Do You Need A Marketing Plan?
Q: As a freelancer, do I need a marketing plan or can I just wing it? A: Indeed, you do need a marketing plan. Marketing
Alvalyn Lundgren
interns
ARTICLES.
Tips and Insights on Mission, Mindset, Mechanics, and Marketing for Freelance Creatives
Job Listings and Special Considerations
If a hiring firm wants to give special consideration to candidates from a specific school, that’s its right. But then it should carry on its notification processes within the sphere of that school’s alumni and career counseling office
Alvalyn Lundgren
Use the Socratic Method to Close the Sale
A key principle in successful use of the Socratic Method is that your work product is not the thing — the objective. It’s the thing that leads to the objective the prospect wants to make happen.
AlvalynCreative
5 Outreach Steps For Winning Better Clients
Successful freelancing is a matter of finding the right clients in the right places for the right reasons. Every client you take on affects your
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Handle Special Requests From Clients
I was asked about how to deal with unusual requests. Once someone finds out you are a designer, writer, photographer… any type of creative, you
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Respond To Unusual Client Requests
An up and coming freelancer asked me about how to deal with unusual requests. We all get these from time to time. Once someone learns
Alvalyn Lundgren
Why Design Is Not Self-Expression
If we approach a design solution as an opportunity for self-expression, we’ll miss the point and risk not solving the problem.
Alvalyn Lundgren
Unpaid Internships Are A Form of Spec Work
Why is spec work so prevalent in the design profession when it’s not in other professions? Increasingly, companies – creative businesses included – are offering
Alvalyn Lundgren
5 Inconvenient Truths About Freelancing
Transform the inconveniences of freelancing into opportunities for your personal and professional growth.
Alvalyn Lundgren
Which is Better for Self-Promotion: Email or Mailers?
Self-promotion is an ordinary and necessary aspect of doing business as an independent creative professional. Unlike social media marketing, self-promotion campaigns are targeted to contacts
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Pay Yourself As A Freelancer
Paying yourself as a freelancer is often as perplexing as how to price your services. To simplify it, begin with the knowledge that there are
AlvalynCreative
The Designer and the Relief Pitcher
If you know me well, you know that baseball is my favorite sport, and I often employ baseball analogies to explain concepts to students and
Alvalyn Lundgren
Keeping Good Clients: 10 Ways To Build Loyalty
Most freelancers will agree that it’s easier to hold onto an established relationship than begin a new one. And it’s less work to retain a client
Alvalyn Lundgren
5 Limiting Lies Freelancers Should Stop Believing
Successful soloism is about 80% mindset and 20% mechanics. I’ve learned from experience that you can get the mechanics right, but still not be thinking right. Much of what holds us back as creatives and independent business owners is our mindset.
Alvalyn Lundgren
The Freelancer As Business Owner
When you start freelancing you become a business owner and are responsible for the success or failure of your enterprise. Honestly, it can go either way,
Alvalyn Lundgren
Technologically Incorrect: Why I Still Use a Paper Planner
It’s red. It’s can get up to 2 inches thick. It’s an almost constant companion. I am describing my paper planner: my planning/project/time management companion. It’s
Alvalyn Lundgren
Designing a Successful Year
Each December I take a couple weeks off to celebrate the holidays and go through a visioning and goal-setting process in preparation for the new
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Budget For A Design Project
To answer the question, “How much will it cost?”, the question, “What do you want to accomplish?” needs to be asked first. Clients are often in the dark
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Overcome Overwhelm
Did you know that most freelancers struggle with time management, project management, and getting things done — on time? With margin? We deal on a
Alvalyn Lundgren
Profit Motive and the Freelancer: You May Be Running A Business If…
A photographer is still in school full time but is already establishing connections for professional work. She is purchasing cameras, lenses and equipment she will use
Alvalyn Lundgren
How To Attract Your Ideal Clients
First of all, let’s define who your ideal clients are. An ideal client is one for whom you do the kind of work you want to do, and
Alvalyn Lundgren
Create A Social Media Connection Strategy
When you’re in business, you use social media differently than you do personally. I was an early adopter on many social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook
Alvalyn Lundgren
How to Design Your Day
Creative freelancers spend a lot of time designing stuff. Good design is structured, organized and unified. When you juggle multiple projects, the ability to focus
Alvalyn Lundgren
Doing Good Work and Working for Good
On his Dear Design Student blog on Medium, Mike Monteiro, design director at Mule Design, author and speaker, discusses designers and their ethics. He addresses
Alvalyn Lundgren