The 5 Most Common Freelancing Positions Clients Are Looking For

Since these are the five roles that I have my clients hire for over and over, it’s beneficial to tell those of you who are looking for freelance work where the opportunity is and what these roles consist of.

1. Virtual assistant

Most of my clients are doing a lot of busy work themselves because it needs to get done and they’ve just been the ones who are always doing it.

In this position, your role is like, “I’m here, I can help you with whatever you need,” and it’s about taking that ability and focusing it specifically on what the client needs.

A virtual assistant is a great way to get started and a freelancing position that is always in high demand. It often grows into more!

2. Operations Assistant

This is a position that’s like a step up from the virtual assistant. A lot of virtual assistants that I work with will then move on to operations assistant in their client’s business if they’re doing good work.

The responsibility of this position is overseeing the day-to-day operations of a company. They come in and their job is to oversee what everybody else is doing and make sure that all the work is getting done.

The client talks back and forth to their operations assistant, and then that person deals with everyone else.

In short, you are there to help make sure that everyone else can do their job well. If they have a problem, you’re going to fix it, figure it out and get them back on track. You are the eyes and ears of the biz and helping to run things for the client.

3. Marketing and Social Media

This is the third position that I often have my clients hire for. Once a client has things humming along with their virtual assistant, they’ll often look at their social media and realize they don’t have a strategy or any dedicated plan for social media.

In this position, the client will have you put together and run a strategy for them, paid and/or organic.

4. Customer Service

This is another position that involves tasks similar to what a virtual assistant could do, but sometimes there’s a need to get more specialized. A client may have their virtual assistant helping out with customer service initially, but as the business grows, they often need to have a dedicated customer service person on their team.

The great thing about customer service work is that it can be very stable, and that’s why I love this for people who are thinking about freelance work but may be a little bit concerned about stability (e.g. not wanting to find a new job all the time, or not wanting to work with a ton of different clients).

If you’re doing customer service for your client and you’re good at what you do and really giving it your all, the client is going to want to keep you as long as the business is doing well. 

5. Content Creation Writer

Many of my clients grow their business through a blog, and they don’t have time to write all of those posts themselves. They often add a writer to their team and have them create content each month.

Content creation can take on different forms as well. It’s not always just a blog. Some clients have people write their email newsletters. Some people contract out all of their Instagram caption creation. Just because someone has a great eye for design and knows how to create an Instagram feed that looks great, doesn’t necessarily mean that person knows how to write captions. Someone else can be hired to get to understand the client’s brand voice and tone and write for them.

As a writer there are a lot of opportunities for writing jobs in the freelance world.

One of the things I love about all of these freelancing opportunities is that they are ongoing work. Even if you’re just doing part-time work for three clients, at 10 hours a week for each client, you’ll have a 30 hour work week and will likely earn more than you would at your current full-time job.

If you enjoyed this quick look at the five most common freelancing positions that clients are looking for. If you want to listen to even more about these positions, check out Episode 6 of my podcast here.

Life Abroad Budget: What You Can Get For Your Money in Colombia

Living the location independent lifestyle often sparks the response, "Must be so nice, I wish I could do that!" But why can't you? The common excuse is "I can't afford it." Let's challenge that notion because, in my humble opinion, you can't afford NOT to explore this lifestyle.

Here’s how to get started. Consider your current expenses: rent or mortgage, utilities, car-related costs, insurance, groceries, dining out, and more. Now, think about adding travel expenses on top of that – it might seem impossible. However, when you embrace living abroad as the core of your lifestyle, the high costs of American living tend to fade away.

The beauty of this lifestyle is that you can travel slowly, finding excitement in everyday activities like grocery shopping, sipping coffee at a local café, or exploring new markets. By residing in one place for extended periods, you can establish a predictable budget, free from the fluctuations of frequent travel costs.

My main expenses as a digital nomad include rent, phone, travel insurance, food and entertainment, and transportation. Notably absent are the typical American expenses like internet, cable, electricity, and other utilities.

Here, I'm going to show you a broad overview of expenses, excluding details like taxes or intercity travel. Let's look at the basic monthly expenses and see how far a budget of $20K could take you in South America. 

NOTE: While living abroad I prefer Airbnb for the sheer simplicity it offers. While I may pay slightly more, the convenience of fully furnished accommodations with utilities included is worth it. Imagine not having to deal with the hassle of setting up utilities for a short stay. 

South America - Low Budget ($20,000) - Medellin, Colombia

Medellín, Colombia (where I got my digital nomad start!) stands out for those seeking a budget-friendly lifestyle. You can find apartments in safe areas for as low as $300 a month! The apartment shown below is a little higher at almost $500 and offers Netflix, an in-unit washing machine, stunning city views, and good proximity to public transport. With an efficient metro system, transportation costs remain low, especially if you're not frequently commuting.

Food in Colombia is also affordable, with ample options for meals under $5. An iconic breakfast, Bandeja Paisa, includes eggs, rice, beans, sausage, an arepa, and cheese, often enough for multiple breakfasts.

Sample budget:

Rent: $500
Phone: $10
Food & Entertainment: $350
Transportation: $100
Total: $960

Even with a $20,000 annual income, if you're willing to spend up to $1,200 monthly, you can save $5,600 per year for retirement or debt repayment.

How I Track Almost Everything I Do On The Computer

I use Toggl for time tracking. I originally started using it to track billable time for invoicing purposes but now I use it to track almost everything I do on the computer, work and personal.

Once I found Toggl, I couldn’t imagine how I lived without it. 

First of all the interface is super simple to understand. (Until I complicated it with all these red lines. 😂)

I can set various hourly rates and attach them to different clients OR set them up for different projects assigned to the same client.

For example, when one client switched customer service platforms, there were days when I jumped right in alongside the customer service team and answered hundreds of tickets in order to help the transition go smoothly. (Plus I’d advocated for the switch and was in charge of making it happen so I was really committed to doing everything I could to make it smooth!)

Obviously, I needed to charge a different rate for those hours so I set up a new project under the same client and now, though it’s rare, if I need to jump into customer service and help out, I’m able to effortlessly switch my hourly rate.

The reports Toggl runs are just beautiful. (I’m a fan of simple but I also like when things are pretty!)

I can easily see where my time has gone and where I need to make edits. In the report above, I did some work for a client and started my timer but didn’t assign it to them. I can easily click into that time block "without client" and then attach it to the correct client and task.

Toggl also does great detailed reports. I type the gist of what I’ve worked on in the notes section as I complete each session. With a few clicks I’m able to pull up a report for any date range I choose, export it to PDF, and send that to each client along with my invoice.

There’s also a Chrome extension you can add to quickly start and stop the timer without going into the website but I found that I would forget to input my notes more often when I went that route.

I just pull up the app on my computer, start the timer, minimize that window so it’s out of the way, and get to work.

As you start or continue your freelancing career, I hope you’ll learn to love Toggl as much as I do!

Cheap Flights: Using Credit Card Points Responsibly

When people ask me about the best ways to find cheap flights, this is hands down my favorite tip for not just getting there cheap, but getting free flights! I never knew the beauty of credit cards until a few years ago when I started working with a client and learned a ton about how to use them responsibly.

Like some of you, I had the whole “credit cards are bad” spiel drilled into my head by my dad and it still pains me to think of the years and years of points I could’ve been earning. 😭

So here’s how to buy a cheap flight using points on a very basic level.

In the United States, many credit card companies offer a signup bonus for getting one of their cards. 

The idea is that:

A) Many people will sign up and not take advantage of the bonus, and 

B) Even if people do take advantage of the bonus, it’s a small price to pay because the majority of people use credit cards incorrectly and the credit card companies will reap plenty back in interest charges over the years. 

All you have to do is NOT be one of those people and you’re golden!

Let’s walk through an example.

ASIV credit card company is offering credit card A with a 50,000 point sign up bonus. 

All you have to do to earn the bonus is spend $3000 on the card within the first 3 months of opening it. 

That’s just $1000 a month and well within what most people spend on expenses. 

The idea is to simply transfer all of your regular expenses to that card for those 3 months. Gas, insurance, phone bill, dining out, it all adds up and everything should go on that card. 

Depending on your living situation, you might even be able to pay your rent on your credit card using a service like Plastiq. 

The one cardinal rule you must always adhere to is: Do NOT‌ change your spending habits to meet the bonus. Just put all your regular expenses on that credit card and earn the bonus for things you would already be buying.

Once the 3 months is up (sometimes sooner with some companies), you’ll automatically get the 50,000 points transferred into your account. Now, some credit card points are worth more than others. With a lot of the good ones, 50,000 points is equal to at least $500 worth of travel. And, there are tons of places you can fly to for under $500.

If you’re interested in learning more about using credit card points to travel for free I‌ can’t recommend the site 10xtravel.com enough (look for their FREE course!).‌ Bryce is a former client (and now friend) and I learned everything I know from him and his team – and painlessly I‌ might add. I thought the points and miles game was far too complex but they are amazing at getting newbies started.

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