With the magic of the internet, you can easily start earning money online this very same month— through freelancing—and the best part is I’ve developed a simple step-by-step guide absolute beginners can use to start making money online
The bad news: Freelancing online is only for people who are willing to work hard and put in the time, NOT for those who just want to find a “magic bullet” to make money instead.
If you’re looking to get-rich-quick, I suggest you find another article. For everyone else, if you want to make money through freelancing, there are just a few things you need to know:
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Step 1: Find your first client

To find your first client you need to know where they live.
No, I don’t mean stalk them, you creep. I mean knowing who they are and what problems they have. Ask yourself:
  • Who is my client?
  • Where do they go when they want to look for a solution to their problems?
  • Where are they ALREADY looking for solutions to their problems?
  • How can you connect them to your service?
In classic marketing terms, you’re going to want to define your target market. It’s an essential first step that, unfortunately, A LOT of people gloss over when they start making money freelancing online. If you don’t do this, you’re going to be at a loss at what exactly you’re selling and to whom you’re selling it.
So do me a favor and niche down your market.
Who EXACTLY is the type of person who might want to buy your product? Ask yourself even more specific questions now about your potential client.
  • How old are they?
  • Where do they live?
  • What are their interests?
  • How much do they make?
  • What books do they read?
You’re going to want to get into your clients’ heads in order to figure out exactly what they need so that you can provide it for them.
Then, find out where they go to find solutions. Get in their heads:
  • Want to pitch to moms that blog about children? Go to The Mom Blogs and start with the ones under “Popular Blogs.”
  • Looking for physical or massage therapists within 50 miles of your house? Yelp should get you started easily.
  • If you want to do… large dog grooming and sitting, well there’s probably a local pet store or dog park near you where owners are all congregating just waiting for you to offer them a solution.
Here are a few suggestions of some other great sites freelancers can use to find business online:
So many people email me saying things like, “But Ramit! I have this idea and have NO IDEA where to find customers!” My response is always calm, yet you know that anger boils closely below. “What have you done to research your audience? Have you emailed a few people? Taken them out to lunch? Asked complementary service providers if this is a good idea?”
The answer is almost always no.
An example that made me angry: Last night, someone said they were going to start a wedding-montage photo business. What should they do? They appeared to be stuck. Answer: Go talk to a few wedding photographers and ask them if this is a good idea. Would their customers buy it? Are there holes in the market that are not being served? What about event planners? Florists? You could do this in 1-2 weeks and save 1 year of your life.
80% of your ideas will be strengthened — or washed out — with this simple exercise. And it only takes a week or two to get started.
Get in these people’s heads & then niche it down. Read their minds and then act on those insights. So you’ve figured out where the secret large dog pet store is. Great. Now look at their website, visit the store, talk to the owner. GET OFF YOUR ASS AND TAKE ACTION.
Could you pitch one potential client each morning? You probably could if you created an email template (more on that in a bit). How about 10 over the weekend, playing with different headlines/offers so you can see which ones work better?
It doesn’t have to take a long time, and it doesn’t have to be agonizing.
Bonus: Ready to ditch debt, save money, and build real wealth? Download my FREE Ultimate Guide to Personal Finance.

Step 2: Make your offer

After you niche down your offering and find a few good leads, you’ll need to craft a pitch that is tailored to them.
In doing so, you’ll want to stress the BENEFITS of working with you — while not giving away too much information as to how you’ll help. I lost my fair share of clients while I was starting out by giving away exactly how I’d help them in my initial reach out. Stupid.
Since I’m such a benevolent and generous person, I’m going to let you in on the exact 5-line email template I’ve used to craft the perfect pitch to potential clients. It includes:
  1. The introduction. You’re going to want to build rapport by introducing yourself and how you know about the client.
  2. The offer. Talk about them. What do you want to do for them? Why are you good for that role? You’re going to want to do some research on the organization to see what they need help with.
  3. The benefit. Walk them through how your work will benefit their company. Are you going to free up more time for them? Are you going to maximize profits by X amount?
  4. The foot-in-the-door. This is a classic technique that utilizes an old psychology trick to get the client to agree to a small agreement so you can ask for a larger agreement later.
  5. The call to action. Be clear with this and ask them if they would like to proceed. The call to action is a critical part of this script.
When it’s all put together, it’ll look something like this:
CLIENT’S NAME,
[Introduction] I read your article about X and noticed that you’ve recently started using videos on your website.
[The offer] I’ve been doing video editing for three years and I’d like to offer to help you edit your videos and get them optimized for the web.
[The benefit] That would make them look more professional and load faster, which is important for your readers. And you’d free up time that you could use to create new content.
[The foot-in-the-door] We can discuss the details, of course, but first I wanted to see if this is something you might be interested in.