instead.

16:20: Consultant vs. employee

• Ron Baker
• Expertise translates into advice.

21:30: Client wants to be involved more.

• Run any request past the business case.
• Keep the project on course.

30:00: Target businesses without your capabilities in-house.

• Do more than just your craft.
• Ask the right questions.
• Establish yourself as an expert.

39:40: Maximize your profit.

• Not just revenue.
• Don’t give away your knowledge for free.
• Value is contextually defined.

45:45: What to say to clients.

• Find out the business goal.
• Communicate about progress.
• Ask for more information about customers.

Picks: Mike Monteiro Keynote (Jonathan) Shard Keychain Tool (Jonathan) Design Is a Job (Philip) Start With No (Philip) How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big (Reuven)   hired.com/freelancershow

1:01 Protecting yourself from “scope-creep” and unending revisions

• Measuring progress and clear communication

10:47 Freelancing without dealing with invoices and collecting payments

• Working with an agency or permanent employer

18:24 First step to launching a career as a freelance web developer

• Positioning yourself in the market and identifying your customer niche

25:58 Choosing programming skills that will be the most valuable as a freelancer

• Skills with broad range and flexibility

34:10 Feeling intimidated by freelance job listings

• Identifying poorly defined projects and not being afraid to ask questions

48:42 Freelancing as an expat

• Tax considerations

Hired.comCashFly

00:30 Chuck leaving the show 1:18 Introducing the topic: Knowing when to move on 5:40 Leaving a successful podcast 15:11 Deciding when to move on 19:19 Being spread too thin versus being effective 22:54 Improving workflow 25:30 Chuck’s focus on online conferences 28:30 Overcoming resistance to change in business 30:05: Getting through lean times 33:22 Hiring help and outsourcing tasks 35:09 Future of DevChat.tv podcasts Picks: Selling to Big Companies by Jill Konrath (Reuven) Soundbreaking on PBS (Philip) This American Life: Quitting (Philip) Philip Morgan - Retired page (Philip) 2017 Wall Calendar - Neuyear.net (Charles) Amazon Echo Dot (Charles) Hired.com

Introduction

• How to differentiate yourself from the crowd
• When you’re not the cheapest option
• Fungibility

6:00: It has to matter to your client.

• Different differentiations for each client

8:50: Marketing and customizing your proposal

• Figure out who your competitors are
• Niche down on a specialty or target market

15:40: What are you offering that others aren’t?

• Training
• Tangible and intangible benefits

20:20: Developing a compelling value proposition

• Eight ways to add more value

22:00 Back it up with proof

• Credibility is critical
• Illusory superiority bias

27:00: Six categories of differentiators

• Predictable cost
• Risk mitigation
• Concierge service
• Vertical specialization
• Urgent service
• Shared worldview

32:15: Commoditization

• Be choosy
• Be passionate
• Use trial and error

42:15: Freelancing vs consulting

• Different mindsets
• Work your way up
• Let your differentiation develop over time

Picks: Save to Google Drive (Philip) Scanbot (Philip) Google Keep (Jonathan) Expensiveproblem.com/18 (Jonathan) Thanksgiving (Jonathan) Clean Master (Reuven)

0:20 What is everyone working on?

• Hourly Billing is Nuts
• Deadline Funnel
• Conferences
• The Eventual Millionaire

5:00: Questions to ask on a Greenfield project

• Bootstrap
• Phoenix
• Elixir
• Open Source

15:45: How to write cover letters and earn clients

• Upwork
• Conferences
• Apprentice model
• Setting the price
• Writing the cover letter
• Redmine
• The Apprenticeship Patterns by Dave Hoover
• Scott Hanselman iPhreaks episode

37:00: What to do if you have no employed experience

• Don’t lie
• Get LinkedIn endorsements
• GitHub
• Stack Overflow
• About.me

Links: Hired.com

Introduction

• FreelanceRemoteConf
• Content marketing that does not involve the written word

4:30: What Is Content Marketing?

• Showing expertise
• Helping people
• Providing value

6:20: Podcasting

• Screencast
• Creating a Twitter Clone

10:30: Missing out on client work?

• Ruby on Rails
• “Giving away the farm.”

16:40: Highly scripted video

• UberConference
• John Sonmez

22:00: Casual video or audio

• Facebook Live
• Aaron Walker
• Facebook community
• YouTube Live
• Fullscope.tv
• Publish on a consistent schedule

34:45: Case Studies

• YouTube or Google Hangouts

39:50: Practicalities

• Search engine rankings
• Transcription services
• Comparing yourself to others

47:50: Infographics Picks: Ditching Hourly (Reuven) Limony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (Reuven) Rev.com (Philip) Trustvelocity.com (Philip) Born to Win by Zig Ziglar (Charles) Mindmup.com (Charles) devchat.tv/conferences (Charles)

1:00: Introduction

• Anna Sabramowicz
• Putting together online courses

3:05: Marketing 5:00: What to put in the course

• What problems do you solve?

9:00: What type of course?

• Email (Paid or Free)
• Video
• Joe Rogan podcast
• Webinars
• HeadsUp app

24:00: Data testing

• Positioning
• Ask the right questions

38:30: Tools

• Start small
• Teachable.com
• Drip

45:30: Be a student

• Create an outline

Picks Weekly newsletters (Reuven) Lerner Consulting (Reuven) Ikea New Cordless Milk Frother Handheld Cappuccino Latte Espresso (Jonathan) Ditchinghourly.com (Jonathan) Deadline Funnel (Philip) Ringr (Philip) Webinar Jam (Charles) Presentation Clicker (Charles) Firewatch (Anna) Papers, Please (Anna) Mark’s Daily Apple (Anna) Hired.com