Still Stuck in a 9–5? — 3 Phase to Go Full-Time Freelance
Freelancing isn’t just about money - it’s about control, flexibility, and designing a life you don’t need to escape from
If you are sick of job interviews, cover letters, waiting for a promotion, asking for a raise, getting ghosted by companies, and having an annoying boss, freelancing might be the perfect job for you.
How To Start Freelancing
I started freelancing, actually, back in high school. I got my first freelancing client, my family owned a small recording studio, and we would have bands come in.
I recommend making these like little music videos for them, and charging 300 bucks. But I always thought that I was going to get a full-time job.
I always thought that, throughout film school, I would graduate, move to New York, and get a full-time job at NBC.
I thought I was going to be going to 30 Rock every day and working in an office.
But then, when I graduated, I was actually in the middle of directing my first feature film.
I actually couldn’t get a full-time job because I needed to leave the country to go film.
So in the meantime, I started just picking up gigs wherever I could.
I started freelancing, working on set, and I found out that not only do I really like freelance video editing, but I was also told I was pretty good at it.
I would just get to edit videos and get paid by the hour.
Then, 2 years into it, I was making 6 figures and not even working full-time.
So if you’re somebody who’s looking for a flexible job, a work-from-home job, a job where you can actually make a decent amount of money, freelancing might be that for you.
Let’s look at the pros.
#1. Pros of Freelancing
- You get to work from wherever you want in the world.
- You can travel wherever you want, whenever you want. Autonomy, you have complete control over your own life and your days.
- Unlimited income, you can make however much or as little you want, depending on your rates and how much you want to work.
- No boss, no people, no annoying co-workers, no office politics, no being told where and when to be, and how to do something.
You are entirely in control of your own life, your own days, and your own career.
#2. Cons of Freelancing
- It’s unstable. You are not getting a paycheck every 2 weeks.
- Some months will make a lot of money, some months you won’t make any money.
But we are going to talk more about that later in this story.
- No benefits. No 401 (k) match, no healthcare plan, it’s all up to you.
- It can be difficult if you don’t have an entrepreneurial or business mindset.
- If you’re not somebody who is driven by money, success, and results, freelancing probably isn’t the best career for you.
- You have to be disciplined. You have to be able to wake up in the morning when you have no meetings.
- And no boss telling you what to do. You have to figure out what to do to make money that day.
But we are going to get into all of this in the story.
Phase 1
So let’s talk about the 3 steps you need to take to get ready.
Step 1: You Have To Pick A Skill
That is the first step. You’re not making an LC, you’re not making business cards, you’re not doing any of that stuff.
You’re just picking your skill. You want to pick a skill that you’re naturally good at.
And you don’t mind doing it because you’re going to be doing it all the time. You also want to pick a skill that’s in demand.
For example, you could try to freelance as a soccer player, but there’s not much demand for freelance soccer players.
And if you’re wondering, Aaron, how am I supposed to find what in-demand skills are out there?
First of all,
- You can go to websites like Upwork or Fiverr and browse who’s hiring for what.
- You can search in the industry where you are already working to see what Freelancers exist in that industry.
- But you have to pick something that’s in demand. The creative industry uses Freelancers like it’s their business.
If you want to charge like hundreds of dollars an hour, I would definitely go into marketing or Tech. And then there’s a bunch of other freelance gigs.
Step 2: Don’t Quit Your Job
Now your freelancing approach differs if you’re early, mid, or advanced in your career.
And in my guide, I actually break down each of those.
So, for example, if you’ve been a graphic designer for 20 years, your approach is going to be entirely different than somebody who’s been a graphic designer for 2 years.
Because you already have a built-out portfolio and connections.
But somebody new doesn’t have anything yet. But the most important thing in the beginning for anybody is not to quit your day job.
You want to ramp up your freelancing career as you ramp down your professional 9 to-5 career.
So, as you’re working your day job, what’s paying your bills, what’s working for you right now, you want to spend your nights, your mornings, your weekends, whatever other spare time you have, building up your freelance career.
And again, that is going to look different depending on how experienced you are.
But for most of you who are beginners or early career, it’s going to look like this.
Phase #1: Don’t quit your day job
Ramp up your freelance career. We’ve established that.
Phase #2: Priority is picking that skill.
Picking that hard skill.
- What is going to be your offering?
- What’s the market demanding?
Step 3: Saving up a 3 to 6-Month Emergency Fund
This is a non-negotiable. So before you even think about attempting to freelance full-time, you must have 3 to 6 months of an emergency fund saved up.
So that is your living expenses for 3 months, preferably 6 months, saved up in a bank account.
It can be in a high-yield savings account. It doesn’t matter where it is.
You just need to have access to it in case something happens, you know, like a global pandemic.
No seriously. I had to dip into my Fund in April 2020. It was not a good time.
Not only is this practical advice, but if you have a dry spell, you can pay your rent that month; it’s so important for your emotional and mental sanity.
You know that you always have that little pillow to fall back on.
Step 4: Set Deadlines For Yourself
A problem that a lot of people have is that they say they’re going to try freelancing.
But they don’t really have anybody to hold them accountable. And it kind of just slips down into the ether.
So you want to say by this date, I’ll have my website up and running. By this date, I’ll have 2 clients.
By this date, I’ll have my offering. That timeline can be as stretched as you want.
But it’s just so important to yourself to keep those promises to yourself.
Step 5: Build your portfolio.
If you’re just starting, people aren’t going to pay you your true rate quite yet.
You can reach out to local companies, friends, and family, and just ask them if you can do some free work for them.
And that is going to help you build your portfolio, which is so, so important. Okay, so if you’ve graduated from phase one.
Phase 2
As a freelancer, people always ask me, Aaron, do I really need a website.
To which I reply, all you need is a website. That is the most important thing.
99 % of the companies that you apply to in your first year are going to see your website before they meet you.
Your website is who you are. And that’s a great thing because you can design your website however you want.
You can make it look fantastic. I personally use Squarespace for my portfolio.
But I know other people like Cargo Collective, Wix.com, and then of course, there’s WordPress.
But yes, you must have a beautiful, functional, professional portfolio.
Step 6: You’re Going to Want to Start Aggressively Reaching Out
So you’re going to want to send at least 10 to 20 cold emails a week. You’re going to want to create a spreadsheet.
Of all the potential companies that you want to work for. You need to reach out to all your warm connections.
Reach out to people that you went to school with. Announce that you’re freelancing on LinkedIn.
You need to regularly follow up. Remember, an email doesn’t count if you haven’t followed up yet.
And just like a little side note here, I teach freelancing for people who want to make a lot of money and not work that much.
There are lots of other people who teach about freelancing who are going to teach you about how to bid and how to win gigs, and how to get around Upwork and Fiverr and get those jobs.
That’s one way to approach freelancing. That’s like how 99% of Freelancers globally approach it. I personally would recommend not playing that game.
It’s exhausting, your Roi isn’t going to be good, and it’s not sustainable in my opinion.
You need to focus on becoming the cream of the crop, I call it. You not only want to be somebody who is damn good at their job and is really skilled, but you also want to be great to work with.
You have excellent communication skills. You tell companies, I would be happy to help you with that.
You send them Christmas cards. I’m telling you guys, you have to be the most amazing.
You have to think about yourself as a company and not a freelancer.
- You are customer service.
- You are an ACC executive.
- You are your own secretary.
- You are a copywriter.
- You are a marketer.
- You are a CEO.
- You are a CFO.
- You are the entire company.
And the Freelancers who really stand out and make a lot of money and freelance for long periods of time without any trouble are the people who are professionals, and are entrepreneurs, and are fantastic people to work with.
They know customer service. So my methods are to teach you how to charge high hourly rates.
You can work less and make more money. I’m not about the hamster wheel, playing the rat race, y’all.
I am about creating a life that you love in the most efficient way possible.
And that’s what we’re talking about in this story. I digress.
Step 7: To Invest in Systems.
So I recommend, in the beginning, keeping costs as low as possible.
And honestly, freelancing has a pretty low barrier to entry. There aren’t that many costs associated with starting a freelancing career.
But there are a couple of systems that you do want to invest in in the beginning, because it’s going to help solve so many headaches down the road.
The first one is accounting software. I personally use QuickBooks. A lot of people use QuickBooks Self-Employed, and I highly recommend it.
But it’s really important to be able to see clearly how much money is coming in, how much money is going out.
Because come tax season, you’re going to wish that you had done that the whole time.
And the second software that I recommend is invoicing software.
Now I think QuickBooks does have invoicing built into it, but I personally use a separate software called FreshBooks.
I’ve been using FreshBooks for years, and I personally really like it.
My clients like it. The user interface is really easy to use. So I recommend it.
Step 8: Quit Your Job
So when we’ve reached that tipping point where your freelancing career is becoming so time-consuming that maybe it’s even impacting your full-time job, that’s when it’s time to jump ship.
And that’s going to be a very exciting time for you, to be able to have all that mental space.
That you were dedicating from 8 to 5 at your full-time job, now free to dedicate to your freelancing career.
It’s going to make a really, really big difference.
Phase 3
This probably isn’t relevant to most people in this story, but if you’ve been freelancing for years, this might be you.
So in phase 3, that’s when you’re going to want to really establish your business.
You can either keep operating as a sole proprietor, as I did.
You can create an LLC if that’s what you want.
And if you’re making a significant amount of money, you can incorporate as an S corp, which I did.
If you don’t understand anything that I just said, just talk to an accountant; they’ll explain it all to you.
Fun fact, I actually found my accountant on Upwork as a freelancer, so that’s fun to know.
Step 9: Raise Your Rates
So every 6 months or every 12 months, you just have to raise your rates a little bit more and more.
The next step is that you really need to create marketing systems. So whether that’s social media, lead magnets, a newsletter, writing articles, or YouTube videos, any of those things are great.
But you want to start establishing some more marketing tactics, unless you’re getting a lot of business through word of mouth.
In that case, you’re probably good to go.
Step 10: Building Relationships
And we’re going to get into why that’s so important next.
Get Clients
This is the part that really scares people. They’re like how am I going to get people to pay me to freelance for them, and I get it.
But let me let you in on a little secret. This is a little secret that Freelancers don’t like to tell people, but I’m going to tell you.
Sustainable high-earning freelancers are not spending their time getting clients.
In the beginning, you’ll spend a lot of your time getting clients.
But if you are the cream of the crop, if you’re great to work with and you do great work, people are going to start referring you. It’s called word of mouth.
I’m all word of mouth at this point. People are going to start coming at you. And believe it or not, you’re going to have to start saying no to people.
There are 3 ways that high-earning, sustainable, and successful Freelancers get clients regularly and don’t stress out about it.
The first way is to retain clients. So, a retainer client just means that you have a client who has a guaranteed spend for a term.
So they have told you I’m going to pay you $5,000 a month for the next 6 months to edit two YouTube videos for me a month.
So you know now that yes, it’s just one client, but you have a retainer with them for the next 6 months.
Which means over the next 6 months, you are going to get $30,000 from that client.
If you’re a video editor and you get just three clients like that, that’s $90,000 a year right there.
And so the trick of the trade, this is what I’ve always done, is get retainer clients that pay your base living expenses.
So, for example, if I live off of $5,000 a month, all I have to do is get 2 retainer clients who are each going to pay me $2,500 a month.
And then my living expenses for the month are good to go.
Any work that I get additionally is extra income for me. My gosh, what, why is he, where is he backing up to, there’s nowhere to back up, it’s a school bus.
How dare kids go to school?
Kids don’t need school; they need freelancing skills.
The second way that successful Freelancers build sustainability is by doing something called permalancing.
Permalancing has been a huge part of my career, and how I’ve been able to see inside of so many other companies.
It’s basically when you freelance for a company for a long period of time.
So, different states and jurisdictions have different rules around this.
Technically, a company is only supposed to hire you for a limited amount of time to work on one project.
But sometimes companies will need a bit more help than that.
So you can work for one company for a 3-month contract, 6 months, 9 months, or even a year.
And permalancing is low-key, how so many Freelancers can make a ton of money.
Here is a thing that so many people don’t get about freelancing and companies. Companies love Freelancers.
Like when you’re reaching out to a company, they want to hear from you. They are not like oh a freelancer reaching out.
They’re like, “Yes, we are always looking for Freelancers.” Companies love Freelancers because we are cheap and non-committal.
When a company hires a full-time employee, it’s so much work for them.
They have to pay their healthcare and their 401k match, and part of their employment income taxes.
And then they have to wait until they quit or they get fired. And if they fire them, they build up a case; they have HR, and there are all of these things associated with having a full-time employee.
But Freelancers, we’re non-committal. Just pay us by the hour. That sounds so bad, but seriously, freelancers, that’s why we’re able to charge higher hourly rates.
Because they aren’t paying our healthcare premiums. They aren’t doing a 401 (k) match.
They aren’t paying for any of that stuff. So we’re actually cheaper for the companies, even though we can actually get paid more from the company.
And so even in an age of recession, or if a company has a hiring freeze, guys, they’re still hiring Freelancers.
They love us. We are low maintenance. And Freelancers also love companies.
It’s a more casual relationship. I think that’s one of my favorite things about freelancing, this power dynamic.
In a normal corporate space, like I’m the boss, when I’m the employee, it’s like this.
When you’re a freelancer, it’s like you’re just completely on the same team.
And there’s just no weird power dynamic. And the last way that successful Freelancers create a sustainable income is by expanding their business.
So you can sell products. You can sell courses. You can sell consulting services.
These are all great ways to expand your services, so that you’re not just charging by the hour, but you can also generate some passive income on the side.
And before we go, I just want to leave you guys with one thing. I’ve never met somebody who regretted trying to freelance.
I’ve only met people who regretted not trying to go out on their own and do their own thing.
If you dip your toes in, the worst-case scenario is that you just go back to the job that you currently have.
But then the best-case scenario is that it completely transforms your life.
- You get your life back.
- You get your days back.
- You get to make more money, travel whenever you want, be home, and just do whatever you want all day.
So if I were you, I would look into it. Because the worst-case scenario is that you just don’t like it that much, and that’s completely fine.
But you just don’t want to spend the rest of your life wondering what if. You guys, I have literally so much more that I can say on freelancing.
I literally wrote a 115-page guide detailing every single thing. I spent months writing this guide.
“Oh, by the way, for my American friends, I also talk all about your healthcare options, retirement, and all of that in depth in the guide.”
So if you’re wondering about that, definitely go down on the guide. But I have to cut myself off here.
So thank you so much for tuning in. Remember that you got this.
Thanks For Reading 🙂
