The Freelance Life, part of Gigabites, is a series of short interviews with top Rafiki freelancers in Africa. We recently caught up with Onyedikachi Ibejih, one of Nigeria's top Product Designers, to hear about her journey into freelancing, her favourite plugins or freelance tools, and any freelance trends she's noticing in 2024.
Why did you decide to become a product designer?
I decided to become a designer because it gave me the opportunity to creatively express myself and my ideas. While I always had a natural flair towards both art and engineering, I never felt truly proficient in either. Design, however, served as the closest bridge I could find to engineering. It trained me to identify problems in my community, brainstorm possible solutions, and actually bring those ideas to life – a process that truly made me feel like a creator. And just seeing the positive impact, no matter how small, that my designs had on others' lives solidified my decision to stick with this path, even after exploring other career options.
What’s one piece of advice you’d give to up and coming freelancers in Africa?
I would say that freelancing goes beyond providing the direct technical services, be it in design, coding, etc. It involves understanding the business aspects as well. This includes skills such as preparing contracts, becoming a good salesperson, managing taxes and incorporating these tax deductions into your rates. I'd also say, get good at budgeting and finance management because freelancing is unpredictable. Client numbers can fluctuate, with a surge in one month followed by none in the next.
What’s currently your favourite plugin or tool? Why?
My favourite plugin is the Write Better Figma Plugin. It has improved my workflow because, often, clients are reluctant to pay for an additional service of a UX writer. But these days, I'm able to generate copies on my own, and with the plugin, it refines them like a UX writer. would
What’s a trend you’re seeing amongst other freelancers, or a prediction for the year?
This year, I anticipate an increasing number of freelancers embracing no-code tools like Webflow and Framer to improve their capabilities and deliver more end-to-end, user-friendly solutions to their clients. Companies are also realising that it's more cost-effective and faster to hire one-time freelancers with knowledge of these tools for some of their websites/e-commerce platforms. Consequently, freelancers are strategically positioning themselves to seize these opportunities.
We believe the killer-teams of tomorrow will integrate in-house talent with fractional freelancers on a granular, skill-specific basis, empowering companies to move quickly, efficiently scaling resources up or down as and when required to drive growth. Our goal is to streamline the use of time, money, and human capital across the freelance economy.
Our flexible approach to working with teams by integrating fractional talent into in-house teams, or building from the ground up, saves time, money, and derisks operations substantially. Brand design, custom Webflow development, and growth marketing specialists.
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