/// Topics
/// Tips
If you work for
yourself, getting more clients is a no-brainer, right? Clients give you work.
Work pays the bills. Do good work and you get a testimonial. Do this enough
times and you get a great client list... which makes it easier to get more
clients in future. It’s a virtuous circle.
Or is it?One problem with approaching your work purely in terms of "getting more clients," is that it means you will always have to get more clients. If you don’t work, you don’t have billable hours, so you don’t get paid. Time off will always feel like money down the drain. If you’re not careful, you’ll find yourself on a treadmill, unable to get off. Spend too long on the treadmill and you’ll risk burning yourself out.
Another problem is that you will expend all your energy and creative talent on other people’s projects. And what will you have to show for it? At best, a great portfolio, client list, and testimonials. But if you want to keep eating, you’ll need to keep working.
This is the classic dilemma described by Michael Gerber in The E-Myth – sole traders start out with dreams of independence, but find themselves trapped by their own business. They spend all their time working in the business (doing client work), instead of on it (building the business).
Sole traders start out with dreams of independence, but find themselves trapped by their own business.
The solution is to stop thinking like a "freelancer" and start thinking and acting like a creative entrepreneur. This does not mean you need to get VC funding and take on an army of staff. The opportunities created by the internet mean you can carry on as a one-person outfit or micro-business. What it means is that instead of just working for hire, you start creating business assets whose value will increase over time.
If that sounds a bit daunting, consider these four types of asset, that are within the reach of any solo operator:
1. A Brand - create and project a professional and consistent image.
Designer and developer Nick Cernis could operate under his own name, but instead he blogs as Modern Nerd and sells his iPhone apps under the name Spiffing Apps. His websites’ design and copywriting are consistent, memorable, and unmistakeable. And because Spiffing Apps is separate from Nick Cernis, he has the option of selling the business in future, allowing the next owner to inherit the goodwill and reputation associated with the name.
2. Online Properties - build digital real estate that grows in value over time.
David Airey is an independent graphic designer. Since 2006, he has been writing a graphic design blog at DavidAirey.com, and more recently at LogoDesignLove.com. He ploughs thousands of hours a year into his blogs. Hours he could have spent working for clients or hustling for new business. But now he doesn’t have to hustle for business any more. Clients come to his Edinburgh studio from as far afield as Japan and Canada. His blogs have also secured him a book deal with respected imprint Peachpit Press.
3. Permission Assets - build lists of contacts who want to know about your ideas, products, and services.
According to Seth Godin, permission marketing is "the privilege (not the right) of sending anticipated, personal, and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them." A permission asset could be an email list, a blog subscription list, a Facebook group, or a following on Twitter. Every day, Hugh MacLeod sends a cartoon to the folks who subscribe to his email newsletter. They are free to print it themselves or buy a high-quality, limited-edition print from the artist. Enough of them do the latter to make it a very rewarding enterprise for Hugh.
4. Products - turn your knowledge and skills into physical or digital items for sale.
If you can deliver a professional service for clients, you can certainly create your own product range. Doing this successfully means you develop streams of income that increase over time – and it frees you from the treadmill of hourly or daily rates. Photographer and writer Susannah Conway makes a living from her innovative Unravelling e-courses combining photography, community, and personal development. Matthew Inman has freed himself from web design hell by creating the phenomenally popular Oatmeal website as a showcase for his comic strips, which he sells as posters, prints, and in a forthcoming book.
It’s not easy to find time to create these assets – in the short term, it’s easier to justify work on client projects that will put food on the table next month. But for the sake of your long-term health, wealth, and creative fulfilment, you owe it to yourself to make the investment. And it doesn’t have to be a black-and-white choice – think of the Google engineers who spend 20% of their time on personal projects, or David Airey writing his blogs while maintaining a steady flow of client work.
--
How About You?
Supposing you spent one day a week building your own business assets… where would it take your business in a year? 5 years? 10 years?
What’s stopping you? What difference would it make if you found a way around those obstacles?
--
Mark McGuinness helps artists and entrepreneurs create remarkable things at Lateral Action. For bite-sized inspiration follow Mark on Twitter.
Or is it?One problem with approaching your work purely in terms of "getting more clients," is that it means you will always have to get more clients. If you don’t work, you don’t have billable hours, so you don’t get paid. Time off will always feel like money down the drain. If you’re not careful, you’ll find yourself on a treadmill, unable to get off. Spend too long on the treadmill and you’ll risk burning yourself out.
Another problem is that you will expend all your energy and creative talent on other people’s projects. And what will you have to show for it? At best, a great portfolio, client list, and testimonials. But if you want to keep eating, you’ll need to keep working.
This is the classic dilemma described by Michael Gerber in The E-Myth – sole traders start out with dreams of independence, but find themselves trapped by their own business. They spend all their time working in the business (doing client work), instead of on it (building the business).
Sole traders start out with dreams of independence, but find themselves trapped by their own business.
The solution is to stop thinking like a "freelancer" and start thinking and acting like a creative entrepreneur. This does not mean you need to get VC funding and take on an army of staff. The opportunities created by the internet mean you can carry on as a one-person outfit or micro-business. What it means is that instead of just working for hire, you start creating business assets whose value will increase over time.
If that sounds a bit daunting, consider these four types of asset, that are within the reach of any solo operator:
1. A Brand - create and project a professional and consistent image.
Designer and developer Nick Cernis could operate under his own name, but instead he blogs as Modern Nerd and sells his iPhone apps under the name Spiffing Apps. His websites’ design and copywriting are consistent, memorable, and unmistakeable. And because Spiffing Apps is separate from Nick Cernis, he has the option of selling the business in future, allowing the next owner to inherit the goodwill and reputation associated with the name.
2. Online Properties - build digital real estate that grows in value over time.
David Airey is an independent graphic designer. Since 2006, he has been writing a graphic design blog at DavidAirey.com, and more recently at LogoDesignLove.com. He ploughs thousands of hours a year into his blogs. Hours he could have spent working for clients or hustling for new business. But now he doesn’t have to hustle for business any more. Clients come to his Edinburgh studio from as far afield as Japan and Canada. His blogs have also secured him a book deal with respected imprint Peachpit Press.
3. Permission Assets - build lists of contacts who want to know about your ideas, products, and services.
According to Seth Godin, permission marketing is "the privilege (not the right) of sending anticipated, personal, and relevant messages to people who actually want to get them." A permission asset could be an email list, a blog subscription list, a Facebook group, or a following on Twitter. Every day, Hugh MacLeod sends a cartoon to the folks who subscribe to his email newsletter. They are free to print it themselves or buy a high-quality, limited-edition print from the artist. Enough of them do the latter to make it a very rewarding enterprise for Hugh.
4. Products - turn your knowledge and skills into physical or digital items for sale.
If you can deliver a professional service for clients, you can certainly create your own product range. Doing this successfully means you develop streams of income that increase over time – and it frees you from the treadmill of hourly or daily rates. Photographer and writer Susannah Conway makes a living from her innovative Unravelling e-courses combining photography, community, and personal development. Matthew Inman has freed himself from web design hell by creating the phenomenally popular Oatmeal website as a showcase for his comic strips, which he sells as posters, prints, and in a forthcoming book.
It’s not easy to find time to create these assets – in the short term, it’s easier to justify work on client projects that will put food on the table next month. But for the sake of your long-term health, wealth, and creative fulfilment, you owe it to yourself to make the investment. And it doesn’t have to be a black-and-white choice – think of the Google engineers who spend 20% of their time on personal projects, or David Airey writing his blogs while maintaining a steady flow of client work.
--
How About You?
Supposing you spent one day a week building your own business assets… where would it take your business in a year? 5 years? 10 years?
What’s stopping you? What difference would it make if you found a way around those obstacles?
--
Mark McGuinness helps artists and entrepreneurs create remarkable things at Lateral Action. For bite-sized inspiration follow Mark on Twitter.
Creative entrepreneurship is essential to a fulfilling life, the problem is that it can take a long time to earn money from your own endeavors. And of course, nothing is certain. With that said, these are amazing times. It is easier than ever to reach an audience for your art.
The real difficulty is in finding something that is authentic and really you. It is tough to succeed as a copycat artist. It takes courage and perseverance to follow through on something uniquely you.
@ Josh - No generation in particular. Yes, there are a lot of people from the pre-internet generation for whom points 2 and 3 in particular aren't obvious. And it's very encouraging to hear 'everyone' from your design school is doing it. But I spoke about this at a design school recently, and it was news to quite a few of the students.
The key to freedom (financial and otherwise) is to add value to people in ways that transcend time and space. All wealth is created in this manner.
All these suggestions are great... but it takes a LONG TIME to monetize any one of them. So if you agree with the premise of this post, you'll have to figure out a way to balance your urgent need for cash by selling your time, and the important work of creating value that will free you from the bondage of "having to" serve clients.
here are to important ideas for you to consider in value creation:
you must do what matters to you
what you do must matter to others
to your inspired success!
Thomson Dawson
http://www.whitehotcenter.com
@ MartinM - You say:
"This is a good motivation article, but it creates a hope which can't be fulfilled by everyone.
If all creatives around the world followed the instruction and spent hundreds of hours per year blogging, no one would be reading their blogs because everyone else would be busy with writing their own (let's face it there are next to zero clients who read our blogs)."
Firstly - your comment itself demonstrates that this won't happen. Not 'everyone' will do this - a lot of them will be raising the same objections you are. So there's a huge chunk of your 'competition' eliminated already. Not everyone will do it - but you can, if you really want to.
Secondly - the article is about building assets, not just blogging, which I cite as one kind of permission asset. There's no point having a business blog if it's not (a) aligned with your business strategy, and (b) powered by an effective content strategy.
Thirdly - plenty of clients read David Airey's blog. And Hugh MacLeod's. And mine. I don't know whether you blog yourself, but if you do and you're not attracting enough clients for your liking, maybe you could try writing more material targeted at them. And there are plenty of non-clients who read blogs and help attract clients - by blogging, tweeting, forwarding links etc.
"I feel the world actually needs more creatives who stop dreaming about "what if" scenarios and focus on continually improving what their are best at."
Read my article again and you'll see specific, concrete examples of creatives improving what they are best at. Read your own comment and you'll see that most of it is taken up with a 'what if' scenario.