Turning one-off clients into clients for life

I moved from spending most of my time looking for clients to now enjoying ongoing business that allows me to save time and deliver quality projects while having more spare time. Here's how you can do it, too.

For years of freelancing, I've suffered with one thing I've spent too much money and time on – investigating and attempting to solve it.

I'm talking about the dreadful loop of "Freelance Rollercoaster."

You go through cycles of having a lot of work, finishing it, and having almost nothing else waiting for you. Sure, having a lot of projects feels excellent. However, because your client's job consumes your time, other aspects of your business may suffer.

For example, if you're overwhelmed with deliverables, your marketing may suffer — especially if you run a business independently.

However, there is one approach you can use to ensure you always have a steady flow of work. It involves taking a one-time client who may want a single project and developing that relationship into a partnership with continuing work.

I only had one-time projects for a long time in my freelance design work. I'd be asked to create a simple website, a few mobile app screens, or a web application's key components. That was fine. But after finishing the project, I returned to prospecting and looking for new work everywhere.

Sometimes it took days. At other times, it'd take weeks before I got more work.

That was until I made a few fundamental changes to how I approached my one-time clients, which resulted in steady employment and partnerships from which we both benefited.

I moved from spending most of my time looking for clients to now enjoying ongoing business that allows me to save time and deliver quality projects while having more spare time.

Here's how you can do it, too: