Marketing

The ability to work from home, a fexible timetable and moving towards an independant career: Working as a freelance designer seems pretty appealing to a lot of people. But every deal of working as a freelancer should be considered well before a decision is made. For being successful the idea of the every day-work life should be brought down to a round figure.

Today we introduce 10 keys to work successfully as a freelance designer:

1. Diciplin and commitment

Working as a freelancer is quiet diffrent as working as an employee. Everything is up to you: no one sets you working hours or gives you tasks to work on. Your career is your own responsibility now, wich can be great but also difficult sometimes. You need to work disciplined and hit it up. That’s why the first years as a freelancer are probably the most exhausting ones. Hold the line!

2. Time management

This is a pretty large topic, but to put it in a nutshell: A to-do-list seems old fashioned but helps you to work efficiantly. What I mean is, that it is important to organize your working hours. Being well organized also helps to maximize your strenghts and minimize your distractions.

3. Communication

It is a keenly important skill to be able to communicate effectively with clients and customers. Therefore it will help you to understand their needs and wants as well as to understand their business. In addition to that you need to land your business in first place. Here it is helpful to build up a customer service. Give your customers and clients the feeling of being reliable and accessable.

The new W3B report shows why internet users become “fans”.

Social networks are first and foremost a base for human relations. 82 percent of social networkers said that they use the networks predominantly for private contacts, 28 percent use social networks for business contacts.

The social network user count is constantly growing. Today 3 of 4 internet users are registered on a social network. Simultaneously with the growing of the user count, the attractiveness of the online-marketing and -sales grows. But are companies in social networks really so important? Do the users actually recognize them?

The new W3B report says yes, although maybe not at first glance. About 40 percent of the social networkers say that they have never dealt with company presences or their ads.

However: At least one of five has visited a fan-site. One in eight does visit fan sites often. Meanwhile, 46 percent of the social networkers indicated that they are already a “fan” or a “follower” of a brand, a product or a company.

Even though the capital investment in social media advertising is rising, every second company questions the prosperity. Half of the members of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) are not sure if it’s worth it to invest furthermore in facebook, twitter, xing or other social networks. Advertisement in social networks can be e.g. a xing profile, a business account on twitter, a group on facebook, a typical advert on the homepage or the like.

So the is it really lucrative to call the customers attention on social media platforms?

The conclusion of the survey Value of a Fan by Millward Brown is that 23% of the members of the WFA think that it is profit-making to invest in advertisement on social media websites. There again 27% say that the cost-effectiveness is at an average or lower. Admittedly 96% of the respondents at last the investment in social media advertising but per contrast one quarter named that working on fan-pages claims more time and money than assessed.

The companies have nearly all the same aims: 85% said that they want to narrow the brand-loyalty of the people using social networks to their corporations as well as they are trying to get more information about their target audience. 80% want to heighten the number of their intercessors.

The combined members of the WMA represent 90% of the expenditures in marketing and public relations worldwide. Basis of the survey is a poll on marketing-guarantors of 24 multinational companies and 3.687 brand-fans of the companies. Questioned was the engagement they put on social media.

Facebook, Twitter and other social media networks give companies various opportunities. But the marketing with social media platforms also bears some risks. As internetworld.de reports, the study “Next Corporate Communication” from the University of St. Gallen put out some concerns of businesses in using social media. To prove this, more than hundred interviews with company representatives, service providers and researchers were conducted.

Based on that result the three greatest sins in using social networks has been analyzed:

1. Feedback stays unused
The information from social media applications are not processed adequately. That’s because marketing departments are not manned sufficient. Thus the work of the employees is for nothing.

2. Distorted public image
Only through social media guidelines employees know what information they should spread to the outside world. Otherwise there could be a scenario in which the statements of the employees contradict the ones of the corporate communication – and that leads to counterproductive effects.

3. Losing control
Social Media is subject to certain momentum. Therefore, companies are concerned that communication content can hardly be controlled. So information can spread quickly and damage the image of the company. Companies should therefore install control mechanisms.