Special Episode Part 2: Build & Sustain Your Freelance Business (From AHP)
This is Part 2 (of 2) of Abigail Boatwright's session for freelancers at the 2018 American Horse Publications Equine Media Conference in Hunt Valley, Maryland. Veteran freelancers Tracy Gantz and Jennifer Bryant joined her in discussing ways to kick off your freelance business and keep it going for the long haul, and attendees participated in a Q&A session.
If you're looking for guidance in freelancing, check out our Mentorship Program HERE. If you want to make an informal connection, join our Freelance Remuda community on Facebook. We're always talking about life as professionals in equine media and it's a great place to find other freelancers.
We talked about setting rates in this episode, but we also discussed rates in this post on Travel.
Here is Jennifer Bryant's previous episode on our podcast.
Tips from established freelancer Tracy Gantz on long-term viability in equine media:
- Hit the word count—editors HATE the comment “it’s long but you can cut it” (why that takes too long, transitions, etc.)
- Know the magazine’s style and follow it, along with no grammatical mistakes
- Be accurate and do your own fact checking (what I do for BH and SH race reports and how I catch mistakes)
- Know the publication's style
These things are simple, yet editors will love you for it. And they will prefer you to the award winners who can’t do this.
Consider expanding your expertise.
Jennifer's tips:
- Fact-checking is crucial, even when you get info straight from your source.
- Develop a specialty
Final thoughts: DON'T PLAGIARIZE! Pitch individualized topics to different magazines. Our pitching podcast episode is HERE.