Having the ability to adjust your tone and style depending on your audience is one of the most important soft skills. Good communication skills are also, comprehending and listening while having a conversation with a client or co-worker, and being able to explain a matter to someone, in an empathetic and respectful way.
Not a lot of people can presume to have efficient communication skills. And as communication plays a significant role in every freelancer’s career, you should start training your expressing and understanding of emotions and social information, to excel at dealing with clients, possible clients, and social interaction in general.
Some of the most important communication skills are:
- Assertiveness
- Active listening and questioning
- Writing
Assertiveness
The healthiest way of communicating. Assertiveness is the ability to speak up for yourself while being respectful to others. An assertive person stands up for their own rights and also defends what’s just for others, at the same time avoiding being violent or aggressive.
Assertiveness is the balance between passive and aggressive behavior because it allows you to encourage others to open up their feelings, while you do the same, so you both look for a problem solution where both parties end up having what they deserve.
To train your assertiveness, you need to:
Be Honest
Expressing your wishes, thoughts, and feelings and encouraging others to do the same can save you a lot of problems if you know how to do it. While talking to a client, you should be honest every time, knowing and accepting your limitations, and also giving your knowledge and wants the value they deserve. Respect your clients’ needs just as you should respect your own.
Be Empathetic
Agreements are not about listening to know what to answer, but about listening to understand what the other is feeling. Especially Customer Service freelancers must master the art of empathy, being always respectful and dedicated to their clients.
Humility
Every person deserves respect, you should treat everyone as equals, be able to accept your mistakes and apologize when you’ve done wrong, and maintain your position when you know you haven’t, but always respect and care for the other.
Active Listening and Questioning
Having a business conversation doesn’t mean it has to be cold and impersonal. Any kind of human interaction is better when it’s full of warmth and gentleness, so, active listening to any person you’re speaking with makes them feel respected and important, as they are. Active listening is an ability you can develop by practicing, although, you need to be patient and take your time to work on it properly.
Active listening means not just hearing what the other person has to say but paying attention to the feelings, ideas, or thoughts underlying what they’re expressing. It’s important for you, not only as a freelancer but as a person, to put yourself in the other’s shoes and feel what they’re saying. This helps a lot in understanding a client’s needs or requests, especially in jobs that work directly with bringing a client’s idea to life, such as Graphic Design or Blog copywriting.
Some tips to start active listening are:
Don’t Interrupt
You have to show the other person you are truly engaged with what they are saying, and that it’s so important you want to hear it all before explaining your ideas. This also helps you get the whole view of what they are trying to say, so when it is time to answer, you can offer proper help or give the right solution.
Don’t Distract or Invalidate
Not only this is rude and offensive, but it’s completely against what active listening means. Every opinion is worthy of respect and validation, and speaking in a working matter, your client’s ideas and needs are literally what you need to understand and internalize first, so while you do your job, you can deliver something that goes along with what was asked. You should never distract your attention or think listening to their verbal explanations is not as important as your own ideas of what has to be done.
Make Questions
You can show you’ve been listening carefully by asking relevant questions. This way, your client or other conversation partner will be able to see you paid attention to what they said, and you’ll also be able to clarify any doubt or misconception about anything, which is also very important to have proper communication with anyone.
Writing Skills
Freelancers’ main way to contact clients is online, social media, or other specific platforms, so, having writing skills is becoming more and more necessary every day. Knowing how to pick the right words to tell a message or a story is a powerful, formerly underrated, skill not everyone possesses. By improving your writing skills, you’ll communicate with clarity, and clients will most likely read your profiles and contact you
Being a less direct form of communication, it gives you time to craft your message and organize the information in the way that you like. By writing, you have the opportunity to express yourself freely, and then read it and re-read it, polish your craft, and work on it, until you are satisfied with it. It gives you the chance to improve your message before making it public, so when you do, you deliver it in the best possible way.
Some ways to improve your writing are:
Do Former Research on what you’re Going to Write
You should make sure you really understand the subject you’re going to write about. Try to picture yourself explaining it to a child, and if you still can’t, then keep learning about it until you find the way. People on the Internet want fresh, concise, creative content, something easy to digest but still very informative.
Outline your Writing’s Structure
Making a list of every bullet point you’re going to cover in your text is very helpful when organizing your train of thought. This way you can make sure to shape your composition before starting writing.
Write as you Speak
Unless you’re trying to be poetic, use words from your every day, words everybody knows and understands. Readers will engage easily with what you’re writing, and have a positive reaction if you explain a complex matter in a pragmatic, easy-to-digest way.
Read it out Loud
A couple of times: When you listen to what you wrote, you can notice some details you might have passed while writing, such as the tone with which you’re approaching your audience, the words you chose, and your grammar and spelling. This is a very smart way to polish your composition, to make it feel more casual and spontaneous.
Having good verbal and written communication skills is essential to really understanding others and expressing yourself. And as a freelancer, you should always aim for improvement in any aspect you can. Practicing your active listening, writing skills or assertiveness will only take some time, but I promise you’ll gain twice what you invest in it. The chances of succeeding in any business will multiply once you feel confident and you communicate efficiently.
Feel free to try any of these tips!
