Unexpected Pros & Cons of Freelancing

On this site I have talked a lot about how great freelancing is. I also try to be honest and present the downsides. Everybody knows that being able to work from anywhere is fantastic. Everybody also knows that not having a regular, steady paycheque can be problematic. Today I thought I'd talk about some of the lesser known pros and cons of working remotely; the things that have taken me by surprise.

Cons

Last week I mentioned a tool that helps me navigate time differences between me and my clients. The downside of having international clients is that sometimes when they want to talk the time difference goes against you. I recently had a conference call with Sydney, Australia and Salt Lake City, USA. Saying that makes me feel pretty cool (see the pros below) but in order to make it work for everybody the meeting happened at 5am my time. I got an early start on my work that day!

Pro or Con? You Decide

I've read a lot of articles about how to be productive as a freelancer / remote worker. I agree with a lot of the things they say: separate your living and working spaces; maintain a routine etc. One that I totally don't get down with is to dress as if you were going to work. I have never been a clothes horse and I don't like dressing smart. One of the best things for me is that I can work in shorts and t-shirt all the time.

The downside? Recently, 2 of my best friends got married. When the weddings approached I looked in my wardrobe to find - a fine selection of shorts and t-shirts... and little else. As I don't need smart clothes for work I had gradually, largely unintentionally but very thoroughly eliminated all smart clothes from my wardrobe. Cue a quick dash to the department store to find some smart trousers!

Pros

My clients live in quite different parts of the world. Some of them work remotely and move around too. I personally get a kick out of talking to people in other countries and hearing what they are up to. It also makes me feel like a boss player when I say, "I have to run, I've got to speak to Washington." Plus, as documented in this post one of my Australian clients invited me over to visit. Hard to imagine how that would have happened when I had a normal job.

In one of my first posts on this site I talked about how freelancing had got me back into music in a big way. Working by myself lets me listen to whatever I want. I invested in a Spotify subscription and I haven't looked back. I also discovered Noon Pacific, a weekly playlist of funky tunes that I always look forward to. All of this has led to me discovering new artists that I love, rediscovering old favourites and generally spending a lot more of my time listening to music. A definite win!

Most of the jobs in my adult life have involved a whole lot of time indoors. I'm not constantly outdoors now but the flexibility of freelancing means I get to see a lot more sunshine. I even get to work from much nicer locations. Currently I am sitting in my local coworking space which has cool decor, comfy chairs and serves great coffee. A big improvement on some of the factory offices I used to work in!

I'd love to hear about any unexpected things you discovered when working remotely. Alternatively, I'd be glad to tell you more about what I discovered. Drop me a line and let's chat.

My Freelance Tools & Tips

This week I thought I would share a few lessons I have learned while freelancing; mainly from screwing things up, and some tools to help avoid the same problems. If you want some hot tips, read on...

Where to Work?

I often proudly proclaim that "as long as I have my laptop and an internet connection then I can work anywhere!" That is true and it is great but what happens when you suddenly don't have an internet connection?

There was an article on the Upwork blog recently giving suggestions on how to prepare yourself. These are all great tips and I especially endorse the mobile tethering. Tethering is not just great as a backup when your net goes down but it also really enables you to work from anywhere. Anywhere could mean somewhere that's not your home or it could be another country. Whenever I go somewhere new these days my first step is to grab a local data enabled SIM card; in most countries this doesn't cost more than $10 - $20. Mobile data speeds are so good these days that it can often be better than a fixed line.

Another great tip is to know your surroundings and have fallback places to go if power / internet fails. I was looking on Product Hunt the other day and found Workfrom. This tool lets you search for a location and shows you all of the places that you could work. Not just coworking spaces but cafes, libraries etc. If you do want a coworking space then Coworker and the Coworking Wiki are also great tools.

Remember Time Zones

I have clients in several countries and time zones are the bane of my existence. I have an engineering degree but for some reason calculating time differences melts my brain.

Generally, I do not have to speak with clients on a regular basis but when I do time zones are always an issue. In Bangkok I am used to the time difference with my clients so it has become semi-intuitive. However, when travelling that goes out the window! It even goes out the window sometimes just because I'm stupid.

I love World Time Buddy, it's a great app that lets you choose multiple time zones and draw lines between them to see what time (or day) matches your time. I find this especially useful with my clients in the US because quite often we are working on different days; my Tuesday morning is their Monday night. If I relied on myself to work things out I would end up posting things not just at the wrong time but on the wrong day too.

The free version only(!) lets you compare 4 locations at a time. There is a paid version of the app but I have found the free version works great for me. I have never needed to compare 5 different locations at the same time. If that day comes then my life will have changed significantly and I will spring for the paid version!

These are a couple of the tools that I have found useful. What do you use? Get in touch and let me know.

A Little Housekeeping

In case you hadn't noticed, 2016 is now in full swing so this seems an appropriate time for a little 2015 housekeeping. I recently attended a small business owner's workshop with one of my clients and read this article. Both of these got me thinking about "knowing your numbers". As a small business owner or freelancer you are often so involved in doing what you do that you don't look back and understand how you performed. If you don't know how you did, how can you know if you're improving?

The article in particular is valuable for freelancers; it helps you to work out what 1 hour of your time is really worth. Obviously this is worth knowing when bidding on client jobs but another benefit that I hadn't thought about before is using this information to make other decisions in your life. To take an example from the article:

Should you buy the nonstop flight and save two hours or get the flight with a stopover and save $90?

Being the cheap ass that I am I would usually save the $90 and spend 2 hours reading. This article made me think about things differently; if 2 hours of your time is worth more then $90 then this is not a cost effective strategy:

If you know your time is worth $80 per hour, then you should always buy the direct flight that saves you two hours even if it costs $150 more than the flight with a stopover.

There is a counter argument that you might not always have work to do, don't mind reading for 2 hours and would like to keep the $150. That is all true but it still got me thinking about how much my time is worth and how I performed in 2015.

Agi and I started freelancing in 2014 so 2015 was our first full year as freelancers. We learned a lot during the year, lost clients, found new ones and kept trying to earn higher rates.

I spent a couple of hours pulling together all of the data I had on my earnings and hours worked last year. I put all of the info into a spreadsheet (I love a good spreadsheet). The result? My average hourly rate for 2015 was $23/hour.

That was a bit lower than I expected but as I discussed in my post about How We Started Freelancing I had to start at a low rate to get my foot in the door. With that in mind I decided to look at how my hourly rate had changed throughout the year:

That's better! So, at the end of the year 1 hour of my time is worth around $32. That's good and I'm happy with that but even more important to me is that I want to keep getting better so check out the trendline:

I'm even more pleased with this trend but how am I going to continue it into 2016? I wrote a post recently about my thoughts on how to keep that improvement going through investment in yourself. I will keep this chart updated throughout the year and let you know how the trend progresses.

Have you done any self assessment like this? What did you find? Get in touch and let me know, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Working as a Freelancer Means WORKING as a Freelancer

I read an article recently about why you shouldn’t be a digital nomad and it really annoyed me. You can read it here. The article isn't new but I hadn't see it before. The author has "done the digital nomad thing" and said that he was unable to feel content without actually working. I’m not quite sure what he thought being a digital nomad was.

Digital Nomad ≠ Backpacker

I have written a lot of articles about how being an online freelancer has enabled us to travel a lot more. This is all 100% true and I am very happy with the lifestyle we have but we WORK to support it. I went to Taiwan for a week and I worked while I was there, often getting up and doing a morning’s work before going to sightsee in the afternoon.

I love the feeling of doing a good day’s work and earning my money. I read an article years ago that said that to be satisfied at work you need the following 3 things:

1. Autonomy: Being in control of our own choices
2. Complexity: Being able to master new skills and improve
3. Direct connection between effort and reward: Seeing the payoff—whether financial, spiritual, or other—of your work

(I couldn’t find the original article but this Buffer article covers the same topics)

I have never been happier in my work life than I am now. Being a freelancer means that I don’t have a boss; I have clients. I can pick and choose who I work for. That’s Autonomy right there.

I have learned new things and been challenged in ways I never expected during my freelance career. Complexity: check.

I know my hourly rate and how many hours I’m billing. Every hour worked has a clear dollar value. The connection between effort and reward could not be more clear. And that’s only financial; the improvement in my life through not commuting to work and being able to spend more time outside is noticeable.

What’s my point?

If you’re going to be a digital nomad you will still need to put in the hours. Being able to travel doesn’t mean that you are on permanent holiday.

I love getting up early, doing a decent day’s work and going out to see something and grab a bite to eat. Living at the same pace as the local people makes me feel like I live there. Also, because you’re working and not on vacation there is no pressure to move move move, see the next sight, take a photo and continue on. You can stay longer and really soak in each place.

Don’t become a digital nomad because you hate working. Become a digital nomad because you want to work in interesting places.

Get in touch if you'd like to know more.

Also, if you're looking for work, 24 Seven is a cool new agency. The link there is to one of their blogs on a similar topic to this post.

The 8 Best Resources for Customer Service Newbies

There is no substitute for working with customers; dealing with different situations, personalities and support mediums. I had my first break in customer service when thrown into the deep end in my first job and I learned so many important lessons from that first couple of months! That was a time before the content marketing boom though. Now there are oodles of resources to help you out and reduce the trial and error that is inherent in any new job. Below are a collection of the best places to hangout and learn about customer service.

1. Zendesk Resources

One of the most commonly used enterprise helpdesk apps out there. Zendesk is preferred by some of the biggest online businesses, so you can be sure they know what they are talking about when it comes to support.

They have a range of resources in a bunch of different formats; webinars, blog posts, videos, infographics… you name it. Because of their position in the industry they do cover some very high level topics but there are also insights for front line support teams.

2. Lynda Customer Service Essentials

Looking to start from the beginning and make sure that you’ve got the the basics down? Then look no further than Lynda which has a bunch of videos that can help get you started.

3. #custserv on Twitter

I didn’t get into Twitter at the ground floor and I resisted it’s charms for quite a while because I didn’t see the value in it as a resource. But if you can get over that initial hump then Twitter is an invaluable source of information where all of the customer service big guns drop their knowledge daily.

It’s also worth remembering that Twitter is an important customer support channel for a lot of companies and you’ll often be asked to give your Twitter handle when applying for jobs.

4. Helpscout Blog

Another helpdesk app in a similar vein to Zendesk. Their blog has a similar feel, covering customer service from a high level to the frontlines. There is also a worthwhile resources section on their website with a lot of useful information.

5. GrooveHQ Blog

And yet another helpdesk app! However, instead of being aimed at large and enterprise businesses Groove is for the little guys. This is small business support software, which means that their blog is a bit more gritty and down to earth. Very useful insights for small customer support teams and businesses that are providing support on the fly.

6. Support Ops

This is where it’s at!  Started and run by some of the startup scene’s brightest support talents from companies like Buffer, Basecamp and Wistia. There are weekly podcasts and blog posts that talk about in depth strategies but also some amazing tips on how to break into customer service from the people that are doing the hiring.

7. Support Driven Slack Channel

OK, so you’ve read watched and listened to enough blog posts, podcasts and videos to take down a charging elephant! After taking all of that in you’ve now got a bunch of questions that you’d like to ask someone that’s in the know. Well, this is the place to do it, this super active support channel is chock full of the nicest, most helpful people on the earth. So don’t worry and get involved!

8. Lincoln Murphy Blog

Lincoln is a consultant and thought leader on Sales, Marketing, Customer Support and Customer Success. His content is mostly aimed at business owners and support team leaders but it’s about as insightful as it gets and if you want to be a customer service rockstar some day this is where you can find out what that means.