I understand that when networking, you don't want to be in sales mode/handing out business cards because no-one wants to talk to somebody like this. Instead, you should listen to people, inquire about their business, find out what their problems are, and offer useful advice. If they need your services, they'll have you in mind when the time is right, but not if you were pushy when you met.
My biggest hurdle though is that I am an introvert and would much rather stay at home than going to an event with dozens or hundred of people and introduce myself. I dread it, and it sucks the energy away from me. But I'll never get enough business if I don't.
How do you fellow introvert freelancers deal with this?
How do you motivate yourself to get out of the house and talk to strangers for hours on end early in the morning or after work?
Are there any tips you're using?
Does it get easier?
I assume you are from a tech background? Break networking down to baby steps. I was always told to go "three deep" on a question.
Ex.
Me: Hey, how are you? What projects are you working on now? Person: Hey, I'm alright. I'm working on this widget Me: Cool. Why did you chose to work on this widget? Person: Because I want to learn more about squelch Me: I don't know much about squelch; what have you learned? ...
This helps avoid shallow talk, and establishes that you are a functional person who is interested in them. (Most). People love to talk about themselves.
Now that you've established yourself, you can start talking about what you want, whether it be you're looking for clients, looking for a second opinion on xyz, etc.
This is not a counterpoint, I'm just venting in an introvert post I guess. /shrug
Assuming you are going to stay a freelancer, the best advice I can give is to find a niche and sell the heck out of that niche. The best overall advice I can give is to get the heck out of freelancing and move as quickly as possible to building a product, where you can use and hire traditional marketing channels.
I made a little app to help HN users network with each other. I can't promise you'll find what you're looking for, but it's free: https://findkismet.com
Realistically, I set up habits that make networking as easy as possible. Meetups, connections through friends, working in shared offices from time to time, mentoring, involving yourself in the local community and so on are all ways to easily build low pressure network connections. Focusing on the tech problems that you find challenging and let that be your motivation when talking to people.
It gets easier with practice. I had to start from scratch as well and found that I wasn't 'pushy' enough and definitely had to sell myself more. Hopefully you find people you like working with.
If you are going to freelance or start a business, you have to be willing to fight your own worst self, which might mean finding coping techniques to overcome shyness or introversion. I'm very introverted and find networking events, etc very overwhelming, but I've spent years fighting through that to gain comfort in doing it. If you are going to be self-employed, you gotta be able to do things that hurt.
Search out colleagues who you have worked with, even if you didn't work directly for them. If they know you they should be in your network. I have gotten referrals from colleagues I worked with 8-10 years ago, because I stay in touch and periodically say hi or comment on their posts. You can do all of this from your couch.
I'm a LinkedIn pro, which I don't think has any additional value other than being able to cold message people. Look for companies hiring for your niche segment and then see if you have any 2nd degree connections. If not use one of your 15 InMail credits. Try to connect and let them know that you are available in case they ever need freelancers/contractors. Most of the time this will yield nothing but it's worth trying if you have nothing else to do.
I found out that lunches are quite good for this. It is in middle of the day, most people do go lunch somewhere, and sending a message along the lines "Hey, could I join you for a lunch sometime this week?" usually doesn't require too much effort from the other party :-)
On the other hand, I mostly use this to meet former colleagues and classmates, so it is much lower stakes than the I-need-to-network-to-get-clients.
Getting the way to message the people is probably the hard part, if I ever needed to meet people I don't really know yet, I would defer to a networking guide by Stephanie Hurlburt of Binomial [1] and just send out cold e-mails.
[1] https://stripe.com/atlas/guides/networking#making-direct-ask...
Lately I've been focusing more on bootstrapping a startup and using freelancing as a part-time way to pay the bills, so time to go out and find jobs has been less. Fortunately, I was able to connect with another freelancer who is great at networking and often lands more jobs than he can handle. He then sends work my way. I charge my usual hourly rate and I suspect he's quoting these clients with project-based billing and in some cases making a tidy profit. I'm absolutely fine with this - he takes the risk, communication overhead, blame if stuff hits the fan, and I get some steady side-income where I essentially report to another developer who is an understanding person.
Perhaps if you're an introvert, seek out an extrovert freelancer that could use some extra bandwidth.
I don't want to discourage you but there may be more efficient ways to get in touch with potential clients. Take a look at "Never Eat Alone" (Keith Ferrazzi). Written by a guy whose whole life is built around connecting with people and is very skeptical about networking events.
In any case, yes it does get easier. These days I do a lot of cold emailing and video calls and even that used to be difficult for me.
What events were the most useful in finding leads?