Side hustle. Gig worker. Ugh. What I hate about these terms – and what you should hate, too – is how they diminish what you do. These terms suggest you’re dabbling. You’re not serious. You’re hustling. You’re just part of the latest fad, that “gig” economy. Screw that. You, my freelance friend, are a business…
Tag: Marketing
3 Steps to Winning Freelance Client Work
I’m a Hidden Brain junkie. No surprise then that this idea comes from a Hidden Brain podcast. The episode talked about hidden obstacles: why consumers don’t buy, why people aren’t convinced of facts, etc. It’s all about friction. More to the point, it’s about removing friction. Friction is that thing that stops you from acting….
No-Marketing Guide to Freelancing
Everyone has a sweet spot. It’s that place where the struggle is over, the work and clients come easily, and that working-hard mode you’ve been in for ages has shifted to the hardly working mode. And you’re actually better off. Man, what a sweet spot that is. But what a ton of work you put…
6 Ways to Sabotage Your Freelance Career
A friend of mine asked me the other day what I knew about a certain freelancer. It was someone who crossed her email, and there was some evidence I was connected to her. “Oh, not that freelancer,” I said. That response was telling. I hadn’t heard from said freelancer since 2015. And yet I still knew…
Breaking Free of the Freelance Low-earnings Rut
Freelance writer, is your struggle too real sometimes? I ask this because in conversation with another writer, I realized that for far too many writers, breaking out of their current earnings level is a battle they wage daily. In the feast/famine cycle of freelancing, famine has settled in for the long haul. Are you one…
One Freelance Marketing Tweak to Boost Results
I saw a tweet the other day that, once upon a time, I would have agreed with. These days, however, I know better. The tweet: The reason you’re not seeing success with your LOIs is this: VOLUME. Send 10 times more of them than usual and see what happens next! You know what? That works….
Freelancer’s Intro to Inbound Marketing
It’s always a good day when Jennifer Mattern shows up on the blog. Jenn, who runs All Freelance Writing and Freelance Writing Pros, is one of the most business-savvy freelancers I know. She’s a no-BS blogger who tells you what you need to hear, but does so with the intent of helping you improve your…
Market in 2021 Like a Freelance Boss
A few weekends ago, I sat down to tally up my invoices for 2020 and pay that final self-employment tax installment. It’s an exercise that used to fill me with untold amounts of angst. I loathe figuring taxes. I never get the percentage right no matter how high I estimate. This year, I still owed…
3 Moves to Power Your Writing Career Forward
Where are you in your writing career right now? Are you earning what you want? Coming close enough to what you want to be satisfied? Feeling stuck? Wanting the work to match the pay? Wanting work that interests you? We’ve all been there. Every writer who’s ever started a freelance writing business has had to…
Meaty Monday: Is it Time to Switch Your Freelance Focus?
You know that feeling when there’s a big old pandemic that’s ground everything from airlines to client work? What am I saying? Of course you know. You too are living through the train wreck that is 2020. While airlines being grounded is frustrating for a lot of us (I’m missing two trips to Scotland this…