Prepare for Freelance Life Before You Leave Your 9–5
Set yourself up for success with these actionable tips.
The internet is filled with stories of people who abruptly leave a 9–5 job and embrace a solopreneur life.
Maybe they were fed up. Or were laid off.
But making a change like that can be scary — especially if you have a mortgage to pay and kids to feed. Even if you dream of a life that puts you in the driver’s seat, turning that dream into a reality can be daunting.
I left a stressful corporate job in early 2021. It was another 20 months before I truly went out on my own.
But during that time, I was preparing to leave — sometimes without even realizing it! The result? By the time I went out on my own, I was able to quickly replace my salary with client work.
Here are some of the steps I took.
Network like crazy
When I first quit my corporate job, I had no idea that I’d end up self-employed two years later. But did change careers, pivoting from fintech to content marketing and journalism.
Networking has been the biggest reason that I’m successful as a freelance writer.
The more you put yourself out there, the easier it is for people to find you.
By the time you’re ready to leave your 9–5, you’re not an “unknown.” Potential clients will be ready and waiting to hire you.
Networking looks different depending on your industry, but includes:
- Being active on LinkedIn (commenting, and posting)
- Participating in communities (Slack, Discord, etc)
- Connecting with your target clients
If the idea of cold pitching makes you nauseous, good news — you don’t have to do that. If you’re working a 9–5, you can connect with your ideal clients in a non-sales-y way.
Send a connection request on LinkedIn with a note explaining what you have in common. By the time you’re ready to leave your 9–5, you’ll have a bunch of connections that might be ready for a pitch about your services (and then it will be a warm pitch instead of cold).
The more you begin to interact with your ideal clients in a genuine way, the better your pipeline when you finally do make the leap.
Anna Burgess Yang
Learn from others
A solopreneur life is hard work — and much of it is behind the scenes.
It’s more than creating work for clients. It’s invoicing, contracts, discovery calls, marketing, and more.
Missteps are common, especially for new freelancers. You’ll run into scenarios like unhappy clients, overdue invoices, and being asked to do work beyond the scope of your agreement.
You can try to navigate these issues on your own. Or you can find out how other freelancers have handled similar scenarios.
As much as you network with potential clients, you should also connect with fellow freelancers. These people will understand what you’re going through and are usually eager to provide support. You can even look for a community to join (either free or paid).
Build scalable systems
Sending an invoice that you create in a Google Sheet or writing down your deadlines on a simple to-do list might work when you have one client. But what happens when you’re juggling multiple clients, deadlines, and deliverables?
When you land your first client, don’t build a system that works for one. Build systems that will work for a full-scale operation.
It’s far easier to build systems when managing only one or two clients than when you have a full workload. Once you’re at max capacity, everything will start to fall apart if you don’t have good systems.
“Good systems” include:
- Project management
- Invoicing and accounting
- Scheduling meetings (with a calendar app)
- Organization (like on your GDrive)
It can feel hard to pay for tools when you’re first starting out. The good news is that many tools have free plans and you can expand to paid versions as your needs increase.
For example, I use Trello to manage client work. I was on the free plan of Trello for a long time. I only moved to a paid version when I wanted access to some automation that would save me time.
Good systems will also make you appear more professional to potential clients. You won’t come across as an inexperienced freelancer fumbling around, but a business owner who takes their work seriously.
Understand your value proposition
There are a lot of freelancers in the world. And many companies are more than willing to work with the right freelancer — but that means you need to set yourself apart from the competition.
Before you leave your 9–5, you can spend some time exploring the question, “What makes me unique?”
And you can clarify this as you network with potential clients and other freelancers. Figure out what potential clients need and what other freelancers may not be able to offer.
That becomes your value proposition. When you finally leave your 9–5 and move to full-time freelancing, you’ll want to splash that message all over your website, your social profiles, and any sales decks you may create.
In the beginning, your value proposition might be price. And that’s ok. Compared to experienced freelancers, you probably can’t charge as much. But in exchange, you’ll be able to build a portfolio of work (which is critical for almost all freelancers).
As potential clients evaluate you, figuring out what you offer should be easy. Your messaging, social presence, and portfolio should all be aligned.
Move at your own pace
There are a lot of benefits to a slow transition from 9–5 life to a solopreneur life.
You can test the waters and figure out what works and what doesn’t work.
It might mean taking on one or two clients or small projects while still working your 9–5 job (that’s what I did). You’re building for the future.
There’s probably no exact right time to make the switch. More than likely, the more you get a taste of controlling your own work and outcomes, the less likely you’ll be able to tolerate your 9–5.
And when you finally reach that point when you’re ready to break free, you’ll be ready.
Check out my free eBook: 17 Smart Tools Solopreneurs Need to Start, Grow, and Scale.