By omitting your freelance experience from your CV, are you underselling yourself? Even though your work is excellent, your credentials are strong, and your prior work experience is relevant, you can find it difficult to sell potential clients on your freelance competence.
You’ve developed an outstanding set of abilities as a freelancer that businesses value. But like many other freelancers, you don’t adequately portray past jobs on your resume. It can be difficult to make your resume stand out from the competitors in the cutthroat global job market and land a new job.
In order to portray yourself as a company’s problem-solver, how can you add freelance experience to your resume?
Thankfully, it’s simple to include your freelance experience on a resume. In this post, we’ll look at a few simple techniques for including freelance work on your resumes in a way that will help you get hired for additional positions.
You could be tempted to completely omit your freelance work from your resume if you have been working both a full-time job and freelancing at the same time.
However, you should only do this if your work as a freelancer hasn’t given you any new skills or expertise. If you have expanded your skill set through freelancing, you can be closing doors to prospects by failing to disclose that on your CV. Working as a freelancer counts as job experience.
On the other hand, if freelancing has always been your sole source of income, your CV must include this information. Not including your freelancing work can give the impression that you have a job gap on your resume, which is never appealing to potential employers.
How to put your freelance experience on a resume
There are a few factors to take into account when including previous freelance gigs on your CV. On their resumes, freelancers should always list their roles in reverse chronological order, along with the people they’ve collaborated with. An overview of your project responsibilities, start and conclusion dates, and any successes or successful project results should all be included in this section of your resume.
1. Indicate what you do in the freelance opportunity
When you can demonstrate that you can effectively complete their work criteria, your job proposal is much more likely to be accepted. Even though it can seem like a no-brainer to include your past work on your CV, it’s crucial to do so in order to inform future customers. Whether the project was large or little, independent contractors need to show potential clients their track record of effective work.
You may show them how you’ve handled these numerous obligations because freelancing carries the weight of independent business ownership. If you’re applying for a job writing advertisements, for instance, you should list any relevant writing experience on your resume.
2. Add the freelance opportunity’s start and end dates
Potential customers, recruiters, and hiring managers may find it easier to comprehend the breadth and depth of your experience in a certain area by seeing the start and end dates of your prior freelancing experiences. These dates also show employment gaps, how long you’ve been with opportunities, and how recently you worked in the field. This section of your resume can highlight long-term or repeat clientele and help your work experience stand out.
For instance, a prospective client should be able to immediately locate your most recent app programming project on your CV if they want to know how recent it was. Finding a job can differ depending on whether a project was finished recently versus several years ago, especially for initiatives involving technology.
3. Include the business that made the service request
Potential clients will view your project experience more favorably if you list the names of businesses for which you have previously performed freelancing work. Listing these previous customers also acts as a professional reference for your job. You’ll be more likely to stand out during the hiring process if prospective clients can see that you’ve worked for businesses that are similar to theirs.
Make sure it is fully represented on your resume, for instance, if you worked as a virtual assistant and researcher for a marketing agency in the same industry as the next freelance position you are going for. However, you can delete from your resume any irrelevant freelance experience, such as a position in the food industry. The restricted area should be used to your advantage to present the best possible case for that particular freelance job.
4. Give a thorough rundown of everything completed during the course of the job/project
Let’s say a prospective client is unable to comprehend their position and duties within a project. If that happens, you can end up losing out to applicants who can better articulate their professional experience. As a result, it’s essential to include brief summaries of your work for previous clients and assignments. Going one step further, prospective clients adore seeing quantifiable contributions. Define your experience in terms of numbers in the project summary section.
5. List the project’s accomplishments and results
Include any accomplishments, honors, awards, or successful outcomes from your earlier freelancing experiences. This brief example of a real-world result related to your profession may help your CV stand out to prospective employers. For instance, if you received a favorable review on your Upwork profile for a particular assignment, think about including a quotation from the review or linking to your profile so the potential client can see the comments.
Why it’s important to constantly include your freelancing work and projects on a resume
Knowing what to include or leave out of your skill set and employment experience is crucial when presenting them. As we’ve already discussed, rather than utilizing a generic CV, you should tailor it to the project or job you’re going for.
Consider creating a resume for a programming position as an illustration. In that situation, instead of utilizing the limited space on the page to detail your restaurant work from 10 years ago, you may highlight recent programming projects and your familiarity with relevant programming languages.
Showcase your adaptability to different businesses or niches.
Strong resumes draw attention to the applicant’s background in a variety of industries. Clients can understand that you can apply your knowledge in their particular specialization by seeing that you can work in a variety of sectors. Assume, for instance, that you are looking for a content writing job with a fashion company and you solely claim your prior experience writing for roofing firms. The potential client might then doubt your ability to write about their industry. Contrarily, it is more effective to demonstrate your adaptability by highlighting your freelance employment, allowing the individual examining your application to understand that you can fit into a variety of businesses and specialties.
Show that you can be successful outside of the regular workplace
Some clients prefer to engage with freelancers who have demonstrated expertise working on freelance assignments, even when the skill sets for freelancers and full-time positions may overlap. Consequently, it’s crucial to list your prior independent initiatives. You can show that you can interact with the customer in a productive manner and adhere to all of the standards for independent contractors. Additionally, by including numerous freelancing tasks, it highlights your experience and skill set and shows how well you’ve been able to satisfy the demands of freelance clients.
The best ways to list your freelancing work on a resume
There are many different resume formats and aesthetic rules to follow when creating your resume. The most crucial factors for you to take into account when creating your resume, however, have been compiled for your convenience. By following these best practices, you may stand out from the competition with your freelance resume and land more interviews.
• Be succinct and use simple words
Throughout your resume, use concise language to make your points. Your resume must be prepared in a formal tone and be error-free in its language and spelling. Having said that, it’s crucial to avoid using excessive terminology or stuffing your CV with business-speak. Using terms that are excessively huge may seem out of place and will probably put the resume reader off. It’s crucial to create a balance between being competent and professional without being excessive.
Even if you want to highlight your prior experiences, a potential employer won’t want to read a five-page resume. As a result, make an effort to keep your resume brief, ideally keeping it to one page.
• Be truthful about your position’s title and duties
When applying to particular positions that seem out of reach, you could feel under pressure to bolster your titles or responsibilities on your CV. However, it is vital to only list precise job titles and any experience or duties you can demonstrate to a potential customer. A freelance contract might quickly become unworkable if you overstate your skill set, particularly if you are unable to fulfill a promise you made in your resume.
• Always include accomplishments and outcomes in the positive
As said above, make a list of any accomplishments or successful outcomes from your prior work. Awards are a fantastic method to highlight your accomplishments to potential clients who need to see what you can do! Increasing sales, conversions, and other honors for your team or potential industry recognitions are all excellent additions to your resume.
• Think about including recommendations from clients
Consider including the business name and point of contact (client’s name) when mentioning your previous clients. A recommendation from a previous client can instill trust in a new client that you have what it takes to complete the task as promised. Naturally, this must be done with the client’s consent first, but testimonials from previous clients and references can be a very good predictor of future success in the realm of freelancing.
Revisit your resume to highlight your skill set
Your resume can be as effective as your skill set if you use the best practices in this article and include a summary of your prior freelance assignments. Finding your next freelance work may be made easier by a variety of variables. But the ideal place to begin is by building a solid introduction with a great résumé that highlights your capacity for freelancing.