Winning New Clients as a Self-Employed Person: The Best Strategies
Updated: 5 days ago
Table of Contents
Why Do Many Self-Employed People Find It Hard to Win Clients?
For many, taking the step into self-employment happens quickly – continuously winning clients, however, is often the biggest challenge. Especially at the beginning, visibility, references, and a plannable process for regularly receiving new inquiries are often missing.
Many initially rely on referrals or their personal network. That can work in the short term, but is often not enough to grow your own business sustainably. At the same time, there are countless ways to win clients – from social media and search engines to paid advertising. Without a clear strategy, it is hard to choose the right channels and to use time and budget sensibly.
That is why it is crucial to look into the different ways of winning clients early on and to build an acquisition process that works in the long term and independently of chance.
Winning New Clients as a Self-Employed Person in 2026. Here’s the Trick.
“Freddy, how do you actually get new clients?”
I think nothing has been asked of me more often than this. Which is understandable – for most self-employed people this is the crux. Then they look for marketing support. Because that promises new clients.
As soon as I start telling people about “Integrative 360° omnichannel full-funnel marketing” and I can see their minds wandering, my short answer is always:
Keep your eyes and ears open. Always.
It’s not rocket science. But it’s a hell of a lot of work.
It’s also more than a daily task. You have to internalize it yourself.
Let me just tell you how I started winning new clients. That actually covers most of the options. Maybe you’re in the same boat I was at the beginning.
Option 1: Win New Clients via Freelance Platforms
This section is only relevant for service providers and freelancers. Online shop owners can jump to the next section.
Mid-2020: Germany in lockdown, everyone sitting at home.
Right in the middle: me, having just finished my master’s degree. Ready to change the world. Yeah.
I started writing job applications and quickly noticed: nobody feels like hiring someone with no professional experience. Despite working as a student employee, an internship abroad, and basically everything you can do.
After more than 100 unsuccessful applications, I realized this wasn’t working.
In the meantime, I had started sorting parcels at DHL. My first job after university.
Then my former professor had an idea for me: “Why don’t you become self-employed. All you need is a business license.”
No sooner said than done.
I went to the residents’ registration office and got my business license*.
Disclaimer: Ideally, you should only venture into self-employment when you have:
a lot of professional experience
a good network
and sufficient financial reserves
Also, make sure to attend the IHK founders’ seminar in your area!
At that time, I had none of these. So I’m not the ideal example.
But if you put your heart into it, it can still work.
So if you start self-employment with enough experience, you have to defend your value right away and enforce your hourly rate.
But if, like me back then, you have no experience, the only option left to get jobs is the other approach: your price.
Which is understandable: less experience > more mistakes > lower hourly rate.
The perfect place for that is freelance platforms.
Freelance platforms work like job portals. The difference is that the jobs are advertised on a freelance basis.
The best-known of these freelance platforms are:
Upwork
Probably the largest platform for freelancers worldwide. That is the advantage, but at the same time the biggest disadvantage. This is where the presumably biggest price war among freelancers rages, since a great many freelancers from India, the Philippines, and other countries also use the platform. The price level in these countries, however, is a fraction of what you can earn in Germany.
Clients know that, too. Most of the time, they look for the cheapest provider here, since freelancers have to apply to individual jobs. For the application, you also have to pay in the platform’s own currency, which means: every application costs you money. Whether you get booked or not.
The jobs are accordingly mostly not the best. Many people just want spam accounts created or want to use you as a moderator on shady adult portals.
The German community is somewhat smaller, which slightly improves your chances.
It is difficult, but interesting conversations do sometimes come up here. Via Upwork, I even found an agency I worked with for a longer time. Great thing.
fiverr
Also international, also a devastating price war.
The difference: here you don’t search actively but create offers, so-called “gigs.” So you basically create landing pages for your offers, which then go into the catalog.
So if someone is looking for graphic designers, you are one of probably 1,200 providers. That reduces your chances of being found from the start.
Most of the time, I only received spam inquiries here.
But what is interesting is that you can post your offer and generate jobs passively, so to speak. In theory, at least.
One of the two big, long-established freelance portals in Germany.
It works in both directions here:
On the one hand, you can actively search for jobs and apply; on the other hand, you can create a profile and be found.
I never got a job through this one either.
But there are also a lot of placement agencies around here. That’s how I received two offers.
Besides Freelance.de, the other big platform in Germany.
Works like Freelance.de. Mainly IT specialists are sought here, but there are definitely some jobs from the social media field as well.
Interestingly, you can also see the visitor numbers of your profile here.
Large intermediaries like Hays also look for freelancers here.
I never landed anything here either.
malt
Also a German platform, but smaller than the other two.
The trick here: you can’t actively apply but have to be either found or recommended.
Unfortunately, it never worked for me.
Junico
A small but excellent startup from Hamburg, back then still known as Freelance-Junior. Junico specializes in junior freelancers, so it’s ideal for beginners.
Companies can choose here whether they are looking for someone with little or a lot of experience.
My top favorite among the platforms, through which I also landed my first jobs back then.
If you want to sign up with Junico, feel free to do so via my invitation link:
Sortlist
A newer platform with a good approach: leads are sold here.
It works similarly to an auction. Companies create jobs and you can apply to them.
The catch: you have to pay to take part in the tender.
Instead of a percentage of your job, you pay a one-time amount X. Depending on the size of the job, you pay between €50 and €500.
The advantage: you have relatively low acquisition costs if you get the job.
The disadvantage: you only pay for taking part in the tender. So Sortlist doesn’t care whether you get the job or not.
A maximum of 4 service providers can apply per job, then the tender is closed. So you have to decide quickly.
If you now take part in many tenders and don’t close any deals, you end up with high acquisition costs after all.
The platform has now opened up to agencies and freelancers, though, and has a high job volume.
Take a look yourself: https://www.sortlist.com/
As you could see, I didn’t have much luck with most platforms.
When you hire a freelancer, you usually expect professional experience for your money.
But I didn’t have that.
And that’s exactly where Junico came in. Junico launched at about the same time as me and was the perfect opportunity for me.
Back then, Junico was still a platform for junior freelancers. Clients here were looking for a good price-performance ratio and therefore explicitly searched for freelancers with little experience who offer their services more cheaply than experienced freelancers.
In addition, the platform was still at the beginning in 2021 and therefore very familiar. After signing up, I got a call from my future contact person. I think that was actually to test my English skills back then. But I’m no longer sure.
It was great in any case, because she also knew the clients. There were only a handful of requests on the website back then. But through the personal contact, I was practically recommended right away.
I then got my first job pretty quickly.
So what I hadn’t achieved with over 100 applications, I managed here with 3 inquiries.
And why did the client choose me?
Because I was the only one who had an email signature and had written a structured reply to his request.
At this point, my favorite email signature generator:
Meanwhile, Junico has matured as a platform and has widened its focus to mid-level and senior freelancers.
Option 2: Win New Clients via Facebook Groups
As easy as getting started with freelance platforms is, they all have one big catch: commissions.
Freelance platforms are intermediaries and don’t do their job for fun. That’s why you always have to give between 10% and 20% to the platform on all of them.
In the beginning that’s not so bad; having 80% of a project is still more than 100% of no project.
But when I did my tax return after about a year and saw that over the year I had paid a total of one month’s income in commission alone, it did hurt a bit.
Freelance platforms are a good runway for your freelance career. But at some point you have to set yourself apart from them.
So I started looking for alternatives. A good alternative is to look where many people exchange ideas about the topics that concern them.
On Facebook, there are quite a lot of groups for self-employed people:
People often also post here who have very specific jobs. You also have to be quick here; it’s like a shark tank. You also always have to find out exactly whether the job is legitimate or not. But you usually find that out quickly.
Of course, there is also a certain price war here – but you also get direct contact without commission if it works out. It’s worth it for you anyway to join the groups and enable notifications so you always stay on top of the news.
In Facebook groups, I also started looking for jobs early and landed a few hits that saved me when my first big job through Junico ended.
Check!
Option 3: Win New Clients via Your Own Homepage
Freelance platforms and Facebook groups are your push channels.
Here you can search actively, but it costs you time.
Now we come to the more elegant methods.
But this method is your digital business card:
Your homepage.
Your salesperson who never sleeps.
Setting up your homepage is quick. All you need is a domain (e.g., from GoDaddy or Ionos) and a page builder (WordPress or Wix).
You can get both for less than €300 a year.
Most people will try to make you believe you have to have a €30,000 homepage built right away. That’s only partly true.
The more money you have for a clean website at the start, the better. But if you start at 0 like I did back then, a page with WIX is enough, as in my case.
Wordpress
The most common CMS on the market and integrable with almost all tools. But it’s also not very user-friendly.
WIX
The faster method is WIX. Fewer options than WordPress, but everything can be created so easily via drag & drop that you can comfortably build your site in a day. It’s also handy because you can play around a lot with integrations and tracking here, which then also helps you with your clients. Connect your website directly with Google Analytics, the Google Search Console and Google My Business, so you can track your growth. You can directly integrate the Google Tag Manager and store your pixels there. The Meta Pixel can also be integrated directly in WIX.
I had created a website right from the start, even though I treated it rather neglectfully for the first 4 years. That’s why I also had hardly any traffic on the website.
But still, over time I got a handful of inquiries through my website. Only one person became my client from that, but I’ve had that client for over 2 years now. So the investment was definitely worth it.
A website alone isn’t worth it, though.
If you want to achieve something with your website, you have to optimize it for search engines and LLMs as soon as possible so it gets found. Aka SEO / GEO.
In February 2025, I started blogging and optimizing my website for search engines.
This is what it has looked like in Google Search Console for me since then:
You can already see a clear difference from April 2025.
There is still a lot to do, but at least instead of one inquiry per year I now get one inquiry per month. By mid-2026, it was already 6–7 jobs per month.
Caution: Make sure your cookie banner, legal notice, and privacy policy are flawless, especially if you also have pixels installed on your site. Otherwise you can be sent a cease-and-desist letter.
Option 4: Win New Clients via Personal Contacts
As you can see, things were going quite well for me by now. I had largely detached myself from platforms and had found some clients via Facebook and my website. Push and pull marketing combined, just like in the textbook.
The premier league of client acquisition for self-employed people is also here: word of mouth.
In plain terms: personal contacts, aka connections.
Nothing brings you better clients with less effort. You usually aren’t even asked about the price or rarely have to justify it.
And how do you get connections?
Hard work + active networking + a pinch of luck
Easier said than done. Because unless you either have a circle of friends full of successful entrepreneurs and self-employed people or have been an expert in your field for 30 years, you initially don’t have any connections. Unfortunately, I didn’t either.
At the beginning, I once had a conversation with a graphic designer who told me: “The first 3 years are the hardest. Nobody knows you yet. But after 3 years your work slowly starts to bear fruit and people will remember you. And then they actively come to you.”
And he was right. After about 3 years, I started sometimes getting messages like: “Hey, xyz told me you do Meta Ads. Can you help me?”
So if you manage to build a personal brand for your field, you’ve already laid a very good foundation.
Option 5: Win New Clients through Active Networking
Hard work doesn’t only refer to your projects, but also to networking.
Instead of just sitting at the computer and hoping someone discovers you, many forget this essential point: networking!
Everyone actually talks about it all the time, especially on LinkedIn, but who really does networking, and what does it actually mean?
Networking means that you actively make an effort to build personal contact with people. Ideally, of course, from your industry.
There are countless options for this these days:
Meetups and regulars’ tables
Associations
Events and trade fairs
Freelancer networks
In the end, your success depends on your personal contacts .
Who thinks of you when it comes to your field?
Besides, the unexpected projects are often the most exciting.
From the start, I went to the nearest coworking space to work. That also let me make some valuable contacts, which led to several projects.
Once we were having lunch together and all introduced ourselves. When I said I run Meta Ads, the person across from me said to me:
“That’s exactly the kind of person we’re looking for right now. Please give me your number and we’ll write to you.”
I’ve never gotten a project more easily.
Tips for successful networking:
Make the first move. Approach people or message them.
Be never pushy or too dogged.
Rather, concentrate on building real connections instead of trying to push your service on everyone.
Recommend others yourself: This increases your chances of eventually being recommended yourself.
Option 6: Win New Clients through Organic Social and Content Marketing
I also avoided this for a long time. Basically hid behind my work.
But since February 2025, I’ve been producing organic social media content for myself. Mainly for LinkedIn and Instagram.
But not only on social media, also here on my blog.
The rule here: stick with it and try different things.
At first, I also posted on Facebook. Via Meta Business Suite, that’s no extra effort. But the reach here is so low that I stopped again.
At first, it feels weird, especially if you’re not a born show-off. But over time you get used to it.
Success is hard to measure, but there are indicators:
In Google Search Console you can track which search terms people use to find you on Google. The Bing Webmaster Tools are a great addition.
The respective social media platforms also show you all kinds of metrics.
In the end, what counts are the inquiries. It’s always worth asking how someone found you. You can also add UTM parameters to your links to track the source of your leads in Google Analytics.
By now, you can also connect your social channels to Google Search Console to see which search terms users use to find you on the different platforms!
My tip: Don’t focus doggedly on winning new clients through posts. That will only frustrate you and make you give up quickly. See your organic channels more as a touchpoint for your personal branding. This is where people get to know you. And when they eventually look for someone, hopefully you’ll be the first to come to mind.
This is my reach on LinkedIn after one year:
So far, this has produced only one inquiry via LinkedIn, but also several direct inquiries by email. So you notice a difference.
Over time, you establish your status as an expert and people take notice of you.
If you’re looking for advice on organic social, you’re in the right place:
Option 7: Win New Clients through Meta Ads
Of course, the best option for self-employed people.
Sooner or later, you can’t get around paid advertising.
Besides Google Ads, Meta Ads are the method of our time for winning new customers.
The big advantages over other marketing channels:
You can outsource the management.
You don’t have to actively take care of distributing your ads.
You can focus on your core business.
The results are transparent and traceable, unlike other channels. Learn more in my comparison of Meta Ads with other marketing channels.
Campaigns can be started and stopped flexibly, even with a small budget. Learn more in my guide on how much Meta Ads cost.
To run Meta Ads, you first need the Meta Business Manager. I’m happy to take care of your Meta Business Manager setup.
If you’re still looking for the right partner at your side for your growth strategy, you’re in the right place:
Conclusion: So How Do You Win New Clients as a Self-Employed Person?
Use all the options and find your perfect combination.
As you can see, there are countless ways to find new clients as a self-employed person.
That’s why I said you should always keep your eyes and ears open.
Be curious and try everything. You’ll notice relatively quickly which channels work for you and which don’t.
And last but not least: hang in there! It often goes up and down, but if you stay on the ball, it will pay off soon.
If you’re looking for support with your Meta Ads, take a look at my Meta Ads management:
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