Classes in entrepreneurship from my freelancing profession.
I’ve had my fair proportion of shopper horror tales as a contract author.
From unpaid invoices to anticipating 2x the scope for half the cash, my freelance writing profession was stuffed with ups and downs.
The freelance writing mannequin labored nicely for a pair years, till I spotted I had approach too many purchasers, and the one method to handle all of them was to work 14-hour days.
My ambition and monetary planning took me to a stage the place I had no time for myself, and all I appeared ahead to every day was work.
That’s once I took child steps in direction of outsourcing and delegating work.
At one level in my profession, I had a shopper who anticipated 5 $200 1200-word articles each week, and having them on a retainer foundation gave me the arrogance to rent my first author.
Since then, I’ve come a great distance. My workforce composition presently appears like —
- 3 writers for 3 completely different niches
- 1 content material supervisor to convey shopper expectations to writers and test if their work is upto the mark
- 1 search engine optimisation professional to edit and finalize the articles.
I’m quickly nearing the three-year anniversary of being self-employed, and at this particular juncture in my profession, I wished to take a second to mirror on how far I’ve come, and the way my expertise as a freelancer has taught me useful classes about working a enterprise.
On this article, I’m sharing all of the reflections from my freelancing days and the way I’m implementing them as I run a content material enterprise. In different phrases, right here’s how I’m being the shopper I want I’d present in my freelancer days.
When purchasers requested me free of charge samples, I wasn’t pushed to provide my greatest work. All they obtained had been half-hearted samples and content material I’m probably not pleased with.
In some circumstances when the expectations free of charge deliverables had been too excessive, I misplaced respect for them and burnt bridges. I even referred to as out just a few purchasers publicly for a way low cost they had been being.
