Jan 18, 2012
Bryn Mooth is an independent
journalist and copywriter at Writes4Food.com. I’ve been checking-in with
Bryn for the past 8 months (since she went freelance) to follow her
journey, and last week, we did our first calls of 2012.
How did she do? Overall, 2011
“exceeded” her expectations. Bryn was pleased with the income she
earned and the work she did.
But…
January is slow.
Why?
Bryn says she “checked out” in
December. She put off doing things like following up on completed
projects, “slacked off” on networking and contacting, and now,
she’s “paying the price.”
What’s her plan of attack?
She says, “I’m starting from scratch, a little
bit.”
Bryn has identified the kind of
projects that really appeal to her, and in 2012 is going to
actively pursue that kind of work. She spent the last week on
LinkedIn building a list of prospects. Then, she’s seeing who in
her network can make an introduction.
What she’s learning about the
marketing process:
Like most freelancers, I’m
not really good at it. Early in this freelance career… some things
were landing in my lap… I was doing some networking and yielding
some good projects. But I wasn’t doing as much of that as I need to
be. I got busy. I kept thinking, I need to allocate some time to
think about who my ideal prospects are and get that planning going,
and I didn’t. So, that’s what I’m doing now.
In this 11-minute interview, I
suggested for Bryn a three tool combination to turn these prospects
into clients:
1. Use LinkedIn to
connect.
2. Use email to follow
up.
3. Use the phone to make it
real.
Bryn is going to do this—and
we’re going to talk to her next month to see how she
did.
How long does it take to take to
turn cold (or warm) prospects that you find on LinkedIn, and turn
them into actual clients?
Stay tuned to find
out…