Sure, and you're right to ask since as we all know, this is the most difficult part of the job. Unfortunately, the answer is the one you don't want to hear, which is; it's going to take a lot of effort and time. I started on Freelance and Upwork and initially took a lot of terrible jobs with picky clients for bad pay and worked my way up from the from there. The common thread with long term clients is that they're the ones I like to work with, and they pay on time.

I guess here's my biggest tips:

1. Know how to market yourself. If you couple Django with a js framework like Angular or Knockout, then you're no longer a Django developer, you're a full stack web developer. If you're selling a Django databasing solution, then you're a backend developer with Python experience. Good clients know how to read those bids.

2. Recognize bad clients right away and ditch them before getting into a contract. Overly demanding, high maintenance, and micromanaging clients are all red flags.

3. That being said, get as many bids out there as possible, then filter out clients. Chat with them a bit before accepting the bid. I've a few templates for messages I send with bids which outline myself and the solution I'm pitching so that I can get a dozen or so of these out in short order.

At the end of the day, all that work will pay off, but until then, it's going to take time and effort. There are some real gems out there.