ST3 | Bradley Jacobs On Getting Started With Your Freelance Consulting Business

Discussion Topics: Bradley Jacobs On Getting Started With Your Freelance Consulting Business

• Step Uno in starting freelance consulting
• Your network = Your potential first client
• Know your niche and the rate ($$)
• How to overcome the fear and reduce the risk

Transcript: Bradley Jacobs On Getting Started With Your Freelance Consulting Business

So Bradley, thanks so much for joining us today.

Thanks so much for having me. Happy to be here.

Yeah. So, you know, I actually ran a poll on LinkedIn recently and the number one side hustle people were interested in, wasn’t actually YouTube-ing or selling art or starting a business, it was consulting and I must admit. I was quite surprised. I expected everyone to want to be a Tik Tok star but clearly, most have decided that the ‘Tik Tok’ they like better. It’s the sound of billable hours. So you all being here today is perfect. But before we start, could you tell us a bit about yourself? And how you got to founding Mylance.

Absolutely. So, after college, I joined a  boutique consulting firm called Kaiser Associates. I was there for a few years. And then I joined Uber and I was part of the operations team. Overseeing nine markets originally in the north Carolinas for the Uber rides business for two years, I then moved over to Uber Eats and I launched Miami and Milan Italy.

Then I ended up moving out to San Francisco to help launch the Uber freight business line and actually scale that in the U.S. over the next two years. So I was at Uber from 2014 to 2018 I left Uber. I was kind of sick of building up big businesses for them. Ready to work for me to some degree and I ended up consulting independently really successfully and it ended up working out.

I averaged about 20 K per month. In about half time, maybe 25, 30 hours a week across the next two years. And so seeing this opportunity, this way of working really opened my eyes up to this whole experience and ended up founding Mylance, really to empower more, to work for themselves as independent consultants so that they can live flexible, fulfilling lives as well.

Wow. 20K a month. That’s a lot of Uber rides. So, you actually gave up the startup hustle to do consulting. And I know, or at least I have read and I’ve maybe seen a few people who start by getting a client first before quitting their jobs, or maybe they even make their employer into their first client. But your story’s a bit different. You genuinely had to find clients from scratch. So, how did you do it?

You’re right. And often your former employer can be the best first client for you. For me, I needed to leave Uber. I didn’t know what was next for me, but I knew I needed out. And so I actually took some time off and I didn’t know if consulting was possible for me with my operations skill set. I think a lot of people would tell me that it’s not. But I thought, what do I have to lose by trying? And so I actually responded to a bunch of inbound messages I had received and ignored on LinkedIn.

Messages where people were asking me to apply for a job and I just, I was honest and I said, look, I’m not, I’m not open to a full-time role. I’m just coming off this four years at Uber, but I’m open to helping out part-time and if you were open to that arrangement and I’m very honest here, then I responded to about 12 companies and 11 of them ignored me. It’s not like they were all hits, but one company said that sounds interesting, tell us more. And a proposal and an interview later, I had my first client and I was working 25 hours a week for them.

I was making 250 an hour, which I had no idea how to even set a rate, but I really just threw something out there and they took it. And it really felt too good to be true, to be honest. But, it wasn’t, it kept going. And as I realized this way of working, I started doing more networking and I really built up my business through referrals and networking, really just having conversations with people that I might not have otherwise.

I found a business partner. We shared a few clients together and it really just kept going. And as I was doing this, I had a bunch of free time. I was working part-time at this point and I started to just share some of my learnings on LinkedIn. I thought if I could do this, maybe other people could too or would benefit from hearing about my story.

And so as I posted on LinkedIn, a bunch of friends and colleagues would reach out to me and say, Hey, I’d love to pick your brain. Like, how are you doing this? What does this look like? And so I started having those conversations and I was helping a bunch of friends, really just one-off like, how did I do it? How could they do it as well?

And actually, in the middle of a conversation with a former colleague, I had like one too many of these conversations and I finally said. Hey, look I can guide you through this whole thing. I have a course and if you basically share some of the revenue with me that you make as a consultant, I’ll help you every step of the way.

It was just kind of like in the middle of a conversation. Why not? And she immediately said, YES, she’s like Bradley, I’m in. That sounds great. Which was great, but now all of a sudden I had to make a course. It’s one of those things where you sell something before you have it. And so I was kind of making up on the fly, what she needed to do, and she would report that content back to me. And I would kind of give her feedback.

Over time, every single conversation that I had with a colleague, I would tell them about this course. And people just started signing up. And that’s where I really started to see that this was a big enough problem that people were willing to pay for. And there were enough people that there really could be a business there.

Okay. I mean, you’re really living the “Fake it till you make it” thought process. That’s great, actually found that there were enough questions or concerns that you could build an actual structured course. What were the typical concerns like?

It really comes down to someone, coming to me and they say, Bradley, I want to get my first client. How do I do that? Right. And so I’ve kind of broken it down into three major parts. There are a lot of smaller things along the way, but it’s really three big rocks. One is your niche.

How are you going to add value to a company? So many people come to me and they think that they’re a Jack of all trades. Right. And maybe they are, but if they go to a founder or CEO and say that. There’s nothing that they can really do with that. It’s not helpful. And you kind of have to force yourself to get really narrow and you can have multiple niches, but in any given situation, you need to have one that’s incredibly narrow. So one your niche, how you’re going to add value to a company?

Two. You have to have an idea of your rate. What are you going to charge? Cause it’s going to come up. They’re going to ask, at some point, you’ve got to sell this service. And so we’ve built a whole rate calculator at Mylance, but you have to have an idea of what that looks like. And then Three, based on your niche, who’s your ideal client? Who are you going to add the most value to?

Because high-value projects really come when your niche matches with that ideal client and that ideal client’s problem perfectly. Like I got lucky with my first client and then, that connection was totally there. And so I got a really high rate. But I learned over time, the better that match is, and it’s not always perfect and that’s okay. But the better it is, you’re more likely to command that higher rate.

Right because they know you can just come in and start doing it right. Right, You’ve been there. You’ve done that. And in my case, I had launched Uber Eats. My first client was trying to launch a food delivery business.

Right. It was like, well, I have the playbook. I could help you guys skip probably a year or more of trial and error. And so given that situation, they were happy to pay me pretty much whatever I asked. I didn’t know that then but looking back, it was a perfect match.

So it was just one quick question over here, Bradley. So you talked about the niche, right? So could you give an example of what a niche sounds like? It can’t be just operations, right? Because that’s pretty broad.

That’s right. And the operation is a great example of a bad niche. Right because I am one of those and nobody knows what that means. Right? at Uber. It means one thing in the freight world that needs another thing, at Apple, it means something totally different. So, you absolutely don’t want to go in with that. It’s so broad anyway. It’s like, you don’t want to go and tell someone you’re in marketing.

What do you actually do? And so for me, I’ll just give my example. When I was talking to this food delivery company, I would be, I’m an expert at launching and scaling three-sided marketplaces.

So, it’s very like from one sentence, it’s just very clear what value I can add and so people, a lot of times I’ll hear things like I’m really good at analyzing data to make strong business decisions. And it’s great but a million people can say that. It’s just, I don’t know what real value you’re going to add and I don’t know how you’re different. And so I really push folks to say, okay, what have you done in your career? That’s different. What’s unique about you? There are plenty of things, but not a time to be modest and write those things down you can start working through them, talk to some friends, and get some feedback. And you’ll come up with something that makes you uniquely different.

Actually, the example you gave, is a three-sided marketplace. That’s very illustrative because essentially it also shows, it’s going to turn away a bunch of people. I would just want maybe some other kinds of skill set, but you’ve defined yourself. Therefore, for those for whom this works, it works very well. And for the others, it won’t work. And we shouldn’t be scared of that.

That’s right. I mean, if you think about it, how many clients do you need to make some good money? If there are a few, probably a few thousand companies that have three-sided marketplaces out there, or at least a few hundred. Then I need two of them to make some really good money. So, I think that it’s definitely counterintuitive, and probably every business, whether you’re an independent consultant or a startup deals with this, the more narrowly focused you can be, especially at the beginning, you’re better off.

Fantastic. This is a really good insight. Thanks, Bradley.

So, we talked about the niche, the rate, and then your ideal client. The typical concern that we dealt with is everyone has some sort of fear. It’s imposter thoughts. We hear a lot, of some sort of fear of failure. And it’ll manifest itself in some kind of an excuse. Oh, I haven’t done it because I don’t have time. Oh, I haven’t done it because whatever the excuse is, most often it’s some sort of fear which is totally normal and rational.

If you want to be an independent consultant, you do have to recognize that fear and work through it. Some of the things that we recommend for our customers is one, just write down if you can label that fear. As you can write down the worst-case scenario. Right? The worst-case scenario for me was I would message all these companies. Everyone would ignore me or tell me no, and it would hurt my ego a little bit, but could I deal with that?

That’s what I would ask you. If you’re trying to do this, can you deal with the worst-case scenario? Two is really knowing your why. Why do you want to consult? Is it a certain amount of money on the side? Is it working in a different industry? Is it getting some equity in some companies? Really knowing why, is important as you navigate the challenging questions that are going to come up.

And then three to really help with these imposture thoughts is to write down those accomplishments that you’ve had in your career. It sounds really simple, but when people do this, they look back and they’re like, wow, I’ve done some cool things. And it’s a really interesting exercise when you actually go through it. Write down what you did, what kind of value you added to a company, and then look back on it and be like, okay, I do know some things and I do have some real value to add to a company.

Okay. Yeah, actually that makes sense. Because when you’re working for the company, building all of these skills, then it’s like, okay, I’m getting paid to do my thing, but then it’s a big mindset shift to say, it’s now somebody’s going to pay me hourly for knowing this thing. And that’s where I’m sure the imposter syndrome comes in because I’m sure nobody thinks they’re worth that kind of money or things like that. And you also mentioned the ideal client and then found the client. So how does one find the client?

There are a number of different ways that we go through in our accelerator program, but the best way, the lowest-hanging fruit is your network. It’s a past manager, a past colleague, people that know you, that know your work, and essentially can vouch for you. If I’ve worked with someone and I think she’s incredible, it’s very easy for me to hire her myself, or if I don’t have the authority to go to my boss and say, Hey, we have to hire this woman.

She’s incredible as a consultant. The long story short is to use your network to your advantage and there are a lot of different ways that you can do that, but the best is to go back to those people, set up some conversations, tell them what you’re up to, be curious about what’s going on in their lives and their businesses. The worst case of that is really, they introduce you to somebody else and then you basically have a referral from that person. So you’re kind of vouched for, from a secondary fashion as well, but your network is your best outlet for sure.

That’s great. So, essentially what you’re saying is you first figured out your niche, the rate, and then your ideal client. You go about networking to find their client, make sure you’re in that mind space and you’re not worried about charging people money for your work. So now you have all of this. You just go out and start making 250 bucks an hour. Right. So, that’s so simple. I mean, I bet at this point everybody’s dropped off. And they’ve done enough to write down the rate card. In fact, I kind of feel like I should get down to it after we finished recording.

Yeah, well, let’s take a pause and then I make it a big point with all of our customers to say, there is no silver bullet to this. It does take some hard work and you’re going to get rejected. That’s just part of it. But there also are a few things to mention. If you do go down this path of freelancing, the first one is you’re running a business and there’s a lot of things that go on with making sure that the backend of the business is functioning compliant, all that kind of stuff which includes taxes and keeping track of your books.

And if you’re full-time freelancing, then you need to buy your own health insurance, which is usually covered by a company or at least mostly so. So, that’s one, you do have some additional costs. Two, people hear about my story or the $15,000 per month project that’s done in 10 hours a week. It is out there. You find the right client that has the funds to pay you where your niece matches their problem set perfectly. And it’s there.

But it’s not something you should really be expecting. I think it’s important to go in with relatively low expectations and just find that client and don’t work for a lower than you feel your value. That’s really important, but just go in and find that first client and kind of get your feet wet, and don’t expect it to be this $ 20,000-a-month client. And then lastly once you have a client, you need to manage that client. Client management is a real thing that they teach.

When I joined a boutique consulting firm, we took a whole training course on client management. And people don’t think about it, but you need to set boundaries. If you’re working 20 hours a week, it needs to really be 20 hours a week. They’re going to ask for more and they want to get more out of you. And how you strike the balance of getting the work done, adding value to your client but not working crazy amounts of hours or more than the scope, you really do have to manage that client. So the good news is you don’t have to deal with the normal politics that comes with most companies but there definitely is some stakeholder management to get it right.

Okay. So we do need to think of it as a full business even if you’re doing it as a side hustle, I’m sure. and I guess that’s important because recognizing the backend effort. It means that more people are likely to get in with their eyes open and have staying power versus just grabbing plant one and then realizing that it’s very hard to make this repeatable, unsustainable without a process or a business kind of mindset. But, of course, I mean the first step is to get client number one. So if I were to ask you right now, What should one do immediately after this episode to get their first client and hence take the first step towards starting the consulting business?

Yeah, let’s do it. So trying to make this as tangible as possible. One is to write down that intention and we talked about it earlier. Why do you want to do this? What are you trying to achieve? It’s going to be different for everybody. There’s no correct answer, but just write it down. Literally, open up a Google doc, write a few sentences, why do I want to consult?

Two, write down those fears. There are some, it’s hard to imagine that someone out there doesn’t have any fears at all. Even if you feel like that, just try. What’s the worst-case scenario? How are your parents gonna feel? Whatever it might be, right? Maybe it takes you six months to find a client. And that hurts but write down those fears. Three, is that niche part, write down your niche, and then you’re going to need to iterate on it. It’s not going to be perfect. That’s okay. Don’t get hung up on this, but also try to make it as narrowly focused as possible.

At Mylance, our HQ product, which is giving you a consulting website, essentially forces you to do this. We even shared a sentence structure for how you can think about this. So you can go check that out, but essentially your niche is broken down into one where you add value to a company. So for me, that was, I launched in scale in this case three sets of marketplaces. And two, I need to back that up, right? So if I specialize in launching and scaling three-sided marketplaces. I can then say that I launched Uber Eats in Miami and malign, and immediately that sentence has credibility.

The next thing is once you have those pieces, go update your LinkedIn. My LinkedIn gets dozens of views every day. I didn’t even know I actually looked at it. You’re like, wow. Okay. So people are already looking at this. Right. So if I can update it with all of my accomplishments where I add value, what am I doing right? Immediately, I’m just getting more and more opportunities for someone to see it and say, Hey, I want to work with this person.

What we also recommend is that, if you start a Mylance HQ, you can link that in your LinkedIn, because it really narrows in on your consulting niche. Your LinkedIn is really more about job accomplishments, which is helpful. But we made the HQ so that you could really communicate your consulting value add, which is different. And you can also put your HQ in your email signature. I started doing that and immediately I was getting 40 to 50 views a week.

Yeah. So, email your signature, link in your LinkedIn, and throw it in your Twitter, If you tweet a bunch. Anywhere that someone might find you, frankly, you should put it.

The next piece and we talked about this earlier is to write up that ideal client and write it as detailed as possible. It’s a seed stage company in FinTech where I’m reporting to the COO and whatever it is, write as much detail. When you think about adding value to a company, what is that going to look like?

And it makes it easier to reach out also, right? Because then you can just filter for such people when you’re doing prospecting or things like that.

Absolutely. You know what you’re looking for and you’re clear on why you’re doing this, your niche, and what they should be looking like. Right. It gives you confidence. And that also helps with those imposter thoughts as well when you’ve really kind of done your homework, right?

The next part is, reaching out to your network, making a list of eight to 10 people, people that you’ve worked with, people that know you and just setting up catch-up calls. You’re not selling. This isn’t a wholesale thing. You’re just catching up. And I really try to reframe it that way because everybody besides sales folks is scared of selling. It’s just this thing that nobody wants to do. Yeah. And so it’s like, look, I’m texting or emailing an old boss and I’m saying, Hey, can we catch up? Can we throw 30 minutes on the calendar?

She’s going to say yes. And on that call, I’m going to be curious. Hey, what’s going on with you? Tell me about your company and for someone that knows you a little bit less, right? Like not probably a former boss, but you can really start asking questions in your area of expertise. Right. So if I’m an expert in three-sided marketplaces, I can say, how are you thinking about acquiring restaurants really quickly, like, are you going to hire a sales team?

How are you going to set the commission structure for those sales teams? Like what kind of cuisine types are you going to have? And when you ask questions in your area of expertise, you’re continuing to validate yourself.

Right. It’s like a, it’s a great way you end up selling yourself without even trying.

Then you have to know what rate would be good for you. We talked about this. Do some math here, right? Maybe your intention is you want to make 5k a month as a side income. Great. That might come from one client and might come from two or three. But no, if you take on three clients, how many hours do you have in the week to spare? What is your hourly rate needed to make that work?

Like do some math and actually come up with what. A rate that would make you feel good. And then have a proposal ready to go. We have a template at Mylance, that has something that if that combo goes well, you’re going to follow up with a proposal, which states – here are your company goals, here are the problems, and here’s how I can help you. And you want to really send that in the 24 hours after that call if it goes well. You want to have that pretty much ready to go.

Okay. That’s actually, this is quite a formula. It seems quite straightforward and quite doable. And even if you have only weekends or evenings, It seems quite possible to take this first step. But of course, I mean, as you mentioned earlier to make it sustainable, you do need to have the influence to make this run like a business.

And that’s where Mylance comes in. Right? So how can Mylance help folks build a sustainable business if they are interested and how should they start?

I’m glad you asked. So. The first part is we have an accelerator program that really walks you through the steps that I just mentioned. You’re right. They are doable and fairly intuitive when you really break it down. But we have a program that has social accountability and we have assignments, we have readings, and we have the best practices. And so people come through our program and they have success in finding those first few clients and launching that business.

So you can come to us for that. We also have, as you said, the backend part. So we take care of taxes, we take care of bookkeeping, we have great recommendations for health insurance, and we have a whole community of people that have made this transition, whether it’s part-time or full-time.

And those people have been there, done that and so they can be supportive. A big thing that I’ve really tried to encourage in the community is to share when you failed, and share when a proposal got rejected. It’s not all about wins here and we’re all going to get rejected. So let’s normalize that and be supportive of each other. And we’ve really built that culture at Mylance.

Yeah. And that’s so important, right? Because when you scroll to LinkedIn, you feel like everybody’s succeeding all the time but that’s actually not true at all. So, this kind of community where I guess you get to see the inside story. Must be actually quite helpful. So Bradley, honestly, it looks like Mylance can really help with a lot of this planning and prep and I particularly like the fact that a lot of the backend work actually just gets taken care of.

So you can focus on the actual billable hours. That’s really cool and I really appreciate you joining us today, Bradley. This was fantastic insight and I’m sure it’s been, it’s sparked a lot of thoughts in a lot of listeners. It definitely has in me.

I feel like I should start thinking about consulting as well. No, this is pretty cool. And by the way, for folks who are listening feel free to click through to our website via the link in the episode description. So you can submit your questions and Bradley will answer them at his earliest convenience. So you can get a bit more out of this conversation than just this episode.

And Bradley, once again, thanks a lot for joining us today.

Thanks for having me.

Yeah, this was a fun conversation and that’s it for today. So we were Amit and Bradley with ShopTok and see you next time.