How Freelance Writers Should and Should NOT Use Social Media
Do you have to be constantly posting on social media to be a freelance writer? NO! But there are some smart things to do on social media (and NOT do) that we're going over in this week's livestream.
That means steps and tips on is LinkedIn social media, what platforms should freelance writers use, what and how should freelance writers post on social media, what stages there are for social media use, what NOT to do, and what to do if you hate social media.
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How Freelance Writers Should and Should NOT Use Social Media
Are you constantly posting on social media as a freelance writer, but you're getting zero clients? Let's talk about that. Theres a reason there are there. There's a reason why you're not getting any clients, even though you're posting on social media and maybe you're posting on, uh, TikTok or Instagram or Facebook or even YouTube or you have like some other kind of social media or like Snapchat.
I don't know how you would use that. These are the kinds of things that we need to know about using social media, what to do and what not to do as a freelance writer. So the first thing that we're gonna talk about, and this is really important, is LinkedIn. So number one, let's talk about LinkedIn. So is LinkedIn actually social media?
1) Is LinkedIn social media and how do you use it to find high-quality clients?
Kind of yes and no. So the cool thing about LinkedIn is that it straddles both sides. So, When we're using LinkedIn, we're using it to connect with clients one on one. So we're sending our, our InMails, right? We're sending our lois our letters of introduction through InMails. We're connecting to grow our network.
We might be sharing little posts here and there, but LinkedIn is like, people are actively looking for opportunities or actively looking for freelance writers or actively doing stuff that has to do with. This is a lot different than other platforms like Facebook or Instagram or YouTube, where people are, you're trying to attract them to your brand or get them to follow you, or, um, it's a way different kind of game.
In LinkedIn, you're not really gathering followers, right? You're gathering connections, you're gathering a lot of different stuff. Hey, Vada. Yes, Vicky, I heart linked in. LinkedIn's the best. Um, so when we're using LinkedIn, it's very different than what we would use for like Instagram or Facebook or other social media platforms, TikTok, Snapchat, whatever.
Um, So as we're kind of using LinkedIn, what we're doing is thinking about it more as one to one. And this is a really important thing that don't step on her that we need to know, , that we need to know. Don't just stay in your own zone. She's already settled. She's happy under her blanket. Right? Come here, come lay down with your little support duck.
Okay, Well close enough. Why don't you lay down with your support duck. Okay. She already, she's settled over there. She's happy she's moving. . Good job everybody. He'll settle. Don't worry. Good boy buddy. Good boy. I saw those, those tail wags. Good boy buddy. Oh, you can't see the tail wags on here, but, um, good job Barry.
So with LinkedIn, , we're using it as one to one. This is something that's really important to know, right? So one to one means connecting with people one to one, right? Hey, Marie. Sending our LinkedIn connection requests one to one. We're sending our lois via InMails one to one. We are liking and commenting on a brand, kind of on a one to one basis.
Don't step on for, It's okay. You're okay. Charlie Barry. Oh my gosh. We have a shuffle, so hold on. I need to deal with this shuffle. Ooh, that was a nice mermaid lag. Mini. All right, Barry, do you wanna go back to your, go over there? Hold. We're dealing with a bear shuffle. All right, go over here. Do you wanna be over here?
Is this what you want? You wanna be over on that bed? Okay. Now that you're over. Oh, okay. Now we're settled. There we go. Let me wrap you up like a little potato, Little hot potato. Here we go. There you go. You got your support? Duck Mini. Why don't you get under here? Get under the blanket. Come here. Good girl.
Come on. There we go. There you go. Oh, she's a stop aid. Oh. Go lay down in your how hole. Hi, Holly. Holly. We're having a little pup. A little pup. Little, little, uh, move around of our friends over here. All right. Do you wanna lay down? I'll cover you in your blankie. You're like, No. You're like, I want the snacks.
You're like, I'm only here for the snacks. Hold on. All right, ready?
There we go. Good job. Good job. All right. Lay down, snug. We're gonna do snacks later. Okay, so one to one. This is really important about LinkedIn. The difference here between LinkedIn and another platform is like it's one to many. So me being on YouTube is one to many, right? I would have to be, um, hoping that lots of other freelance writers come and find this channel, right?
Which is obviously important, but it's way different than getting clients as a freelance writer like me building a brand or building, um, like brand awareness or building, um, a library of tips and tricks for freelance writers or. Building an education hub like I do on YouTube, or like I do on Instagram, that's way different.
So a lot of times I see . Yeah, it's definitely the dog shuffle that we, we have all the time. Now she's over here with like her blanket half on. She looks like she definitely has a mermaid tail. So as we're kind of thinking about these platforms, We as freelance writers, I get it. There are some freelance writers who have like tens of thousands of followers on Instagram.
They get clients to reach out to them all the time, but I haven't found that that's the majority. It's really the minority. And usually what ends up happening is that person has spent many, many years building a following and then they specialize in something super specific like sales pages, right? Or something like a very specific type of copy.
Where people on Instagram would be looking for that type of thing. For us who actually need to pay our bills and eat. We need to do one to one. We need to get on LinkedIn, we need to grow our network. We need to be in a place where people actively do business stuff, right? So I have a bear, I know I have like a mini hair on my eyelash.
So as we're kind of building our business, really think about it as like one to one and one to. So when I do YouTube and when I do Instagram, I know that that's one to many that like I'm using different techniques or I'm using different stuff to gather people right around my content. Right? That's not what we want.
as freelance writers, we don't have time to wait for people to gather around our content, right? We have to pay for kibbles and we have to pay for other stuff, and we have to actually build a business. This is a big difference when you're, what you should do with social media, what you should do is use LinkedIn.
And LinkedIn should be used in a couple different ways, right? Number one profile so people can find you. Make sure you answer those right questions. I have a video on that. I'll link to that in the, um, description, . And then, um, the other thing to do with LinkedIn is grow your network. Send your lois via InMail.
LinkedIn sales Navigator is like the best. Um, and then, um, as you're using LinkedIn, what you're posting is stuff about wins with your clients, or you're posting about new clients that you've gotten, or new clips that you've gotten, or things that have changed in your business, right? Kinds of things that potential clients would care about.
Anytime you're kind of wondering, what should I post, what should I post on linked? The answer is, what do my ideal clients need to know most about hiring me? Like, what do they need to know or what are things that they struggle with that I can help with? Uh, I don't like the idea of putting up a post, being like, Hi, I'm looking for work, or My schedule is finally open.
You know, like, that's not , that's not like a power play. That's not. Something that looks good like it. I just feel like that's desperation and I don't like it. Like the freelance writers I know who make above six figures or who are really killing it, even if they don't make six figures, but their schedule's always busy.
They're never posting on LinkedIn that their schedule's open or like that they're taking work. Like they're always posting. Hey, I can, um, I, my schedule is full, but I can recommend writers. So if you've been reaching out to me, I can recommend somebody else. Um, okay. Boo Boo Boo. Yeah, Marie. So if you never know what to post on LinkedIn, I know business says the same thing.
You're just posting, like, here's the thing. When you're in a certain part of your career, you're don't even worry about posting. Like the posting part for me came way later in my career. So like, I, I just wouldn't worry about it. Like I just, I would not even worry about it. Use your posts strategically, so you might not post that often, but when you post, it's actually useful stuff that people care.
So with LinkedIn, it's not like Instagram likes recency, right? And YouTube and a lot of other places like recency, So they want you to post a lot, right? TikTok. But with LinkedIn it's not so much about recency, it's more about quality and it's more about like actually adding to the conversation or doing stuff that's worthwhile, at least from what I've seen.
So you don't need to post all the time on LinkedIn. You just need to post. When you get new clients, when you get new. Um, and not saying like, I got a new clip. Check it out. It should always be a post that's like, Hey, bla, you know, at client, right? Like, tag your client. Client and I worked on this thing. I got to interview some subject matter experts, and we talked about tips and tricks to do these things.
If you feel like that would be helpful, check it out here. Like you're always using this post to reflect back on the working experience or how great it was or the fun things that are in the content. It's never about like, I have a clip, just read it. That doesn't work. So the posting on LinkedIn is more about important things that your clients care about, or important milestones in your business or things that are useful to solving the pain points and struggles of your clients.
Right? It's not about recency, and this is another big difference that we'll talk about about platforms, right? Um, LinkedIn is the best because we don't have to be posting constantly. It's not really. Um, it's not really like Instagram or, or stuff where like there's up and down and like however much you post, the more your stuff gets seen and like, it's a whole thing.
So just focus on, first, focus on sending your lois and growing your network. Then later on when you have extra time, then you can worry about posting stuff. Um, . Yeah. And the other thing is like if your ideal clients aren't on LinkedIn that much, then don't even worry about posting cuz they're not gonna see it.
I would rather go email those people. Like if you find out that there's actually a couple of my students, um, and Marie is kind of one of them where they're not on LinkedIn that often. So you send them an email or you call them. I have another student, Ruth Ann. Um, you know, we were talking about her stuff and I was like, Why don't you call and get the marketing manager's email?
So she calls to actually get emails cuz they're just not available. She can't find them. Um, and that's just something where you learn how to use different platforms. So you might use LinkedIn to find the marketing person or the content person, but then you might have to go find their email with hunter.io or you may have to go call the company and get their.
But honestly like if your people aren't using LinkedIn that much, you're using LinkedIn just to find out who they are, then you're using other methods. So even then posting wouldn't be that useful. Um, yeah. So Vesna, this is a good thing if you're trying to figure out what to say about working with clients, and it sounds unnatural, it will sound unnatural.
It's a new thing, right? Vesna, these are like new things that we're. As we're kind of going through these posts, they're gonna sound weird, right? And when I write them, it still sounds weird, but what you wanna make it is like as genuine, like make it genuine. Don't make it like sleazy sounding. So what that means is you just say like, Who did I work with?
What did we do? What did I do to complete that project? And then explain the experience. This was like, you know, maybe the experience wasn't fun, , right? Maybe the experience wasn't fun and exciting, but the experience was like, I learned so much about this topic from this expert. Or maybe the experience was like, you know, like doing all this research really reminded me how much I really enjoyed diving into the.
Or maybe the answer is like, I really loved interviewing these people because of X, Y, Z. Like what you're doing is explaining those things. Like, who did you do? I have to sneeze, but who did you do the project with? What did you do? Hold on.
Okay. Who did you do the project with? What did you do? Was it a blog post case study, White paper? How did you do that? Did you do interviews? Did you do research? Did you make a list? Did you make a blog post from a webinar? What did you do? How did you do it? Interviews, research, write it up, whatever. And then what was the experience like?
If you follow that format, it's very genuine. Like you just say what it is and if it was a shitty experience, maybe you cut the experience part. Maybe you just talk about the clip, but it's don't overthink it. Remember, the more you kind of get used to doing this, the easier it becomes. It's the same thing as.
Connection requests, right? Like I always have students that are like, What do I say? And it's like, you know, they have, we have templates, but it's also like the more you do it, you don't even need the templates cuz you write the same thing so many times that you just don't even need to worry about it.
Hold on. All right, so that's number one. So number one is LinkedIn is kind of social media ish, but it works differently. Oh my gosh. Woo. Go back to your Woohoo. Nope. Hi. Go back to your huba hole. You have to go back to your huba hole. Go back to your hobb at hole. Come here, go back to your haba hole. Then you can get something.
All right. Let's do a little up date real quick. Barry, your eye is really leaking today that you, as you can see, , Barry's gonna have surgery on that eye that's leaking. He has a little bump on there that all of a sudden, just like he's had it for two years and we had it examined and it's benign and all that.
And um, all of a sudden it just started leaking and like, Getting outta control. So his eye is always leaking. But on the positive side, a few things. Bo is gonna be 16 in a handful of days. So on November 1st, Bo is gonna turn 16 and he is a giant dog, . Okay. So like if this is your first live stream that you've ever watched, Bo is like 60 to 65 pounds somewhere in there, and he is 16 and he still runs up and down the stairs.
He still runs around outside. Back up. Back up. All right, Barry, do you wanna tri. Go buddy. Good job. So, um, I was gonna tell you some interesting thing about them, but I forgot what it is right now. . Ready? Good job. Good job. Other one. Other one. Good job. I like your bugeye. Your bugeyes are adorable. Go back to your haa hole.
Yes. I like your little bow. Go back to your ho hole. Back up. Go back to your hoba hole. All right. I did say trio. Okay, good. Vesna. I'm glad that that was helpful. Yeah, just break it down into simple steps. Don't sit there looking at the blank post for LinkedIn and be like, What am I supposed to say? Just break it down into the facts of like, who did I work with, what did I do, How did I do it, how did it go?
That kind of stuff. Ready, Mary. Good job, buddy. All right. Charlotte High five. Good job. High five, other one. Good job. High five. Good job.
You look very, very beautiful today. Both of you, even though your eye is leaky. Barry, this is just part of it. Hi Getty. Welcome, . It's okay. You can always linger. It's okay. That's totally fine. All right, let's talk about number two. So now we know a little bit about LinkedIn. We know, Oh, and just ps. LinkedIn is my all time favorite platform.
2) What platforms and social media should freelance writers use?
It's the best. Use LinkedIn. Forget about everything else. . All right, let's talk about two. So what platforms can we use if we really wanna be spicy? Um, we wanna be spicy tamales. What platforms can we use? LinkedIn, . Just use LinkedIn if you wanna be spicy Tama and use other things. I do know writers who use I.
But honestly like the, I've gotten clients through Instagram or not, like I haven't signed them, but I've gotten inbound leads from Instagram and it's never been stuff that I, that's high paid or quality work or stuff that I actually wanna do. Um, I just, I think Instagram can be kind of a crapshoot. It's not as reliable.
Like LinkedIn, if you need to build a business, you gotta go on. The other thing is that I have other platforms, right? So platforms could be that you're using Apple Podcasts. So when you get to a certain point in your career, I have a couple of friends who have podcasts, um, to attract ideal clients, right?
They even interview ideal clients on their podcasts. Um, and so that way it's very niche down. It's very specific. And they have these podcasts so that they can get more specific types of clients and they can become kind of, Um, like a thought leader and an expert, like they can show their skills in that niche.
The other thing is live streams, right? YouTube, I think YouTube is helpful if you do a lot of video stuff, right? So there are more and more video opportunities coming up. Um, and I think if you were able to show your expertise or explain a lot of things, YouTube is good for that. But a lot of these are advanced.
Like a lot of freelance writers just use LinkedIn, just turn mute on everything else that's not LinkedIn. Then if you wanna work on things later, like you wanna share other things, Instagram, YouTube. YouTube is great because it's very evergreen. Like they do like recency, but they also, um, you know, they will show like content that's years old.
So YouTube and Instagram are great. Snapchat is super short. Uh, TikTok is like, you really gotta, that's like a whole thing. And that's the same thing with recency and like, it's a lot of work and it's like a lot of short stuff. Um, you don't really get the chance to like explain things as well cuz it's so short.
Um, but there's so many different platforms. I just think that when we're kind of starting out and when we're kind of Yeah. If you wanna be a spicy tomorrow, I, Holly I can't believe I haven't said that yet in our Holly's, one of my students and I just can't, I usually say that in our live q and a, so like, I can't believe I haven't said.
But yeah, like I just, There are different phases of your career. So like, I didn't start YouTube and Instagram until two years ago. Like I was very late to Instagram, but also, Hi, Woo. But also I didn't start building out parts of like me teaching students and teaching freelance writers until a couple years ago, even though I had been teaching them for years before that.
Um, and these are useful for me, kind of growing a brand or growing other things when I'm starting my actual business. Like even in my business right now, my six figure business, my freelance writing stuff, I still like almost. Like, I always use LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube are things that I use for like helping freelance writers or answering questions on that front, like, and that is more widespread, right?
I'm not necessarily, um, like trying to get a client to like sign a contract. I'm more showing like knowledge or helping them or, um, getting them to the next step or helping them understand that like maybe my course is a good fit for them as their next step. You know, we'll talk about Freelance Writer Wealth Lab, or we'll talk about the community part, or we'll talk about what happens in there or what they learn.
So this is a lot more of an opportunity for me to kind of like warm people up and have them understand like, am I right? The right teacher? I hear you. Woo. Am I the right teacher? Go back to Haa Hole. No, go back to Haa Hole. Am I the right teacher? Are they getting value from my free content? Which means they would get value from my paid content.
Um, and then that process is very slow. We can't do that in our freelance writing business. We can't wait years or months for someone to just like agree to do something in our business. You go, buddy. All right, Charlie. Ready? High five. High five. Good job. Oh my gosh. Uh, we need, we need things to move a lot quicker, which is why we like LinkedIn and direct reach outs and one-on-ones and all that stuff.
So we can use other platforms, but they're not as quick. They can take a long time and we're using them for different things. So really just LinkedIn. Holly says, The course is amazing, . Thank you Holly. Um, I always like a little shout out for the course just because I feel like a lot of what, what I think is interesting and I.
I give a lot of stuff away for free, right? I write a weekly newsletter, which is different than what I do here on the live stream, right? Every week. Every week I have a newsletter and a live stream, so I'm giving away that. Plus, I'm giving away tips and tricks every single day on Instagram and LinkedIn and YouTube, right?
So I'm like putting all the stuff out there. But , the thing is like, that I think kind of is important to note, is like when people get in the course, the course is. Dense. It's like bootylicious. Okay. The course is like a voluptuous heavy set, like big, thick peach, right? So even though I give a lot of stuff away for free, like the course itself is still very dense.
And I think that's important because I don't know if you're like me or you've taken a freelance writing course and you're like, This is all the stuff I already heard from them, right? This is all the stuff I already know, or these are things that they're just repeating from their free stuff, or like they're not actually going.
The course, This is like what I give you, all the free stuff is like tactical, but the course goes way deeper into like functional, really deep down thought-provoking steps. So even if you watch all this free content, I can guarantee you . I can guarantee that there is, the course is like thicker than you will imagine.
Like it, it has all of the extra like little bits that help. Okay. Back to the, back to the point , it's Mandy's knowledge on steroids. Yeah. It's kind of like that. It's like I, I, the course gives me a focused place to like lead people through the steps and it gives me a place to like say like, Okay, we norm, you know, we talked about this, let's go this.
The livestream is like, I can't really do that. Like not only do I not have enough time on the livestream to do it, like, but I need to do a lot of different things in the lessons and take people through different. And give them worksheets and have them think about things that we really can't do on the live stream.
So just a little plug for the course , it's opening in April, 2023. So it's, it's still a while away. Let's talk about number three. Let's talk about three. Um, one second if I can figure my stuff out. There we go. Three. And let's do a little pub date. Um, let's do pub date. Oh, we're missing a pup from our pup date, Charlotte.
Go back to your hobbit hole. You sass, you're like over here being a sass machine. Okay, first of all, let's see if we can like readjust a little bit. Okay? Now we get your cute little ears. Barry, you look beautiful. You look super geriatric and adorable. Good job. Okay, Ready? High five other one. Good job. High five.
Ow, fizzle. All right, Good job. As you'll notice, Charlotte is getting more and more of her powdered sugar jowls. She's about to be 10 in a few months. Go back to your haa hole. Oh my gosh. You're active sass today. Can you spin? No, you can spin. If you spin, you'll get it. Can you spin here? Can you spin? Nope.
We're working on new tricks. I know. We're kind of like high fived out. We're working on new things. Back up, back up, back up, Back up, Back up. More back. You know how to back up. Back up. One more. Back up. . Back up. Back up.
Okay, fine. Just because you're cute and I like your little shark teeth. All right, Barry. If anyone has any suggestions of what we should do for Barry's 16th birthday, we are open to that as. So if you have any recommendations of what we should do, he can walk quite a distance. So we took him on the trail the other day and uh, the trail I think is a couple miles.
So round trip, I wanna say the trail all the way back through our neighborhood is like close to a couple miles, or it's like a mile and a half. I forget what it is, but, so he can walk on trails, he can. He, his vision's not great . But, um, if anyone has any recommendations of what we should do for a 16 year old 65 pound geriatric dog that's kind of blind in deaf, we're open to it.
All right. Hello. Do you wanna be picked up and see everybody or you just wanna stand here and like get your jo juice all over me. All right, let's talk about three. Okay. Let's talk about what we should post, which we already did, right? So let's talk about when we're posting on social media, which basically right now just means LinkedIn,
3) What and how freelance writers should post on social media, and what stages should freelance writers use social media?
So when we're posting on LinkedIn, what is it Vesna? It's who did you work with? What did you do? What was the project? What did you actually do to complete that project? And how did it go? Basically, like what was the experience? That's what we're posting on LinkedIn. Don't overcomplicate it. , Okay? Please don't make it over complicated because the more complicated you make it and the higher you're like, Oh, this person did this and now I have to do this, and now I have to compete.
You won't do it. Literally just make it simple and you will post more often and you will get better traction. Like you will get more comments or you will get more clients who see your stuff, who are excited about it. Like when I posted, I had a case study that I really enjoyed working on Go out, I don't know, like a month ago or something, and I posted about it and I had a bunch of people like, and like talk about it that, or talk to me about it, who I haven't heard from like forever, like potential.
So, um, I I think that that's more important. Like, just do it. Don't overthink it. Don't make it crazy. But talk about, um, what, like who did you work with, what did you do? Blog, post case study, ebook report, blah, blah, blah. How did you get it done? How did you actually do the work and what was the experience like?
Excuse me, What did you enjoy? What did you learn? What was the, was it fun? Um, was it something that you've reminded you of? Something like, use that as a way to just describe it. Um, and then when we're moving through things, so as we're going through social media right, we don't wanna be, this is something not to do, right?
Don't post the desperate post. I already mentioned this. I know people do it. I know they do, but please don't . Please don't. It just kind of furthers the starving artist thing. Okay? And if you haven't read, um, Jeff Go's book, Real Artist, Don't Starve, Please go read that book. But I see this all the time from freelance writers and this is, I know this to be true cuz I know.
Personally, so I know that a lot of these freelance writers who post this are making like 40 grand, 50 grand a year, and they're not happy at that number. There's a big difference between a freelance writer who makes 40, 50 grand and they're like, Yes, I feel good at this number. I don't wanna make more money.
I don't care about whatever I feel good at. And people who are like struggling every single year to hit 40, 50, 60 K and they're like, Oh my God, when does it get easier? Okay. The people that I. Posting those things like, Oh, I have schedule space, or like, I can take on two more clients. Or like I can, you know, like, Oh, please contact me if you need a writer.
Those are the people who are struggling to actually make money every single time. It's always that it's not people who are killing it. People who are killing it are like posting about how they can give away work. Right. So we need to think about when we're posting on social media. Right? So this is just LinkedIn that I'm talking about, and then we'll go to other stuff.
So as we're posting on social media, It's gonna be in different phases too. So number one, post about new clips, new projects, new clients, new stuff. The other thing that you're gonna post about or use it for is basically just to maybe talk about milestones in your business or things that you've learned or changes that have happened, or how these things are affecting writers in your niche, or how the economy or blah, blah blah is affecting freelance writing or laws.
That's another thing is like there's a lot of weird. Um, that have affected freelance writers, and so you can talk about that or stuff that's trending in your niche, right? So we're using these for different stages, but when we're kind of starting out, like I would, I didn't even start really posting on social media until I started building more teaching education type stuff.
I posted what I talked about, right? Things. I got clients, wins, clips, stuff I cared about, like things that I care about in terms of like getting more clients. I hear you. Woo. I hear you. You're woosh. You're woosh. You're woosh and spicy. So when you get to the next stage of your business, This is a couple things.
So let's talk about the next stage part. The next stage part is that you know who your clients are. You know who is bringing in the cake money and the icing money, you know, where you need more clients. Like if I'm looking at prop tech right now, right? I might wanna say, Huh, I need add more hospitality tech.
Or if I'm looking at travel, I might need to add more of this. Like, you're better equipped to understand what you need to promote to get more of, or what you need to. The other thing is that you, if you're gonna start a podcast, or if you're gonna start YouTube or something, it needs to be specific. And I do know freelance writers who have very general newsletters, right?
Um, but it's the same thing where, oh my goodness gracious, you're spicy, you're spicy taco. Okay, Charlotte, go back to your haa hole. That's not your hava hole. Um, . So when you're thinking about doing something that's outside of LinkedIn, think about specific. So if you were gonna do Instagram, you would want it to be very specific.
Do you help people with, with sass, right? Like, you know a lot about writing in sass, so then your whole Instagram thing is about sass. Specificity on other platforms is really important. Like inst uh, Instagram really loves that. They want you to be about, like one thing. They don't like generalized random shit.
So, and this is just like my general knowledge. I'm not an Instagram. Hello. Go back to your hava hole. No, I'm not going to. Okay, I see you doing high fives and they look spectacular. But you have to go back to your hava hole in order to get your snack o go back to your trio hole. Go back to your hava hole.
We can stand off here all day, buddy. , go back to your hava hole. So as you're kind of doing stuff, think about specificity. So if you're gonna do a YouTube channel, if you're gonna do Instagram, if you're gonna do some other platform, Think about as like you have so much knowledge to share or you wanna learn more things about that, or you wanna do specifically like kind of go down the rabbit hole, That's what you would use them for.
You have to go back to your huba hole. Go back to your huba hole. All right,
back up back. Back up. Yeah, back up, back up, Back up. Back up. Charlotte. You're just like full on sass today. You're sass being, Here you go, buddy. I know. Sometimes it's hard to see where it is. Yeah, you can tell 'em you're sassy. Exactly. You could be a sassy writer. Yeah. So anytime you're thinking of another platform that's not LinkedIn, and even on LinkedIn, you're specializing, but you're usually specializing in multiple niches.
I think if you're gonna do Instagram or some other type of platform, you really need to be like a specialist in that, in that area. So it's like my friends who have like a marketing podcast for a specific type of business, or they talk about, um, like one of them right. Has, uh, she talks about like payments, like hr, or not hr, um, accounts like accounts and payments.
And then the other one is like super complicated engineering stuff that I don't understand . So, but those have to do with their ideal clients and they're moving more into strategy, content strategy, marketing strategy, messaging, and position. So if you are gonna make that transition, I would suggest really having a specific type of client that you wanna attract with those things.
Cuz when it becomes too general then it's like all over the place. Right? And there's a, I even have a thing, right? We're here because I give advice for freelance writers, right? If I was like talking to freelance writers, book authors, social media strategists and all this stuff, like, this would be a channel that would be too disorganized, right?
I like Sassy. Yeah. Um, so when you think about these other platforms, you should make sure that it's focused. Don't make it too general. Don't go through there and make it all garbagey. The other thing is that recency, right? You need to know which channel or uh, which platforms focus and like recency, because that means you need to post a lot.
LinkedIn doesn't really do that. That's not really how their stuff works as far as I know. Maybe it does. I don't know. Maybe I'll learn something today, , But the deal is, When we have LinkedIn, we have a better way of kind of targeting and, um, being around other people that are looking for help. Right? When we're on Instagram, it's like we're fighting a lot of different things, and a lot of people are on Instagram and it's like your clients aren't necessarily using Instagram to find writers, right?
Your clients are using Instagram to grow their own brand or to share their own stuff. They're not on their, and they like find their own clients, not necessarily find a writer. So we wanna make sure that we're using them properly. Same thing with YouTube or any other platform. So when we're thinking about what to do and what not to do, those are really important.
Specificity, generalization, right? Specificity. Specificity is really important. What's not important is being general and what's not. What you don't wanna do is like write random posts that have. Just nothing to do with you getting clients or that are like, Oh my God, I'm desperate. Please give me some work.
The other thing too, to remember about that, if you end up posting something where you're like, My schedule is open for these many clients, like most of the time I just can't imagine someone comes to you with a $10,000 project. No one's just gonna be like, Oh, they have schedule space. We have a $10,000 project.
We were hoping you would work. So it's not how it works. Like usually it's like 500 bucks. They're like, Yeah, we have a project, it's all one off 500 bucks. Or it's like, Yeah, we can have you do this thing that's, you know, a thousand bucks, like when you're doing that kind of stuff. That's why I don't like posting it, because it's really hard to move your income up if you're always taking these like little projects all the time.
So when you're using social media, really pay attention, especially LinkedIn, right? What we're doing here is. We're thinking about how to help our clients, how to attract them right to basically solve their problems. Attracting them means showing that you know how to solve their problems, which means showcasing your work, showcasing clients in their niche, that kind of stuff.
We don't wanna be putting up general posts like about needing work. That's just not good. Plus, the other thing too is that there's a big difference, like if you go look on different platforms, Twitter is another one. If I was gonna go on Twitter, right? Like some people use Twitter to get clients, right?
They, they use Twitter as a way to send dms to their clients. And a lot of times it's editors, so they'll, the editor will have a call for pitches or they will just like send a DM to them, um, on Twitter, cuz they see they're super active and then they'll send 'em a pitch, right? They'll get their email address and send 'em a pitch.
So Twitter can be really helpful for writers, but it, I still don't think it's as helpful as using LinkedIn plus. Twitter is the same thing. You have to like pub, like publish content all the time. You're always publishing things. So as you move through, like if I really had to pick some, like, I just, I just think LinkedIn is the best.
Um, the other thing is that we're, Oh, we have four. We need to do number four. Hold on. Let's go to four. Number four. All right, number four. We still have a friend who's not in the HOA hole. Go in your hava hole. Oh my gosh. Why is your sassing come here? Oh my gosh, you're such a sas being go to your hava hole.
All right, well you can hang out over here and Barry's gonna get all the snack overs over there cause you're not in your hava hole. Here. Go Barry. You have to get your hava hole. We're Get in your hava hole. Good job. Good job, Barry. Barry, you're doing great today. I like your support duck. I like how your support duck is supporting your little legs.
Good job, buddy. All right, Charlie, you wanna do one high five for the road? Good job.
Okie dokey. Let's go back to, Hold on. I have, I have dog drill all over my hands. Ugh. Okay. There we. So let's talk about a little bit of, uh, anything to do if you hate social media. So number four here is what to do if we hate social media and anything else that we should not do. So I think a lot of times there we go.
4) What NOT to do on social media as a freelance writer and what to do if you hate social media
I think a lot of times when we are thinking about social media, we think about, like, this is the question I get a lot from freelance writers is the recency. Like, Oh my gosh, I don't wanna post that much, or I hate social. Then don't use it. , don't use it. This is something you don't have to use social media as a freelance writer.
You don't. I don't consider LinkedIn that social media E, right? We're using LinkedIn not to post, and most of the time when people talk about social media, they're talking about posting Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Post, post, post, post, post. We're not doing a ton of posts. Literally, you need LinkedIn to go find people to reach out to, to send your lois.
And then you can use other resources to find magazine editors and send them pitches. But when we're kind of going through that, you don't have to post a ton. There are plenty of writers who never post, ever, and they still make a ton of money. Right? They don't post anything. They don't have Instagram, they don't have Twitter.
They might have a podcast, but they, they literally just do their marketing. They send their lois, they send their pitches, move on. So you don't even have to use social media . Yes. Social media is, is a thing that a lot of industries use and yes, it's a thing that your clients might ask you if you can help with.
You can just tell them that you don't wanna help with that, but. Literally, if you can use LinkedIn just to find people to reach out to, that's enough. Okay. So if you hate social media, don't use it. , don't use it. It's not essential. Like I said at the very beginning of this video, it's about one to one connections.
That's, I still believe in that because I haven't seen like, Huge piles of freelance writers make huge piles of money from like making posts all the time. It's like they make a connection with someone and build a relationship and get some work. Or they send an LOI and they start building a relationship, or they send a pitch and they start building a relationship with that magazine editor.
It's still one to one. So the other part is that, um, I think the other thing that people are worried about is just, um, When they get on social media that they should be following a bunch of trends or that they should be following a bunch of this person's doing that, or that they should be, There's like a bunch of rules that they need to follow in order to be successful, and I just don't think that's worth it.
Like I think it's better to stand out. I think it's better to do your own thing. How am I gonna help my clients talk about that? How am I gonna get more projects or solve problems or, or deal with their struggles? Talk about that, like you're, LinkedIn isn't necessarily so much about like personal stuff.
Twitter can be more personal. Um, Instagram can be more personal. Facebook obviously can be more personal. I don't know that many freelance writers, there's like a hair. There we go. I don't know that many freelance writers who are using Facebook to get, um, clients, but like, just. Man, I just think that it's better to just be yourself.
It's better to be yourself and talk about the things that really matter to you and your clients. That helps you actually get people that are interested. If you feel pressure all the time to post and you feel pressure to do all this stuff and be on all the platforms, like that's not gonna make you do it.
like having, just the fact that you have LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok doesn't mean you're gonna do it all the time. Like they have to be platforms that you actively use. Like I actively like using LinkedIn. I actively like using Instagram and I actively like YouTube. Those are the ones I use all the time.
I like. I don't use Twitter, so I don't go on Twitter and I'm not on TikTok or Snapchat or any of the other things. Right. Clubhouse. Um, but as we're thinking through these things, you have to use it in terms of where you're spending time. So don't just like set up all the profiles and be like, I have to be on social media.
Someone said like, just don't. Um, and I also, like I said, the times where I've seen people really get high end clients is because they specialize in it and they make a profile and a brand about it, right? So they specialize in sales pages. So they make their Instagram all about how to do better sales pages or use copywriting to create sale, better sales pages or whatever it.
And they give away so many tips that eventually a lot of high-end clients like, go find them and they stumble upon their content and hire them to do that. Right? Business says, I'm so happy to hear that I don't have to use so social media and it won't kill my bus. It won't, like it's really still one to one.
It's not all, It's not like you have to be everywhere all the time. And like I said, I only started using Instagram and. After the fact, like that was a, After I had already been coaching people and already been mentoring people and alre, like I already had a ton of stuff going on, then I did that. The other thing to think about too is that you're using social media as a way to like expand on things, right?
So I'm using social media as a way to like give you guys more tips and tricks or to go on Instagram and give like quick hits of like, here's some things to think about. It's an a way for me to share more of the stuff. Like I already have a ton of ideas. I keep a , I keep a giant document of, of the live stream ideas and I keep a giant document of email ideas.
So like all the stuff you see is beyond that. Those are like extra ideas I've had. So like if you are bursting with ideas about something that could be a podcast or a blog or a live stream or a social media profile. But if you're not, that's totally. What you need to focus on is like paying your bills, which means getting clients, which usually means the only platform you care about is LinkedIn, so don't start all these things.
The other thing too is that if you feel like you would find it hard to be consistent, don't do it because you might end up having to give your clients advice and write your advice. This is a thing about a blog, and I talk about this often. This is why I don't recommend people like freelance writers start a blog because if you start a blog and you can't be consistent with it once a week or twice a week, however often you're gonna post, you cannot go to your clients and tell them, Oh, you have to do this blog stuff because it, you know, otherwise it's not worth it.
You have no credibility now because you stopped posting on your blog three years ago, or a year ago, or six months ago, right? This is why I don't like the blog thing, because what happens is you're, you're like using the blog as a way to maybe get clients or to show expertise or whatever, and then when your schedule gets busy, the blog falls to the wayside, and now you're trying to give advice on something you don't do, right?
That's not good. This is the same thing, like if you're on social media, you gotta be consistent about it. Like in terms of Instagram, Facebook. YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, you gotta be more consistent about it. LinkedIn, you don't have to be that consistent. You can do it when you need to. And you use LinkedIn enough to be on there to send Lois and pitches.
Yes. Woo. Hello? Um, yeah, so LinkedIn is also, the other thing about it is, like what Marie said is that LinkedIn is more of like a database rather than a platform, right? So, A lot of Instagram and YouTube stuff is like a platform where people go to find other things. LinkedIn is like, people are usually going on it to like do certain things with their profile or share things or.
You know, interact in a different way. It's not the same thing as if I go to someone's Instagram feed and I scan through their posts. That's way different than going to someone's LinkedIn profile. Right? Or if I go to YouTube and I get stuck in a YouTube hole watching like 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 of someone's videos, that's way different than looking at someone's LinkedIn profile.
That's the difference is like how we consume them, right? We're consuming LinkedIn in a way different way than we are almost all the other platforms. Right? So when I think about that, like I just think it's better to focus on the thing that's actually gonna pay your bills and get you clients LinkedIn, right?
Can you go back to your Habi hole please? I'll give you ane. You're over here. Can you, I don't know if you guys can hear her making noises over here, but she isn't over here making noises. Go back to your hava hole. Go back to your hobbit hole. Good job. All right. High five. High five. You gotta actually make it.
There you go. Good job,
Oh, oh. Lost it. There you go. Good job. Oh my gosh. All right, so. I'm hoping that this is making you feel a little bit less pressured about social media and what you should and should not do. Don't look desperate. Don't post all the time if you don't want to. Don't set up an account, um, that you feel like you have to run all the time.
Um, if you have a ton of ideas, right? Like if you are coming from a place of like you have hundreds of ideas to talk about, something like you've been working. cyber security for a super long time, and you just have like tons of ideas to talk about. That could be like an Instagram or a YouTube where you could talk about and give ideas for content or about that niche.
But oftentimes you're better off not doing that until later on. So a lot of times I get early on freelance writers or people who have been freelance writers for like two to three years that are like, Oh my God, I have to do this thing. Like I have to get on social media. No, you don. No you don't and you never have to get on social media.
I still know people who are not only not on social media, they don't have a website and they still get work. Okay. Like I still know people who do not have a website, which I, that I think is like, you definitely need a website. I definitely think like you can start with LinkedIn and then build out a website, but I think a website is kind of, you gotta have that.
But I still know people who don't have websites who still get a ton of. So social media is like buzzy and fun sometimes and it is very popular and we love to talk about social media cuz it's like the thing people are addicted to, right? But I just think if you're trying to build an actual business, it's not about recency and it's not about metrics and it's not about likes and it's not about this thing.
Like I think if, uh, the actual foundation of your freelance writing. Is getting the marketing activities done. You have to do the foundation, You have to get good at that foundation. That foundation has to take you less and less time. Then when you have way extra time, then when you have lots of ideas, you can go off on podcast.
Other like YouTube, social media, bonanza if you want to. All right. Let's see. Um, I'm gonna check the chapter questions. I didn't see any, but maybe there are some. Do Doo do.
Okay. Yeah. So last thing I'm gonna say about this, right? If anything, what have we learned? LinkedIn is important. Forget everything else. If you do wanna get on other platforms, feel free. But remember, like it's a D, it's a different ball game. The other thing is like, don't post about you needing clients. I just don't think that's useful.
It just makes you look desperate. Actually do the marketing. I also feel like when you do that, it's like lazy marketing. Like if you were actually doing the marketing, you wouldn't need to ever post that. If you were actually doing your marketing and following the steps and sending your lois and pitches, you would never need to say like, I have two spots open.
Like, no . So if you do the foundational stuff, you'll know what to post on these things. You'll have a bunch of clips, you'll have new clients, right? And you'll have a bunch of things that you can post. You know, I don't know, Whenever you feel like it, whenever you finish the project. Right? Like ves. Vesna for is a good example actually, cuz she just finished her first white paper.
So round of applause to Vesna, she finished her first white paper. So when that white paper gets published vesna, that means you need to make a post about it, right? And you don't need to say it's your first white paper, but you do need to say like, Here's my client, here's what I did, here's why it was fun or interesting or unique.
And then here's the link to check it out if it's like, you know, publicly available if it's a pay wall. Be, you know, it depends. Um, but definitely post about that. Right? Cuz you would want more of, you want more white papers. , I know you said it, it, it almost kills you. That's what it's like sometimes when I'm gonna talk about this for a quick second.
That's what it's like sometimes when. You have a new project, Like remember how I talked about, it took me a month to write my first article. That wasn't even a white paper. It was just my first reported article. It took me a month to do it. That's part of this, like, it was a process where it just, it was the same way, like almost killed me.
It was like it was a disaster. And it took forever, but I did it and then now it's like riding a bike. It's like not that big of a deal. It's just part of the process of like learning how to do it. And then once you do the first one, now you can optimize it. Now you can figure out how to do it. Now the pressure's kind of off because you already have an example.
Um, but it's just kind of, part of it is like, this is why it's hard for people to write . People often think they can write and they. Even for us, right? These are hard things to do. It's hard to write the right things or say the right things at the right time, or, um, have the proper research or footnotes or put things in the right areas, or, it's a lot of complicated steps, right?
But at least now that you've done it, you don't have to worry about doing your first one again, and you have an example, and now you can post. Right people. So we're here every Friday. Oh, you know what? If you feel it like this was helpful, give it a thumbs up. If you feel like you wanna learn more about building a freelance writing business, you adore, or hitting six figures, subscribe.
We're here every Friday, even when we're not in our haba holes. We're here every Friday at noon. Central time. Go back to your haba hole. Okay. Here. Oh my gosh. Did you just melt? What are you doing? Oh my goodness. Go back to your hava hole. You sas. Anyways, I tried to pick mini up and Minnie just like melted into my arms, like a little hotel mint.
Go back to your Hava hole. Um, we're here every Friday at noon Central time. If you ever want to suggest a question or a topic, you can put it in mandy s.com/question. So if you have been watching this and you're like, Wait, I have questions, don't worry. I always answer them. Go to mandy s.com/question and you can put your question in there and I'll answer it on the live stream.
Or if you have a topic that you want me to cover, pop it in. Um, if you are wondering how to price your projects better, go to mandy s.com and get my free pricing guide. Um, and I just updated it a few months ago with a bunch of strategy projects, so it's all fancy. Um, . So if you go to mandy s.com/pricing guide, you can get it.
And I think that's it. So we're gonna say go back to your hub hole. You just like, you just love to be over here like barking at me and stepping on my feet and being a sas, you can't get anything unless you're in your hava hole. Good job. You're so sassy. So sassy and spicy, So sassy and spicy. Here you go.
Good job. High fun. Other ones. Good job, other one. Good job. All right. So we're saying goodbye from the hobbit hole and we are saying goodbye and I hope everybody has a good weekend. Um, I hope everybody has a good Halloween cuz I'm not gonna see you guys until after Halloween, but I hope everybody has a fun time on Halloween and has fun costumes and all that stuff.
And, um, I'll see you next Friday. Bye.
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