Freelance Job vs. Freelance Business

Do you know the difference between a freelance job and a freelance business?

So many people ask me how they find a freelance site so they can find a job. They simply want to do the work and get paid. In all the hundreds of emails I receive and the writers I meet on networking sites or forums, easily 95% of them ask "How do I find a freelance job that will pay me?"

Then there are the very rare 5% of writers who will ask me the question "How do I build a successful freelance business?"

Let's look at the difference between a job and a business more closely.

Freelance Job

A job is where you are an employee. You work for an employer who pays you for completing work. You can only earn what that employer wants to pay you and the amount you can earn is limited by how much work you do.

This is what most people do when they turn up to a day-job every day. You can only earn money for the amount of hours to turn up to work. In order to earn more, you can work more hours or get another job. Your income is limited by how many hours in any day you are able to work. Increasing your income to full-time levels and beyond is almost impossible unless you're willing to work every waking moment you have.

This means if you stop working, your income STOPS. If you take a day off or take a vacation, your income STOPS.

If you find freelance work where you get paid when you work, but the moment you stop working you stop getting paid, then you've found yourself a JOB.

Freelance Business

A successful business is one that continues to make money whether you're working or not. Of course building, creating, sustaining and maintaining a successful business takes a lot more time, effort and knowledge than just simply turning up for a job.

The beauty of a business is that it should still work whether you're working or not!

This is achieved by creating revenue streams that continue to bring money into your business whether you're working or not. Examples of these kinds of revenue streams are royalties from ebooks or books or anthologies, advertising income, affiliate sales or outsourcing writing contracts and many other options.

If your freelancing still brings money into the business whether you actively work in it or not, then you have built a business. Your income is unlimited.

Combining Your Job With Your Business

Writers WRITE. There's no two-ways about this. If you're a writer, then you want to write. You enjoy writing just for the sake of writing. You want to earn your income from doing what you love.

Business-people run businesses and this is where many writers struggle to make the change between having a job that only pays you if you work and running a business that requires a different skill-set.

It is possible to build a business around doing only the things you love. A prime example of this is my own writing business. Of course I write every day because I simply love what I do. I've also managed to build that same business to the point that I'll still earn money even if I take a day off and go shopping or swimming or hang out with my daughter.

I outsource some of my own writing work to other writers when I'm so busy that I just want to do something more fun. The work keeps coming in, but I'm not working 12 or 15 hours a day.


So... the next time you're tempted to ask someone how you can find a freelance job - be careful what you ask for or you just might get it.