Hustling to Survive: Freelance Web Design & Copywriting, Book Writing, and Building a Brand

[Dark Water]

While its been a while since I've posted here, I have been lurking somewhat regularly. As I sit here in a Starbucks today drinking my $2.41 hot green tea (essentially the price I pay so I can get out of the house and be around people outside of my gym), I came across this thread about the cancelled 2019 summit which really opened my eyes. In February of 2016, I attended the fastlane summit at Talking Stick in Scottsdale which was an amazing experience. I listened and learned a lot, although unfortunately couldn't bring a lot to the table at the time other than "I work in insurance and have some fastlane ideas". Which essentially was the extent of my conversations outside of two or three eople I really connected with.

At the time, I was a personal lines insurance agent with almost two years in the game. In April of that year, I walked into my office about 5 minutes late one day right into the CEO giving a meeting to the entire floor. They were shutting down the entire office and laying everyone off, except for 10 top performers or so to work at the other office in the city (in Boston). My performance had put me in the top 5 of the company but I didn't receive a folder to stay, so my mind instantly shut that job off and I felt free to finally pursue my hustles. My manager did text me the next day saying the CEO asked if I would like to stay but its a text I never returned.

At some point, I began on Upwork, and gleaned tons of knowledge at the time from Fox's web design thread and and Lex's thread on copywriting and second thread on Upwork. I started with small jobs and built my way up to bigger jobs and regular, long term clients.

So let's fast forward to today, what this is all about.

My work consists of 90% copywriting and 10% web design work, and I'd like to strike a balance between the two. I rely way too much on Upwork although I have a few clients off Upwork. But if Upwork goes under for any crazy reason at all, so do I. And then I'll actually be forced back into a slowlane job.

So one part of this thread is dedicated to my hustle which helps me survive: web design and copywriting. I need to do three things here: systematize the process as to make it easier and more efficient, hustle for more work, and create a simple system to find more work off Upwork. Despite my disdain for a scheduled work week, I need to treat this like a full time job and set hours for myself to stay focused.

Part two is dedicated to a brand idea I had in 2015. Three years ago. I've owned the website ever since and have slowly been building up content on it. But I haven't executed on the actual program I want to offer. To an extent, its in the fitness/health category but is its own niche. Expect a lot on this as I need to take it off the backburner.

Part three is writing my first book. I've always had a desire to do this and threads like ChickenHawk's and HeldforRandsom's inspire me to this day, despite reading them what feels like an eternity ago. I just opened the Google doc on my book. My last edit was February of 2017. Absolutely awful. At one point I believe I had 10,000+ words but scrapped it, now down to an outline and 600 words. Since its been so long its probably best to start fresh though. At this point, I just need to go through the motions of writing a book and publishing. First step will be to go through Amazon and then post them on my personal site, which will be a combination of copywriting services and books.

So essentially, this thread is a personal journal of my journey in:

I. Freelance copywriting / website work / surviving
II. Launching a brand
III. Writing a book
IV. Further building my own personal website which will feature website design examples (coupled with copywriting), probably a blog on my personal fitness journey, and my books that I will publish

Its probably going to be gritty and full of failures along the way, but as we're entering the final stretch of 2018, its time to cross off some goals. It might come across like I'm spreading myself thin but I feel all of this ties together. Progress in one area will help another. My goal is to make daily progress on all of the above, no matter how small.

By December 31, I'd like at the very least:

- Publishing the book
- Finalizing my own personal website along with weekly blog posts
- Finalizing the program, copywriting, and website of the brand I'm working on (we'll call it SK), along with weekly blog posts
- Stepping up the hustle on my web design and copywriting work so I can pump money into the brand once its done, looking at avenues like PPC

From here on out, I'll go into much more detail and nuances with each update. Hopefully that gives some insight as to where I am and where I plan to go. Let's begin.

 

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[Fox]

Great post - watching thread. Keep it going!

 

[100ToOne]

While its been a while since I've posted here, I have been lurking somewhat regularly. As I sit here in a Starbucks today drinking my $2.41 hot green tea (essentially the price I pay so I can get out of the house and be around people outside of my gym), I came across this thread about the cancelled 2019 summit which really opened my eyes. In February of 2016, I attended the fastlane summit at Talking Stick in Scottsdale which was an amazing experience. I listened and learned a lot, although unfortunately couldn't bring a lot to the table at the time other than "I work in insurance and have some fastlane ideas". Which essentially was the extent of my conversations outside of two or three eople I really connected with.

At the time, I was a personal lines insurance agent with almost two years in the game. In April of that year, I walked into my office about 5 minutes late one day right into the CEO giving a meeting to the entire floor. They were shutting down the entire office and laying everyone off, except for 10 top performers or so to work at the other office in the city (in Boston). My performance had put me in the top 5 of the company but I didn't receive a folder to stay, so my mind instantly shut that job off and I felt free to finally pursue my hustles. My manager did text me the next day saying the CEO asked if I would like to stay but its a text I never returned.

At some point, I began on Upwork, and gleaned tons of knowledge at the time from Fox's web design thread and and Lex's thread on copywriting and second thread on Upwork. I started with small jobs and built my way up to bigger jobs and regular, long term clients.

So let's fast forward to today, what this is all about.

My work consists of 90% copywriting and 10% web design work, and I'd like to strike a balance between the two. I rely way too much on Upwork although I have a few clients off Upwork. But if Upwork goes under for any crazy reason at all, so do I. And then I'll actually be forced back into a slowlane job.

So one part of this thread is dedicated to my hustle which helps me survive: web design and copywriting. I need to do three things here: systematize the process as to make it easier and more efficient, hustle for more work, and create a simple system to find more work off Upwork. Despite my disdain for a scheduled work week, I need to treat this like a full time job and set hours for myself to stay focused.

Part two is dedicated to a brand idea I had in 2015. Three years ago. I've owned the website ever since and have slowly been building up content on it. But I haven't executed on the actual program I want to offer. To an extent, its in the fitness/health category but is its own niche. Expect a lot on this as I need to take it off the backburner.

Part three is writing my first book. I've always had a desire to do this and threads like ChickenHawk's and HeldforRandsom's inspire me to this day, despite reading them what feels like an eternity ago. I just opened the Google doc on my book. My last edit was February of 2017. Absolutely awful. At one point I believe I had 10,000+ words but scrapped it, now down to an outline and 600 words. Since its been so long its probably best to start fresh though. At this point, I just need to go through the motions of writing a book and publishing. First step will be to go through Amazon and then post them on my personal site, which will be a combination of copywriting services and books.

So essentially, this thread is a personal journal of my journey in:

I. Freelance copywriting / website work / surviving
II. Launching a brand
III. Writing a book
IV. Further building my own personal website which will feature website design examples (coupled with copywriting), probably a blog on my personal fitness journey, and my books that I will publish

Its probably going to be gritty and full of failures along the way, but as we're entering the final stretch of 2018, its time to cross off some goals. It might come across like I'm spreading myself thin but I feel all of this ties together. Progress in one area will help another. My goal is to make daily progress on all of the above, no matter how small.

By December 31, I'd like at the very least:

- Publishing the book
- Finalizing my own personal website along with weekly blog posts
- Finalizing the program, copywriting, and website of the brand I'm working on (we'll call it SK), along with weekly blog posts
- Stepping up the hustle on my web design and copywriting work so I can pump money into the brand once its done, looking at avenues like PPC

From here on out, I'll go into much more detail and nuances with each update. Hopefully that gives some insight as to where I am and where I plan to go. Let's begin.

Great post - I hope you find more success at what you do.
By the way why didn't you do something related to your past experience as a insurance agent? I mean you have more opportunity than the normal people out there...