Guest Post: The Freelance Complacency Trap

There’s this feeling you get when you come across a freelancer who just gets it. Someone whose approach to freelancing is proactive, smart, and collaborative. Someone who treats freelancing as the small business enterprise it is. Someone who inspires you to do better.

That’s the feeling I get with each interaction I have with Randy Hecht.

So when in one of our phone conversations Randy suggested she write a blog post on something that popped up in her orbit, I did a little happy dance.

For those of you who are not acquainted with Randy, she is a bilingual writer and editor whose clients span the globe. She owns a multilingual communications firm. She moderates the LinkEds & Writers group on LinkedIn. And she hustles like no writer I’ve met to keep the pipeline of client work going.

She also thinks critically, and can pull out a thread of opportunity and weave it into her next project or marketing approach. This post is an example.

The Freelance Path Forward

by Randy B. Hecht

Recently, I heard the CEO of a multinational corporation talking about his company’s post-pandemic path forward.

And “forward” was the key word in his comments. There’s no U-turn in the road that will take us back to our old normal, and there’s no profit to be made in trying to get there. In fact, the more we consider our 2019 models to be “business as usual” and not relics of a vanished past, the more we put our work and income at risk.

[bctt tweet=”To put it bluntly: failure to adapt is the first step toward failure of your #freelance enterprise.” username=”RandyBHecht”] And it’s an unnecessary step, because there are opportunities worth pursuing as long as we look to the future and don’t dwell on a past that can’t be resurrected.

You may know some freelance writers and editors who are the exceptions to that rule. A poll I conducted last month in the LinkedIn writing group I run asked: “Looking to 2021 and beyond, do you see your business and mix of projects unchanged/back to the ‘old normal,’ improving, or getting worse?” In that poll, 13% of respondents chose, “Unchanged, I’m pleased to say.”

But it’s never wise to bank on being one of those exceptions. That’s why successful freelancers never stop marketing, exploring new opportunities, and watching the market for changes that forecast the closing of some doors and the opening of others. Those freelancers are among the 40% of survey respondents who said their business was, “Better: new projects and focus.”

That leaves the 47% of respondents who answered either: “Unchanged but needs a shake-up” (20%) or “Worse: not sure how to fix it” (27%). If you’re in one of those groups or fear that you’re sliding toward one of those categories, there are things you can do to get your freelance business back on track.

Engage in marketing, not self-promotion.

This is a key distinction that many struggling freelancers miss. Self-promotion is asking for work, either in one-on-one conversations or via social media. Conversely, marketing looks out rather than in and asks how others can benefit from networking with you.

Marketing is sharing helpful news articles with clients, commenting on or sharing their social media posts, and offering congratulations when their companies announce good news. (If you’re not following your clients on social media, fix that now.)

Marketing is offering helpful advice on social media to enhance your reputation as a knowledgeable and capable professional.

It’s even forwarding job or assignment leads to colleagues who are a better fit than you are. I do this frequently, and those colleagues respond in kind. We can all help one another to be more successful.

At the same time, beware negative marketing.

That’s what you’re doing when you show up in LinkedIn groups only to complain that there’s no work out there. Or you tweet about how you’re going to miss your deadline but you’re just struggling to get the writing together today, and can anyone relate? Or you do a blog post about how unreasonable your clients have been lately. All of that is marketing that contributes to a negative impression of your brand.

Another key tip: Don’t sabotage yourself mentally or burn energy lamenting the work you love that’s disappeared. And listen, I get it. I love travel writing, but that’s such a void right now that The New York Times suspended publication of its Sunday travel section.

Missing the work is fine, but it’s not OK (and won’t solve anything) to get twisted about wanting what you can’t have right now. You’ll enjoy a higher salary and a better margin of sanity if you look at the market, see what work is available right now, and explore those opportunities that are a good fit. Find the places where you can develop new skills, master new topics, and make the mortgage.

It’s empowering to discover that you can rebound from setbacks. Don’t deprive yourself of that insight into your abilities and your capacity for continuing to rely on writing as your source of income. Look forward, and keep moving in that direction. It’s the only way out.

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Writers, what is your most impactful marketing approach?
How has that changed as the economy has tanked?