Balance Your Biz
SEASON 3, EPISODE 5:
Here's the thing: If you're only offering one service in your freelance business, you're probably on the train to burnout town. What's better? Offering a few (related) services, which helps you pivot when things get wild (hi, pandemic) and allows you to shift when you're feeling low-energy or craving something more vulnerable. This week's coaching session includes a conversation all about balancing your energy in your business. Wudan chats with Maria Paula Rubiano, a freelance journalist based in Colombia. Maria covers environmental justice, and she just graduated from New York University’s Science Health and Reporting Program last winter. She's now an early-career fellow at The Open Notebook. You can check out her work at mariapaularubiano.com and follow her on Twitter: @pau_erre. Wudan and Maria talk about building confidence and business planning, which will feel like familiar ground for those of you tuning into each episode so far this season. (Have we mentioned that so many of us struggle with the same things? You're not alone!) Then they get into bandwidth. For instance, reporting and writing are oftentimes very vulnerable. Creating things is an act of vulnerability, and vulnerability takes a lot of energy out of us! Listen as Wudan helps Maria anchor herself by adding another service to her roster that is not super demanding. If you’re an All-Access member and higher, you’ll get access to several resources along with this episode: a worksheet that helps you evaluate your services based on bandwidth, and a modified confidence log -- a negotiation log -- to track your negotiation wins. If you’re looking to purchase these resources a la carte, we got you: They’re online here. By the way: Listeners of this podcast may also enjoy the podcast Is This Working? Now in its fifth season, Is This Working? is a podcast where two best friends have honest conversations about money, careers and success. Listen wherever you podcast!
Full Transcript Below:
Jenni Gritters- Hey everybody, this is Jenni.
Wudan Yan- And this is Wudan. Welcome back to The Writers' Co-op. How are you doing, Jenni?
J- I am hanging in there. By the time this episode goes live summer will be in full swing, which means I start my coaching training program soon. And I'm actually pretty excited to go back to school. I was in grad school, and I'm a certified yoga teacher, and this feels like kind of another little step in my journey as a student. So I will report back about how the program goes. As of now there's been a lot of homework. We had to do all this pre-work of self-reflection, and figuring out a lot of the stuff that I do with my coaching clients: intention setting and the gap between where you want to be and where you are now. So, you know, fun stuff. I guess, other than that, I'm keeping my workload chill so I can hike and paddleboard. Yep, that's the real stuff. So yeah, Wudan, how are you?
W- I love it. I'm over here, you know, summering, I'm also keeping a moderately low workload. I'm working on two big projects that I can't talk about publicly, and generally just swimming along.
J- Ooh, I love that you have a couple of big projects, especially because we've been talking about you leaning into some things that have a long-term payoff. So that is awesome. I was actually talking to someone the other day about how taking time off is an investment in yourself. Because if you burn out, you literally can't work, you know? So I think we're both being liberal this summer about how much time we're taking off, because this year has just been a lot. And I personally need some time off to balance that out. So you know, I think my goal right now is more so to play, and move my body outside than it is to be super aggressive about my business.
W- Yeah, my entire ideal setup when I first moved to Seattle was to spend the summers being outside. So I really love leaning into that this time of year, taking work that I can do on my own time that doesn't have really quick turnarounds, etc. We also have a full episode about the benefits of being out of office. It's our second to last episode of season one. We will link it to the show notes.
J- Sweet. Okay, so before we launch into today's show, we have a plug for another podcast that we think you might enjoy.
W- Yes, this podcast is called Is This Working? Now in its fifth season, Is This Working is a podcast where two best friends have honest conversations about money, careers and success, much like what we do here. Anna Codrea-Rado and Tiffany Philippou seek to question everything we've ever been taught about work, because they believe that the quality of our lives is as strong as the quality of our work. The two are often joined by guests. So whether it's on issues such as productivity, procrastination, burnout or asking for more, Is This Working has got you covered. They like to say a better working life is coming your way. And you can find is this working on all podcast platforms?
J- Okay. So back to The Writers' Co-op business.
W- Yes, business. So as you probably know, by now we are making a business podcast for freelance creatives. This is season three, just to orient you, and we're organizing this around the theme called the business edit. Basically, we are being Marie Kondo but for freelancers and their businesses,
J- I love the idea that we are Marie Kondo. So basically, we're using coaching as a tool in this season to help freelancers in different stages of their freelance businesses make some changes. If you need an orientation to what coaching is, you'll want to actually listen back to Episode One of this season where we talk about it and we coach each other in that episode as well.
W- Yeah, we've coached folks just starting out, folks who have been in this business for a while and need to change, and more. We've talked about business planning, money, saying no, picking your ideal client, and beyond.
J- So who is on our show this week, Wudan?
W- This week. I spoke with María Paula Rubiano. She is Colombian freelance science journalist who's written for Audubon, Atlas Obscura, Popular Science and more. She covers environmental justice, and recently graduated from New York University's science, health and reporting program last winter. Here is that interview. María, welcome to The Writers' Co-op. Thanks so much for coming on the show.
María Paula Rubiano- Thank you. I'm really excited to be here.
W- Yeah, absolutely. So like I said, these episodes are meant to be mini coaching sessions. And why don't we jump right in. Tell me about your business. What services are you offering right now? And who do your clients typically look like?
M- So the first thing that I think I should say about my business is that it's still pretty young. I just graduated from an NYU master's program. And since I am not from the U.S., I'm actually from Columbia, my freelancing possibilities were different to someone that is American citizen. So because of that I really started freelancing as a full time kind of thing in January. And what I've done until now is mostly writing stories, some shorter ones, mostly in the 2000 or 1500 range. I've also edited some stuff for a Colombian NGO. And I've also translated several of my own stories. And I'm just starting to translate the stories for Audubon, which is kind of my more stable client. I'm translating stories that someone else is writing. I'm editing them in Spanish.
W- So María, that sounds like a really diverse set of skills that you have, being bilingual, even though you feel like you're just a few months out. Why don't you tell me a little bit about your current work schedule? Like how many hours a week are you working? And how many vacation days are you taking in the last quarter, for instance?
M- So I am working nine to six probably, every day. I like to take one or one and a half hour to eat lunch. So that's probably like eight hours a day. So 40 a week. And I don't know if weekends count as vacation here. I try to take them almost religiously. I feel like Columbia work culture is very different from in the states so I didn't want to pick up any bad habits in regards to giving myself free time. Sometimes, especially when I'm on deadline, I probably will work until like 11/12 in the night for a couple of days in the week. So if it's like a regular week, I think nine to six. But if it's like deadline week, probably three of the days of the week, I will be working unitl midnight.
W- Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. With that work schedule in mind, what do you think your bandwidth is? Do you feel burnt out? Do you feel like you have capacity for more? Where are you on that scale?
M- No, it's a good question. Because I mean, I'm not feeling extremely stressed, which for me is success. I'm a really stressed person by nature. Very anxious. So this schedule is working. And I feel like I could even push a little bit harder, you know, write some stories that are simple. Because most of the things that I'm writing are kind of longish, like a short feature kind of thing. And I love them, but they require so much like mental effort and like calling so many people and I worked in a newspaper for almost three years. So I kind of miss writing those fast turn around, easy, entertaining kind of stories that could pay good money, allow me to have a more steady income and not requiring so much emotional mental energy for me.
W- Yeah, absolutely. Features feel really gratifying once they're done for me as well. But the process kind of makes me want to tear my hair out.
M- Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I mean, they are not like feature-features. They are like under the 2000-word mark, that. I don't know if this is like a problem with me. But I tend to over report stories. And I see them as short features. I don't know how else to explain it.
W- Those short features can actually be the most tricky because you're trying to convey so much information in a packed space such that the amount of reporting that goes in needs to be condensed to that word length.
M- Yeah, exactly. you interviewed like 10 people, and then you have like 1200 words to pack them all in.
W- María, tell me what you're hoping to get out of this meeting. What are the top two or three things that you're hoping to troubleshoot in your business right now?
M- So I feel like I have like two main kind of concerns. One, I think I've already kind of mentioned it, which is to get something some sort of like income that doesn't require that much mental energy and that is like a faster and more steady income. Because right now since I am working on these kind of short features, they're great, but they also take months to get done and be paid. So right now I'm like running really low on the money aspect. And I would like to learn how to pitch and get some sort of client that will allow me to have weekly income, just to get the day to day stuff just sorted out. That's the first thing, getting clients for these faster turn around things. They don't have to be even journalism. I wouldn't mind doing content if it's not against my beliefs or if it doesn't interfere with my journalism. And the other thing that I think is kind of important to me is I would love to finish this year landing like a feature in a household name publication or at least next year, because I love like the places that I'm working, but I would also love to have a byline in more generally known publications, if that makes sense. Because I feel like I have enough clips and enough experience to break into those places. But I don't know how. And I feel like a lot of the stories, not all of them, but a lot of the stories I'm pitching are from Latin America. And sometimes it's a tough sell. Because, you know, a lot of editors still are very American centric in their interests.
W- That's great. Can I summarize what you basically just said to me?
M- Yes.
W- So in essence, it sounds like you're looking to build a more stable freelance business so you have time and space to pursue something more ambitious that you can sell to a more general audience publication.
M- Yeah, that makes sense. That's a good way to connect those two ideas.
W- Yeah, I think this is one thing I try to make a lot of my coaching clients see is that a lot of their goals are very interconnected. And issues don't really exist in isolation. There's something that's the connective tissue. So why don't we actually dig into the money aspect of the business at first. Tell me a little bit about how much you're making every month now and how much ideally you would make every month for your business.
M- Yeah. So it varies a lot what I've made this year. So in January, I got paid two stories that I published last year, and it was about $1200. I had some savings. So that's how I've been surviving basically these months. And so in February, I only got paid $400 for just this— It wasn't a journalistic thing. It was another thing. So only $400, I was living in Colombia, so that really helped with the expenses. You have to know that $1 is equivalent to 3000 pesos. So 3000 pesos is not a lot. But it's like if tripled the amount of money that I have available. So $400 for that month was amazing. Well, not amazing, but the basic stuff could be covered with that. And so then in March, I got paid 100 euros, I don't know how much is that in dollars, and I'm getting like $120? I don't know. And another $600 for something else. And now in April, I'm getting paid $3200 because a lot of the stories that I've been working on in the last couple of months are going to be paid because they finally were published or were close to publishing. So yeah, you might say it's really unstable.
W- Yeah, that's actually part of the nature of a lot of relying on just journalism, I think, because it takes time to put out pitches and then develop story ideas. And then stories are in different forms of edits or at different stages. And when they publish, that might all coincide at a certain point in time. And then the payments also come through at the same time. So what you're describing sounds really normal. But tell me your ideal situation, how much money on average would you make, maybe not per month, because as we've seen, it's pretty variable, but maybe every quarter.
M- So I think for me, around $12,000, a quarter will be perfect. Why? Because my plan is to live in Colombia. I know that sounds like very little the cost of living in Colombia, it's way lower than it will be living in the States. And my plan is to stay there to do the journalism that I love from that place of the world. And, you know, with that amount of money, it will be very comfortable for me to pay my debt, to save money for vacation or buy a house or, you know, all of this stuff.
W- You know, the number that we strive to make isn't it's not up to other people to judge if it's too little or too much. It's is it enabling you to live the life you want? If I were to coach you consistently, I would actually have you fill out a business plan and figure out what these numbers are and how they actually affect your hourly rate. Okay, you told me $12,000 per quarter. That comes to $4,000 every single month. Let me ask a different question, which kind of will help answer how much of that might have to come from a steady client. So it sounds like $4,000 a month can be the goal but how much do you need to cover your bills and rent and healthcare insurance if that's the thing there? How much does it cost for you to live?
M- I think like the most basic will be around maybe $1,000 or $1200 to cover all the basics.
W- Okay, that's a really good start. So the framework that I have is about a third of your income every single month should support what you need to survive. Where do you think that can come from?
M- That is a good question. I don't know. I mean, I'm guessing it could come from stories, just like basic news stories. I think writing perhaps two or three of them a month could cover those expenses, if they are paying $500, $400 each.
W- You mentioned a bunch of other skills when we were describing your services. On your scale of desirability of utilizing your editing or your translation skills, or even writing for different clients like the NGO that you mentioned and broadening that perhaps: Or how do you envision those skills and services fitting into you making a third of that income you want every single month?
M- I would love to get, for example, a job translating something steadily for someone. But I found that at least for me, it has been more than Oh, we love this story. We also want to publish it in Spanish. Can you translate it? But I don't know how to find like places where, you know, you offer your translation skills? I don't know how to find those clients. And I feel like, that's been kind of tricky. The editing gigs I've got in Spanish and things like that are through clients or through someone recommending me. So the NGO, I'm editing this huge report that they wrote, and that was like a significant income. But yeah, someone recommended me. It's not like, they were looking for it, or they did a call for editors. So I wouldn't know how to offer those services.
W- So it sounds like you've gotten a lot of work from referrals.
M- Yes.
W- Here's how I would think about it. And again, if I were coaching you regularly, another piece of homework—and I'll send this to you in a follow up email as well—is build an ideal client base. Like are there NGOs that you could sell your services to? Could you list translation or editing as a service on your portfolio page and say you're open for work? Could you go to newsrooms that commonly take stories and translate them into Spanish and see if you can be added on their roster? Basically, I'm kind of asking you to take control of who your clients are even though it's easy to get referrals. You don't have to put in any of that legwork in securing a client. Another idea would have is going back to some of those same clients and asking if they have additional translating, editing, etc, needs. How do you feel about those options?
M- I like that, I think you've mentioned these in a previous episode of the podcast. And I feel like having a variety of activities in your work is one of the things that I have been enjoying the most about freelancing. It gets really draining when you're only writing and researching or reporting. So I don't mind translating or working with other materials that are not related to journalism, because I feel like it gives me some air to breathe and to better think about my stories. So I love those options.
W- Can I say something that I've noticed you just said, which is you said that you find writing and reporting a little draining. And yet when I asked you how you think you can fill that $1200 every single month, writing and reporting was the first thing you said.
M- That is so true.
W- How do you reconcile that?
M- I have no idea I don't know how to explain this. I don't I don't know if this is the correct wording but someone I don't know someone said like, Oh, I hate writing but I love having written. I don't know if this is a true quote from a writer or not. But that is exactly how it feels. I find journalism really emotionally demanding, mentally demanding, but I absolutely love doing it. I don't know how to explain it. It's a love/hate relationship.
W- Oh, yeah, I'm a glutton for punishment, too.
M- So I mean, I love it. But I don't want it to be everything. You know what I mean?
W- Absolutely. Let's talk about rate setting. How about that because I think that's also going to help you achieve some of your income goals. When you get a new story for about $400 or $500, how do you make the business decision to take on that assignment or not?
M- I almost always calculate the rate per ward. I don't know if that is a good idea. I know that you don't recommend that. It's better to think about how many hours you're going to work on that and calculate the hourly rate. But I usually do it on that way. And sometimes I feel like it's enough and sometimes I feel like it's not after I'm done. So especially if it's with a new editor which, these days, almost everyone I'm working with our new editors, because I'm very new. I feel kind of bad asking for more money, especially if I already signed a contract. So yeah, I don't know if that's the correct way to do it. But that's the way I've done it. Like I try not to get on there 50 cents per word. If it is, it's because it's a story that will demand a lot of energy, or because I think it's an important kind of editor to know. But I try not to get like below that.
W- Yeah, it's interesting listening to you talk through money in the context of being relatively young in the field, being based in a place that is relatively cheap, and affordable to live in compared to a lot of major cities in the U.S. And it's interesting to hear you talk about how you think about whether to take on a story or not. And I think there's a lot to unpack in there. Let me ask you this: when a story that pays $400 or $500 comes in and you did the per word calculation, and in the end you realize you spent way too much time on it, how does that make you feel?
M- Like I'm robbing myself. Like I'm a very bad boss to myself. But at the same time, I feel like journalists have these kind of weird relationship with their own work where we romanticize so much of it. So it's like, Yeah, I know, I spent too much time on it. But like, I didn't want to write a mediocre story. Because why I chose to do freelancing is because I was like, Okay, then I will have control over how much time I spend on a story. And I won't have to write mediocre stories, which we all journalists that have been in a newsroom probably wrote at least one. So yeah, I'm robbing myself. But at the same time, it's really hard for me to reconcile the fact that I don't want to do mediocre work if I'm freelancing.
W- Yeah. So if you had it your way, power structures and all of that aside, what is the ideal business scenario for you to be doing journalism at a high quality level? What does that look like? How much are you getting paid?
M- So like, the ideal situation, I think for everyone, I don't know, well, maybe not everyone, but at least for me, it will be at least $1 a word. I think that's what's fair a lot of the time. Or getting paid around 30 dollars an hour. And also in my ideal world, you would be able to renegotiate after the thing is done. If it took you more reporting than you originally envision, and more time, and a lot of edits, I feel like in the ideal world there would be room to renegotiate the amount of money you're getting paid.
W- Do you think that ideal world exists?
M- I think it could. I think I could create it, but I feel like since I am so new in negotiating my rate with clients I am not entitled to do that. Which is kind of sad. But that's how I feel. Like I'm not entitled yet to ask an editor for more money after I wrote a story.
W- What if I told you that you've already started really earning your stripes? What is your immediate reaction to that?
M- I don't know. Why, would you say that?
W- Do you believe that? I mean, I'm asking you: Do you think you've done enough at this point to prove yourself as a journalist editors and readers should trust?
M- I feel like I have. I feel like we're getting in very in a very sensitive area, which is, I feel that some times some editors underestimate me or my ideas because my background is not U.S.-based. It feels kind of weird. But I feel like it's like some editors brush off the fact that I have three years of experience covering biodiversity and environmental issues in the most biodiverse country in the world. I feel like some editors don't think that's good experience, and I feel like it is. But sometimes I feel like I don't believe in myself. And I let those external thoughts on my work and the value of my ideas and my work say, No, no, you just graduated graduate school, you're not allowed to do these things that more experienced journalists are allowed.
W- Yeah, I hear you talking to questions of confidence right now a lot. And that ties into the rest of your business. That's what it sounds like. Would you say that's correct?
M- Yeah. I would say that's correct. It's embarrassing that it's correct. But I think it is.
W- No, I think this is super relatable! And as we roll out these episodes, this is one exercise Jenni and I keep drawing people to is build a confidence log. In the secret episode of, I believe, our first season, we talked about how confidence and bravery is a muscle that you exercise. It's not just a meme when women of color say pitch yourself with the confidence of a white man with a patchy beard. It is a lot of manifesting and practicing and flexing this muscle that I'm talking about right now. So in this confidence log that we're having, and I'll send it to you as well, is proving to yourself that you have really worked up to your own standards, and the work that you put out is good. And whether it's negotiating for $50 or $100, more, whether it's just telling yourself that you're not going to work for less than $1 a word and sticking to it, right? Those are all acts of bravery. And the more that we do these things, the stronger our boundaries become, and those boundaries are going to help us run our business. And the other thing I wanted to say is that that ideal world you described, where you're getting paid at least $1, a word that allows you space, you're working with editors who respect you and your expertise, and you can renegotiate the contract if there's scope creep, I would argue that that exists. And let me throw this question to you: How do you think is the way to get there for you?
M- Well, I feel like not being so scared of asking. If it is the first time for me working with an editor, I almost never asked more money because he's like Oh, they're giving me the opportunity. Which I know is the completely wrong way to think about it. But I don't know how to do that if they haven't worked with me yet.
W- Do you think about money as a game? How do you think about money?
M- I think about money as a thing that it's necessary to live. My mom always taught me that it should be a source of calmness or something that won't shoot and cause you anxiety, either because you know, you don't have enough or either because you have too much of it. To me, it's more likethis thing that I need to be really focused on the things that I care and that I like about life.
W- Yeah, you're describing it as a tool.
M- Yeah, it's more a tool for me.
W- Exactly. And I think the kind of flip side of that coin of being a freelance business owner is thinking about money as a game. So if you can get a little more every single time with a new client— say your typical rate for 1500 word story is $400, can you ask for 450 if that's not as scary as asking for $500. I think the game is really just asking for a little bit more every single time. What's your reaction to that?
M- I feel like I feel more comfortable if it is small, incremental steps. So like, okay, maybe once I land like new assignments, I can ask for 50 more dollars, even if it's not a lot. Like I think it will start this confidence muscle that you talk about. I feel like it's a good place to start the workout. And then scale it up. I think that is feasible.
W- Yeah. I love that. I'd love for you to try that. And log what happens in that confidence log.
M- Yeah, I mean, that is a good idea. Like, I will make it a goal.
W- Uh huh. So we're almost up on time. But I do kind of want to bring this full circle. And I feel like this is the second interview that I've done for this upcoming season where I kind of bring you, the coaching client, in all sorts of directions and then tie it together. Because you came in wanting to talk about getting more stable income, and then also landing a story with a big publisher. With that first category of stabilizing your income, we talked about brainstorming ways to make the money that you need to hit: a third of that $4,000 every single month. We didn't calculate your hourly rate. I will have you do that in a worksheet but I want you to go into every new client negotiation with, if not that rate, at least double, if you feel comfortable with that. That's where I want you to work your confidence up to.
M- Whoa!
W- But María, this goes with what I was saying. It's kind of a game to see how much you can get a client to book you for. Because it's not just you living in a place with a lower cost of living. It's the value that you are providing to a client. And sometimes the translation of a story for it to reach a much broader audience, that value is actually extremely high. So I wouldn't undermine or under sell that service. And I think stabilizing your income will naturally allow you to take bigger risks. And so to address your point of landing a story with a larger publisher, my question for you, and you don't have to answer me right now is Do you know who those publications are? And can you start sending very targeted pitches to editors there?
M- Well, I feel like in some publications, I know who to pitch and the kind of stories they're interested in. But a question that I would like to ask you is, do you think it's better to first start pitching smaller stories? This is a recommendation they gave us at grad school, which is try to pitch first small stories, like the single study kind of thing. And then once you have that confidence with that editor, then pitch them a big one. I don't know what your takes are on that. And also, just so I don't forget, like how much negotiating is too much negotiating? Because I feel like sometimes I negotiate. And they reach back with less than I asked for and I don't know if I should push again.
W- Yeah, let me answer both questions in the order that you posed them. Continuing to write quick turnaround news stories is only going to get you better at writing quick turnaround news stories. If the thing that you ultimately want to write for a publisher, is a long form magazine story, I usually try to pitch at that level so the editors know how I think about stories. And there are editors who I've pitched for a while who have continually rejected my ideas. And every rejection, I feel a little closer as to understanding what that publisher wants. So find an editor who will happily sit and read your pitches and provide some useful feedback and pitch those more ambitious stories too, right? Because, as you said, you feel like you haven't produced anything mediocre to date yet. And that's powerful. So whatever you're doing is already working to an extent. And the second question about negotiating power: this goes for journalism and non-journalism clients, but I not only work within the parameters of their budgets. So you know, you told me in your ideal world, that you wouldn't work with publishers who pay less than $1 a word, right. So that's also a boundary that I have in my business. And so I'm ignoring everywhere else that pays 50 cents, 75 cents a word, and just gunning for places that pay more. My negotiating power can be a little more at those places, too. So I've gotten not exactly double. People have gotten double a going rate. People have gotten 5x or 6x publication standard rates. But think about the value of the story that you're bringing to that client, or the value of your services that you're providing an NGO or somebody who's looking to translate their story. There's a lot of room to negotiate. And I will say for a lot of non-journalism clients, you can go to them and say, these are my rates. Does that work for you? I would love to work together.
M- So but for example, if you are already negotiating with an editor, when do you stop the negotiation?
W- I think you have to know your walkaway point like you can never negotiate up. You can only negotiate down if a client doesn't like it. So when you're proposing that first fee you want to get make sure it's higher than what you think is most reasonable.
M- That makes sense. And if the auditor is the first one to offer a rate, then you should say "no" and ask for more. It's about what you want, right?
W- It honestly depends, right? Because if an editor tells me Oh, we only have the budget to do $1,000 for this piece, in my mind, I think oh, that's like 12 hours of my time. Can I do this story in 12 hours? If yes, okay. If not, I will probably ask for a little bit more. So that's where the business plan, which I will send you, comes in handy because every negotiation is different. Sometimes it's not about money. Sometimes it's about rights, or indemnity or your payment schedule. So we talked about this in our first season episode on negotiating, which is know what you need to make the assignment happen and know at what point you're going to walk away because you can't get everything.
M- That makes sense.
W- And being strategic about your pitches too. Like, is this story a good fit for this publisher? All right, María. Well, I hope this half hour mini coaching session was helpful. And like I said, I will follow up with the related homework and worksheets that can help you clarify the vision that you have for your business so you can land that clip in a publisher of a general readership audience, and also have stable sources of income. How does that sound?
M- It sounds so great. Thank you so much for inviting me. It was really, really helpful.
W- Absolutely. Well, thanks again, and talk to you soon.
M- Thank you, bye!
J- You know, I really enjoyed the moment in this interview, when you pointed out to María that even though she first thought about building her client base to include more writing that could actually be really exhausting
W- Yeah, I feel like I do this a lot in coaching sessions. I think it's hard for people to listen to themselves. And it's easier for us to reflect that back to them. I think it is easy to forget that what is easy is not necessarily desirable, or rather, what we know to work might not be desirable. And I think you've talked about that before, too.
J- Yeah. For me, I need a mix of services. And a lot of writing for me is very vulnerable. I think you're putting your thoughts and your synthesis out there in the world for other people to read. And you do not know how they are going to respond. And for me, feature writing and personal essays are really emotionally intensive. So while I know I'm good at making these and I know I generally liked to write these, doing more of that work would actually cause me to burn out. So I need to balance that work with editing and coaching. And while, I mean, you all have listened to three seasons of this, you know my business model. But for me, really the magic is in the mix of services, not just doing one thing.
W- One of the pieces of homework I've sent María's is to think about what services would work best for her, and what the balance could be like to balance out that outward energy of writing. So what is that emotional lift for writing, editing, fact-checking social media and more?
J- I love this, you know, we usually ask people to think about upfront in our business planning guides, we say what kind of work have you done in the past? And how has it worked for you? Like which thing is more taxing, which was less taxing? And I think this is actually similar to building an ideal client list. Like it's figuring out what you want to do before diving in. So rather than just doing what feels habitual, and then hitting burnout six months in, you're sort of making an educated guess about what you think would work best for you and starting there, which I think saves us a lot of grief. That introspection is very worth it. So it was really, really great to hear that play out in a coaching session, I think, Wuan.
W- Totally. The one other place I find coaching clients like María, who are relatively new to the field, but already have done good work is that they're often afraid to break out of a lower paying tier of publications when it comes to journalism work.
J- And I think a big part of that is mindset work. It's the stuff that we talk about believing that you are good enough and that your work is valued enough to ask for more. But this industry definitely does not operate on that mindset. So for you to operate on that mindset, I think, is very counterculture. So in journalism and media, the governing idea is that you're lucky. You're lucky to get a byline. You're lucky that you're getting paid at all. And, you know, Wudan, I'm obviously not about that. I know neither are you, right? Evidence suggests that people like María are skilled and competent. And, you know, having confidence makes sense, right? And you know, asking for a living wage is not asking for too much.
W- Yeah, I can't believe we have to say that. But yes. And sometimes I have clients tell me, I literally can't afford to work for that little because I'll go broke. And I think that's a big inflection point for many people as well. And it's a big moment for any business owner. It tells you that something needs to change. So I've also sent María some exercises to work on confidence building. But it's a different type of confidence log from where we've talked about before, where she can specifically track her wins and rate or contract negotiations. Again, working the negotiation muscle gets stronger. And of course, I wanted her to create a client list that can help her make those income goals.
J- I think a reminder for everybody out there listening: if you're negotiating for something that you deserve, and even if someone says No, that doesn't necessarily mean that you're being unreasonable. In fact, the other day I met with a client who asked me if I thought her rates were correct, so we were looking at them, like her different pricing for different services. And eventually I asked her if anyone had ever pushed back on any of her rates or even taken a while to respond, indicating that maybe it wasn't something that they could meet when she was pitching her prices. And she said she had never gotten any pushback. And I offered that perhaps it would be a time to push the rate until she started to get some pushback, because I think the occasional No is actually a good sign.
W- I think I saw from another freelancer at some point that if you're not being told No to your rates more than around a third of the time, you're not pricing yourself high enough. But anyway, if you're an All Access member who wants to become your own hype squad, so you can shoot for better clients and more pay you will want this worksheet pack.
J- Yeah, absolutely. And you know, as we've done with previous episodes, we're going to wrap up this homework into a little workbook and put it on our website. So if you're a Patreon member, you get it for free. If not, you can still get access to it, we will link in the show notes. And with that said, you know, the Patreon membership is probably worth the money if you're going to go buy it because you also get access to the Slack channel, which has been hopping lately. We talk about stuff like this: rates, and negotiation, and tricky clients, mindset monsters. It's a good place to be. A lot of good camaraderie. Yeah, I think that is it for today. Right, Wudan?
W- Yes. One more thing. We are offering a few online courses as well. If you're just getting started with building your freelance business, you'll probably want to check out our business basics for freelance writers. You'll walk away with a business plan that you can use right away. So much of what we talked about today can be found in that course. And if you're just getting started with negotiating, our contracts course is perfect for you. We even had a lawyer work with us to create boilerplate legalese that you can use right away when you walk away from that class. And so apart from that, we will be back in two weeks on the airwaves with more.
J- I love it. I will talk to you soon , Wudan.
W- Bye, Jenni.
J- Season three of The Writers' Co-op is made possible by you, our listeners. This season is hosted by me, Jenni Gritters and my co-host, Wudan Yan. And the podcast would not be possible without the help of our producer, Jen Monnier and our editor, Susan Valot.
