🎙 The Digital Nomads Daily Podcast Episode #35

Building A Successful Creative Freelance Career With Suzanne

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Listen to our interview with digital nomad Suzanne:

🔥 How Suzanne started her freelance career as a creative
🔥 How Suzanne finds clients as a creative freelancer and how you can do it!
🔥 Here are some tips for finding a healthy balance between working online and traveling
🔥🔥🔥 And so much more must-know digital nomad lifestyle tips for (aspiring) digital nomads!

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“There’s no bright time to pursue a nomadic lifestyle, so just do it but have a bit of a plan!”

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Starting her freelance career as a creative

Suzanne didn’t start her journey as a digital nomad. In fact, she only found out while she was doing it that she was actually living the digital nomad lifestyle. During her first years of traveling, she worked in exchange for food and accommodations. It’s a popular way for low-budget traveling.
Over time she offered her creative services through freelancing. While many people believe in finding a niche, Suzanne enjoys doing more than one thing like entrepreneurs and podcast guests Chels and Micaela.
So Suzanne mostly does concept development for boutique hotels and restaurants and offers various creative services like photography, branding, and design. She loves both, so she decided to combine her passions, giving her creative and financial freedom.

How to find clients as a creative freelancer?

Just like any freelancer and business owner, you need to find clients. Suzanne has different marketing strategies but also shares that this isn’t always easy. One of the challenges she is facing is wearing many hats so she doesn’t always find the time to work on promoting her services. To tackle this Suzanne plans and creates content for a month and this is how she’s been able to market herself.

Another challenge he faces as a creative freelancer is coping with client feedback. Especially at the start of her journey, she would take feedback very personally, which would affect her well-being. Over time she started to understand that it’s never about her but feedback about the work. So Suzanne was able to distance herself emotionally from the feedback, treat her as clients’ needs, and adapt her designs according to their values without feeling offended or upset. This is an important lesson for anyone who is doing creative work.

‘‘Know what they want. Know which direction you want to go and it’s never the same.’’

Suzanne identifies herself as an introvert like Marcel, who also joined the Digital Nomads Daily Podcast. Both Suzanne and Marcel share on the podcast that this lifestyle taught her how to network better. Here are 3 things that helped her feel more confident:
🔎 Join co-working spaces because it’s easy to meet other people
🔎 Go to networking events and set small goals for yourself. For example, talk with 3 people about my work.
🔎 Schedule social/networking nights in your calendar and stick to it. It may feel uncomfortable but if you stick to it soon, it will feel more natural.

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Combining work and travel

Talking about co-working spaces – Suzanne shares why she loves working in co-working spaces. The first to know about co-working spaces is that every space has its own unique vibe. When you arrive in a new spot, it’s helpful to find a couple of co-working spaces and check out the memberships they offer.
If you cannot choose the right co-working space, there is an easier and more affordable way to enjoy it but have flexibility. An app used by many digital nomads is called Croissant App. It offers different kinds of memberships according to how many hours you want to work and you can use those hours for various co-working spaces. So instead of having multiple memberships you have only 1 membership but access to all co-working spaces listed on the app.
At Digital Nomads Daily, we love this app and you should definitely check it out! Go to www.getcroissant.com
Another important part of Suzanne’s work-life balance is understanding her own needs and finding locations, accommodations and a community that meets those desires. And while it may not sound sexy – planning and self-discipline are part of every digital nomad’s life.

Digital Nomads Daily Podcast Photo Building A Successful Creative Freelance Career With Suzanne (1)

Final takeaways

🌟 There’s never a right timing. If you really want to go for it, then just do it with a plan and save up some money.
🌟 Everyone can save some money, but you must adjust your lifestyle for it if you want to.
🌟 When you’re looking into coworking space, always check out what kind of memberships they have. It doesn’t have to be full membership especially if you’re new to the city because you’re traveling and discovering.
🌟 Take those small steps and put your calendar one networking day.
🌟 Adjust yourself with the needs of clients.