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 Notable Quotes:

• I’m always challenging myself to do something else, to do more. To explore new things and I guess that’s how I got into the where I am now.
• Having just one source of income, it’s not really secure especially if that one source of income is just your corporate job. So, it really helps to have multiple sources of income. And I think I read somewhere that millionaires have at least eight sources of income, so ask yourself how many sources do I have. So, if you want to be a millionaire so should have at least eight sources of income.
• I sacrificed a few years of my life to be able to have all the time in the world right now for the rest of my life. So, I would definitely say it was worth it.
• But doing the same thing, day in day out for around 2 or 3 years, that will become eventually a burden to you. So, ask yourself to have a two-year plan – after that, how do I move towards doing less or probably doing something different. It will keep you challenged. I guess that’s how I survived it. I found something interesting, something that I love, and at the back of mind I had a plan that I will be doing this forever.
• You start where you are. You try to scale up. Try to find ways, so that you don’t need to dedicate as much time as you used to with the work that you’re doing.  
• Increase your rate first, then start building your team one person at a time, until you realize that you already have enough people to actually put up an agency.
• If you cannot survive the challenges of a corporate world, then you will probably not survive freelancing as well.
• If you are just starting as a blogger, it’s really important to blog about something that you can talk about for so many hours, because blogging is really about story telling. So, start with what you are really interested in or what you are really passionate about, and then try to see where your audience is most engaged with. 
• If you really want to blog, your first challenge is really to find that schedule and make it a habit to write. So, it doesn’t matter if it’s every day, or if it’s just once a week. I say to people that the frequency doesn’t matter, it’s the consistency.
• Focus on your productivity. There are a lot of productivity tools and strategies out there and try to find which one will work for you.

Fitz Gerard Villafuerte’s Journey to Freelancing

• He’s a civil engineer who used to practice his profession having a nine-to-five job in the corporate world. He worked for J Summit as a purchasing engineer, and at Asian Terminal as a port engineer. With an employee mindset, he was looking for a way to have a higher paying job.
• Started to study programming upon learning from a friend that there was a high demand for programmers in Singapore. To gain experience, he asked his college friends who were computer science graduates for freelance projects. That led him to the world of online freelancing, as he was referred to several websites.
• Did freelancing for a couple of years and realized that he’s making more money through it than his job. He resigned from his job to learn more about freelancing while doing it full-time, and put up an internet café from the earnings he made through it. This made him feel secured because the business will bring him a regular income compared to a freelancing job without regular projects. Came a time that his income from the business was almost the same as his income from freelancing. That made him study entrepreneurship.
• Expanded his network by reaching out to other entrepreneurs online. Became an online forum addict at pinoyexchange.com, and learned about entrepreneurship through it. He also learned about blogging and started doing it, not only for money but because he was ecstatic to share his learnings on entrepreneurship through it.  
• Launched his blog about personal finance and investments, and money management in 2007. Eventually, he became a registered financial planner.
• Now, he’s known to be the founder of the blog “Ready to be Rich”, and one of the founders of 199jobs.com. He also wrote the book “Guide to Investing.”

Q&A Highlights

How you got started?

I’m a civil engineering graduate and of course, I worked in the corporate world. The thing is when I was working, I felt that it wasn’t really for me. I guess it’s part of my personality that I wanted to have more freedom when it comes to my schedule. So, that’s when I started to explore anything that I can do on my free time. But also, I was having an employee mindset, I was also looking for a way to have a higher paying job.  During that time, a friend of mine told me that there was a high demand for programmers in Singapore and so I thought to myself I could maybe freelance as a software programmer. I could self-study, and at the same time after I got the experience, I can probably move to Singapore and find work there. So, that was the original plan that launched everything.

Because I needed freelance work to gain experience when it comes to IT, I started contacting my friends who were computer science graduates and asked them if they have any freelance jobs that they could outsource to me. I got a few projects, but ultimately it led me to do the world of online freelancing. I was referred to several websites where I could get modules or short and simple projects that could help me add to my portfolio.

That was what I did for a couple of years, until I realized that I was actually making more money from my freelancing sideline than my actual job. So, I told myself, "What if I resign from my job and see if I can do this full time?" I’m sure I could learn more if I am doing it full time. That’s what I did but at the same time, I also realized that it’s scary to have a freelance job because you don’t have regular income. So that’s when I started to consider putting up a business, because I believe having a business will give you a more regular income.

So, I thought to myself, what’s related to what I’m doing now, and at the same time, something that I’m really passionate about. And the first thing that came into my mind was an internet cafe. So that’s what I did. I used the money that I saved from my freelancing job as capital to put up my first internet cafe. So, the internet cafe provided me regular cash flow while I continued working as a freelancer.

However, there came to a point that my income from the internet cafe is almost the same as my freelancing sideline. So, I told myself, “Hey, looks like this is a better deal.” I could probably just focus on my shop and find ways to scale it up and make it grow. And at the same time learn about how to properly run a business because I was just really lucky because the computer internet cafe business was really booming at that time.

I didn’t have to do anything to make money, but I realized that this business will not be profitable forever unless I develop it or make it grow. So that’s when I studied entrepreneurship. I started to expand my network. I tried to reach out to other entrepreneurs that are online particularly in pinoyexchange.com. In pinoyexchange online forum, I was able to find and connect with people who are like me, struggling to become a successful entrepreneur. So, I learned about entrepreneurship through the discussions that I had there. Until in 2007, I realized that I have learned so much and I wanted to share it to other people as well. And back then, the Philippine blogging population was already sort of taking off. 

My original plan was really to write a book but I was just not organized back then. So, a friend of mine also suggested that why don’t you write a blog and just put out your articles there and then later on, you can collate it and compile it into a book.  So that sounded like a good plan, so that’s what I did.

So in 2007, I launched my blog about personal finance and investments, money management. Actually, the first few months of my blog, I was really discussing about entrepreneurship and money management. But later on, I discovered that there’s a good niche when it comes to personal finance, so that’s where I eventually went to. The Registered Financial Planners User-ship of the Philippines reached out to me and asked me if maybe I wanted to get accredited as a financial planner, so that I can have more authority over the subject that I discuss. So, I said yes, I took the certification. And yeah, a lot of people know me now as the registered financial planner who talks about money. But where I am now was not, wasn’t really planned. I just went from one phase of my life to another thinking and asking myself what’s next for me. How can I make this better? How can I grow as a person? What direction would I take and what path is more exciting for me. So those are sometimes the things that I ask myself whenever I’m like, stuck in a place.  I’m the kind of person who doesn’t really want to be stagnant, to be complacent. I don’t want to stay in one place. So, I’m always challenging myself to do something else, to do more. To explore new things and I guess that’s how I got into the where I am now.

You started as a freelancer for programming, right? Was it all self-study stuff? Did you take courses? How did you learn programming?

Back in college, I already have some subjects when it comes to programming. As an engineer, I had my background, but we were not really taught to become a programmer. We’re just taught to understand softwares. So, when I bench into freelancing, I really did a self-study. A friend of mine sent me his book and that’s what I read. I practice and then actually the best learning experience was getting the modules because I was forced to learn specific things. Not just simply following the tutorial and creating those ‘hilo’ world type of a very simple programs. 

The original plan was to get well, and then probably be part of a big project so that I can add it to my portfolio, which will be added to my resume, so that I can apply for a programming job in abroad. So, that was the first original plan that launched everything else.

When you’re starting a business you’re not really sure if you’re gonna earn from it or not. So how did you get that courage to get started? 

It wasn’t really trying to get the courage, but for me I was more scared of freelancing because I know that the money is not regular. So, I really asked myself, what else can give me regular income. The answer that came to me was, “Why don’t you put up a business, because at least in a business shop, there is sales.”

It wasn’t really a big giant leap towards entrepreneurship. For me, it was like more of a necessity. I still need to have regular income.  So, all the money that I’ve saved from the freelancing, I used for capital for the internet cafe. I actually started with just six computers. They were all secondhand computers. I didn’t buy new ones because when I was starting, the games a lot of people play were just Counter Strike and Red Alert. You didn’t really have a need to have an internet connection. But after around six months, seven months, people are already starting to ask me about Ragnarok, etc. I was also seeing the potential of the cafe. I guess that was the big leap – when I decided to focus more on the business and not accept that many freelancing projects.

So, what I did was I decided to decline some freelancing projects. I wanted to spend more time on the internet cafe because I see that there’s potential. Since I’m always full and I have enough money to probably buy a few more computers and do some renovations, I tried to look for a new place, a bigger place. The most number of computers that I had was actually 24 computers. That really got me into entrepreneurship. That really got me interested into running a business.

You’re so busy working, you have no time for your family, you have no time for friends. Talk about that a little bit.  What was your experience and do you think it’s worth to have to sacrifice time, sacrifice having fun, for the jump start period?

Yes, I would say that it was worth it because, well, look at all the time that I have right now. I sacrificed a few years of my life to be able to have all the time in the world right now for the rest of my life. So, I would definitely say it was worth it.

But of course, during that period, you would always have self-doubt. You always ask yourself, "Will this really be worth it?"  And I guess the thing that motivated me to continue was because I was actually doing something that I like or I was really passionate or interested about.

So, even though I had no time with my friends, and of course doing the things that I used to do before, I started jumping. It was replaced by something that kept me busy, kept my mind challenged. I have to replace those bad habits with something more productive, I would say.

It’s good to spend time with your friends, it’s good to watch television as a form of entertainment, but I can replace those with something that will eventually produce an output, which is focusing on my business and doing some freelance work.

But doing the same thing, day in day out for around two or three years, that will become eventually a burden to you. So, ask yourself to have a two-year plan.  After that how do I move towards doing less or probably doing something different. It will keep you challenged. I guess that’s how I survived it. I found something interesting, something that I love, and at the back of mind I had a plan that I will be doing this forever.

Do you have any advice to those that are in that jump starting period, but don’t have that vision yet? How do they choose their vision or choose that motivation in which direction they want to go in the future? 

Well, they could always start with where they are now, and try to see, “How can I scale up the things that I do?” One thing that I’ve noticed among freelancers right now is that, the best way to get more projects is to create a team. So, it’s not really a formal business, but they could reach out to new freelancers. Give them a chance to create or build their portfolio by hiring them to do some of their work. So, it’s basically outsourcing their projects to other people. Create a team so that they can slowly scale up, build up. And then along the way they can they can learn how to manage people, how to manage a team as a leader.

So, start where they are and probably, actually they’d be able to run a business. I know someone was able to really outsource 80% of the work she does to a team. So, she has so much free time, she was able to put up her own business because that was something that she was planning all along. She wanted to have her own cake shop or I think bakeshop. When she was capable to outsource most of her work to a team, she had more time to study baking and put up her own pastry shop. So, that’s how you do it. You start where you are. You try to scale up. Try to find ways, so that you don’t need to dedicate as much time as you used to with the work that you’re doing.  

One venue that you can outsource tasks is the website called 199jobs.com. So, can you tell us about 199jobs?

How it all began was also an accident. It wasn’t really planned. It was back in 2009, I was in a financial seminar in Makati and I sat next to Romy Miranda, one of my co-founders for 199jobs. So anyway, we got into talking and I learned that he was one of the people that I used to interact in pinoyexchange. So, that was a really good accident to bump into Romy in real life. After that, we collaborated on several online projects.

And several years after that, in 2011, I met Glen, the other co-founder for 199jobs. At that time, I was really looking into expanding my network of freelancers and when I was introduced to Glen, he also had the same vision. Glen, on the other hand, is on the freelance writing field. He has Memo Kitchen, a content marketing company. At first, he was just a one-man team, but later on he started to build the people. He was able to build a team, managed several people to scale up his projects, but it came to a point that he had so many people that it’s hard to organize them already as one man. So instead of hiring another manager he thought he would build a website called 199jobs.com to manage his people. And when we were introduced to each other, I was also looking for something like that, but I’m on the other side. I wanted to find a website where I can hire Filipinos to do simple tasks.

So, Glen and I decided to put up 199jobs. We invited Romy to come onboard because Romy is really a good salesman. Romy used to be a real estate agent, he used to sell a lot of things. So, we now have 199jobs.com. It’s really a freelancer marketplace, where freelancers can sign up and offer a job that they can do for a minimum of 199 pesos. 199 pesos is just the starting, of course. You can offer a job that’s more expensive, but what we require is that on your initial sign up, just offer something for 199 pesos. Now if you’re a freelancer who is looking to outsource some of your work or a starting entrepreneur who would like to outsource some of the business tasks, then you can also go to 199jobs because for 199 pesos, you can hire a freelancer for an affordable rate. And I assure you that we have a feedback and rating system to assure you that you get quality work when you order from us.

Why is it too low, and there’s a service fee so the freelancer only gets 150. So why start at that rate?

It was a result of our research also. We ask entrepreneurs and our potential buyers, “How much are you willing to risk to hire a freelancer?” Our research shows that at 200 pesos entrepreneurs are willing to risk, shell out money to see if this freelancer can do a good job. So, we settled on 200 pesos and well, of course, for marketing purposes we made it into 199 pesos. So, that’s how 199jobs was really born.

I guess it’s at 199 that entrepreneurs or the buyers are willing to risk to hire a freelancer, because if you price it a thousand pesos, some entrepreneurs will already have hesitation. So, our research showed that 199 pesos is really the amount that they’re okay with, to the point that they can actually just do an impulse buy. And at the same time, we don’t want to focus on really complicated projects. We said that there’s already other websites, other marketplaces where you can post project based services. What we wanted to focus on are fast cycles subjects, fast cycle jobs, something that people can just do in an hour, maybe in 15 minutes. So, that’s also one reason why we kept the price low.

You’ll be surprised because some freelancers who are really making a lot of money, are really making money on the side without breaking a sweat, what does that mean? For example, I know a writer who can write a 300-word article for 30 minutes. It’s really something that just she’s really skilled with. So, that’s already 199 pesos or 150 pesos for 30 minutes’ worth of work. So, she’s able to accept 4 to 5 jobs a day, so that’s around two and half hours of work and she earns around 600 pesos, 500 pesos from that.

So, it really depends on the perspective of the freelancer. You can either have a bad impression, say it’s too low or just dismiss it or typed out and you’ll see that if you can really find or offer a job that you can do even if your eyes are closed then you’ll be able to earn a lot.  

I know a lot of people who take advantage of the fact that a lot of freelancers didn’t get discouraged when they see 199. So what they do, they upload different types of jobs. So, what they focus on is fast cycle jobs that they can do in just 30 minutes and yeah, then you’ll be surprised people are actually looking for freelancers who can do this simple task. 

After waiting and learning for seven months, I was able to onboard for local clients doing social media marketing. But client keep on inquiring now and I can’t cope up with the demand. Is it a good validation that I should start a social media marketing agency?

He should first try to increase his rates. It would be better if he could try to get at par first, and then once he’s able to do that he could probably start building a team. So, starting a social media marketing agency is your goal. But so that it won’t overwhelm you, start by just hiring one person. Then, it’s important to document the things that you teach this person. So, once you are able to see that this is going well, you can just hire another person and you already know what to teach them. So get your team, one person at a time until you realize that, “I already have enough people to actually put up an agency”.

So, that’s what I would do actually, you know, increase your rate first then start building your team, one person at a time, until you realize that this can now be an agency.

If you were to start over, where would you start or what would you do differently to be successful in business?

That’s hard to answer, but I’m sure I would still start in the corporate world because I learned a lot from there, that I don’t think I would learn anywhere else. I know people who really jumped into freelancing and entrepreneurship right after graduation, and I realized that most of them become too bossy. They really didn’t know how it feels to be an employee, a rank and file person.

Being in the corporate world, especially at the bottom ladder, will help you learn humility. You will learn how to follow instructions, even if you think that it’s not really a good idea. So those things teach you character. The discipline to really wake up early in the morning, work the whole day, not slack off etc., those are opportunities for you to learn to be productive, to learn how to manage your energy so that you can last throughout the day working. Those are the skills that you can apply when it comes to freelancing. A lot of people see freelancing and entrepreneurship as a great time to do anything that you want, because you have more time with your schedule, but that’s not true. You will be working longer hours when you’re a freelancer. So, if you cannot survive the challenges of a corporate world then you will probably not survive freelancing as well.

I would start in the corporate world because that has taught me a lot of things, a lot of skills, a lot of personal motivation I have that allowed me to survive freelancing and entrepreneurship. And now when I ran businesses, I know how my staff feels, so I try not to be that boss that everybody hates in the office back then.

You did say that you found your niche in like financial planning. We have a lot of bloggers in our audience aspiring bloggers, existing bloggers who are trying to monetize their blog but they don’t know what to focus on. They don’t know what their niche is. How did you find your niche?

Well, I started out my blog because I was really at that point when I wanted to share all the things that I’ve learned. So, I told myself that I will write a book.  But I don’t have the time to organize all my thoughts into a chronological book, so I started a blog and said that I will just organize everything else later on.

So, as I was writing it, I learned that these are the top things that people respond the most. So, instead of really focusing on to entrepreneurship, whenever I write about personal finance, there were more people who are more engaged to those topics. So, that’s how I eventually discovered to venture into personal finance because that’s where people are really interested in.

What I would say is that, if you are just starting as a blogger, it’s really important to blog about something that you can talk about for so many hours, because blogging is really about story telling. So, it’s telling your stories, sharing your thoughts. So, start with what you are really interested in or what you are really passionate about, and then try to see where your audience is most engaged with. 

That’s a great way to find the specific niche that you can eventually go into, because number one, you have people who are really interested in that topic. Number two, it will be easier to monetize your blog if you know specifically what type of readers are looking for in your blog. So, once I ventured to personal finance and investments, that’s really when I started to monetize my blog in the financial industry. I started selling financial products. I started doing financial seminars. As oppose to just general blog about money, it’s harder to sell something or offer something of value if your blog is too generic. So, start where you’re passionate about. Be sensitive by what your readers tell you. Be willing to accept feedback so that you know which direction you will eventually go into.

I think what’s more important and what a lot of starting bloggers miss is making it a habit. Writing is not easy, so making it a regular thing will be harder. So, I advise people that if you really want to blog, your first challenge is really to find that schedule and make it a habit to write. So, it doesn’t matter if it’s every day, or if it’s just once a week. I say to people that the frequency doesn’t matter, it’s the consistency. If you think that you can only afford to write once a week, then just write once a week but make sure that once you commit to that. You really give something for your readers that’s worth reading. And never miss a schedule. So, once you’re able to get that groove, that schedule, that habit, then that’s when you really focus on the niche, the topics, and how you want to eventually monetize your blog.

So, did you start with monetization in mind?

A friend of mine suggested that I should put ads. So, that’s just what I did. I put BidVertiser Ads, it wasn’t really AdSense at the start. But the point was I didn’t really earn anything from it for the first six, seven months.

So, I would say, put your ads on your blog early on, but don’t expect to earn anything from it for the first six months. I had monetization, but I really didn’t earn anything from it. I was really focused more on the content as advised by other bloggers as well. During the time, there was really nobody teaching about blogging locally. There were no Filipinos who are writing about blogging, so I really relied on blogs that are based internationally like blogger Tyrel Rose, and all those people who are doing affiliate marketing online. I had to filter through all the affiliate marketing articles and try to find the articles that are really helpful when it comes to developing a blog.

Do you use ghost writers?

I would not say ghost writers, but I say ghost researchers or editors. So, I‘ll share my writing process. The thing is I’ll think of a topic. I’ll write the topic sentences that I want. The article or the blog post to have and then I hire a writer in 199jobs.com. I tell them, “I want an article with this topic, can you make a coherent article at least 500 words out of this. Here are some links that you can also use for reference if you need to add anything else.” After that, I receive the article after three days, and then I edit it again. I input personal stories to make it more interesting because people love reading stories. So, I try to edit the sentences so that it would be under my style, my preferred tone etc. So, that’s what I post as a blog article.

So, I wouldn’t say it’s really a ghost writer because I still do a lot of editing. I’m still the one who did the main topics etc. So, I would say a ghost editor, I hire ghost editors for my blogs.

Any final advice that you wanted to give to freelancers and those probably who are aspiring to start their own business? 

There are already a lot of advice when it comes to success and work and passion out there. What a lot of people don’t really focus on is productivity, and I guess that’s the advice that I would like to tell people. Focus on your productivity. There are a lot of productivity tools and strategies out there and try to find which one will work for you. A lot of people will simply say make up to do list, plan out your day, plan ahead etc. But these are just generic advice when it comes to your productivity.

I would say what really helped me become more productive. What helped me to really produce a lot of output, what helped me to finish a lot of projects was when I started to find strategies to make use of my time. For example, instead of having a to-do list, I have a personal Kanban. Instead of a planner I actually have a big whiteboard where I use post-it notes to put the things that I do. So, because I’m very kinesthetic when it comes to stuff, I prefer these types of productivity tools. So, it’s really up to you to find yours. One thing that also has helped me is I’m sure you’ve heard of Pomodoro Technique. So when I’m working, I try to take five- minute break every 30 minutes. So, some people would find that irritating, some people would find that one hour, a 10-minute break every hour would be better, but me I like five-minute break every 30 minutes of work. So, what I’m saying is that there are a lot of strategies out there to make you more productive. Try to find the ones that work for you and focus on that because no matter how good you are, how skilled you are, but if your productivity habits is bad you won’t be able to produce anything, or you won’t be able to finish a lot of projects, and eventually scale up. So, I guess that’s a unique advice that I would say, if you want to succeed, you have to focus on your productivity. 

If people want to get in touch with you, what’s the best way that they can do so? 

They can add me on Facebook. Well, they could message me on Facebook and they can also follow me on Twitter, @brodfitz, B-R-O-D-F-I-T-Z. But if you want to email me, my email is [email protected]. So, if you can’t remember that you can just go to fitzvillafuerte.com and just look for the contact form. The link is at the bottom, at the footer of the website. So, there’s a link there going to the contact form. So, yeah, you can find me on different social networking sites also. So, I check all of them regularly so just call me in one of those and we’ll be able to message each other.