1, 2, 3, or 4: Where are you at in your freelance career?

Greetings, Training for Translators subscribers, and happy 11/11! Today’s free webinar, Getting Started as a Freelance Interpreter, is full (thanks to all 200 people who signed up!) and there are three spots left in the November session of Direct client research lab ($160; personalized direct client marketing advice). We also have a good group signed up for guest instructor Molly Yurick’s upcoming self-paced class, Breaking into the subtitling market ($110) and there’s still room for you! 

This week’s topic: 1,2,3, or 4: Where are you at in your freelance career?

When I teach marketing classes for freelancers, I often ask people to put a number (1-4) in the chat:

Put a 1: If you need more work, in general

Put a 2: If you have enough work, but it’s low-paying

Put a 3: If you have well-paying work, but not enough of it

Put a 4: If things are good (you have well-paying work, and enough of it) 

For the record, I’ve been in all of these situations throughout my freelance career:

• During my first 12-18 months as a freelancer, I just needed more work, end of story.
• Then, I had a decent amount of work, but it didn’t add up to that much money.
• When I finished my conference interpreting degree, I quickly found some well-paying interpreting work, but not enough to meet my financial goals.
• These days, things are good. I’m working a bit more than I’d like to be, but it’s all work that I enjoy, and in this economic climate I’d rather work more and bank the extra money. 

I really like this system, because it’s simple and it forces you to look at the reality of your business. I had a very gratifying conversation with a young freelancer at the recent ATA conference, when they told me, “In the past six months, I’ve gone from a two to a three!” 

Next step: Getting to Four 

Again, this is going to be a simple analysis of a complex situation, but here goes:

• If you’re currently a One, you should be marketing during every second that you don’t have paying work. Keep at it until you have a little more work than you want. That sounds brutal, but it’s key. When I was a beginning freelancer, I made a lot of mistakes, but I did one thing right: every second that I didn’t have paying work, I marketed, including applying to more than 400 agencies during my first year in business. 
• If you’re currently a Two, this is, in my opinion, the hardest situation (and I say that as an optimist!). Why? Because you’re working all the time at low rates. So you’re going to have to carve out the time to market to better-paying clients, either by doing that on top of your regular work day, or turning down some of the low-paying work so that you have time to market. 
• If you’re currently a Three, then you need more clients like the good clients you have now. On the positive side, no client is really that unique. Google or ChatGPT can help you identify your current well-paying clients’ competitors, other clients in that sector, other clients with similar characteristics, and then you can apply to them. 
• If you’re currently a Four, life is good, but don’t get complacent. In this economic climate, things can change quickly. At least one of my big interpreting contracts is going to end in March (because the project that requires the interpreting is ending), so I’m already thinking about how to replace that part of my income. 

Here’s to Getting to Four! Just hit reply if there’s anything you want to ask me or tell me. 
Thanks for reading!

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