037: Behind the Scenes of My Business: Q&A
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behind the scenes of my business: q & a
Welcome back to the podcast. Thanks for being here. And thanks to everyone who's reviewed the podcast, on Apple podcasts, Spotify, whatever, it means the world to me, I'm so so grateful. If you want to review the podcast, if it's something you feel called to do, and you haven't done so yet, you can do it on Spotify or Apple podcasts, it's very easy just takes a minute. And yeah, I would really, really appreciate it if you find this helpful. I did an episode A while ago that was about the editing process of what it's like to work with an editor and I took you through the process of working with me all the way from you reaching out on my website, to me delivering your finished edited product. But I have been getting some questions lately from people about how to get started as an editor and just questions about how I do things. And so that's why I wanted to do this episode. Part of me feels like this weird sense of, I don't know, like it almost feels a bit self indulgent to just have an episode where I'm talking about myself. But I do get questions about this. And I know there are a number of people who follow me and who listen to this podcast who are writers who are interested in becoming editors. So that's why I wanted to do this episode. And hopefully, you know, you get something out of this episode, even if you're a writer who has no plans of doing any sort of freelancing or any sort of editing, editing work in the future.
Okay, I, the first question that I got, that I thought I wanted to talk about on this podcast was about how many clients I take on at one time. My business has two components right now I have my editing clients, and I have my coaching clients. My editing clients, I have between one and two clients at one time 95% of my editing project start on a Monday, I just like to do it that way. It's easy for me. Occasionally we'll all start or finish on another day. But most times I start and finish on a Monday. So this week, for example, I'm just looking at the calendar, I had one person start on Monday, and then I have someone starting on the next Monday. But I will all still have been I'll still be working on the person's manuscript who started with me this week. So I'll have two clients. It takes me generally about two weeks to do a manuscript evaluation and three to four weeks to copy edit, depending on the scope of the project and how long the manuscript is. So I do try to stagger, but yeah, generally one to two editing clients at one time. It's, it's ideal for me if they can be different types of editing just because it gives my brain something different to work on if I have a manuscript evaluation client and a copy editing client, but sometimes it doesn't always work out that way. Which is, which is totally fine.
For coaching, I have six one on one clients right now who are working with me in my six month program. That program is designed to help you write your book. So it's we work together for six months, you get access to me Monday through Friday, we meet once a month, I review pages along the way. And then I edit whatever you've written at the end of our six months together. Six is my I think six is my limit. Probably with with just workload and how many people I can be managing and feel like I'm delivering a good experience for them. I would say six is probably my limit. I could maybe do one more. But yeah, so I have six clients in in coaching and then between one and two in editing. I also do the occasional digital product like a an online class or a workshop or something that is delivered to many people. And actually I'm gonna go ahead and I wasn't planning to talk about this, but I'm gonna go ahead and just preview this.
I'm putting together something really exciting. That's a membership. It's a six month membership. That's like a more scaled down version of the experience that I offer for my one on one clients. So for six months, you get access to a full Online course that's really comprehensive. It has like 25 modules, or 25 lessons rather about how to write your book. And then there's going to be a compute community component of it. So you can be meeting other writers, we're going to have drop in writing sessions each week. So you can make progress on your manuscript. And there's going to be a monthly training that's included. And all of this is going to be so, for the value for everything you get i'm pricing it so low, because it's a new offer. And I really want people to be able to do this with me, I'm super excited about it. But I'm still in the process of recording the modules for that. So I'm expecting to launch it at the end of July, maybe early August. So stay tuned for more on that, I'll definitely be sharing more details. If this is something that sounds appealing to you. If you think that this might be an opportunity you want to jump on, I highly recommend getting on the waitlist, I'll include a link to the waitlist in the description of this episode, you can also click on my profile on Instagram or tik tok and then there's going to be a link to get on the waitlist, there's no obligation, obviously, it's just that you'll be the first to know when enrollment opens. And you'll also get first dibs on the early bird pricing. So highly recommend getting on the waitlist for that.
Okay, the next comment or the next question that I got, let me pull this up here. I got two questions that were very similar. Someone asked what kind of experience or educational background do you feel a freelance editor may need. And there was someone else who was wondering about a degree or experience for becoming an editor, wondering how I got into it. I have a degree in English Lit. I also have a master's degree in Library and Information Studies. But my undergrad was in English Lit. And I think that's helpful, it can be helpful to have an English degree, but it's not necessary. I had a big break between the time that I graduated from college. And then the time that I started editing, I'm in my mid 30s. So there was a large gap where I wasn't really using that English degree much. So I don't think it's absolutely necessary. And I will tell you that no potential client has ever asked me what my degree is. And they've never asked me if I have a degree in English, that might be important to some potential clients. But it's never, it's never come up in conversation. So I think what's more important when it comes to getting into editing, and being prepared to edit is training and classes and writing workshops, and continuing education and all of those things. Before I decided decided to start freelancing. Well, first of all, I was always editing things for people like resumes and cover letters. And I worked on my mother, my brother's med school application. So that's something I recommend too, is just getting your feet wet. Even if it's not a full length manuscript, just just try to edit what you can. I took a lot of writing classes, there was a period of a year or two where I was taking a lot of writing classes, and I was taking workshops that would take place on one day, and it would be held over the course of a few hours. And then I also took ongoing kind of longer classes where it would be an eight week thing. And we would meet once a week for a couple of hours. And I did that because I seriously considered getting my MFA in creative writing. But I ultimately decided it was just not something that was financially, that made sense for me. I still had student loans for my other graduate degree, I just didn't want to spend two years in school. So I decided not to do it.
But kind of uh, what I did instead is I just took all those writing writing classes, and I did that to help me improve as a writer, but I also did it to help me understand how I could edit and how I could give feedback to other people. Because I didn't have that skill when I started. I didn't understand story structure. I didn't understand character development. I didn't understand pacing. And I didn't understand how to give feedback to someone on any of those things beyond just, I liked this, or I didn't like this. So I highly, highly recommend doing some writing classes. I live in Nashville and we have a great literary center that offers writing classes, but if you don't have that available in your city, please go check online. There's there's tons of classes that are available. I also took a short grammar course that was on I think it was on Coursera I want to say before I started copy editing, and I I have a copy of the Chicago Manual of Style which is a style manual that dictates rules for grammar and punctuation and usage. And I basically just. I mean I don't want to say I read it cover to cover because I didn't but I really took my time to understand grammar because it had been awhile, it had been a while since I've taken an English class, and I wanted to make sure that I was solid, that I knew the nuts and bolts of the English language that I knew how to correct punctuation, and just that I could feel confident in offering those skills to people.
So the other thing that I did is I started on Fiverr, I was on Fiverr, for not very long, but I wanted to get some experience working with people. Fiverr is a great stepping stone, you don't make much money. In fact, it's it's kind of a joke how little money you make when you're starting out anyway, as a new seller, if you've been on the platform for a while, you can definitely charge, like actual market rates for your editing. But at the beginning, it's, you really don't make much. So I just gained some experience on there. I got used to working with clients, I got used to giving feedback seeing different manuscripts in different genres. And yeah, so I recommend that as well. Once you feel like you've taken some classes, you're you're solid on grammar, you're solid on knowing how to give feedback on story elements, if that's the kind of editing that you want to do. Yeah, I think those are that's kind of the best way to go about it.
Okay, let me get to my notes here. I did get a question that was very easy for me to answer. And I answered it on social media, but I'll answer it here as well. The question is, would you be willing to be an editor for an author who's self publishing? And the answer is yes, absolutely. I haven't done a breakdown. I haven't looked at the statistics. But I would say probably close to 50% of my clients are self published authors. There are some people I work with who aren't sure which route they're gonna go down if they're going to do traditional publishing, if they're going to try that if they're going to self publish, they're just not sure. But yeah, probably close to 50% of the people that I work with are self published authors. I love indie authors. So much. So it's a big, big yes for me.
Next question, how do you balance social media marketing with your other work tasks? Let me tell you, this has been an evolution for me. I want to be someone who batches my social media content. That basically means batching content is just making a bunch of content at one time, like some people will set aside an hour a week or two hours a week, and make all of their content during that time period. So they'll they'll write all of their Instagram posts, they'll record all their Tik Tok videos, whatever other social media that work they might be doing, they get it all done in one burst of, you know, one, one short period of time. I have tried that and I just, it just doesn't work that well for me, I do a lot better in short bursts. So when I recorded Tik Tok, for example, I'll usually record a few at a time. My Instagram content is much more casual, I'll repost some reels. Or if I've got, for example, if I've got a podcast episode coming out, I will write out a post the morning that it comes out and then post it later that day. It's just a lot more fun for me when I do it in a way that's intuitive when I do it in a way when I do it. In moments when I'm feeling inspired, and I want to create, it works a lot better for me.
I think of it also is a break from editing. So when I'm doing client work, I'm very focused, on the computer. Doing content is a different task completely. It uses a different part of my brain, you know, so it's kind of fun to think about that as being a break. A lot of times I'll record tiktoks in the afternoon after I edit in the mornings. It's just nice to do something different. So it's definitely important but But what I'll say too, is that I've gotten a lot better at being quick with my social media content, which makes it easier to fit into my schedule, which makes it easier to balance it with all the other things that I have going on because I can knock out a tiktok video in like three minutes. I can go on stories and say something, record it once and post it. I used to agonize over every little word in an Instagram post. I used to rerecord something if I didn't like it in a story, if I didn't, if I looked weird, or I didn't say something perfectly, I would rerecord it. And I've just let that go. And it has been so freeing to just give myself permission to let it be messy. And just put it out there.
So social media marketing, making social media content, it really doesn't take me a lot of time, but that's definitely something again, that that has changed over the course of of me being on social media and having this business so that that helps just the fact that it doesn't take a lot at a time. One final thing I want to say about social media is that it can be challenging for me to be on social media for the business and not just be on social media to consume content. Sometimes I'll say to myself, Oh, I need to, I need to record some tiktoks let me scroll a bit. And then 30 minutes have gone by, and I just scrolled, and I haven't come up with any ideas, or I haven't, you know, created any content myself, I'm just watching tiktoks. So that's not really that's not really helpful. It's not productive, but that that line just gets blurred. I'm still working on how to best like, be on tiktok, creating content and then leaving the app and not getting lost in the FYP and being on there for 30 minutes or an hour or whatever. It's challenging, but.
Okay, I think those are all the questions that I got about the business, everything I wanted to highlight in this this episode. If you have any additional questions, feel free to DM me. I'm happy to chat more about anything. You know, I don't share a lot about the business just because I know a large portion of the people who follow me aren't interested in that. That's not why they follow me. But I but I love talking about business. I love talking about marketing. I love talking about mindset when it comes to business. I love talking about money, all of it. So feel free to reach out if you have questions because I again, just love talking about this stuff. All right. Thank you for listening. We'll be back with another writing episode next week.