There is no such thing as a free lunch!

The saying comes from the 1920s, when bars used to offer free lunches to entice customers in, who would then run up a large bar tab.

What was true a century ago in an American bars is true today on the internet, free technology isn’t ever totally free.

The secret is to understand why each tool is ‘free.’  If you avoid a few traps, you can keep costs down as you launch your career, by finding online partners who want you to win and will get you on the road to success.

Start with your goals, the technology must help you reach them

Using technology just because it is free is recipe to wasting time. You need to have clear goals and understand how that tool will help you achieve those goals, which are to grow your network and reputation, while building vital relationships that will sustain your career

If you are confident, consider going premium

If you are an expert, or you are part of a large organization with a technology team, buy the technology you need. There are some great products out there that give you access to lots of advanced features that are sold together and work together seamlessly.

However, if you are a busy art professional, working on your own, unfamiliar with technology. Then paying for an expensive bundle is going to be a waste of money and suck up a lot of your time.

In particular, some of the most advanced features revolve around data analysis and tracking, which can take some time to truly understand.

Instead try free tools to see what you like. Free e-mail management, graphic design, hashtag analysis, key word analysis and other tools. . Experimenting with free technology will help you assess what works for you.

Free Trials periods don’t solve your long term problem

Free trials are only useful if you have a good sense of what you need and how it will help you build your career. If you really want to learn how a tool works and it will take more than a month.

If it’s free for life, you are not a client, you are the product

Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and other platforms that are free for life, because you are the product. Your details are being sold to their clients.

You can turn this around, by becoming a client, paying for access to users, but, that underlines the point that this isn’t free technology that you use, it’s technology that sells its users to its clients.

Choose firms that you can grow with

Google is great example of a company that charges for high usage. For example, you get some free space in your Google Drive, then if you find it useful, you upgrade, it’s not that helpful you stay with the free version.

There are firms that charge even light users. If an e-mail management system is only free for the first few hundred subscribers, it doesn’t allow you to assess whether you can use it to grow your subscription list.

Some firms only charge power users. These are the technologies you want to use because they rely on word-of-mouth and recommendations to grow and want to grow alongside you.

The Free Version must have enough features

Most free technology will have some features locked, which is fine, as long as there are enough features for you to get started. If a design platform has thousands of templates but only gives you access to one, or an e-mail management platform is free but you can only send a handful of, your not being given a fair chance to understand how this technology could help you.

It must look great

You are not selling insurance, you are getting people excited about the work you do, the art you provide, so the technology needs to give you great artistic control as well.

It must be easy to use

There is no point spending months struggling with complex technology that wear you down. It needs to be relatively simple to use.

It must have decent support

Popular tools are great because there are so many tutorials on Youtube, but, everyone gets stuck sometime, so you need customer support to have your back.

The paid version must be affordable

If you ever want to upgrade to the paid version for more features, you should be able afford it. If the paid version is unaffordable to you,  then you should avoid  that provider.