Hello, my name is Sami Ullah Zakir, CEO of ILMGHAR, and I am also the founder of this company. My roots are from Depalpur, Okara, Pakistan.
This story is about how I worked my way up to the top. It’s a success story of a struggling freelancer.
The first ever job I landed was at a medical factory, and the pay scale was only 15k for an amateur like me back in 2015.
After completing my B.S honors in mathematics in 2019, COVID-19 hit the world, and everything was closed. That is when I started my journey toward freelancing and got to where I am today.
Entering the world of Freelancers
I left my job at the medical factory in 2015, and after saving some money, I bought a laptop. I started operating my blog, which later got approved by Adsense within six months of my start in this field. The name of my blog was https://bsmath2015.blogspot.com (renamed https://learnfreelancingskills.com).
In today’s world, learning every skill requires you to join an institution to learn, but I did not have that luxury. So what I did was that I learned solely on my own; with the help of the internet and books, I became a self-taught expert on graphics designing, SEO, WordPress designing, and video editing. It is still amazing how I could grasp all these skills just by surfing the net and reading and then practicing whatever I’ve learned.
Getting a degree in mathematics, with work to juggle, is not easy. All of this required time management, which was difficult to do since I was young. I had to prioritize my work and study, I struggled to balance the time spent.
During 2016 and 2017, there were a few ads on my blog posts about Fiverr, and it encouraged me to go and check them out. I opened the website and was amazed at all of the perks and benefits that it was offering me, so I opened up an account and started setting things up. But because I was a full-time student and with other responsibilities at home, I could only give it time a few times a day. I tried to use and update my blog and the information was populated twice or thrice a week.
I had a problem getting orders and gigs; landing even one gig seemed such a big dream. I had these bad feelings of failure and often wanted to give up amid a lack of success. Honestly speaking, I lost hope in the platform.
By 2018, my gut feeling started urging me to get more productive on Fiverr, so I started uploading more gigs, and orders started piling in. At first, it all seemed so unreal, but that was my reality. Slowly and steadily, I began to pave my way toward becoming one of Fiverr’s oldest and finest freelancers.
Now, as every person’s story starts with hope, failure, and desperation to continue, my story is not much different. I did not give up and kept working towards reaching my goal and finally achieved it.
Fruits of my labor on Fiverr
I started to offer my services on Fiverr after making an account. I offered YouTube SEO, graphics designing, WordPress website designing, and interactive portfolio designing.
The first ever gig I landed on was only USD30, and it made me more than happy that now it wasn’t just wishful thinking, but I felt that I could achieve my dream. The first order added fuel to the fire, a desire to achieve what I was insanely obsessed with: being a successful freelancer from Pakistan.
After I optimized my gigs, one of my gigs ended up on the first page of Fiverr against high-volume keywords that people were searching for. I started to receive more orders, and so my path finally opened.
I became a level 2 seller on Fiverr and completed up to 300+ projects, but in 2022 my Fiverr account closed down due to a silly mistake that was just a small setback in my long journey to success. I had this belief, if I had done it once, I could do it again. Without second thoughts, I created a new account and again became a level two seller with my hard work and the fruits of my labor.
My journey on Upwork
If you know about Upwork, then you know how hard it is to bid and land an order on Upwork. I started applying my self-taught tips and techniques on bidding, and in just one month, I was able to land a project on my Upwork account.
The biggest thing I learned through this was that communication and grasping the client’s wants were key. You had to portray your view and understand the client’s standpoint to win the bidding competition.
Now I am one of Upwork’s top-rated accounts, all thanks to my hard work, techniques, studies, and my parent’s support and prayers.
How to be successful as a Freelancer?
There is a formula for success; as long as you learn and apply that formula, you will surely be rewarded. Be loyal, communicate, and stay consistent, be humble, and you shall get through anything. It would be best if you got out of your bubble to achieve something in this big world. I would recommend watching Hisham Sarwar’s playlist if you are looking for best freelancing course in Pakistan.
How can I help you?
If you need help in getting an order online or need to learn how to do your bidding, I am here to help, and for free.
Looking at my Fiverr and Upwork series, you will learn the patterns of writing proposals and profile optimizations with tips, tricks, and hacks.
And, if you are interested in learning freelancing skills like blogging, WordPress, YouTube SEO, graphic designing, etc., you will find my channel quite useful.
After writing this article, I finished my course on the Fiverr mystery series and a YouTube SEO course. If you see my channel and learn from it, you, too, will start earning in just a few days.
You can learn everything for Free on my YouTube channel. The link is
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8A5SK11luZ9uBmpIoVW8jg?sub_confirmation=1
Conclusion
Don’t rush. You will reach your goal as long as you keep walking; as long as you walk, you are going somewhere. Don’t give up!
Good things come to those who wait, and you will surely be rewarded.
Good luck on your journey.
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