Beau Mueller
We are excited to announce that going forward we will be featuring regular interviews with financially savvy educators and other awesome personalities. It is our hope that these interviews will serve as motivation and inspiration for you! To kick things off, we share our interview with Gina Horkey, freelancer extraordinaire and creator of “30 Days or Less to Freelance Writing Success: A Course for Brand Spanking New Freelancers.”
For this interview, we asked Gina a handful of questions relating to educators and freelance writing. Without further ado, here are our questions followed by Gina’s compelling responses!
What qualities make a good freelance writer? Do you think educators are (in general) well-suited for freelance writing?
Just get started!
I think you should probably enjoy writing at the bare minimum.
Being good at it or having decent writing chops is helpful, but can also be learned and improved over time. The best qualities are probably having a thick skin and fierce determination – success from freelance writing comes from putting yourself out there consistently and following up. I.e. marketing yourself and doing the work.
I think teachers and educators are definitely prime candidates for freelance writing.
As an educator you’re likely pretty good at teaching and imparting helpful information on students. Writing as a medium accomplishes the same thing – you’re communicating and educating an audience of readers and ideally helping them to improve their lives in some way.
How much can a part-time freelance writer expect to earn?
Of course I have to say it depends. 😉
It depends on these factors:
- Your niche. Some niches are higher paying, like personal finance or healthcare.
- Your experience. As you gain experience (and samples) as a writer, you can command higher rates.
- Your confidence. If you don’t believe you’re worth a certain rate, you won’t ask for it.
From my experience, new freelance writers tend to start out around the $30-50/article mark and work their way up. More experienced writers command hundreds of dollars per post.
Using myself as an example, freelance writing is only a portion of my diversified business, so I’d consider it “part-time.” I average $2,000-3,000 from just writing in an average month with just a few key clients.
Can you share a success story of an educator who successfully freelance writes?
There are actually a fair amount of teachers that have gone through my course, 30 Days or Less to Freelance Writing Success . Many of them have actually started a mastermind together for accountability and because they have so much in common.
Here’s Philippa’s story, for example:
Leaving teaching was not an easy decision to make, and working out what to do next was even harder!
I was an English teacher, so writing seemed like the perfect fit. Except, people can’t seriously write for a living can they?
When I realized that there was a market for writing website content, updating Facebook or creating tweets, I couldn’t believe it! This wasn’t even a career option when I was a school (which really wasn’t that long ago!).
Initially, I started VA work, but soon realised that I wanted writing to be my main focus. I decided to invest in Gina’s 30DOL course and it helped me to no end! It made everything seem so easy, and totally achievable.
As Gina was writing her 30DOL VA course , I had just landed my biggest client to date and I was thrilled when Gina asked me to create a case study about it for the course. It was amazing seeing “Lesson 10 – Philippa’s Story” pop up in my inbox.
That course, combined Gina’s blog posts and the Facebook group have really helped me move my freelancing up a notch. I now confidently cold-pitch regularly (teachers are not known for being sellers, not in our nature) and have this weekend been working on my latest new client’s website content!
I still can’t believe that people pay me to write.
It is a dream come true. I don’t make enough to do it full-time yet, but while working in my non-teaching day job, freelancing is keeping me motivated, satisfied and happy. I am on the way to the balanced lifestyle I want, and am much, much, much closer to it than when I was teaching!
Besides your own course, do you recommend any particular resources (websites, books, etc.) for educators looking to get started with freelance writing?
One of the recommended resources that I came across was The Yahoo Style Guide! It’s a great (and very comprehensive) guide to help you learn how to write for the web.
My friend Sarah also has a site called, Life After Teaching, which helps educators that are looking to transition out of teaching find their way. She also has a book with the same name that you can find on her website.
Anything else you would like to say to educators interested in supplementing their income with freelance writing?
Most people let fear (or any number of excuses that disguise themselves as something else, but really are fear – lack of time, lack of direction, needing everything to be perfect, etc.) hold them back from taking action and pursuing a new direction.
Don’t let that be you.
Instead, punch fear in the face and do it anyway. When I started, I decided I was either going to succeed or fail hard trying.
Why not you, why not now?
About Gina Horkey
Gina Horkey is a married, millennial mama to two precocious toddlers. Additionally, she’s a professional writer and online business marketing consultant with a decade of experience in the financial services industry. Gina enjoys helping other freelancers gear up to quit their day jobs and take their side hustles full-time. If you’re interested in starting a freelance career, take Gina’s FREE writing course to kickstart yours today! Click here to get the first lesson sent to your inbox.
