This is my third month for disclosing my freelance writing income. If you missed the first two, check out July and August; it will give you a good idea of where I am coming from and what I have accomplished as of late.
My income in September was spread out pretty evenly from beginning to end. Even though a lot of my income came from repeat clients, I also secured several new jobs during the month. This should definitely help to increase my income throughout October, and hopefully far into the future.
Here are my freelance writing income stats for September 2007.
Number of Completed Projects: 21
Payment by PayPal: 19
Payment by Check: 1
Payment by Bank Wire: 1
Total Income: $4,891.16
September’s income was not quite as high as last month. But with that being said, on average, I only worked 4 hour days last month. I spent the second half of each day, as well as the weekends, working on some new projects. While I would like to spend eight hours a day on freelance writing alone, in order to get other projects up and running I need to concede time somewhere. Even though I cut back on my hours, my income remained above $4,500 which is what I strive for month in and month out.
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Making a solid income as a freelance writer is more than possible. I must admit, when I first started out I was scared that reaching a reasonable income level would never happen. But within a few months things started to break my way, and the rest is history. This is not to say that making a living as a freelance writer is easy, but it is a career path that you can follow if you put your mind to it.
Here are three keys that are essential if you are interested in working as a freelance writer, and of course, making enough money to support yourself.
1. During the early stages of your career do not be afraid to take lower paying jobs. This does two things for you. First off, low paying jobs will give you confidence in your writing skills. Even though you are not getting paid a lot, you are getting to practice your craft. Additionally, these lower paying jobs can add up over the course of a month. If you do not have any other jobs on the table, why would you pass these up? Any work is better than no work.
2. If possible, make yourself available to write on a variety of different topics; at least when you are getting started. This will give you the ability to service a wide range of clients, and also get a better feel for what topics you like and don’t like.
3. It is essential to turn one project into another. In other words, you need to garner repeat business. This is the lifeblood of a freelance writer. Once you find several clients who hire you time after time, you will notice that your freelance writing income is building.
These three tips should help you when chasing your dream of making a solid freelance writing income.
Freelance writers have the ability to control their own income in more ways than one. First off, the time that you put in will be directly related to how much money you earn. I have found this out time and time again. In addition to the actual money you make, you may also have the ability to control when you receive it from clients. The question is: should you cash in now or hold off until the new month begins?
There are two ways of looking at this scenario. There is a side of me that likes to hold money over from one month to the next so that I can get off to a “good start.†For example, I have three invoices from the month of September that total more than $1,500. Even though I am confident that I could send them and get the money within a day or so, I have decided to hold off until after the first of the month. This way I can add the money to my October total, which will make things much less stressful during the early days of the month.
The downside of holding off on sending invoices is that clients can and will disappear. One situation in particular stands out in my mind. I was working with a client who I thought I could trust. For this reason, I decided to push their $750 invoice from one month to the next. The result was the client disappearing for weeks, and upon coming back into the picture, paying me in small chunks of the entire voice. Of course, this still may have happened if I would have sent the invoice right away, but something is telling me that as I was waiting they spent my money on other things.
The only time I will hold money over is when I know the client is good for it. In other words, never wait if you are working with a client for the first time. You might as well invoice them right away in order to give yourself the best chance for payment. Not to mention the fact that they will probably appreciate this as well.
What income level do I have to reach in order to start thinking about holding money over? For me, this usually comes around the $4,500 to $5,000 mark. With my current workload this is the minimum amount of money that I want to earn each month. So if I hit this mark and there are only a few days left in the month, I will usually wait until the next month to send invoices. But if I reach this income plateau earlier, say the middle of the month, I obviously push on.
This is one aspect of a freelance writing business that has nothing to do with producing content. But as you can imagine, it is very important. After all, you are working to collect money!
