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Hey writers, can we get real for a minute?
Web designers are kicking our butts in terms of earning potential at the moment, and I felt like this article needed to be written in an attempt to explain why.
While right now is one of, if not the best time to be a writer in general, there is great disparity in the earning power of most writers online.
That is to say, a majority of ‘freelance writers’ tend to be fighting for bottom-of-the-barrel rates for work that isn’t rewarding on any level (in terms of creative expression and personal branding), while a smaller selection of folks are killing it with their writing.
While this sort of food chain exists in every industry (even web design and development), I can’t help but feel like the divide is getting dangerous for writers.
There has been so much coverage on why it’s hard to be a well paid writer in a world that wants writers work for free, that I can’t help but notice how crappy things are for so many writers these days (be sure to read this article from a web developer on the subject, it’s eye opening).
But there is a reason why this is happening, and I’m sad to say that the writers are partly to blame.
You see, they have a problem that web designers don’t have to deal with, and that problem is that they label themselves as “freelance writers.”
Why is that a problem?
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Freelancing is a fantastic way of making money online.
The barriers of entry are low, qualifications are not a necessity and anyone with a relative level of skill and enough desire can build up a healthy income in a relatively short space of time. When one considers the lengths some people go to in an attempt to establish “passive” streams of income, freelancing is a dream option.
Having said that, freelancing does have its limitations. Perhaps the most obvious is the time-for-money issue: you’re only making money freelancing when you are freelancing. There comes a stage in any successful freelancer’s career when they realize that in order to grow any further, they must look to expand beyond the time-for-money business model.
Doing exactly that is what I want to discuss in this post.
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Time is money.
It’s an idiom that’s never been more true than for the self-employed, and freelancers everywhere know the importance of managing their time and keeping billable hours optimized.
The problem with advice on productivity today is that too much emphasis is placed on trying out the latest shiny app instead of examining human behavior and seeing why we are struggling with getting things done.
Since those of us who work from home (or co-op spaces) have to be our own boss and rely on our own disciplinary schedule, today I thought we’d take a look at some tried and true methods of getting things done the smart way.
Let’s jump in…
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“How do I find clients?”
While many established freelancers tend to run into problems like client overload and scope creep, the question above has to be one of the most asked in all of freelancing—likely because by nature, there are more freelancers seeking work than those looking to manage it.
While the process of “getting clients” is of a broad nature and will receive continuous coverage here on the Bidsketch blog, today I wanted to address the fundamentals of landing clients in a reasonable time-span.
If you’re a new freelancer looking to finally secure some paying gigs, or if you’re experienced and just in a bit of a lull and could use a few more clients, get ready to jot a few things down.
Today we’ll run-through some proven strategies for landing work that do not involve selling your dignity for $5 on Fiverr.com…so let’s get to it!
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Unless one is extraordinarily well organised, there will come a time in any successful freelancer’s career where they become overwhelmed with the amount of work they have on their plate.
While this is a happy problem, it is a problem nonetheless, and a potentially dangerous one at that. Client overload can lead to any number of unwanted outcomes such as a reduction in the quality of your work, the neglect of other parts of your business, and even the neglect of your family and other things that are important to you in life.
In an ideal world one would spot client overload from a distance and plan accordingly, but such an outcome is unlikely; especially if you have never experienced it before. After all, how can you spot and fully appreciate the ramifications of an impending situation that you do not fully understand? With that in mind, this post takes a “firefighting” approach and lays out what you should do to clear the decks in the event of client overload.
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Tom Ewer
Gregory Ciotti
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