For most new freelance writers, writing rates are arguably the most complicated and frustrating part of their new career, for a variety of reasons.

Increasing your freelance writing rates can be difficult, but it's an important part of your continual development

Thinking back to when I first started freelancing, the primary reasons why it was such a headache topic for me were firstly because I had absolutely no idea what a ‘good’ per word / article rate was and secondly because I was, without sounding a little melodramatic, petrified that if I ever increased my rates, all of my existing clients would leave and I’d have to completely rebuild by client base.

Over the following years, I received some great advice on various aspects of freelance writing rates and now, at the start of every year, I take the time to sit down, review what my rates currently are, whether there is justification to increase them and how exactly to increase them if need be.

And in this two part blog post, I’m going to explain exactly what I do, step-by-step, to hopefully give other freelance writers who are in the position most freelance writers were in once, a helping hand when it comes to increasing your freelance writing rates.

Step 1:  Review my existing rates

When I’m looking at increasing my freelance writing rates, the very first thing I do is review my existing rates and question whether I actually need to increase them.

In all honesty, I haven’t ever said to myself ‘No, I don’t need to raise my freelance writing rates this year’, but I always ask myself the question.

The main reason behind this is an increase in my rates could lead to a drop in business, whether that’s because I’ve continued to raise my rates year-on-year and I’ve priced myself out of the market or the economy has had such a detrimental impact on my target audience that I need to remain as competitive as possible to continue a steady stream of work.

Step 2:  Can I justify increasing my rates?

There is often a belief amongst many new freelance writers that because they’ve been writing at a certain rate for 12 months, the absolutely must increase their rates, irrelevant of any other impacting factor.

The problem is, not all freelance writers can justify increasing their freelance rates, particularly with regards to existing clients.

With new clients, it isn’t such an issue – you’re offering a price for a project and if they can afford it, great, if not, they’ll move on – but with existing clients, you need to be able to justify increasing your rates if you want to remain working with them, as you’re essentially asking for more money for exactly the same output.

One of my favourite methods of justification is being able to prove that the writing I’ve provided over the last year has been particularly beneficial to the client – being able to show actual proof, such as an increased conversion rate or better search engine ranking is fantastic – and without the work, there would be a noticeable drop in certain aspects of their business.

Considering, as freelance writers, we often promote other people’s products and services, I’ve found that a lot of writers struggle with justifying an increase in their rates – the equivalent of basically telling people how good you are.

You don’t need to blow your own trumpet to the customer and make them think you’re the world’s best writer, but you do need to be able to impress them enough for them to see how beneficial the service you provide is.

The information here details two of the three steps I carry out at the start of each year and next week, I’m going to explain how I exactly increase my freelance writing rates after I’ve reviewed my existing rates and justified an increase.

Image:  damozelijane (Flickr)

Would you consider money to be the most prominent aspect of your success?

There are a lot of great freelance writing blogs out there (including Get Paid To Write Online ) and while I don’t get chance to look at all of them every week, I tend to have a day once every week or two where I go through several blogs and see what other freelance writers are saying.

Earlier on today, I came across a post by Allena Tapia from 4th January where she explained that someone had made a comment on a piece she wrote for The Huffington Post, essentially saying that she wasn’t a successful freelance writer because she had time to volunteer at her child’s school.

Now, I don’t know Allena personally, but from what I’ve read about her / from her, I’d say she was a particularly successful freelance writer and I believe our views on success will be similar – if you can make a full-time living from freelance writing while also being able to live the life you want, that would make you pretty successful in my book.

This person who commented on Allena’s piece, although I don’t agree with their comment, obviously doesn’t believe that this is what success is based on and it appears that they believe the more  time you’re working throughout the day, the more successful you are.

One of the issues – or benefits, depending on which way you look at it – with freelance writing is that as it is such a varied profession, it’s extremely difficult to pigeon hole people into being successful or unsuccessful.

With other careers, there are often pre-planned routes that lead to a specific point whereby you – and people around you – can assume that you’ve become successful within that career.

And while there are some writing career routes that do have more of a structured path, your standard freelance writing career isn’t one of them.

What also makes measuring success difficult as a freelance writer is that success can come in many different forms and your idea of success can change from one form to another over even a short space of time.

For example, when I first started writing, I remember I had the goal of wanting to earn more from freelance writing than I did from my salaried role and once this was complete, I’d consider myself to be a successful writer.

After achieving this goal, however, my idea of success changed and I wanted to write full-time in place of my salaried role – and now my idea of success has changed once again, as I want to continue to increase my income, but lower my working hours.

There’s no doubt that everyone’s view of what it takes to become a successful freelance writer differs – often widely so – but I would go as far to say that the person who commented on Allena’s post was in the minority when judging success, as I don’t believe there are many people out there who truly believe working all the hours available makes you a successful freelance writer.

Image:  tobym (fotopedia)

My goals for 2012 seem to revolve around having a happier time - how about yours?

Before Christmas, I explained that I wasn’t going to set any goals for 2012 until after we’d welcomed in the New Year, taking a step back from my usual way of working.

The reason behind this was that I’ve noticed in the past few years that I generally feel different towards freelance writing and my career in general after I’ve had chance to relax and spend time with friends and family, rather than in the often manic month of December.

I did make a few notes about what goals I would have set if I planned them in December and as expected, they have changed, with the following being my goals for the coming year.

1.  Get more into working from home

As some of you will be aware from my previous blog post (Working From Home vs Working In An Office – Which Do You Prefer?), I’m a bit indifferent to working from home at the moment.  After years of working towards having a more flexible schedule, generally revolving around working from home rather than an office, I’m surprised at how I’ve struggled somewhat with working from home.

I believe this is down to the work I carry out (which I’ll cover in goal #2) and the fact that after working in the public sector for the past 8 years, I’ve become somewhat accustomed to an extremely structured way of working.

I’ve always wanted to work from home and so one of my primary aims for 2012 is to embrace working from home as much as possible – it has so many benefits and with so many people stuck in 9 to 5 jobs, I’d be stupid not to savour and enjoy every moment I have to work from home.

2.  Start doing more work I truly enjoy

The last 12 months turned out to be quite a whirlwind time for me in terms of my career, as I changed my salaried role and almost all of my freelance work.

What I’ve realised over the past few weeks is that while the salaried role is great in various respects, from financially to the fact that I get to travel, it’s not something I truly enjoy – unlike my freelance work.

I’m not saying that I’m going to give up my salaried work completely immediately, but by the end of the year, I want to know that I’ve made at least some steps forward to carrying out as much work as possible that I really, really enjoy.

3.  Start improving my working relationships

The past year has been somewhat manic for me and one of the aspects of my career that’s suffered is my relationship with various colleagues.

I started to develop some really great friendships with a lot of freelance writers, but unfortunately, I didn’t get chance to do a lot of socialising and networking in 2011, so they’ve suffered.

For the coming year, I want to get these relationships back to where they were – good working friendships with people I know I can rely on and talk to.

4.  Learn the basics of a few languages

One of my goals for 2011 was to learn French and although I started, I never got round to giving it the time needed to develop my knowledge.

So, for 2012, I want to give learning a language another go, but in a slightly different respect.

I like travelling and wherever possible, I like to try and say a few basic words and phrases.  At best, though, they are basic phrases (and are very often non-existent) and so by the end of 2012, I’m looking to have developed a basic understanding of a few different languages, at least to the extent that I don’t have to consult a phrase book when I want to say hello, goodbye, please and thank you, for example, every time I visit a different country.

For me, those are my goals for 2012.  Not extensive by any means, but each and every one of them has been thought through and I’d be absolutely delighted if I could achieve them all over the coming 12 months.

How about you?  What are your goals for 2012?  My goals seem to revolve heavily around having a better, more enjoyable personal life – do yours or are they more focused on heavily developing your career?

Image:  ucumari (fotopedia)

Could this really be the best way to work?

Over the last few years, I’ve worked in a variety of different roles while being a freelance writer, from an MIS Officer through to a consultant for a technology company.

Up until 2011, all of my freelance writing work was carried out on an evening and weekend.

It started off as a way to fill some spare time I had, developed into a way for me to be able to work for myself and has now opened up a range of opportunities, both writing and non-writing related.

At the moment, I’m a freelance writer for half of the week and I’m in a salaried role for the other half.

For both, I’m predominantly home based.  While there’s a lot of travel involved with the salaried role and I do have to travel occasionally for the freelance writing part of my work, I spend a lot of time working from home.

This started in the summer of 2011, working a day or two from home and in November 2011 it grew to being working from home for most of the week.

At first, I thought it was great and to a certain extent today, I still do think it’s great – the freedom is fantastic and I’m not restricted to working 9am to 5pm.

One of the major pitfalls I’ve discovered about working from home, however, is that it can be particularly lonely, something I’ve discussed previously.

While I thought I’d be able to get past this loneliness, it’s actually proving a lot more difficult than I first thought and before Christmas I started to make more of an effort to get out of my house, spending more time on-site and visiting clients.

This last week, however, I’ve started to wonder whether I’d be better suited to going back to an office based job – a writing / communications one – even for a day or two a week, simply for the social aspect.

What’s slightly confusing for me is that I love my own space.  Sure, I love spending time with my Better Half and seeing friends, but I’m quite happy to be left by myself to do whatever I want.

When it comes to work, though – and I never thought I’d say this – I do miss the general day-to-day interaction with others.

My work doesn’t suffer in any respect by working from home and I don’t think it ever will, as I love the work, but it’s just that it can be slightly difficult, on occasion, to get motivated without anyone to bounce ideas off or to simply have a chat to.

For those of you who have worked both from home and in an office, which do you prefer?

And for those who’ve only worked in one or the other, have you considered working in the other?  Do you think it would be more beneficial to you as an individual?

Image:  fancycwabs (Flickr)

Start 2012 with a bang by improving your social network activity

Happy New Year!

I hope you’ve all had a fantastic Christmas and are looking forward to a wonderful 2012.

Over Christmas, I took the time to look at the blog posts I’d made throughout the year and realised that I hadn’t talked much about activity on social networks, something I strongly believe is imperative to the continued development and success of any freelance writer.

Therefore, linked in with New Year’s Resolutions, take a look at the following five tips, which explain how to boost your freelance writing career on social networks in 2012.

1.  Sick to the 80/20 rule

One of the most valuable pieces of information I’ve ever come across in relation to activity on social networks is to always stick to a 80/20 balance – 80% useful, interesting and helpful information, 20% sales, self-promotion and direct career progression talk.

There are far too many people out there who use Twitter, for example, for nothing other than publishing their latest blog posts.  As great as this can be when integrated with a larger strategy, it won’t do much at all without other tweets that are helpful or informative to your followers.

2.  Don’t blatantly advertise.  Not all the time, anyway.

Just because 20% of your social network activity should be activity that directly helps you to progress, you should refrain from blatant advertising.

Social networks are just that – social.  If you were in a room with 100 people, would you stand up and say “Hey, hire me, I’m a fantastic writer!”?  Chances are you would do it in a much more social, conversational manner, such as speaking to a few individuals, explaining that you’ve got some availability as a writer, you feel you could help their organization and if they’d like to chat, you would happily give them a call.

Of course, a little blatant advertising isn’t going to damage your reputation massively, but keep it to an absolute minimum.

3.  Remember you’re a brand

Although you’re a single individual, as a freelance writer, you’re also a brand and you need to ensure that you keep this in mind at all times, not just when you’re looking at activity on social networks.

What I find works best is if you think of yourself as an organization with a few employees and carry out your activity like this.  You’re still going to want a few personal comments in your activity, but refrain from – or at least think intently about – making comments that are too personal and may impact upon your career, such as political comments.

4.  Little and often is better than bulk

With so many things to do as a freelance writer, it can be difficult fitting in regular social network activity, with many people putting aside time once or twice a week to dedicate to their activity.

While there’s no doubt some activity is better than none, it will always be much more effective if you set aside time every day to carry out a little activity, rather than a lot of activity once a week.

5.  Don’t let it take over your life

One of the problems I have with social network activity personally is that 10 minutes can easily turn into two hours, which ends up having a detrimental impact on my schedule as a whole.

Linked in with point four, a properly created social network schedule – and one that you ensure you abide by – will ensure that you really do only spend the right amount of time on your chosen social networks each day.

Whichever social networks you choose, you can be certain that by following these five points, you will continue to progress as a freelance writer and develop your career overall.

Image:  suneko (Flickr)

What do you take away from the Christmas period?

There’s no doubt that Christmas is one of my favourite times of year and as much as I have a lot of fun over Christmas, I always manage to take something away from it that can benefit my writing career.

Looking back at the last few Christmases and how I’ve changed my writing habits afterwards, the following points are just three things I’ve learnt from Christmas that have helped my freelance writing career.

1.  You need some time with others

Working as a freelance writer can be extremely solitary and something I’ve realised particularly over the last 12 months is that no matter how much you enjoy working alone, you need some time interacting with others.

This interaction isn’t just to help you develop as a writer, but it’s – as extreme as this may sound – for your own personal sanity, as working alone 24/7 can start to have an impact on your personal well-being and how you generally act around other people.

You don’t have to go to networking meetings or speak to each and every one of your clients face-to-face, but by working from a coffee shop or phoning a colleague every now and again, it will, in my experience, see you develop and be more productive as a writer.

2.  You need some you time

On the contrary to point one, there’s no doubt that everyone needs some time alone.

Some people need more than others and I openly admit that I could quite happily hide away for a few days at a time without talking to anyone, whereas my Better Half gets a bit antsy if she goes a few hours without talking to another person, but I truly believe we all need some time to ourselves.

Whether it’s to gather our thoughts, focus intently on a piece of work or just to relax, alone time is just as important as time with others.

3.  Don’t take things too seriously

At Christmas, we always tend to play a few games, getting the entire family involved and a few years ago, my brother’s girlfriend didn’t want to get involved when we were playing an interactive computer game.

I think it was her first Christmas with us where all of my family had been together and so understandably, it might have been a little daunting and she may very well have been a bit worried of making a fool out of herself (although that was part of the fun!).

The problem was, by taking herself a little too seriously and not getting involved with the game, she essentially removed herself from the ‘group’ and seemed to spend the rest of the evening not getting involved at all, no matter how much we tried to get her to play along.

By applying the same principle to freelance writing and getting too concerned whether you’re, for instance, using exactly the right word or putting a comma in a place where it doesn’t really make any difference if there’s one there or not, you can completely remove the enjoyment factor from writing.

I’m not saying that you have to be overly relaxed with your writing, but at the end of the day, you’re never going to get it right first time, every time and you’d have to be working with an absolute nightmare of a client for them to expect it perfect on the first draft.

I really, really love Christmas and everything about it and hope that each and every one of you has had a wonderful Christmas this year and I wish you all of the very best for 2012

Image:  jmtimages (Flickr)

Have you achieved, postponed or cancelled your 2011 goals?

Each and every year, I always set goals for myself, generally in relation to my working life.

Although I’m not going to set goals for 2012 until early January (as discussed in last week’s post, ‘Bucking The End Of Year Trend – Reflecting, But Not Preparing. Yet.’), the end of the year is always a good time to reflect on goals that were set for the existing year.

And I’ll happily start!

1.  Stop working 70 hour weeks

I’m pleased to say – very pleased to say! – that I managed to achieve this goal several months ago.

The problem was that I was working a full time salaried role in addition to 30+ hours writing and so when two part-time opportunities arose – one salaried, one freelance – I took them both and instantly reduced my working hours by almost 50%, while still bringing in the same amount of money each month.

2.  Develop my client base

While I’ve actually reduced my client base in terms of numbers, I see this goal as achieved, as my client base has almost completely changed, developing from a handful of clients to just one or two, while still seeing the same level of income.

3.  Learn a language

My intentions started off really well with this goal and I got my Better Half involved, too (we started learning 10 new French words every day), but the simple truth is I didn’t have enough time to continue with it.

I honestly do want to learn a language, so I’m going to postpone this goal and hopefully move it forward into 2012.

4.  Work on a kick start / support / assistance idea I have

Although I’ve still got this idea in mind, I’ve done next to no work on it this year and I don’t believe I’m going to have the time to in 2012 either, so I’m unfortunately going to cancel it.  Maybe some day!

5.  Look at a move to London

I was initially looking at a move to London with my Better Half as we spend a lot of time down there with friends and family and although we did look in mid-2010 at a move, we postponed it for various reasons.

We did take another look this year, but I don’t think it’s ever going to be a permanent move, at least not in the foreseeable future – we have such a lot coming up over the next 18 months, that I think a visit every few weeks is going to be the best option, rather than a full time move.

So for that reason, I’m going to say that this goal is cancelled.

6.  Increase my rates

I see this as an achieved goal, as while I didn’t increase my rates with several existing clients, I successfully applied a new rate card to all new clients.

7.  Look at other opportunities

Not long after I initially set this goal, a new opportunity came up and it’s one that I’ve been heavily involved in throughout the full year.

I’ve had to stop working with some clients and it’s meant more travel than I initially planned, but the opportunity is fantastic and it’s one that I see continually developing right throughout 2012 and beyond.

For me, the last 12 months have, overall, been successful and I don’t believe that I’ve blatantly ignored any goal.  Some have been achieved easily, others I’ve had to put on the back burner, but generally speaking, 2011 has been a great year for me.

How about you?  Has 2011 been a good year?  Did you achieve your goals?

And as this is my last blog post before Christmas, I really do hope that you have a very Merry Christmas!

Image:  tomoski (Flickr)

Apart from being seasonal, this image doesn't have much to do with the post - but isn't it beautiful?!

Take a look around most freelance writing blogs at the minute and you’re likely to see the same type of discussions – how the last year has gone and setting goals and aspirations for the coming year.

Last year, I followed suit. We looked at how 2010 had been and discussed what goals we’d like to meet in the coming year, all before the Christmas season had started.

While I believe reflection on the past 12 months is still imperative before Christmas, as you can’t determine how successful the year has been and therefore you can’t plan your coming year without doing so, I realised something this year about planning and preparing for the coming 12 months.

Over Christmas, I spend a lot of time with friends and family. It’s the only time of the year where I truly move away from work for any length of time and for a week or so, I focus entirely on relaxing and having a great time.

When I set my goals last year for 2011, while many of them were still relevant after the Christmas break, I may not necessarily have chosen them first and foremost.

The reason behind this is leading up to Christmas, I’m almost solely focused on work. I want to get as much done as possible before I stop for Christmas, so it seems that I’m working – or at least thinking about work – for most of the time I’m awake.

Although this means that I’m able to reflect on the past year fantastically, it often means that any goals I set for the coming year are heavily business orientated.

Some of you may now be thinking “isn’t that the point?” and on one hand, yes, it is the point – you’re setting goals to achieve within business.

What I’ve realised this year, however, is that the goals set are almost always done so in a way that will help me professionally and not necessarily personally.

Perhaps I’ve had a bit of an epiphany, but these past few months I’ve realised just how important it is to think and plan when it comes to friends, family and myself as much as it is when it comes to business.

So this year, I’m going to try something different – and I’d like you to, as well.

I’m still going to reflect on the last 12 months and see if I achieved my goals (something I’ll do next week), but instead of setting goals immediately, I’m going to wait until early January.

I want to feel properly relaxed and in a different frame of mind than I do now, as by planning goals now, they’ll all be business orientated – leave this side of my work until after Christmas and I believe I should be able to define goals that although business related, will allow me to achieve a better work / life balance.

I love work and being able to write for a living is fantastic, but I do think I – and I’m sure many others – can become to obsessed with it and need to spend more time setting goals that will be of benefit personally, rather than just professionally.

Image:  Vicci (Moon Stars and Paper)

It seems as though I’m constantly banging my head against a brick wall when hiring freelance writers!

As easy as you might think it would be to work with writers – there seems to a copious amount of us willing to take on new work! – it brought back memories of when I tried to outsource work a year or two ago and simply put, it was nothing short of a nightmare.

Actually finding writers wasn’t a problem – it was finding writers who could deliver the work that was the issue.

Looking at the problems I’ve encountered both in recent times and in the past, the following three points are all problems I’ve faced when hiring freelance writers.

1.  No rate card

I never had a rate for years.  Either clients would come to me saying “Can you create this for this amount of money?” or I’d make a figure up on the spot when asked how much I’d charge for a certain project.  Sometimes I’d charge too much, others too little and sometimes I’d get it right.  It wasn’t ideal by any means, but it worked.

When I started to take freelance writing seriously as a career, I realised that I needed to have a more structured way of pricing projects and so while I still don’t have a set rate card that I adhere to 100%, I do have several figures in mind per word and per hour that I like to work around.

One of the most annoying points for me when hiring writers was that many couldn’t give definite answers as to how much they’d charge or whether they’d work for the fee I suggested.  I don’t mind if you say no and you want more money or you give me range of prices depending on, for instance,  the number of words offered, but don’t just say “oh, about $50 a piece”.  What’s a piece?  250 words?  2,500 words?  A blog post?  A press release?

I may not have had a pricing structure in place for several years, but I’ve always been able to tell a potential client how much I’d charge for a project.

2.  Deadlines that can’t be met

This is my number one pet hate.  Period.

I’m not a fantastic time keeper outside of work.  I very rarely say “I’ll meet you at 7pm” – it’s always “I’ll meet you at around 7pm”.  There are occasions when I – or anyone – need to be at a certain place at a certain time, but I’m a relaxed guy and if I don’t get out of a meeting until 5.30pm, I’m not going to rush home to get showered and changed so I can be at a bar for 7pm – being 15 minutes late isn’t going to harm anyone.

When it comes to work, though, I’ve always stuck by one principle – I don’t mind if you’re going to be a day or two over your expected delivery time, but please just tell me sooner than 4.55pm on the day the work was due.  If nothing else it’s courteous.

If I have notice, I can plan and prepare.  If I don’t have notice, I can’t do anything.

If you can’t deliver 5,000 words in a week, that’s fine, but don’t tell me that you can.

3.  Ignoring guidelines

In most pieces of work I’ve requested, I haven’t asked for much.  For example, it might be a set amount of words, a broad style requirement (i.e., formal, not conversational) and the occasional link to a source.

So why do several writers seem to think these requirements are optional?

If I said “between 400 and 600 words”, I’m pretty sure you would all agree that it could be taken two separate ways – produce a piece that’s between 400 and 600 words long or produce a piece that uses at least 4oo to 600 words minimum.

I’m also pretty sure you’d all agree it doesn’t mean “try and use between 400 and 600 words, but if you only manage 350, that’s fine”.

I also understand that people could interpret ‘formal, not conversational’ in different ways, but whichever way you take it, you don’t want to be including colloquialisms or internet speak (i.e., LOL).

This piece isn’t meant as a dig at any freelance writer in particular or even freelance writers in general – remember, I am still a freelance writer!

I’ve just provided these difficulties for everyone to hopefully learn from, as I honestly believe there are hundreds of high quality writers out there who can produce the required content, but they just need a little polishing when it comes to their business skills.

Image:  Oast House Archive (Geograph)

Tying up loose ends can be time-consuming, but it can be extremely rewarding, too.

As soon as December starts to beckon, it seems as though Christmas is only days away.

I’ve always been a relatively organized guy who likes to plan and prepare to a certain degree when it comes to business, but around this time of year, I used to always think that there wasn’t a great deal of time left before I took a break for the holidays and so I wouldn’t start anything new.

Even now, I tend to use December primarily to get ahead of schedule, giving me an easy, smooth run into the coming year.

As I was looking at my schedule here for the next few weeks, specifically a post or two around how the last year has been for you and what you’ve got planned for 2012, I realised that it’s all about reflection and preparation.

Although I love looking back at what I’ve done and using it to help me prepare for the future, it’s become apparent that while reflection is fantastic for future preparation, it’s also great for looking at any obvious gaps in your work or missed opportunities.

So, while we’re going to be looking at how 2011 has been for you as a freelance writer and preparing for 2012 in the coming weeks, it would be great now to think back over the last 11 months and look at any areas of your work or your career where an opportunity was missed, wasn’t taken full advantage of or wasn’t finished properly.

For me, there are two main points that I want to go back and tie up before the year is out:

1.  Towards the end of the summer, one of my regular clients reduced their workload massively.  At one point, I was producing over 55,000 words a month for them, but at the end of August they sent through no work requests at all.

They did start requesting work again in September and have continued to do so since, but it’s still only minimal compared to the previous levels.

Due to various other projects, this drop in work wasn’t a massive issue and I never followed up on why there was such a substantial decrease in the workload.

What I’m planning to do is contact them and simply ask what the reason was.  Was it the work I was producing or was there no longer the need for the work?

From what I can understand, there has been a change in staff and within departments as a whole, but it would still be great to know the answer, as if it was the quality of my work, I need to know so I can improve.

2.  Over the last six months, I’ve made a concerted effort to send pitches out to potential clients.

Some pitches were blatantly ignored, others I received a reply back saying they weren’t interested and there were several who expressed an interest in working together.

Although some of those who expressed an interest did turn into clients, there were several who I never received any further correspondence from, even after contacting them once or twice again.

It’s been a few months since I contacted several of those who showed an interest and so I’m going to go back and try and reconnect with them – not in a sales way, re-sending my previous proposal, but in a way that simply lets them know I’m available and it would be great to work with them.

Reflection is fantastic, but it’s important that you don’t use it exclusively to look at what you’ve done and learn from your mistakes.  With four weeks left to go until Christmas, that’s enough time to at least attempt to fill in any gaps and tie up any loose ends from earlier in the year.

Image:  Manda Mia (Flickr)