Self Promotion

I just drew a picture of an astronaut. Folded it up and put it in a box whist nobody was looking.

I fear I'm missing the point of this "self promotion".
 
Thanks for your input Scotty ;)

Neon, I assume you're looking for more leads to chase down?

I think you really just need to let your work speak for itself. Do great work, in the time promised and find ways of promoting it on and offline.

I sell myself as a strategic partner these days, not just someone who builds websites and designs logos. It's part of the transition from one off jobs to working with clients over a longer period of time, it takes a while to get to this stage but it means that clients actually start becoming friends that I talk to on a regular basis. This is a really great place to be with clients, because it means that you can start attending events with them, such as networking events - and you can bet that if you've done a good job with them, they will be pointing people towards your direction and singing your praises on the night. That really helps you stand out as someone who can be trusted - rather than someone who's only intention is to sell their products/services at the event! Plus, your clients friends could eventually become your contacts too, and if you're working with a lot of business owners, well I don't need to point out the obvious.

I really cannot stress how important it is to start meeting people in your local area and simply just making new connections and doing good work :)

I have not spent a penny on advertising, coming up to three years in business, and I'm booked solid for at least the next 3 months.
 
Sean Lee-Amies said:
I sell myself as a strategic partner these days, not just someone who builds websites and designs logos. It's part of the transition from one off jobs to working with clients over a longer period of time, it takes a while to get to this stage but it means that clients actually start becoming friends that I talk to on a regular basis. This is a really great place to be with clients, because it means that you can start attending events with them, such as networking events - and you can bet that if you've done a good job with them, they will be pointing people towards your direction and singing your praises on the night. That really helps you stand out as someone who can be trusted - rather than someone who's only intention is to sell their products/services at the event! Plus, your clients friends could eventually become your contacts too, and if you're working with a lot of business owners, well I don't need to point out the obvious.
More for neons benefit than anything... I'm literally the complete opposite of this lol.

With my line of work being able to keep a design secret until release is important so I literally sell 'confidentiality' as part of my business model, it seemed a natural progression from signing lots of nda's (non disclosure agreement). I don't discuss clients, ie name drop, or work that I've done in the past with new or potential clients and I tell them why, I even have a non disclosure policy as standard with all projects. Now that doesn't mean I'm not willing to do what Sean does but most of the time I'm more like a silent partner fulfilling a particular purpose.

How you sell yourself really does depend on the type of work you do, the level of confidentiality that I employ in my work arguably isn't as important for general web and graphic design but it is worth considering.
 
Sean Lee-Amies said:
Thanks for your input Scotty ;)

Neon, I assume you're looking for more leads to chase down?

I think you really just need to let your work speak for itself. Do great work, in the time promised and find ways of promoting it on and offline.

I sell myself as a strategic partner these days, not just someone who builds websites and designs logos. It's part of the transition from one off jobs to working with clients over a longer period of time, it takes a while to get to this stage but it means that clients actually start becoming friends that I talk to on a regular basis. This is a really great place to be with clients, because it means that you can start attending events with them, such as networking events - and you can bet that if you've done a good job with them, they will be pointing people towards your direction and singing your praises on the night. That really helps you stand out as someone who can be trusted - rather than someone who's only intention is to sell their products/services at the event! Plus, your clients friends could eventually become your contacts too, and if you're working with a lot of business owners, well I don't need to point out the obvious.

I really cannot stress how important it is to start meeting people in your local area and simply just making new connections and doing good work :)

I have not spent a penny on advertising, coming up to three years in business, and I'm booked solid for at least the next 3 months.
I'm looking at starting to meet people in the area, Just trying to find out what networking events etc there are. Best looking for new year now.

The building I'm in has a digital media exchange project - it's something to do with helping start up businesses and Vanessa that runs it approached me and said about perhaps putting together an offer or package for people that are referred to me through her with a slight discount. Which i've thought about and put a few things together so I'm hoping something come from that.



Levi said:
More for neons benefit than anything... I'm literally the complete opposite of this lol.

With my line of work being able to keep a design secret until release is important so I literally sell 'confidentiality' as part of my business model, it seemed a natural progression from signing lots of nda's (non disclosure agreement). I don't discuss clients, ie name drop, or work that I've done in the past with new or potential clients and I tell them why, I even have a non disclosure policy as standard with all projects. Now that doesn't mean I'm not willing to do what Sean does but most of the time I'm more like a silent partner fulfilling a particular purpose.

How you sell yourself really does depend on the type of work you do, the level of confidentiality that I employ in my work arguably isn't as important for general web and graphic design but it is worth considering.

I can sell confidentially to anyone so it might be an idea to look at that more. It's definitely something that is needed when it comes to certain projects, had to do it before on some other projects.

Basically I'm selling myself and my work, my no bull shit approach 100% honesty, 100% creativity 100% ME, I'm not trying to convince them that they need to spend £££££££££ on a project to make it successful, it can be done for less £££ etc

obviously theres different ways of approaching people rather than me just saying 'it's shit i can it do better' but ultimately its all the same just worded different.

This probably doesn't make a lot of sense. I don't think it helps that its xmas aswell! I hate it and i've got no money and phone got cut off yesterday as I'm awaiting payment from clients :( its sorted now though. But money is tight.

I'll stop moaning now.
 
If I was teaching that class it would read: "Easily, um, thingy."
Then I'd look out the window.
 
Actually, the best self promotion I ever did was a couple of things and neither of these use social media.

The first thing was when I was climbing the walls in a studio I used to make myself desktop wallpapers to keep myself sane and improve my skills.
I came across a site where you could upload these and they put the best ones up for download with a link to the author.
I put a load on there and I started to get interest and my very first gig as a freelancer and I still work for that client today.

The other and thing that generated the most new work was to write an article about character design and I included a free download on the tutsplus site.
This got me loads of work at the time.
 
I tried social media and it wasn't much cop, I got a bit of work through word of mouth. A couple people contacted me through Behance. Is Twitter etc a viable option for getting work?
 
You really have to have something to say when it comes to making the most out of social media, so if you don't have a blog, any free (or paid) downloads or anything else to say other than "Hi, I'm X and I do branding/web design/etc" then you're unlikely to get very far.

Any of the social media platforms can be used as a viable option for getting work, it's just a case of figuring out which ones to use and how. I think there's a view that if you are active on social media, social media should get you work - but really it is no different to the real world and the focus should be on meeting the right types of new people - preferably ones that want to hire you.
 
Sean Lee-Amies said:
You really have to have something to say when it comes to making the most out of social media, so if you don't have a blog, any free (or paid) downloads or anything else to say other than "Hi, I'm X and I do branding/web design/etc" then you're unlikely to get very far.

Any of the social media platforms can be used as a viable option for getting work, it's just a case of figuring out which ones to use and how. I think there's a view that if you are active on social media, social media should get you work - but really it is no different to the real world and the focus should be on meeting the right types of new people - preferably ones that want to hire you.
Social Media is the root of all evil!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
I see social media as a platform that in reality is quite similar (at its core) to many real world environments that a lot of people wouldn't have been able to access before (especially small businesses/sole traders) who would perhaps limit themselves and not get outside of their comfort zone - the problem is that it looks and feels like something massively different to anything in the real world and because of that, and that it's still quite a new thing, relatively speaking (especially for people aged 35+), I think a lot of people have potentially incorrect assumptions and heightened expectations of how it all should work.
 
Social Media never really worked for me, maybe because I've never tried to promote it.

I think they key thing is to promote your self as a person, tell everyone you know what you do and show that your cool and honest - i bet they will be telling there friends about you in no time B)
 
In this time image is the most important role of social media. At first I said social media is one kind of user friendly site here everyone connect each other. So my opinion says if I am posting an interesting image or my daily spend image then social media have benefited.
 
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