by Jane Rutherford

Created on: January 01, 2011

When choosing a career in freelancing, whether you are a writer, a programmer or an internet marketing professional, you need to make sure to have enough work going to be able to pay your bills. But every now and then, especially at the very beginning of your career, you might find yourself without work. Here are some tips to give you some ideas about what to do in such cases.

- Look for new clients

When you don’t have enough work it either means that you don’t have enough clients, or that your clients don’t pay you enough. Either way the answer is to find new clients. There are lots of places where you can look.

There are online marketplaces such as oDesk.com, Guru.com or eLance.com where employers are looking for freelancers every day. And while each of those sites charge fees for contracts and/or memberships, it’s an easy way to find new income sources, expand your client base. For new freelancers, it’s also a great way to build a portfolio.

- Build and market your brand

Brands aren’t just those of products. Your name can also be a brand. As a freelancer, you’re a face of your business. Your freelancing business and you are a brand that you need to build on, to get more recognition and better paying clients.

So when you don’t have enough work, you can invest in yourself and become your own client. You can spend some time building or improving your website. If you’re a freelance writer you can write blog posts for your blog, several posts ahead. That way when you get busier with your work, your blog will still be active.

When you have free time, you can update and improve your profiles on social networks, update your friends and past clients on what you’ve been up to and what services you’re offering.

Brainstorm ways in which you could market your freelance business. Maybe guest blogging or investing in Adwords is what your business needs.

- Networking

Nowadays, networking is a very important component in every venture. In the digitized era, it translates into social network sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and social bookmarking sites. Developing a personal relationship with other freelancers in your niche by commenting on their blog or cooperating with them is also a very powerful way to get your career going even if you happen not to have work at that very moment.

Personal relationships can lead to referrals, people sending work your way, your client pool expanding. It also adds to the professional image that helps you get higher paying clients. Higher paying clients mean working less and still being able to pay your bills.

Isn’t it what freelancing is really all about?

- Investing time and money in passive income

Passive income is the most ingenious aspect of freelancing ever invented. It’s based on an idea that a product, which can be anything, once created brings profit over and over again.

As stated before, passive income can be anything. It can come from an eBook, a software application, a website. Photographers can sell their photographs over and over again for royalty fees. Writers can earn with the same articles for years after writing it (most often by putting it on a content site like Helium).

The reason why every single freelancer doesn’t have a passive income source is that it takes time an effort to create one. That’s why it’s such a great opportunity to use the time you have, when you are having a down time in your paid work, to work on a passive income source. When combined with marketing and networking efforts you’re already putting in, it can explode into a truly remarkable revenue stream.

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