Like all jobs, freelancing has its pluses and minuses. The biggest advantage about working for yourself is that you set the pace, and you get to determine which jobs you will accept. The biggest downside, however, is that when something goes wrong, you only have yourself to blame.

One of the biggest challenges for new freelancers is knowing how to screen potential clients – but sometimes even seasoned freelancers struggle with this aspect, especially when bills need to be paid. Asking questions is the single most important thing that you can do to assess whether you and a potential client are a good fit for each other. Here’s a case study from my own freelancing career to illustrate the point.

I recently booked my biggest client to date. The job involved redesigning the client’s website, providing ongoing technical support through the end of the year, and ghost writing on the client’s blog. Before I accepted the job, I determined what the client’s deadline was, what all of the components of the project would be, and what our communication process would be like. Completing the initial website build in 30 days seemed like a realistic project, although it meant that I wouldn’t be able to accept any other jobs during that time period, and it also meant that I wouldn’t have time to write my own articles for publication. However, this was a project worth prioritizing, so I gave the client a price quote, and I accepted the job.

The biggest mistake I made when I accepted this job was that I didn’t ask enough questions on the front end. Part of the website design involved consolidating five different blogs into one archive. I should have asked more questions about how many blog articles were involved, since each of them would have to be moved over individually. The blog consolidation was defined as part of the initial website build, so I am not able to bill on an hourly basis for this work – it was all grouped into the flat rate that I billed the client for the website design. As a result, a lot of my time will never be financially compensated. A hard lesson learned. [Read more…]