Free Tools for Freelance Creatives
This month I’m showing you all of my favorite tools for running my small business. I’ll walk you through what I’m using to maintain my business when I’m not doing client work. The best part is that these resources are free! Nobodies got extra cash to invest in yet another subscription service, so I wanted to make sure I was recommending tools that everyone can use as long as you have access to a computer/phone and internet.
If you’re trying to grow your business, social media presence, or get noticed as an artist and designer, then this list will be helpful for you.
One Stop Planning & Project Management for Creatives
I was just recently introduced to Milanote and although I haven’t been using it for long, I can already say that it’s the brainstorming tool I’ve been looking for my entire career. It’s all the best parts of Trello, Pinterest, a whiteboard, and pocket notebook, but somehow better. It’s available on the web, and if you like working on the go, they also have a phone app.
It does it all. You can create mood boards, mind maps, design briefs, to-do lists, content calendars, and more! This tool is completely flexible so you get to use it exactly the way you want with no restrictions. You can upload files, link out to inspo images, project-manage, and collaborate with others. There are tons of great example boards that show you just how many ways you can use their platform, making it super easy to get started. My favorite part is that you can share boards and collaborate with other users, including clients! I’m gonna experiment with it a little more, but I can’t wait to hand over deliverables and style guides through Milanote.
It has simplified my workflow tenfold, now I don’t have to use a different app for each of my needs, I can do it all in one place and access it no matter if I’m hunched over my desk, or going for a stroll around the block. I constantly feel like I’ve got a messy, tangled ball of noodley ideas floating around in my head with no way to get them out in a way that makes sense. Milanote is helping me organize all of those loose thoughts in a way that’s much more organized. You can use the app in whatever way makes the most sense for your brain, which, as a creative person, is the most amazing way to work. I don’t feel creatively restricted or by the limitations of the platform I’m using. There’s a handy desktop plug-in that goes along with Milanote making it even easier to snag images from other sites, it keeps the source link, the same way Pinterest does, but you can integrate it right into your project board so you don’t have to add extra steps to your process. It’s completely free to use so if you want to check it out and see if it fits into your workflow, check it out here.
For the Lovers of List-Making
Prior to discovering the majesty of Milanote, I was using Google TaskBoard to organize all of my random thoughts into categories that make sense. I’m a huge list maker, I’ve got notebooks full of random grocery lists, ideas, to-do lists, etc. TaskBoard helped me increase my productivity just by being so dang easy to use. It’s available in desktop and in the app store, and I can’t lose my notes the way I lose all the random post-its I was using before. I’m the type of person who has some of the best ideas while I’m trying to fall asleep, but that doesn’t really work well for me because I don’t have space to keep notebooks and pencils next to my bed. So when I get a stroke of genius, I quickly type it into my TaskBoard app and drift off to sleep. If you’re a shower idea person, you’ll love this too. I have a Google phone so I just go “Hey Google, add a new Moleskine notebook to my shopping TaskBoard” and bam! I added an item to my list without having to touch my phone. Technology is so cool.
It’s pretty flexible as well, you can make it work very similarly to popular project management tools like Trello or Asana. If you like that style of organizing yourself, then give TaskBoard a try. There are no extra bells and whistles getting in the way, and there’s virtually no learning curve because it’s so simple and paired back.
This one’s foolproof, if you ask me, give it a whirl.
Schedule Your Posts Like a Pro
I had been looking into every post scheduling app on the planet and none of them worked for me, most of the free plans don’t support automatic posting, and honestly, I don’t want to have to remember to hit publish every time a scheduled post needs to go live. But then I discovered Facebook Creator Studio, and my life changed forever. This is what I am using to schedule all of my Instagram posts (it works for Facebook too!). Heads up, I use this tool with my Business Account, the features may differ for you if you have a Personal or Creator Account.
Again, it’s very bare-bones, but that’s exactly what I need. I write all my Instagram captions, add my hashtags, and images, pick the date and time I want to post and then I’m done. It’s so easy. For the first time, I could create and schedule a full month’s worth of Instagram posts because I started using this tool. I also love the analytics that you can view, it’s slightly better than what you’re able to see in the phone app, but it helps me determine what days and times my audience is most active so I can maximize my engagement.
There are a couple of additional features, like managing sponsored posts, but I’m not using those so I can’t speak to them. It’s the perfect app for people who want a free resource to manage their social media content while they work their way up to a paid platform. It’s available on desktop or in the app store, making it that much more convenient. I can’t tell you how much this changed the game for me. Go check it out.
Time Track Like a Total Babe
Okay, so I do not offer my services at an hourly rate for a whole mess of reasons. That being said, it’s still extremely important to keep track of logged project hours. I used Toggl Time Tracker to do this.
Let’s talk about the importance of time tracking real quick. How long does it take you to design a logo from an initial call to deliverable? Don’t know? You have to be able to give clients accurate expectation for timelines so you don’t end up over-promising and under-delivering. Honestly, that’s my worst nightmare. No one wants a disappointed client. But the most important reason to time track is to make sure you’re charging the right amount for your time and being as efficient as possible while you’re working. Let’s see if I can explain this in a way that makes sense.
There’s an industry standard for hourly rates in the design industry, for lots of different services. (Grab yourself a Graphic Artists Guild Handbook, you’ll thank me later.) Not to mention, we all need to make a certain amount of money to 1) maintain a certain quality of life and pay our rent, and 2) cover the costs of doing business. The best way to figure out how much money you need to charge to make sure you’re meeting your basic needs is to work backward.
Let’s say you charge $750 for a logo design, and you take roughly 15 billable hours to deliver the complete logo to the client. That’s including preparing the proposal, contract, mood-board, presentations, calls, design time, revisions, and creating the agreed upon deliverables (file types in multiple colors etc.).
Divide your service charge by the number of hours it takes to give you your hourly rate. In this case, $750/15 hours = $50/hour! We’re gonna fudge some numbers here for this example. Let’s say you do four logos a month, your monthly income is $3,000. Does that cover your bills? If not, then you need to reevaluate how much you’re charging for your services. Don’t pull numbers out of a hat or charge willy-nilly, use the book I mentioned earlier, take your local market, economy, and budget into account and create a business model that makes sense for you. And for the love of all things good, DO NOT UNDERCHARGE. It screws over the rest of us trying to make it in this industry.
If you’re not currently keeping track of how many hours you’re putting into your projects, go check out Toggl.
That’s all I’ve got today. Let me know what your favorite resources are so I can check them out and incorporate them into my workflow! Thanks for reading along :)
