5 actions to make a difference against your competitors

With more than 4 million freelancers in France, standing out is becoming a major challenge. While some skills are only mastered by a limited number of professionals, other areas of expertise have spread more widely. Technical or strategic expertise is therefore not always a differentiating factor. This little extra is what allows more experienced freelancers to build a solid base of customers who trust them and have chosen them for the uniqueness of their service. What exactly is it about? What actions can you take to develop your uniqueness on the market? In this article, discover 5 concrete actions that will have a positive impact on your growth.

Why stand out as a freelancer?

Your success depends, in part, on your ability to stand out from the crowd. This therefore involves building your personal branding, that is to say the image you communicate to your prospects and customers, on some key points of your identity. To do this, you will therefore have to stand out: the more you will nestle, the more recognizable you will be. It is a real business challenge since your reputation has an impact on your turnover.

The most common fear is believing that you are going to lose customers. Indeed, if you stand out for this or that characteristic, you will certainly more attract prospects who are sensitive to it and, conversely, push away those who do not recognize themselves in it. Let's take a concrete example: if a company is looking for a Business Analyst, how will she choose among the 25 profiles who offered the same service? To obtain the mission, the self-employed person will have to prove their uniqueness because it will act as an added value for the company.

Let's remember: companies are looking for partners who know the challenges of the mission, know how to meet their needs and provide their expertise from the start of the mission. In the long term, it is a real time-saver for the company. It is therefore not surprising that a company in greentech, for example, naturally prioritizes profiles with knowledge of this sector, in addition to the expected technical skills.

Standing out from your competitors will help you during your prospecting phases. But not only that: it is also important to convince a prospect during an initial interview or even to be able to increase your rates. How are you going to convince these potential customers to choose you? How are you going to explain to them the difference in amount, compared to the rates charged on the market? Businesses will tend to challenge your offer in order to understand your perceived value. So offer it on a platter.

By developing your uniqueness, you can be recognized for your services and your personality. That's what we call “being top of mind.” But if you remain anonymous, your target customers will turn to the competition who will make more noise than you.

5 actions to become a “top of mind” expert

1. Adopt an entrepreneurial approach

By definition, independent professionals are business managers. You combine skills in your field of expertise but you also have the role of sales representative, customer service, communicator and accountant. Unless you have the opportunity to delegate these tasks to dedicated professionals, you will necessarily have to develop skills sales, communication, customer relations, and this, in parallel with the realization of your missions.

Some freelancers have therefore chosen to get closer to networks of entrepreneurs in order to evolve in an environment close to their daily professional life. Others preferred to be accompanied by mentors in order to benefit from their experience and obtain broader perspectives on their situation.

This approach often goes beyond simple training because it positions you in a genuine entrepreneurial approach. This allows us to open our horizons in order to perceive opportunities where they really are.

2. Always focus on the “problem solving” vision

Above all, your customers are looking for an expert who will provide concrete answers to their current problem. They are faced with a situation where they do not have either the in-house expertise or enough staff to carry out the project. Whether it's one or the other, always maintain a problem-solving posture.

Before starting a collaboration, therefore, carry out an in-depth analysis of your customer:

• What are your customer's current challenges?
• What are its goals and expected results?
• What is its desired trajectory?
• What are its failures and why did the methods previously applied not work?

In addition to providing a multitude of solutions, this process will strengthen your position as an expert. Your client actually needs a professional who masters certain technical skills, but they are also looking for a person who is able to immerse themselves in a context in order to identify the key points that need to be developed. Your customers or prospects will feel more confident in the face of an expert who offers to move quickly to solutions.

Problem solving is a particularly sought-after skill. But it is also beneficial for your business since you will be able to better identify the solutions to adopt for your own problems. In the analysis phase, for example, you can ask your customer why they did not call on you sooner. By doing so, you will already have an overview of the actions to be taken to improve the communication of your offers or even simply of the ways to reach other customers who will encounter the same difficulties. It's two birds with one stone: you solve the problem and you also identify what you need to grow your business.

3. Building your offer from the market

Surely you know the adage: “the market is always right.” Being independent may be a way of life, but it is above all a way of meeting the needs of the market by relying on your own strengths. It is therefore essential to understand the market in order to identify the points of frustration of your target customers. “What are the needs of the market right now?” will naturally lead to the following question: “What offer can I create to answer it?”

This vision of the market is the perfect link between your area of expertise and the sectors of activity you want to target. Whether it is an evolution of business practices (e.g.: change management) or the use of a new technology that you have been using since its inception (e.g. prompt engeneering and AI), you have an interest in strengthening your positioning according to these market trends. The idea is not to adapt your offer to each trend, but to get closer to one or two of them in order to prove your expertise. After all, it is possible that these trends turn out to be real substantive topics that are more than appropriate to grasp when they are just emerging.

4. Become the ideal partner for your customers

A particularly profitable strategy in order to increase incoming mission requests is to multiply your meeting opportunities. Of course, the ideal is to attend events where your target customers are present. At first, it may even be a matter of focusing on the events of your former customers. On the one hand, they will be happy to see you again (in case a mission went perfectly). On the other hand, they gravitate in an ecosystem that could contain other prospects. So multiply the exchanges in order to find out about them. The more you maintain your professional relationships, the more they can generate mission opportunities.

It also puts you in a partner position. You are not simply a service provider who intervened urgently on a project. You are a professional that your client called upon because he understood your added value and therefore trusted you. Be aware of the benefits you are offering him but maintain a humble posture. Prefer to let your client shine who will thank you and will make sure, by himself, that you reap the benefits of your investment in the project. Word of mouth is a good example.

But beyond the service you provide, your most satisfied customers are often those who have seen the effort you put into the project. It is natural to want to thank the people who have served us and who have truly invested in us. This approach remains the same, whether it's your start as a freelancer or your first assignment with a newly acquired client. If you want to build a long-term customer relationship, make a genuine commitment to them. They will give it back to you.

5. Make decision makers aware of freelancing

Do you personally know decision-makers in your network? They can be operational directors, or even members of comex. Businesses still need to get used to freelancing and collaborating with independent profiles. The quality of your professional network can effectively be measured by knowledge that has the capacity to influence.

To take the example of comex, it can be an interesting strategy to distinguish yourself. Indeed, operational teams are often the ones that are best able to welcome freelancers. But the final decision is not always up to them because the relevance of self-employed profiles has not yet been legitimized by the entire Comex. By understanding the strategic challenges of the company and by demonstrating the added value of freelancers, freelancers would benefit from approaching business decision-makers in order to acculturate them on the subject.

These political games can be profitable but require strong agility to achieve the mission, while having an impact on the culture or methods of the client company.

Self-employed status is increasingly winning the hearts of French workers. This is still far from being the norm but for professionals who have already adopted this status, competition is already strong. Standing out is essential, if not imperative to make yourself visible to your target customers and convince them to use your services. In addition to the eternal personal branding advice, you will have to rely on various strategies that will have a strong impact on your business. To name just a few: develop a skill that will be in demand in a few years, increase business meetings with prospects or even meet managers in order to evangelize decision-makers to the culture of freelancing. So, what actions are you going to take to stand out from your competitors?