Before you start anything, it is important, to have a plan in mind as you use these methods. They really don’t have to take that much time and effort, but can be very rewarding.

Every promotional step you take online should be part of a strategy rooted to your particular niche as a creative, your expertise and your focused area. If you ignore focusing on what it is that is unique about what you do, you risk wasting valuable time and energy on promoting yourself.

It’s up to you whether you want to use all the methods or one or two. What’s great is that each method will support what you do with the other methods, through cross promotion in the form of links.

Admittedly, these ideas are not new, but for those needing some detail into exactly how these methods work, and just to maybe rekindle your interest, here goes…

1. Writing for other sites

One of the most effective ways of gaining exposure, as well as credibility as a creative freelancer is to offer to write guest posts, online magazine articles, columns (ideally regular ones) on key sites relating to your freelancing niche. You should find success depending on the site you approach, as those running the sites will be happy to off load some writing work to people with fresh new insights.

Particularly on well chosen sites, contributing an interesting post or article will bring ears and eyes to your know-how, your work and your site, and it will get you established as an expert in what you do.

You can use social sites like Delicious, Faves.com, Twitter and Digg, as well as the Google blog search to find sites worth contacting (via their contact page/button) based on popularity. Alexa is a great site you can use to gauge the level of traffic coming into sites.

Obviously, if you can get your name and your writing on sites with high traffic levels, that would be ideal, but don’t forget that even on less popular sites, your writing will be archived for a long time, and can be picked up through people searching on search engines. You can also re-use your post or article in some of the other methods I’m about to discuss.

2. Starting a niche blog

Writing your own blog is an excellent way to gaining long term publicity for your services. The beauty of blogging is that it provides a system that facilitates regular, fresh, new content to be viewed by interested visitors.

Blogs create an excellent position from which to build and develop your personal brand, which friends, fans and prospects begin to recognise you for. Like many of the other methods in this report, blogging adds to your credibility as freelancer, whilst building trust and respect amongst loyal readers who see what you have to say.

It is best to focus the content on your blog into one simple niche, like logo design, electronic music or short story writing, to throw some examples out there, so that people remember your blog for something in particular, and to enable you to write focused, high quality content.

There are a few approaches you can take in getting your name and work out into the ‘blogosphere‘.

The first is to incorporate a blog into your personal website (or vice versa by incorporating a portfolio or bio into your blog site, which can be done through blog platforms like WordPress, and you might need the help of a web developer). You can use this blog to give updates of anything you like, including news on what you are working on, and so on.

The second approach is to set up a ‘standalone’ blog, again through a platform like WordPress.org, Tumblr, WordPress.com (hosted by WordPress) or Typepad, for example. This blog can be linked back to your own site, portfolio, Facebook profile etc.

A standalone blog is useful because the focus of blog posts can be on any focused niche you choose, although ideally relating to your industry, attracting visitors around that niche. This is instead of focusing on your personal blog, which will be focused more around your personal projects.

Unless you are pretty well known already, a standalone blog is likely to attract much more traffic than your personal blog.

By establishing yourself as a bit of an authority on what you share (and this is why it is important to have a focused topic area for your blog/s), particularly if it relates directly to what you do as a freelancer, your self promotional efforts will pay off in the form of a larger fan base and contacts, greater trust and respect, more support and more visitors to your personal site. That includes potential clients.

Another approach to blogging you can use, especially if you don’t have enough time to commit to regularly writing posts for your own blog, is to apply to submit posts to other blogs related to your niche as a contributor. The work of setting up a blog and attracting visitors (hopefully) will already have been done for you.

Group blogs also exist. These are set up to pool the contributions of more than one individual, which serve as a connector and effective promotion source for all contributors. Thunderchunky, the design and illustration portal, serves as a demonstration of this, linking together the contributions of four designers, whilst promoting their work at the same time.

You might consider setting up a group blog with some friends, colleagues or people who are freelancers like you (who can find and contact on forums, social media sites, and other blogs, for example) to promote yourself, and take some of the strain off writing for one blog regularly.

3. Article writing

Here’s a powerful way to share your knowledge and ideas with the world, while bringing traffic to your site, and increasing your integrity as someone who knows and cares about your speciality.

Make sure you write a clear and concise article on something you think many will find useful, and post it to a popular article submission site like ezinearticles.com. Your article doesn’t have to be long. Usually a minimum of 250 words is all that is required. Your ‘return on investment’ in the form of traffic back to your site, can be extremely worth it.

Be sure to give a reason for people to click a link that you provide at the end of the article, such as in suggesting that your site contains more information or examples of what you have been writing about.

You should be aware of who you plan to target your articles to when writing. For example, a freelance graphic designer might submit an article on effective logo design methods if he/she is looking to target people in their own industry. However, to target potential clients, they might submit an article on how to use illustrations on websites to attract customers, for example.

People will find your articles, through articles sites themselves or by searching in search engines. Articles tend to get indexed (ranked) very well in search engine results, and a high proportion of anyone searching for your topic would be taken to your article and link.

A large list of places to submit articles to is included at the back of our ’10 Steps to Powerful Online Self Promotion’ ebook, downloadable here.

4. Commenting on blogs

Commenting on other blogs and websites can prove to be very fruitful in promoting yourself online. This involves finding blogs (through Delicious or Google, for example) that are relevant to what you know and are interested in, and, importantly, are places that would attract the kinds of people you would like to gain exposure to. You then write an appropriate and meaningful comment beneath blog posts that you have something to say about.

There are many benefits one can take from commenting on blogs, making sure your web link or appropriate contact details are attached.

With well written and thought out comments, you can begin to build credibility as an expert or as someone who cares about your field (or at least the blog post in question). This will build trust with readers looking over your comment and will add to your reputation as a creative freelancer.

Blog comments can be sources of traffic to your own site through the link you leave, as people seeing your insights choose to find out more about you. This often brings with it comments left on your own site if you have a blog, often from the writer of the blog you left your comment on. Comments on your site will add to its perceived value from visitors as well.

Commenting on other blogs will point important backlinks to your site (your own link to your site that you left with the comment), which will improve how your site is ranked in the search engines.

It is also an important part of your networking strategy in making friends and building up a following and publicizing yourself. You also never know who might be browsing over the comments, including yours. It could be someone who can get you work or further publicity.

A separate Red Lemon Club post on blog commenting can be found here.

5. Writing on forums

Contributing to, or starting appropriate ‘threads‘ or conversations on Internet discussion boards (forums) can be a great way of gaining exposure. It enables you to meet and interact with people in the same industry as you, get work, gain referrals, gain traffic to your site/s, as well as providing a valuable source of support and inspiration from those people that share your interests and share their work with you.

Posting on forums can be a good way of finding prospects directly, as many people will use the forums for their own research into finding suitable candidates to work with them on their own projects.

Many forum sites have a special area dedicated to posting and finding jobs for freelancers, that you can use for finding potential clients to work with. You will be well positioned to get work if you have built up credibility on the site from previous interaction. You only need to contribute valuable information occasionally to gradually build credibility with those members using the site.

If you are a web designer based in the UK, for example, you can use a site like WebDesignerForum to get some publicity as a web designer and to simply become known in that industry. This particular site has, like many other forums, an area where you can browse work on offer, and an area to directly promote your own services too. Of course, with the Internet, you don’t need to be restricted to do work destined for one country.

It is important to include a link to your site if you have one on your forum profile and within your ‘signature‘ that appears at the bottom of your posts. Like with commenting, this will add important backlinks to your site, as well as bring traffic to it.

6. Publishing a newsletter

If you have a website or a blog, you can publish a regular email newsletter or ‘e-zine’ to those people who have chosen to put their names on your mailing list. The value in having a mailing list, apart from building a list of contacts, is the regular contact you can make with friends, your clients, prospective clients and your network in general, which, for many (if the list is extensive), can be priceless.

Your site need only be a simple one for this to work and for you to place an ‘opt-in‘ box on the site where visitors fill in their name and email address.

You can use Aweber for setting one of these up and building your list. This service attracts a small fee, but there are free mailing list services available like Aardvark and Bravenet.

Your newsletter can be about anything you like, but ideally with updates that relate to what you do as a freelancing professional and creative. It’s also worth sending out brief details on what you are working on and what you’ve recently completed, to keep those who receive the newsletter in the loop.

Newsletters or e-zines can be sent out on a monthly basis, for example (if you are giving updates on what you are doing, I would not suggest sending one out more frequently than this), or perhaps weekly if you are providing helpful information that is not selling anything.

Anyone on your list will be sufficiently kept up to date and reminded of you. It is a great way to keep up relationships without spamming people, as long as you make it possible for individuals to opt out of the newsletter at any time.

Hopefully you will strike the balance just right between alerting people with updates and providing interesting and valuable information.

A Red Lemon Club post on newsletters ’10 Ways a Newsletter Can Drive Your Self Promotion,’ can be found here.

Remember to focus on quality, not quantity in all the self promotional activity you do.

Comments are encouraged!

Particularly with the ease in which material is transmitted and shared on the internet, such products as training videos, ebooks and articles, have become an incredibly powerful means to get your brand in front of many targeted people. Creating information products can help you gain exposure to potentially thousands of people, no matter what your profession.

Apart from allowing people to learn more about the way you communicate and express yourself, producing information products are useful for you in the following ways:

1. They will help you get more clients because such products will give people the ability to connect with you and learn more about how you communicate and what you know about before taking further ‘risks’ with you.

2. They create opportunities for ongoing passive income that requires little ongoing work.

3. The opportunity for your product, your name, your brand to go viral (spread through word of mouth), if the product is free.

4. Having an information product improves your credibility as a creative freelancer because it establishes you as an expert in your field and will distinguish you from others in your industry.

Whether you’re a musician, illustrator, writer or painter, there are information products that you can put together to sell or to give away to boost your self promotion dramatically.

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Here are some product ideas to think about:

• A free e-book full of special tips
• A full e-book to pay for (usually in the form of a pdf file)
• An audio mp3 or CD
• Training videos
• Teleseminars
• Ezines
• Charts, maps and information graphics
• Write an article

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Make sure the product relates to the work you do, is straightforward and isn’t overworked. It doesn’t need to be perfect.

An example of this in action is a web designer putting together an ebook on how to best optimize a site to make navigation as easy as possible. This way the product would be of interest to other web designers and site owners, and people who run blogs, but also potential clients who want to know whether the navigation on their own sites are as easy as possible, who may eventually use that web designer’s services.

It is ok to put together information that has originated from elsewhere, as long as it is presented in your own words and isn’t an obvious copyright infringement. You can also get the majority of the work outsourced, although for your credibility’s sake, you’ll want to exert a fair amount of control over the finished piece.

Does anyone have any further ideas?

It can be a wise way to expand your network, pool resources and save time and work.

The Internet has opened up a range of exciting possibilities for engaging others in promoting your work effectively.

Here are 5 ways you can do this:

1. Joint Blogs/Sites. Getting a blog or simple website out there that you can use to showcase your work, build credibility in your field, promote yourself, and simply express your interests, is an important element in one’s online self-promotional strategy.

A successful blog requires regular and outstanding content to be in for a chance of attracting many visitors. Particularly for those lacking in time, it is worth considering setting up a site with one or more suitable other people. With others working on the same platform, it is now possible to build up posts quicker, combine skills and resources, and promote everyone’s work through a single site.

Some freelancers might even want to consider using a joint site as a platform to promote the combined skills of several people as a business, as opposed to promoting individual freelancers.

2. Friends on Social Sites. Social media allows people to build up substantial networks of people who we’d want to know about our work. With sites like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter, it has become possible to link up with potential clients, fans, as well as key influencers and even celebrities in your industry. It’s best to add new people to these networks with appropriate personal messages.

What is extremely powerful with being connected to people who are well connected themselves, is that you are effectively ‘piggybacking‘ on their networks whenever they are linked to something of yours. For example, on Facebook, if someone with connections joins your page, all their contacts will be aware of this in their newsfeeds.

Linked up with key people, you can keep them in the loop with whatever you are working on, adding to your Radical Strategic Visibility.

3. Content Swapping. Getting material on someone else’s website, can be a great way of having fresh new people seeing your name on the Internet. You can agree to put an article or a guest post on another site in return for content for your own, or even agree to swap decent comments with someone else with a site or blog relating to yours.

One underused method of enhancing your validity online as a freelancer is to request a review/testimonial swap with someone. These can be placed visibly on your site, is mutually beneficial, and adds real value to the services etc you offer.

4. List Promotion. If you send out a newsletter to a mailing list that you’ve built up, you can use this to promote other people and get your name on other lists. Having a feature, link, article about you on someone else’s newsletter is possible through polite asking. However, it’s even more possible through agreeing with relevant people who have mailing lists to swap content like articles or even simply a link in a newsletter so that you and your work get seen by a new and targeted audience.

5. Exchanging Links. A straightforward but useful promotional tactic is in agreeing to place a link on your site to someone’s work who has done the same for you on their site. People do click on links featured on or recommended by sites and by having many of your web links on key sites around the web, this will benefit your exposure.

If you have any thoughts or more suggestions, please comment!

Thanks

One of the best ways to do this is to have people in your network, including fans, friends, previous clients and potential clients, sign up to your email mailing list.

Although it doesn’t have to be termed as such, a newsletter is the best way to attract people onto your mailing list in a mutually beneficial way.

Here are some great benefits for creative people of sending out a newsletter to your list to drive your promotional activities:

1. Building Validity. Getting a newsletter out to members of your mailing list will strengthen the way people view you as an expert/specialist/devotee to your area of interest. This will build trust in those following you in this way. This is why it is important for your newsletter content to regularly focus on your speciality or area, or at least be consistent in what you write about.

2. Receiving feedback and gathering testimonials. Keeping people updated on what you are doing will allow you to see what people think of your work if you request feedback from them. This feedback can be posted as testimonials (once permission is asked) on your site, to add value to your products and services.

3. Building loyalty. Keeping people updated through a newsletter, reminding them of you and providing them with good content, will have the benefit of increasing their loyalty to you.

4. Ability to introduce new products/services. Newsletters are a very practical means of keeping people updated with new projects you might be working on, products you’re marketing, exhibitions you’re in, as well as any changes you make to your set up as a freelancer.

5. Maintaining traffic. Newsletters can regularly boost traffic coming to your site through a link you place on the newsletter. Those coming to your site will then have a chance to potentially browse through whatever else you have to show/offer on your site.

6. Strengthens your own brand. If your newsletter content stays consistent, your personal brand as a creative can be strengthened over time. This is not only reflected in the information and expertise you provide, but in the way you transfer your personality, attitude, passion and everything else associated with ‘brand you‘ across to your readers. All these elements are important in creating a brand of yourself that people will remember you (and come back to you) for.

7. Improve your skills. Regularly writing for a newsletter, although this doesn’t have to be more than once a month, will improve your writing skills over time, but also add to your creativity, as you think of and apply new things to keep your readers interested.

8. Keeps you focused. Newsletters will improve your focus as a creative in aiming to succeed, producing and showcasing high quality work etc. Ideally you’ll want to be updating your readers with positive things that are going on in your freelance world, so newsletters help you set goals and hopefully get things done!

9. Re-establishing connections. Contact with a proportion of your business network in this way will help fire up relationships with clients or fans that were perhaps previously lost.

10. Expands your network further. Newsletters are a useful platform on which to hint to readers the other ways they can keep in contact with you. This can enable your network to strengthen and build further. For example, if you let readers know of your LinkedIn profile, and they connect with you through this, you receive the benefits of having a new LinkedIn member, which includes their access to your profile and more regular updates, their LinkedIn contacts being aware of you, receiving recommendations and so on.

If you have any suggestions or comments, don’t hesitate to contribute using the comment form below!

Thank you.