How I Make up to $75,000 a Month As a Freelance SEO Consultant

• Amit Raj was performing as a pharmacist in 2013 when he started off learning Search engine marketing from an on the net mentor. 
• Raj started out freelancing as an Search engine marketing marketing consultant as a aspect hustle working with platforms like Upwork for gigs.
• This is how he quit to consult full time and manufactured his annual salary in a month, as told to Amber Sunner.

This as-explained to-to essay is centered on a transcribed conversation with Amit Raj, a 35-yr-outdated founder from Glasgow, Scotland, about setting up an Search engine optimization and hyperlink-building organization. It has been edited for length and clarity. Insider has confirmed Raj’s profits with documentation.

I joined Lloyds, a well-liked Uk pharmacy chain, as a pharmacist in 2012, but I have often been intrigued in digital advertising. 

In 2013, I begun looking into Seo. I was browsing a marketing and advertising forum known as WarriorForum when I stumbled throughout a comment from Dan Ray. 

Dan was speaking about clientele he labored with who had been shelling out over £10,000 a month for Website positioning and digital providers. I messaged him to obtain out a lot more, and I figured out he was an Web optimization expert.

We had a couple phone calls, and he asked if I desired to be the “guinea pig” for his coaching company. He desired to check out using a comprehensive novice and instruction them to get to his amount of Seo expertise. 

I figured out the ropes of Seo by doing work less than him as an intern and sooner or later begun to do url-constructing outreach for him all over 2014. This was usually unpaid for a handful of hours a 7 days. I did it in my spare time for about 6 months.

Connection setting up is the method of obtaining your web site included in other web-sites as a hyperlink.  This builds a website’s authority on Google and will improve its site visitors and research ranking.

Acquiring witnessed how beneficial the field was when doing work with Dan, I begun an Web optimization side hustle

I started off undertaking freelance Web optimization consulting frequently in 2016 whilst doing the job whole time at Lloyds. I spent a couple of hundred lbs . of my discounts to make and host my freelancer web-site on WordPress. 

It was a large amount of manual perform to establish my website’s Search engine marketing to be certain it  would rank for phrases such as “freelance Search engine optimisation marketing consultant” and “freelance url builder.” I was in the leading 10 on Google search terms at one particular issue. It helped to continually push prospects. 

I labored on Web optimization tasks just after get the job done and on the weekends. I only experienced two purchasers at the get started and had determined to focus in the backlink-constructing element of Search engine optimization function.

I would access out to other web sites and weblogs on my client’s behalf to be showcased as a hyperlink by possibly displaying them our client’s content material or sharing one thing newsworthy about the client.

My first couple of clients arrived by means of freelancing platforms such as Upwork

When I first begun out, I was charging £10 an hour or operating on a package deal foundation. (Now, £10 is the equal of about $12.50.)

In 2018, I was often doing work with between two to four clientele, and I was generating plenty of income to employ my initially freelancer. They assisted me scale the corporation by using on the manual work of sending attain-outs.   

In 2019, I resolved to move to element-time operate at the pharmacy, working two days a week.

I preferred to devote far more time in the enterprise and obtain better-worth clientele who signed more time-phrase contracts, but quitting solely appeared also risky. 

With my time freed up, I acquired more Search engine optimization expertise. I also started out putting up much more on social media and in Search engine optimisation and advertising-related groups about my business enterprise and private model. As a final result, I gained a number of new shoppers and started setting up up my community of freelancers.

In 2020, I rebranded my corporation to The Back links Dude and established up a extra experienced internet site on Web Movement. We employed a net designer for £600 to layout a site that would inspire far more trust in our prospects.

Considering that the pandemic, much more firms have turned to on line expert services, so they’re investing additional in Web optimization

In the 2020-2021 tax year, we produced £151,000. 

In June 2021, I stop Lloyds. I failed to delight in the pharmacy market — it is really a ton of tension to tackle people’s medicines.

I also left for monetary good reasons. My Search engine marketing business was rising, but my pharmacist income had stagnated, so I decided to aim on my organization.

I started attaining shoppers organically through referrals in 2021. Now 90% of my customers tactic me. We have shoppers in dental, tech, and telecoms. One particular of our clients is Components Swiss, a producer of high-top quality CBD oil.

Last yr, we manufactured £285,500 in profits. I now have 20 freelancers doing work on our information. and I am nevertheless the only full-time staff.

I manufactured £60,000, or about $75,000, in revenue final thirty day period. My yearly income as a complete-time pharmacist was fewer than a solitary month’s income now.

I have realized not to scale as well quick

Don’t check out to do anything — we concentration on link making. It will make items simpler to take care of when it arrives to advertising and marketing Web optimization products and services. 

I recommend that you check a small business plan out prior to using a large threat. See if it will get the job done out by going component time in your present-day job or carrying out the business on a modest scale.