Lead Generation Strategies That Freelancers Can Use To Acquire New Clients

  Lead Generation For Your Freelancing Business

When you get interest in your work, either through your email, or your freelancing website, those are important leads. A lead is a potential customer or long-term client who could benefit from your services as a freelancer. There should be constant machinery in place to generate leads for you and an action plan once a potential client lands in your e-mail or website.

Lead generation is the process your business uses to attract potential clients and guide them from interested parties to paying clients. Lead generation works by using offline or online channels to build interest in your freelancing business. This can be your website showing your services and sample work or your profile on a freelancing platform showing your work and ratings from previous clients. It can also come from offline channels like word of mouth, where someone that has used your services recommends you to others.

Once a potential customer expresses interest in your work, you should then engage them by naturing a relationship in order to move them closer to making a purchase. You need to understand the needs of the customer to provide them with solutions that meet their unique problem.

Lead Generation Strategy

Capture the lead- This is collecting information on the potential customer. You should capture their name and e-mail but you also need to know what services interest them and who referred them to you.

Lead Magnets- A lead magnet is an incentive you might give to encourage the lead to give up some information about themselves. This could be a free e-book or a discount on their first order.

Segmentation- This helps you categorize your lead according to their need, persona, the section of your website they visited, content on your site they downloaded, and any information they provided about themselves. This could help you pinpoint what services to highlight in e-mail marketing or what time of year to offer discounts for a seasonal service offering.

Do you have a lead generation strategy for your freelancing business? How do you attract new clients for your freelancing services? Comment below, and share your thoughts with our community of African freelancers. 

We Can Work.

Making Money On Your Phone Using SagaPoll

Sagapoll Review 2022

Sagapoll is an African survey app that allows you to earn from your phone by taking polls. This app is free and you make money on the app by answering short surveys every day to earn points. The points can then be converted to cash that can be withdrawn on PayPal.

How Can I Participate?

1. Download the app on google play.
2. Create your account-It's free
3. Earn points by taking polls

How Can I Earn As An Ambassador?

1. Download the app on google play.
2. Create your account.
3. Create a video on YouTube/Tick tock/Instagram telling your followers about Sagapoll.
4. Earn points every time a user uses your referral code.
5. 5000 points= $20

Register to Sagapoll and USE CODE: QY34T to earn 5 points. Share it with your friends and family using WhatsApp and earn even more points. Its that easy. This is how you can make money from your phone.

Watch our video exploring the Sagapoll website and other great opportunities for African freelancers.

Will you sign up to Sagapoll? Do you often make money by taking polls? Comment below.

Making Money With Shortened Links

 How Content Creators Can Make Money With Short Links

Content creators and website owners share website links all the time to promote their products and services online. Freelancers who are social media managers spend time creating content and sharing it on various social media sites. Platforms like Twitter that require only 140 characters per post work best with short links. Plenty of websites charge a monthly fee to shorten links, but others will pay you for shortening your link on their platform.

These websites will pay you to shorten your links but there is a catch. They usually pay you for traffic from specific countries. Some countries earn more money than others. No matter your country there is a link shortener that can earn you money. Here are some examples of these websites and what audience they pay out to.

DZ4link- Pays $2 per click for worldwide traffic.

Shrinkearn- Pays $3.50 for worldwide traffic 

Short.est- Pays $14.04 for 1000 views from the U.S

Bindbucks- Pays $ 1.30 per link for IK traffic

Link.tl- Pays $4.80 for traffic from the U.S

Shink- Pays $5 for traffic from Australia

African Traffic Link Shorteners

These are link shorteners that pay specifically for African traffic.

Linkrex- Pays $15 for 1000 views of traffic from Angola

Lanzame- Pays different rates depending on the country, but has a global rate of $ 3.50 for 1000 views

Please note that most of these link shorteners are only good for a limited time, once the short link is created. I encourage you all to look at your audience and find one that works for you and look into their terms and conditions to understand how they work. You also need to be aware that Facebook does not allow you to post shortened links on its platform.

Are you a content creator? Do you have a website? Which one of these link shorteners would pay you for your traffic? Comment below and tell us how you plan on monetizing your content.

Easy Online Jobs For African Freelancers

Easy Remote Jobs You Can Start Today

Remote work is a job that can be done by the employee regardless of their location. No office commute is required but one needs to have access to a computer, laptop, and a stable internet connection. It also helps if you emulate a work office environment by having a quiet workspace with good natural or artificial lighting. For those of you that may be new to remote work, here are some easy jobs that you could get started with today.

Product Testing

Often times when you see a job listing for a product reviewer the listing asks for students or teenagers because of how simple and uncomplicated this job is. These jobs require reviewers to write product reviews for e-commerce vendors. Sometimes the job also requires inspecting finished products and write up of the product. The review will include materials used, quality of product, and whether or not it is as described in the listing. Individuals can sign up for product testing, and give their demographics such as location, age, and sex.

I recently signed up for a product testing position on Opinion Hero, see my thoughts on this platform on our YouTube channel.

Website Testing

If you own a laptop or desktop computer with a webcam, a pair of headphones, stable internet, and a quiet well-lit room, you could start website testing today. This job entails using a browser app to record your screen as you give your opinions out loud. Often times they will have a task that they want you to accomplish on the website in order for companies to improve the user experience of their customer while buying goods or signing up for services.

I have a whole review on my experience on Userbrain on this blog and a video of how I was able to make over $800 using this browser extension alone.

Blogging

Blogging is an easy yet challenging way to make money online. It's easy because you can get started for free on blogger.com which allows anyone with an idea, interest, or something to teach an audience can document it in their dedicated blog for free. Challenging because it takes years to fully monetize a blog after which it can generate monthly passive income. The advice that I can give anyone with an idea or a passion to share is start now and rip the rewards for years to come.

Breaking Down Affiliate Marketing For African Freelancers

 What Is Affiliate Marketing And How African Freelancers Can Use It To Make Money

Affiliate marketing is performance-based marketing in which businesses reward partners for visits to their websites for products or services bought from their affiliates' efforts. This is a marketing arrangement by which an online retailer pays a commission to an external website for traffic or sales generated from its referrals.

This is a way in which thousands of freelancers make recurring income online by partnering up with online retailers through affiliate programs. This is especially effective for freelancers that have a blog. There are so many brands, products, and services that could benefit from affiliate marketing like insurers, wireless routers, flights, and perfume subscriptions hence no matter what your blog audience is, there is an affiliate program that your audience can benefit from. By simply recommending products and services to your audience, they benefit by having information on products and services that they would already use. You as the blogger will benefit by having content for your audience and earning based on action taken by your audience.

How Do I Make Money?

Affiliates get a unique link that can be tracked by using cookies. These links can be integrated with blog posts, social media posts, or any other place that drives traffic. Cookies then track purchases within a certain amount of time, for example, the cookie might track clicks and purchases for 15 days or 60 days. If a purchase is made within a certain amount of time from that click the affiliate gets paid a commission. The payout is usually through PayPal but sometimes an affiliate program will ask for bank details for direct deposit. Other rewards like gift cards and points might be earned. 

Types Of Affiliate Programs

Content Creators- These are bloggers and influencers that independently make content for their audience. By featuring products on their platform, they would drive organic traffic to brand websites and likely result in sales and website traffic.

Review Sites

These websites are popular for higher-end purchases. When a buyer is about to invest a larger amount of money on a product online, they go to review sites to make sure the product reviews well. By creating review sites freelancers can post reviews of products and provide their audience with affiliate links for purchase.

Search Affiliates

 Freelancers pay to promote offers on search results like Google, Bing, YouTube, and Facebook. This will drive traffic to the advertised websites and result in clicks and purchases. 

Coupon Sites

These sites are popular with bargain shoppers that are always looking to get the lowest price while shopping online. Freelancers that love to discount shop online can create coupon sites that encourage their audience to go to certain websites for the lowest price on goods and earn commissions on these sales.

Email Marketing

This kind of marketing works best when shoppers provide their email addresses to get notified of new products or sales on brands or products that interest them. affiliate links would be attached to these emails and sales generated by these emails will gain you a commission.

There are plenty of affiliate programs in every conceivable niche online. Which niche would generate your blog or website money online? Comment below.

Futuristic African Cities Built Around Tech

African Futuristic Smart Cities Underway in 2022 

Back in 2010 or thereabouts, there was a huge need for African cities to be built to accommodate a tech-savvy future. Innovation emerging from the African continent encouraged wealthy individuals and governments to create cities where technological advances would be made. A career in tech, cryptocurrency, blockchain technology, and all-around innovation would bring about a great future for the whole world. Here are some of these project cities and their progress so far.

Akon City, Senegal

The $6 billion city is the brainchild of Senegalese American singer Akon. This mega project would feature ultra-modern skyscrapers with the city overlooking the Atlantic Ocean in the village of Mbodiene. Akon wanted this city to be a refuge for the African diaspora hence the name. The currency would be the Akoin which would be a cryptocurrency for this smart city. The first phase of Akon city is expected to be completed in December 2023.

Konza City, Kenya

This is a project of the Government of Kenya by the Konza Technopolis development authority. This will be a world-class technology hub with a mix of business, workers, residents, and urban amenities.  Konza city construction began in 2017 and at this time in April 2022 is 50% completed. The first phase of this project is projected to be finished in December 2022.

Kigali Innovation City

The master plan for Kigali Innovation City was unveiled in December 2021. The 61 hector site entails mix-use construction for three universities, research facilities, development facilities, business incubators as well as retail, hospitality, and accommodation. This is a project of the government of Rwanda that will integrate smart solutions for green solution transport and building designs. With a variety of green and open spaces to foster collaboration and exchange of ideas in the ecosystem. 

Modderfontein New City South Africa

This current defunct mega project in South Africa was proposed in 2013 by a private Chinese real estate firm. The goal was to create a New York in South Africa, however, a lack of investments and pushback from the municipal government led to the eventual demise of this project. The initial project may be dead in the water but it has inspired other such mega projects.

Which of these futuristic African cities are you rooting for? Which have the most potential for progressing the African continent. Comment below.

Best Paying Jobs Across Africa in 2022

 5 Highest Paying Jobs In Africa

If you are looking to make great money in Africa as an employee, it helps to know the best paying jobs in Africa. In fact, there are many in-demand occupations that pay extremely well. Knowing the best-paying jobs will set you on the right path as a freelancer to direct your services.

Software Developer

There is a high demand for software developers in Africa. African developers are getting full-time jobs that pay as high as $107,000 per year. The job involves developing, designing, supporting, and deploying software to customers. Software developers also design application systems for smooth operations. Analyzing and testing computer programs and software is also part of the job of a software developer.

Marketing

It will come as a surprise to many how well marketing jobs in Africa pay. According to glass door marketers in Africa are making about $112,000 per year. The job involves demographic analysis. Promoting products and services to the right audience as well as promoting ideas to certain demographics to increase revenue and the growth of businesses.

Agriculture

With vast fertile land, Agriculture is a natural fit in the continent of Africa. Agriculture is Africa's largest economy generating the highest paying revenues. This industry requires management, business research, manufacturing, packaging, marketing and so much more. These employees make an average of $60,000 per year with commercial farmers making around $90,000 per year.

Mining

Mining accounts for 20% of economic activity in Africa. Careers created in mining are such as scientists, surveyors, geologists, engineers, as well as drillers. Mining engineering is the most sought-after in mining. Earning an annual salary of about $72,000 per year. The trade and industry around mining bring in large revenue in Africa.

Transportation

With its relatively low barrier of entry, transporters across Africa enjoy huge power and influence because of the income generated in this sector. This industry offers lucrative daily revenue to many from drivers, accountants, bus companies, couriers and so many more. An average transportation logistics manager will make a minimum of $33,000 per year. There are numerous ways to make money in the transport sector.

As a freelancer where do you see the opportunity to benefit from these high-paying jobs across Africa? Comment below and share with our community of African freelancers. How can we make it work?