If you’ve got a flair for writing and enjoy creating stimulating and informative articles, then you’re probably ready to start your own freelance writing business.
But, being good at writing isn’t enough. It’s a very competitive marketplace. You need your business to stand out from the crowd and to keep your present online; even when you’re not.
The best way of achieving this is to have an effective marketing strategy. [Read more…]
Freelancing in any field carries risks. How can you possibly feel safe when you’re not getting a steady, guaranteed paycheck? However, experienced freelancers know the truth. With a traditional job, you could be fired or laid off at any time—meaning you have less control over your income than you do when you’re self-employed. [Read more…]
Thanks to technology, a physical office is no longer necessary for many occupations. Cloud-based communication apps, such as Slack and Basecamp, allow collaboration across the globe. Remote teams and digital offices offer many benefits for both employees and employers. Workers aren’t stuck commuting to and from one location every day. Additionally, companies can hire from a global pool with reduced overhead. If you’re ready for a positive change, a work from home set-up could be ideal for you. More so, you may want to freelance on the side and then transition to working from home full-time. [Read more…]
You have decided you want to start your own freelance business. That’s great! If you are like most freelancers starting out you are working with a limited budget. Whether you are going to be a freelance writer, translator, coder, you want to look professional. Here are 10 awesome resources to help you look like a pro and run an efficient operation right from the start without breaking the bank. [Read more…]
As a freelance writer, your income depends on your ability to market yourself, bringing on new clients and attracting desirable work. Without the force of a company with a marketing budget, however, it can be hard to put yourself out there. You need some low-budget, high-return strategies.
Luckily, there are plenty of simple marketing tricks that can help you attract work, from the mundane to the peculiar. At the end of the day, much like writing, marketing yourself depends on using what you have and working your networks to build professional connections. [Read more…]
Editor’s note: This post was written by Sharon, an author who likes to write on themes and issues related to project management software. Through her write-ups, she provides tips and suggestions for businesses, so they can better manage their projects and duly achieve their business objectives. You can also follow her on Twitter.
Freelancers need to communicate and collaborate with a variety of clients while working on multiple projects. This helps them to better understand clients’ specifications and convey to them exact progress achieved over projects. But such communication should be transparent and fast, only then they would be able to get quality results. For such enhanced communication, the best tools need to be used. These would enable freelancers to save their time, effort and costs as well as increase their productivity and profits. They would be able to deliver projects on time and as per their clients’ satisfaction. Happy clients would recommend their services to other people in their community which will boost their business prospects. [Read more…]
I had one goal when I started working on my freelance copywriting business full-time:
Stay married.
I don’t mean it to sound like my wife was unsupportive of the idea. She just is not a huge fan of the unknown, which we all know the freelance life has in spades.
Plenty of people make measurable goals for their first year in freelance, but I haven’t heard of a goal quite a measurable as that one. I’m either successfully thriving or paying alimony. That’s measurable.
Intrinsically, if I’m still married in this lifestyle, it means that other things are happening that might serve as goals to other people. Obviously, enough money must be coming in. In addition, I must be happy with the lifestyle in order to be bringing value into our relationship. People who are depressed because they haven’t left the house in a week tend not to stay married, either.
I met my goal. In fact, our relationship is better than ever.
There are plenty of books about how to embrace the freelance life, how to set up a freelance business, and how to grow your business once you do, like The Wealthy Freelancer, The Freelancer’s Bible, and The Well-Fed Writer. The problem is that books like that are often too good at their jobs: they flooded me with so many tips and tricks that I couldn’t possibly investigate all of them.
So what really worked? I’m glad you asked, considering that’s what I promised in the title of this post.
Specialize!
Freelancers tend to start out as generalists, afraid to turn down anyone that wants to give them money. That’s why it’s possible for people to make a living from sites like ODesk and Elance. Although being flexible is obviously a great skill to have in freelancing, I found that specializing in one market or vertical solves many problems that can come up in a freelance business.
I chose to specialize in companies looking to do business in the education market, due to my background as a teacher. Not only did I find a thriving market of potential clients, but I also saved myself a lot of time. My marketing is limited to a couple of LinkedIn groups that my decision makers frequent. If I want to go “press the flesh”, I have my pick of conferences where my clients and targets will be presenting. When you have a narrow focus, you can spend your time on more important things, like billable work. You also don’t have to worry about the local economy and the businesses around you.
Guard your time
We all got into freelance work for one reason: to control our own destiny. But too often I hear of freelancers answering e-mails at all hours, working 80-hour weeks, and never having a weekend.
If I had let myself fall into those traps, I would have definitely not met my marriage goal. All of the books I mentioned told me to keep work time and family time separated, and I’m proud that I’ve been able to follow through.
A client will try to test your response time very early in the relationship. No matter how long you’ve been working with them, if they call or e-mail after business hours (my time zone, not theirs), I let it sit and dealt with their issue the next day. Guess what? I never lost a client because of it. They simply got the hint that I was out of the office at that time, even though my office is the living room and I was technically “in”.
Get out!
I’m very happy being alone most of the time, which is why the freelance life is great for me. However, early in the last year, I let myself slide into a slight depression because the only people I had had a conversation with for a week were my wife and three-year-old daughter. If you don’t know, a preschooler doesn’t really form opinions about politics or sports.
So I fixed it. I became active in my local Rotary club. I formed my own networking group of dads who worked from home. I started some new hobbies. In other words, outlets that I wouldn’t have had time for if it wasn’t for my flexible schedule. I’ve met many new people, instead of just the small group around the water cooler or in the teacher’s lounge when I was working, and have things to look forward to every week besides work and the occasional family activity.
Keep a nest egg in the business account
In my personal finances, I’m not much of a saver. But with my business account, I always like to keep a fair amount in reserve. It may not be the six months of income that some of the freelance books suggest, but it’s enough not to worry about the times where business is a little thin (which happen to everyone and don’t let them tell you otherwise).
Another reason to keep some cash on hand is to take advantage of short-term opportunities. For example, the Creative Freelancer Conference sent out some great discounts in the weeks leading up to the event, which made me look up the airfares to San Francisco and talk to my wife about leaving for a weekend. If I didn’t have the $1500 or so on hand, I would have never had the opportunity to participate in a great learning and networking experience. You never know, good or bad, what can happen in this freelance life.
Scott Sterling is a freelance writer and editor who focuses on marketing content – such as web content, white papers, and case studies – for educational companies and tutoring services. Before taking the leap, he was a teacher, insurance agent, and technical writer. He is based in St. Petersburg, FL and can be found at www.educationcopywriting.com or www.caregiverdad.com.
Images via Grand Velas Riviera Maya and kojotomoto
Richard Branson is the founder of Virgin Group, a highly successful company with customers around the globe in multiple lines of business. He’s also a serial entrepreneur — he just pursues his entrepreneurial spirit through his larger company (and on the occasional extreme sporting trip).
Today, Richard Branson published a post on his blog called How to Succeed at Failure. That post leads readers to a question and answer series that he participates in, which is published on the American Express Open Forum. In this particular question and answer post, Branson responded to questions about failure, and his answers can be applied to any business, including freelance writing.
As a freelance writer who works for himself (or herself), you’re an entrepreneur and business owner. You need to learn how to market yourself as a business, research and find opportunities, and fill gaps that are not currently being met by a competitor. Richard Branson’s take on failure is motivational and helps put business decisions that don’t meet objectives into perspective.
Branson was asked by another entrepreneur how he decides when to call it quits and switch to another initiative or venture if he’s not getting the results he wants and needs. Branson replied by first explaining that to build a business you need to be confident and ready to stick it out through the hard times, but you also need to admit when something isn’t working. He explains:
“The impending failure of a business is something that you will instinctively recognize deep down, but human nature may prevent you from acknowledging it. … There will be times when you must accept that despite your best efforts, an idea or business cannot be saved. … Overall, it seems to me that if you have been struggling to pay the bills and salaries on a regular basis; if you cannot get traction with customers; if you can’t raise awareness of your product or brand, then it is time to quit.”
When asked how he regroups after a failure, Branson explained:
“Over the years, my team and I have not let mistakes, failures or mishaps get us down. Instead, even when a venture has failed, we try to look for opportunities, to see whether we can capitalize on another gap in the market.”
Clearly, Branson is an advocate of taking calculated risks to build a business and committing to his business decisions, but he does know that not all of his decisions will turn out to be good ones. He’s willing to accept the consequences, learn from those mistakes, and do what it takes to keep growing his business. He explained:
“I have lost count of the number of times rivals, reporters, bankers and even my own finance directors have told me that our time was up — but every time, I kept going and tried another angle, thinking that our situation was not as dire as it appeared. We have sold houses, hotels and even other businesses to raise cash. Sometimes we expanded our way out of trouble by ordering new planes, signing new bands or even buying new nightclubs.”
You can learn from Richard Branson and other successful entrepreneurs as you work to grow your own freelance writing business. Remember, you’re not just a writer. You’re also a small business owner!
You can follow the link to read the complete answers from Richard Branson and get more insight into the mind of a successful entrepreneur.
Image: Flickr
