Emily tripled her freelance UX rate and got a full time UX Writing role too

Sarah Doody [00:00:00]: The steps to get someone to say yes, whether it’s to hire you for a full time job or a contract or a freelance role, it’s the same. At the end of the day, people still need to see, trust, and believe that you are the person that can do the job for them. And you can communicate that through your resume, through your portfolio, through a strong LinkedIn profile, etcetera. Hey there. I’m Sarah Doody, host of the career strategy podcast. Many professionals are seeking more impact, flexibility, growth, and let’s face it, getting paid what they’re worth. But how do you unlock this in your career? It starts with strategy. I’m taking you behind the scenes of what’s working for my career coaching clients.

Sarah Doody [00:00:46]: You’ll hear strategies and actionable, yet sometimes against the grain, advice for how you can be the CEO of your career and stop dreading Mondays. Ready to level up your career? Let’s get after it. Hey, friend. Today, I wanna share the story of Emily. Emily switched to the field of UX, specifically UX writing, was able to land multiple contracts, freelance contracts, and then went on to get hired at a major airline as a UX writer, which is so cool. So I wanna share a little bit about Emily’s journey to help you see why the things we teach in career strategy lab can help you land your own freelance or contract UX projects. Whether you wanna do freelance work on the side or make it your full time gig, I think this episode is gonna help you see the value of learning how to design, market, and sell yourself as a freelance consultant to the potential companies you want to hire you. And, of course, if you’re looking for a full time job, all of this applies as well.

Sarah Doody [00:02:04]: Because at the end of the day, whether someone is going to sign your job offer for a full time job or sign the contract, you have you do a freelance project for them. The steps to get them to sign are still the same. You need to attract their interest and attention for you as a potential consultant or candidate, and then you need to prove to them why you are the best person for the job so that they trust you enough to then hire you. So let’s dive in. First of all, though, I wanna talk about Emily’s kinda journey because Emily did not start out in the world of UX writing. Emily worked in kind of the fashion, in beauty space, doing a lot of marketing and design, and she came across the field of UX writing, and it really intrigued her. And she realized she’s kind of been doing a little bit of it already in her job in design and marketing in kind of the fashion and beauty worlds. So she decided to go for it, and she did a UX writing certification program, and then she faced the job search.

Sarah Doody [00:03:11]: Right? As maybe you have been in this situation before. And Emily had trouble getting hired after doing that certification. And so the problem, one of them, was that Emily didn’t have a portfolio. Emily struggled with getting initial interviews. And so she ended up joining career strategy lab, which is my UX job search accelerator, and listened to what happened. So Emily decided that obviously she needed the portfolio, so she got to work on that. And then she updated her resume and her LinkedIn and everything else. And, you know, ironically, she realized that even as a UX writer, she had made a lot of writing mistakes on her resume, on her portfolio, on her LinkedIn and elsewhere.

Sarah Doody [00:04:04]: And so Emily decided to create a profile on Upwork. If you’re not familiar, Upwork is a platform where you can create a profile as a freelancer or service provider, and then companies can hire you off there. So it’s like a marketplace for freelance work, and there are a lot of UX people on Upwork. So Emily decided I’m gonna make this profile on Upwork. And then a major company that you would definitely know if I said the name, but I’m not going to. They’re kind of in the HR space. She got recruited by this company. They reached out to her one day, and then three days later, they hired her for a UX writing contract.

Sarah Doody [00:04:51]: And she ended up doing that work, and then they hired her for another project, which is awesome. So this is an important point to make because many people kinda think contract work might look bad on their resume, and it does not. Contracts can lead to additional contracts. Contracts can also lead to full time jobs. Contracts can also mean a lot of money. So I wanna just break down some of the money elements of Emily’s example. Emily’s first UX writing contract, which was not the one from Upwork, it was this other thing she did, that was for $35 an hour. That’s what she charged them.

Sarah Doody [00:05:44]: Then the next contract that she got with a different company was for $100 an hour, and that was after she joined Career Strategy Lab. So that first one was $35 an hour. She did it, then she joined career strategy lab, redid and refreshed and optimized her resume portfolio etcetera, and was able to charge $100 an hour. And then a few months later, she ended up increasing her price to $125 an hour. So she went from $30 an hour to $125 an hour in less than six months, which blows my mind. And I am so thrilled for this person because they posted in our community and essentially said, like, how amazed they were when they really broke down these numbers, especially when they compared it to their previous full time job where they were working in fashion and and beauty and stuff, where they were making far far less than that. So that is what Emily did and kind of the financial element of how she was able to increase that hourly rate as a result of being able to communicate her skills and experience and value that she would bring to the company through her resume, portfolio, etc, which then she was able to turn around and use bits and pieces of what she wrote for her resume and her portfolio, etcetera, and use those on her Upwork profile. Right? So after Emily shared all this in the community and with my team, we asked her like, well, what do you think really made a difference when it came to what you did during your time in career strategy lab? And she said, and I’m just gonna read it.

Sarah Doody [00:07:48]: She said, I didn’t know how to articulate that I could succeed as a UX writer. And CSL, career strategy lab, helped me both tell and show that while building up my confidence. I continue to apply to full time roles, but I also am confident I can continue getting freelance work. And side note, as I said in the intro, this person then went on to get hired at a major airline, which is very, very, very cool. I would love to do UX writing for an airline. I have so many suggestions. But another thing I wanted to point out are some lessons that Emily shared concerning this kind of career journey that that she was on from switching careers to then doing freelance and getting hired full time. One of the lessons that really stood out to me, she said close the wrong doors so the right ones can open for you.

Sarah Doody [00:08:48]: And in your own career, maybe that means you need to say no to a freelance project because they’re low balling you on the price, for example. Maybe it means that you need to switch careers because you’ve been telling yourself you’re gonna do it for weeks, months, or years, and you still haven’t done it. Maybe this episode is a sign that it is possible to switch careers. Another tip that really stood out to me was this, this is what she said, don’t be afraid to shift as you go. I had to edit my compass statement, which is like an elevator pitch, so I had to edit my compass statement, LinkedIn, and resume at least three times, finalizing them with feedback from each critique. And this is so important because it’s a testament to Emily’s commitment to not getting such stuck in perfection. Right? By seeking feedback early and often, Emily was able to make small changes before they ended up becoming giant redos of her resume, of her portfolio, etcetera. Another thing that stood out to me was Emily said treat non interviews like interviews.

Sarah Doody [00:10:05]: So in other words, treat every email, every conversation, every interaction that you’re able to have with someone that might be hiring or works at a company that you wanna work at, treat it with the same integrity that you would with an interview. Meaning, take the time to prepare if possible. Right? Be very intentional about what you say, how you say it, etcetera, so that you are able to put your best foot forward. And I would also add, make sure you follow-up with people after interactions. That just creates another touch point, and the more touch points you have with people, the more likely they are to remember you, which is very important whether you want to get freelance work or get hired full time. Okay, the last tip that I want to share with you from Emily is the following: focus on the process, not just the end goal. My end goal was always to get a full time job, and I didn’t realize how lucrative freelance could be. I think this is so so important, and I would also expand on this a little bit if I can in that many people think the process is all about getting hired.

Sarah Doody [00:11:22]: Right? The end goal is the getting hired part. But what a lot of people don’t realize is the personal growth that happens on that journey. And even in Emily’s case, she mentioned multiple times how, sure, her mind was blown with how she increased that freelance rate from 35 to $1.25 an hour, but she was also blown away by her confidence and how she grew as a professional and as a communicator, even as a UX writer. So if you are in the middle of a job search or if you are thinking about trying to get freelance clients and contracts and things like that, please remember that the steps to get someone to say yes, whether it’s to hire you for a full time job or a contract or a freelance role, it’s the same. At the end of the day, people still need to see, trust, and believe that you are the person that can do the job for them, and you can communicate that through your resume, through your portfolio, through a strong LinkedIn profile, etcetera. And the last little tip I would give you is that if you are freelancing and you’re thinking about joining a program like career strategy lab, you can probably list career strategy lab as an expense when you file your taxes. Because if you’re doing freelancing, then you have to do certain things with your taxes, and you’ll have, you know, sales, and you’ll also have expenses. And so if you join career strategy lab, your accountant can probably list career strategy lab as a professional expense, which will help reduce your income, which will help reduce your taxes.

Sarah Doody [00:13:08]: And we all love that. Alright. So that is it for today. I I just wanted to include this one because so many people ask me, will career strategy lab help them get freelance work? And the answer is yes. We have a lot more examples of people who have gone on to do this. So we’re gonna make a point to do more episodes like this to highlight people who have been able to leverage what we teach in career strategy lab and build awesome freelance businesses, whether it’s their full time thing or they do it for, you know, a certain time in their career or they do it on the side. I myself did freelance on the side for years. I also did it as my full time job as well.

Sarah Doody [00:13:52]: So hopefully this episode helps you see the benefits of doing freelance or contract work and gives you some tips for how you can stand out to potential clients and what you need to do to get them to say yes to you. All right. That is it for today. We’ll see you in another episode. Thanks for listening to the Career Strategy Podcast. Make sure to follow me, Sarah Doody, on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, or LinkedIn. If anything in today’s episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear about it. Tag me on social media or send me a DM.

Sarah Doody [00:14:29]: And lastly, if you found this episode helpful, I’d really appreciate it if you could share it with a friend or give us a quick rating on Spotify or review on Apple Podcasts. Catch you later.