Welcome to Episode 31 of The Business of Freelancing Podcast.  Today I’m very excited to bring on my good friend Mojca Mars.  Mojca will be a speaker at the Double Your Freelancing Conference in September, and I will be working with her personally in the near future as well.

Mojca had a quick start to her current consulting agency, Super Spicy Media, by getting those initial first customers via Twitter.  Now she says that the majority of her customers actually still come from Twitter and the engagement she’s built there over time.  Adding value is core to her approach to social media.

Don’t spam people, don’t use automated tools to send massive amounts of posts, and don’t try to use hashtags to reach new people.  Add value, answer people’s questions, and engage in a meaningful dialogue and you’ll also see the return on investment that Mojca has seen too.

Almost all of us have personal Twitter and Facebook accounts.  Should we have business accounts too?  Mojca says it depends on the business, but for most freelancers their businesses are so closely mirrored to their personal profiles it just doesn’t make sense.  It usually just will create more work, and not have a lot of upside.

As powerful as social media tools like Twitter and Facebook are, Mojca still says that building an email list is the first thing that most business owners should do.  The conversation usually goes over to social, but starting it on email is a great way to begin a conversation.

For those of you just getting started, Mojca says to start with a finite amount of time on each platform, and have a plan in mind before you get started.  As you begin to get engaged with your target audience, look to test your approach early and often.  If what you’re doing is working then you can do more of it, if it’s not then try something new and iterate the process.

You can reach out to Mojca (not surprisingly) via Twitter @MojcaMars.