Freelance Smackdown – Did It Blend?

For those just joining us, I called out Christine O’Kelly to put her Freelancing Guide to the test for 30 days and build a $1000-$2000 per month part time revenue stream. Now it’s time to sum it up what actually happened over these last 30 days …

Subheading Scanners, Unite!

• The Last 7 Days of Freelance Smackdown – Did It Blend?
• My Biggest Lesson From The Last 30 Days
• What’s Coming Up For The Next 30 Days
• The Moral Of The Story + The Oscar-esque Link Love

The Last 7 Days of Freelance Smackdown – Did It Blend?

The results are in – upon today’s payday I will have generated $1,225 in freelance income over the past 30 days, simply by following the steps outlined in Christine’s eBook. It definitely blends. For those curious, the breakdown goes like this:

• $1,075 in outsourced work (meaning someone else contacted me with jobs)
• $150 in sourced work (meaning I got off my a$$ and found the jobs myself)

And, moving forward, I have

• $700 in contracted work over the next 60 days (sourced)
• $700 in potential add-ons for that work (also sourced)

Since my goal was $1,000 to $2,000 over this 30 day period, I feel 100% satisfied that this experiment was a complete success – not just because I hit the immediate monetary goal, but because I have some sustainable income over the next few months. I easily see being able to bump it up to an ongoing $1,000 in the future.

These last seven days had a lot more effort in looking for higher paying business.

• As I mentioned in last week’s report, one of the 5 emails I sent out to SEOs panned out, so that’s contributed to my sourced income and will stretch on for 2 months. And it’s at my higher, ideal rate of $X, so it’s more roughly twice as profitable than the outsourced work I’ve been doing.
• This week I contacted about 25 SEOs, and received about two potential bites, but nothing else. Given that it took a while for my current SEO client to reply to my email, I understand that a certain part of this game is waiting, so I won’t stress.
• This week I also netted a long-term contract at my ideal rate from an old coaching client of mine from a year ago … who just happens to be an SEO expert. I still have no idea why her name wasn’t on the top of my list of contacts. It’s forehead smacking time.

I’m pretty wiped at this point, since generating the lion’s share of this income came from article rewrites and writing endless product descriptions. While that has been amazing for creating a steady stream of income, I don’t think I could be happy sustaining that much rewriting year-round. I’ve discovered that more than ever, I love to do the creative work, writing new things instead of rewriting old – especially since I’ve tasted the higher rates that come with doing original content.

However, it’s nice to know that the rewrite income is there for the taking. I simply wouldn’t have been able to make my goal this month without it. My key advice to new freelancers: don’t think that a less creative job is beneath you – if you’re just starting out, take it, generate some income and then use the magic of dissatisfaction to push you to seek out higher-paying projects as quickly as possible.

My Biggest Lesson From The Last 30 Days

If there’s one lesson I’ve reinforced to myself, it’s that pulling the trigger and taking action is more important than anything. Just jumping in to “see what might happen” has been invaluable – and profitable as well. I have to admit I had my doubts that I could bag writing work at my ideal rate of $X so quickly … but it happened. Not because I was one slick marketer, but because I just got the word out about what I do and what my rates were. Lucky roll of the dice? Perhaps. But the point is that I actually rolled the dice, instead of wondering “what if.”

That’s where having a steady stream of work coming in at 1/2 $X really saved me. If I were a freelancer full-time, or if I was in a tremendous financial pinch, I would have been terrified of using writing as my full-time income. I just couldn’t see myself as being able to ask for $X right from the start, because I’d be afraid of being turned down by everyone and having no revenue stream. But since I had money coming in, that took the edge off. I was able to try to source work without fretting about being rejected, because I had a cushion building. If you’re feeling afraid to ask what for the rate you think you deserve, try this strategy. It just feels better.

What’s Coming Up For The Next 30 Days

Time is tight for the next 30-60 days, so I have to use every moment wisely. I feel very fortunate that I was able to book all my upcoming work at my ideal rate, so my focus will be to get more of the same-paying work in the pipeline. To do that I will try a few strategies to talk the 2 SEOs I’m sourcing work from into giving me additional work. Just as it’s much more profitable to market to existing customers rather than new ones, it’s a more leveraged use of my time to get added value out of my clients.

If I can generate 5-10 hours a week of work at my ideal rate of $X, I’ll be very content with freelance writing. So that’s my focus for now. The other 5+ hours I’m allotting for business will be spent building my own blog content and building my client base (or better yet, finding even higher-paying work).

The Moral Of The Story + The Oscar-esque Link Love

Take action, and don’t be afraid to be rejected. Value yourself, and the work will follow (as long as you’re getting off your a$$ to help find it – or at least to find someone else to find it for you). So buy the $12 eBook already, use it, and join me in a profitable adventure.

Here comes the link love:

• Christine, for writing words that kicked me in the a$$ and got me going,
• James and Harry, for constant encouragement, understanding, and awesomeness,
• Naomi, for inspiring me to reach out to the “itty bitty businesses” (ka-ching, baby, it works!),
• Jon, for giving me a platform for the callout in the first place,
• To all my commenters, new email contacts and readers – you put a smile on my face every day.

Let the commenting begin – I’d love to hear how the Freelance Smackdown series has inspired you to kick a$$ in your own special way. And go ahead and subscribe to this blog if you haven’t already – it’ll do you good!

See you in the comments,

Dave