It's time to audit your freelance writing business
Auditing your freelance writing business can be time-consuming in the moment, but will keep you on track to meet your goals and may save you time down the road. It’s been 8 months since I last audited my business, and boy oh boy is she asking for it. Follow these steps and join me in doing a much-needed freelance audit.
Here’s how I audit my biz and all the tools I’ve created to help me do it better.
Update (or create) your dashboard.
Create a dashboard or update one you already have. Make sure it includes:
The point of contact
Their company
The number of hours of work you have them scheduled for (monthly)
How much revenue they bring you (per month)
How you feel about them (do they make you feel drained? do you like working for them? do you feel neutral about them? This matters too!)
Every client on your roster should be contributing to your goals (financially and lifestyle-wise) and making you at least “content” to show up to work.
Go through your roster and highlight:
Any client who doesn’t make you feel at least “content” to show up to work for them
Any client who takes up more than 15 hours per week of work (unless you lovethem and they’re paying you at least your goal rates)
Any client who isn’t paying you your goal rate
Any client who isn’t within your target niche or a niche you’re trying to expand into
These are the ones you should consider replacing (that low-paying client that takes up 10 hours a week of your time isn’t worth it!!).
Update your rates & budget.
Check out the Rates Calculator, it’ll help you set your rates based on what you need to earn to pay your bills and reach your financial goals.
Run through your personal expenses, business expenses, savings goals, and debt, to make sure they’re accurate and up to date.
If you haven’t heard, I recommend tracking your spending (even if you only do this for 3 months, you’ll learn a lot about yourself). This is a great way to make sure the expenses in your dashboard are accurate.
Then, highlight any expenses you can cut back or optimize.
Create a new schedule.
This is technically a three-part step.
First, go through your current roster and decide:
which clients you’ll replace (if any)
how many more clients you need to get to reach your income goals
how many hours of work you can reasonably take on
your new rate (if it changed when you updated your rates calculator
Second, wrangle all of your tasks. Write out:
your routine tasks (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly)
your miscellaneous tasks (things you need to get done for the next 3ish months like getting new clients, catching up on client work, or updating your website and pricing guide)
Then decide how and when you’ll do each of these tasks. What days of the week will you aim to do your routine tasks? What date(s) will you finish each miscellaneous task by? Add these to your calendar.
Third, create a new schedule.
I personally work best with a schedule. I like to know when my days off will be and what my usual working hours are going to be. It’s not rigid, but it helps me plan. Take a second to outline your new working hours.
Maybe block it out in your calendar or planner. Perhaps you want to schedule some co-working calls to find accountability. Whatever you do, know that it’s not permanent, you can always change it later. But you should try to stick with it for a month before you make any changes again.