Advanced Freelancing

 Laura is back with a solo podcast to discuss the benefits of taking on freelance projects that are outside your comfort zone. Although her core business is SEO blog writing supplemented by a handful of project management and coaching jobs, Laura recently had the opportunity to assist a client in the development of an advertising budget.  Inspired by this experience in print and digital marketing, she outlines the beauty of accepting opportunities that are not on-brand, the advantages of developing new skills and the ways freelancers can leverage newly discovered abilities to expand and transform their businesses.

Although you might hesitate to accept a project that seems unglamorous or outside your niche, listen and learn how to change your mindset, expand your skill set and uncover your hidden talents!

Key Takeaways

Every project you take on as a freelancer will not be on-brand

• This is especially true for beginners who may not know what they’re good at
• Rather than feeling ‘meh’ about a project that is not ideal, see it as an opportunity

Reasons a freelancer might take on projects outside their comfort zone

• Financial considerations
• Change of pace
• They have the bandwidth and interest

Laura’s guidance about focusing on a niche

• You should concentrate your freelance business on a handful of select offerings
• But don’t close yourself off to other opportunities that come along

The benefits of taking on (and even pitching) opportunities that aren’t a perfect fit

• Develop new skills
• Incorporate new services into your business
• Realize increased marketability

Laura’s advice about choosing projects that aren’t spot on

• Don’t accept a project just because you need the money
• Do assess each opportunity to see if it might be a good fit for your skill set

Complementary offerings allow you to pitch additional services to existing clients

• Developing an expertise in press release composition allows Laura to offer an additional service to clients she already has a relationship with as an SEO blog writer

 Resources

Laura’s Full List of Courses 

Connect with Laura Pennington

Blog 

Twitter 

Website 

Daphne Gray-Grant grew up in the newspaper business. Her parents owned a struggling weekly, where she worked from the age of 16. From there she advanced to the position of senior editor at a major metropolitan daily, supervising a dozen reporters and editors and managing several daily pages. Eventually she spent four years as a director of communications for the newspaper’s parent company.

Today Daphne is a communications consultant, writing and editing coach, and the author of the best-selling book, 8½ Steps to Writing Faster, Better. She is currently working on her second book titled Writing Your Crappy First Draft. Her popular newsletter Power Writing, which is delivered to more than 12,000 readers around the world, helps corporate communicators, business owners and students write better, faster.

Daphne is also the mother of triplets, which only serves to cement her reputation as a compulsive overachiever. This time on the podcast, Daphne walks us through her journey from traditional job to self-employment and teaches us how to manage our time to accomplish long-term goals as we write better – faster!

Key Takeaways

Daphne’s best tip for writing faster without sacrificing quality is to break the habit of editing-while-you-write

• Train yourself to separate the phases of the process: research, mind map, write, then edit
• Avoid stopping to research when you discover a hole in your knowledge

Daphne’s advice for reaching a long-term writing goal:

• Spend the first half hour after you wake up on your big project
• We have maximum willpower and concentration first thing in the morning

What is most important to you may not be the most urgent

• You must make time to work on the projects you love
• For the sake of accountability, Daphne’s clients report to her each day – or she tracks them down!

Daphne’s tips for making a long-term goal into a bite-size, achievable project

• Begin with a word count goal (if the client doesn’t give you one, create an arbitrary one of your own)
• Do the math to determine how many words you need to write per day, working five days a week

Your feeling about your writing is irrelevant to the number of words you produce

• You need distance before you can accurately judge your work
• Daphne encourages writers to wait 6 weeks before editing (on a long-term project)

Select your topics in advance so that you are not faced with a blank page when you sit down to write

Resources

Daphne’s Book 8 ½ Steps to Writing Faster, Better 

Connect with Daphne Gray-Grant

Website and Newsletter Sign-up 

 Frank Salas (also known as the Talented Mr. Salas) is a serial entrepreneur from Texas living the digital nomad lifestyle. He was born homeless to a single mother, English is his second language, he was raised on a rural farm in Mexico, and he dropped out of college to start his first business at the age of 20. Starting with limited resources, Frank leveraged social media marketing to blow up his business and developed a unique skill set of hiring offshore assistants to grow his online empire while leveraging his currency to get the most return on manpower for his dollar. Today he travels the world, sharing knowledge on entrepreneurship with social media. When he’s not live streaming growth hacks for his tribe, the Talent Tribe, he’s probably somewhere on a rooftop smoking cigars or enjoying some yoga and posting it on his Snapchat.

On this episode of the podcast, Frank talks about his all-in attitude toward entrepreneurship, strategies to build your tribe via social media presence, and how you can scale your business through outsourcing. Get ready to get inspired!

Key Takeaways

Frank’s litmus test for deciding if entrepreneurship is for you

• Would you rather work 80 hours a week for yourself and make nothing, or work 40 hours for someone else to earn a salary?

The Four E’s of Value

1. Experience
2. Expertise
3. Emotions
4. End game

Frank’s advice for determining your target followers:

• Don’t say your product/service is for everyone, get specific
• Ask yourself, “Who is the person I want to help?” and figure out how you can make their lives better

Successful entrepreneurs understand that social media is today’s primary marketing strategy and build an online presence to establish their tribe

• Frank recommends live stream video as a way to connect with people who might buy your products or hire you as a speaker or consultant
• Doing complimentary work demonstrates your value

Frank’s guidelines for outsourcing to scale your business:

• Your job is to develop the relationships with clients and close the deal
• Delegate all other work that is not necessary for you to do to virtual assistants
• Establish standard operating procedures for processes

Knowledge is not power… The application and execution of knowledge is the power.

Resources

Trello App 

 Connect with Frank Salas

Facebook Page 

Join Frank’s Email List

Website 

Welcome to the premiere of the Better Biz Academy podcast with Laura Pennington! Laura is a wildly successful freelance writer who creates content for a variety of clients, including entrepreneurs, small business owners, life coaches and law firms. She is also the owner of Six Figure Writing Secrets, a platform through which she teaches new and emerging freelancers how to build and grow their businesses.

In 2012, Laura left a teaching career to pursue freelance writing full-time. In just 18 months, she established a six-figure freelance writing business. She is passionate about teaching others how to skip the trial-and-error stage and fast track their careers in freelance writing. On this episode, Laura covers the benefits of pursuing a freelance writing career and outlines the three things you must have to get started.

Key Takeaways

Don’t fall for the myth that it’s too much work to get started

• There are no startup costs
• You only need a computer, your brain, and an internet connection

While 80% of new businesses fail within the first year, freelance writing is low risk but has a high potential reward

Another benefit of pursuing freelance writing is that it fits in well with other responsibilities

• When you work is up to you

Laura’s 3 Non-Negotiables for Landing Clients:

• Quality writing samples
• Clients will overlook lack of referrals and testimonials if you have killer writing samples
• Determine the niche/industry you want to pursue and research what others are doing in that field
• Consume as many free resources as you can
• Pitch
• Don’t focus entirely on yourself
• Discuss what you can do to help the client reach their goals
• Don’t overwhelm the potential client with too much information
• Willingness to put yourself out there
• You will hear no and/or get no response a lot
• Don’t take rejection personally

Laura’s advice for presenting yourself as a competent professional:

• Don’t present work with grammar or spelling errors; clients will write you off entirely

Resources

Laura’s SEO Writing Course 

Laura’s Full List of Courses 

Connect with Laura Pennington

Blog 

Twitter 

Website