Let's discuss the problem. We're talking here about a big problem. That's kind of an umbrella term "getting better clients," right? But there are lots of small things that go under that. Being a freelancer is really, really hard getting and finding clients. And sales, in general, is a really difficult skill to learn.
And most of us as creative professionals never learned how to do that because they don't teach it in college. And we've never worked as salespeople and training for that is really hard to find or very expensive. Another part of the problem is that freelancers are chronically under. They're consistently underpaid, but part of the problem is that they don't value themselves.
Working as a freelancer is exhausting and it can be emotionally defeating. Over the years, as I've talked to freelancers, I've noticed that the things they struggle with and the things they complain about are very common. And I hear them repeated over and over again. Here's a list of complaints. I've heard many times see if you've thought or said these yourself.
I'm always working seven days a week and I'm still not covering my bills. I have this client who fill in the blank with something really bad or frustrating or unprofessional people just don't value what I do, or they're not willing to pay what I'm worth. The client hasn't paid me yet. I'm not sure what to do.
The client canceled the project and they're asking for their money back. Here's one that makes me really sad. I had to drop my price in order to get the. I think that one more than any really outlines the problem that we're talking about here, sales, as I've mentioned for freelancers is really difficult to learn and to do well.
Here's a bizarre example from nature that I think will blow your mind, but really you'll recognize that it's similar to the sales process. when two scorpions meet each other in the wild. They're trying to determine one of three things. Number one, do I eat this number two? Do I meet with this number three?
Do I kill this? That I know it's really strange, but sales as a freelancer and with your clients is almost exactly like. I know that's a crazy analogy, but go with it. Think about it. You, as a professional are one scorpion and your potential client is another scorpion. You both have stingers, you both have claws and you're sizing each other up, trying to decide, can we work together?
Do we trust each other? Are you a threat to me? So you're spending your sales process trying to convince the. That you're not going to hurt them, but they're potentially afraid of you because they've been burned in the past or they don't really know you, or they don't really trust you yet because they don't know how this process works.
Okay. Mating dance analogy over. Don't think about it too much, but the point is valid sales and marketing and working with your clients is a tricky process. You can hurt them, they can hurt you. You're trying to build a relationship and trust over time. Our goal is to find out which are the bad scorpions that are going to hurt us, and which are the good ones that we're going to build relationships.
If you're not a big fan of invertebrates, I have a better analogy that I'll share in the next video.