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Departments
- Welcome!
- [Not] Just for Newbies
- On the Radar
- Dollars & Sense
- TAMW Calendar
- The Savvy Marketer
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Cash, Trash, Stash, and Panache!
We're kicking 2015 into high gear right out of the gate, and we hope you are, too. Year-end brought a flurry of frantic phone calls from clients who wanted to know our availability at the start of the New Year. And lucky us, they all came through!
Taking stock of what got us to this fortunate point in our careers and in our freelance businesses, four things came to mind and that's what this issue of Pencil Points is all about.
Cash is king. And if you don't believe us, talk to someone with a cash flow problem. In Dollars and Sense this month, you'll learn about retainers and why freelances love them or hate them. Spoiler alert: it's all about the cash!
We were surprised to learn that entrepreneurship, particularly among millennials, is in the trash right now. How can that be when there's so much money to be made as a freelance? In [Not] Just for Newbies, we peel apart the layers of this stinky problem and (hopefully) inspire you to come up smelling like a rose.
We write and talk a lot about the many benefits of social media--both as a marketing tool for freelances and as a strategy to help our clients build their businesses. But once you amass a stash of social media outlets, how can you possibly manage them all? We tell you how this month in The Savvy Marketer.
Panache is a flamboyant confidence of style or manner. We're not likely to use this word to describe the great thinkers and innovators of our time. But perhaps we need to rethink that. Rethinking is what the intellectual resource we discuss in this month's installment of On the Radar is all about, and we think everyone should be talking about it!
We also have a few speaking engagements in the works, which you can read about in Where in the World are Brian and Cyndy?
So there you have it. We're starting 2015 with some cash, taking out the trash, managing our stash, with a little panache. We wish you the best this new year has to offer, and some surprises and discoveries along the way!
Until next month,
Cyndy and Brian
The Accidental Medical WriterPS. We're excited to be Amazon Associates. Every time you visit Amazon through our website or click on a product link we provide and make a purchase, we earn a few pennies that allow us to continue to give you free content through this newsletter. We would really appreciate it if you did so. |
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 [NOT] JUST FOR NEWBIES
Information and Inspiration for New and Experienced Writers
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WANTED: Young Entrepreneurs (And Older Ones, Too)!
Small businesses are vital to a healthy economy. But it seems entrepreneurs are becoming harder to find, and millennial entrepreneurs are needed most.
According to a recent analysis by the Wall Street Journal of a study conducted by the US Federal Reserve in 2013, the number of households headed by an adult under 30 years old who has a stake in a private company has declined 66% since 1989-from 10.6% of households to 3.6% of households. That's around the time we started our freelance businesses. Who knew we were in the heyday? The number of new US businesses fell again in the first quarter of 2014, so the situation's not getting better...yet.
What we found most interesting about the Wall Street Journal article, written by Ruth Simon and Caelainn Barr, is the decline in business ownership among young adults. As the authors point out, this runs counter to the stereotypical 20-something as an entrepreneurial risk taker. Sure, starting a business in some industries takes a lot of credit or capital, which can be very hard to find. But evidently many millennials are struggling to gain the skills and experience they feel they need to start a business. To them we say--freelance!
Going off on your own in an industry in which you already have some experience is a relatively low-risk, potentially high-reward way to launch your own business. We know that to be true, and many of our readers know it, too. To start a freelance business, you build on what you do know, and learn the rest as you go. That's how we did it, and that's why we're committed to helping you do it, too.
The great thing about this message is that it doesn't apply just to millennials. Anyone who wants to grow personally, professionally, and financially beyond the limits of a staff position is the perfect candidate for becoming a freelance. This message also doesn't apply just to Americans. Small businesses are vital to every nation's economy. So anyone with a passion for personal, professional, and financial satisfaction should consider helping themselves and their country by launching a freelance business.
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ON THE RADAR
Resources for Medical Writers | | |
TEDTalks, and We Should Listen
TED (Technology, Entertainment, and Design) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization devoted to the power of ideas to change attitudes. It began as a conference in 1984, and has been building a clearinghouse of free knowledge from the world's most inspired thinkers ever since. Today, TED covers almost all topics in more than 100 languages. TEDTalks shares the best ideas from the TED Conference, for free. We were thrilled to discover it. It's filled with convention-breaking mavericks, icons, and geniuses, each giving the 18-minute talk of their lives. A fresh TEDTalk is posted every weekday, so as you can imagine, there's quite a lot to see and hear. In fact, they currently have an archive of more than 1900 TEDTalks! We find them fascinating, thought-provoking, and inspiring, and we think you will, too.
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DOLLARS & SENSE
Advice on the Business of Freelancing
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Retainer Arrangement: Good or Bad?
At one of our open sessions at the AMWA Annual Conference in October, an audience member asked us our opinions about retainer agreements. Of course, we thought, what a great topic for an article in Pencil Points!
When you enter into a retainer arrangement with a client, you agree to provide the client with a specific number of hours of work during a certain time period, usually monthly, in return for a set fee, or retainer. Retainer arrangements can be good for you and your client. You receive a guaranteed income each month and your client gets you for a predetermined amount of time. If you're just starting out, a retainer arrangement can be a good opportunity to gain experience, build your portfolio, and create contacts as well as cash flow.
Keep in mind, though, that retainer arrangements can also negatively affect your business if you enter into them without considering some of their pitfalls. The first issue to consider is how much to charge. Your retainer fee should be at least the hourly rate you want to earn multiplied by the number of hours you guarantee the client. After all, when you are doing work for your retainer client you can't do work for any of your other clients. Why would you charge your retainer client less than you would charge your other clients? The answer is you wouldn't, not if you want to be profitable.
And that brings us to the second issue, juggling the workload from your other clients while still being available whenever your retainer client needs you. It is very easy to become too dependent upon a retainer client and agree to work so many hours for that one client that you have little time left for others. If you can't take on additional clients, you can't increase your income. You also put your freelance business at the mercy of that one client, which is kind of like having a job.
Then there's the whole marketing issue. If all your time is taken up working for one client, you won't make the time to market yourself to potential new clients. Take our word for it, that's a recipe for disaster, especially when your retainer client decides to cancel the agreement. Clients leave all the time, and if you have focused solely on nurturing one client, you're left with no prospects and no cash flow.
One final issue to consider is how and when to renegotiate the retainer agreement so that your income keeps up with inflation. The cumulative rate of inflation between 2010 and 2014 was about 9%. If you haven't raised your retainer fee over the last 4 years, you haven't kept up with inflation-which means you're earning less now than you were then. We recommend reviewing retainer agreements annually and adjusting rates accordingly.
And if you're not a very good negotiator, check out Negotiating Your Salary: How To Make $1000 a Minute . It's filled with key concepts and strategies you can use to become a better negotiator.
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| WHERE IN THE WORLD ARE BRIAN AND CYNDY?
The Accidental Medical Writer Calendar
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Brian and Cyndy are starting the year off with plans to present and speak in a number of venues including the AMWA Mid-Atlantic Chapter Conference on Friday, March 13, 2015 and the AMWA Delaware Valley Chapter Freelance Conference on Saturday, March 28, 2015. Watch for announcements and register for these outstanding educational and networking events. We hope to see you there!
Brian and Cyndy are also preparing proposals for sessions at the AMWA 75th Annual Conference in San Antonio, TX, September 30 to October 3, 2015. It will be a huge event and also a very important 75th Anniversary celebration for AMWA you won't want to miss!
Webinars are also in the works, and you'll hear more about these soon, too.
We would love to present at your next upcoming meeting or event, so invite us!
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| THE SAVVY MARKETER
Marketing Tips to Build Your Business
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Social Media Management Tools Can Save You Time
We've discussed in other issues of Pencil Points the value medical communicators can gain by using social media platforms to engage with colleagues, connect with prospective clients, and keep tabs on the latest news in the industry. Social media also are important tools for drug and device manufacturers, hospitals, health care systems, medical publications, and public health agencies to communicate with consumers and health care professionals. Whether you manage social media accounts for yourself or develop and manage content for clients, executing a coordinated social media marketing strategy across multiple platforms and measuring the results can be time consuming. That's where social media management tools come into play. If you are overwhelmed by the time and energy involved in updating and monitoring social media channels regularly, here are 3 options to consider.
Hootsuite. Hootsuite is probably the most popular social media management tool for individuals and businesses, with more than 10 million users including 744 of the Fortune 1,000 companies. It features a web-based dashboard that allows you to create and share content across multiple social media platforms, including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Foursquare, and others, without having to log into each separate account. Moreover, with the Hootsuite dashboard you can use filter and search tools to view other people's content, which allows you to monitor conversations. You can also schedule messages in advance and measure results with its custom analytics system or through Google Analytics. Hootsuite offers a free plan for up to 3 social profiles, a Pro Plan for $9.99 per month, and additional plans for small businesses, teams, and agencies.
Buffer. With 1.8 million customers, Buffer has found its niche within the social media community. Buffer is similar to Hootsuite in that you can schedule and share content across Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Google+, as well as App.net. Once you add your social media posts to a queue, you don't need to specify when you want them published (although you can designate very specific scheduling times and patterns). Buffer will publish content for you at optimal times, staggering them so that they are spaced out throughout the day. Buffer also points you toward content you might be interested in, and provides analytics to measure engagement and reach of your content. Buffer has earned kudos for its customer service, scheduling flexibility, and ease of use; however, it falls short when compared with Hootsuite in its analytics and ability to monitor discussions. Buffer is a fairly new kid on the block and it is constantly improving its features and changing it pricing plans. You can choose from a free, 7-day trial, an Awesome Plan for $10 a month, and Buffer for Business plans that start at $50 a month.
BuzzBundle. BuzzBundle is yet another tool trying to gain traction in the crowded field of social media management. It includes most of the bells and whistles found in Hootsuite, with one differentiating feature: the ability to create unlimited personas so that you can act and join discussions as different people (for example, your company's customer service representative, CEO, or anyone else you need to represent as part of your job). BuzzBundle supports Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, and YouTube, as well as forums and blogs. Purchase the software for $199, or download a free version of the software that enables you to use some, but not all of the features for about 15 days.
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