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Want to find a solution to an editorial business problem? Louise and Denise are hosting a Q&A on The Editing Podcast especially for editors and proofreaders. Watch the video to find out how to submit your questions and get them answered on 11 May 2020!
How to submit your question Go to The Editing Podcast's Facebook page and drop your question in the comments underneath the video. We'll be answering questions about the following:
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading (CIEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, connect via Facebook and LinkedIn, and check out her books and courses.
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Editorial training without borders: Should you bother with international editing conferences?9/10/2019
Does your editorial conference budget include provision for travelling abroad? If it doesn’t, here's why you might want to consider it and what you need to factor in to make it viable.
I’m a Brit who’s been to three editorial conferences in the past 12 months. Two of them required me to pack my passport.
First up was the one day mini-conference hosted by the Society for Editors and Proofreaders Toronto Group. I travelled to Canada in early November. I bought a new winter coat for the occasion because Toronto in November is cold cold cold. The weather foxed me – it was balmy – but the conference was everything I expected. Brilliant. Nine months later, I headed for Chicago, this time for the Editorial Freelancers Association meeting. The sunshine came as promised, not just on the lake shore but in the Swissôtel, too, where the conference took place. I received a lovely welcome and had a ball. Three weeks after that, I was learning again, but this time in the UK. The annual Society for Editors and Proofreaders conference took place at Aston Business School. Rain threatened but never arrived, and the meeting was smashing. Three different conferences. Three different countries. And one thing in common ... The delegates were international. And that’s the thing about the editorial community – we’re from everywhere, and our conferences reflect that. Still, attending conventions, especially those abroad, means an investment in money and time for the professional editor, so why bother? 
Being an editor isn't a national occupation
Our clients don’t all live where we live. Take me. I’m a Brit but I’m not an editor of British novels. I’m an editor of novels written in English ... or I should say, Englishes. And as all pro editors know, there is more than one English. And while those Englishes come with variances in spelling, punctuation, grammar conventions and idiom, all of that can be learned and understood. And that's one of the pulls of international conferences. What better way to hone your craft than by spending time in the places where those Englishes are spoken and written, and hanging out with the people who speak and write them? 
Other factors to help you decide
Here are some ideas to help you decide whether to cross the border for your editorial training: 1. Look at the conference programme Are there sessions on aspects of editing, or the business of editorial work, that you can’t access elsewhere? For example, take a look at the 2019 Toronto SfEP mini-conference programme (Wednesday, 6 November). You can learn how to identify the missing parts in a fiction narrative, how to use macros, how to master templates, how to edit indexes, and how to tackle fast-turnaround editing. There’s also an optional pre-conference workshop on raising rates. 2. Who's speaking? Are the presenters offering learning opportunities that will be easier to learn face to face? Or perhaps there are keynoters or after-dinner speakers you’d be unlikely to meet otherwise. At the 2019 SfEP conference in Aston, bestselling crime-fiction author Chris Brookmyre , linguist Rob Drummond, and broadcaster/writer David Crystal were all on the schedule. We learned hard ... and laughed harder because all three make what they teach memorable through humour. 3. Can you leverage being an international speaker? Think about whether speaking at editorial events beyond your borders is something you can leverage professionally and that will pay back your investment in the long run. Some of our potential clients value knowing we have international speaking experience because it reflects a global trust in our specialist knowledge. 4. Is an honorarium available? If you’re prepared to speak on a specialist topic, you might qualify for financial support. Of course, this depends on the organizer’s budget and the value they think you’ll bring to the conference, but editorial societies are increasingly recognizing the benefits of international speakers in view of the global nature of our community. Don't assume that assistance isn’t available. Even a contribution to flight, accommodation or meals might be the tipping point for your saying yay rather than nay. 5. Can you buddy up to reduce costs? If a flight’s involved, you’ll have to bite the bullet. If you can drive across the border, however, you can share the cost of travel. And how about sharing a room? I did this with my podcast pal Denise Cowle at the 2018 ATOMICON marketing conference. We halved our costs. And neither of us snored. Promise. We’re talking about doing ACES in a couple of years. Being Airbnb buddies will be one way we’ll make it viable. 6. Find out who else is going Face-to-face networking is powerful. Spending time with international colleagues could lead to referrals that will earn you a return on investment further down the line. And if you have books, courses or other training materials relevant to your editorial colleagues, you could reach new markets when you take the time to put yourself in front of your audience and speak at an international event. We’re much more likely to buy from those we trust, and while online networking is great, and the online editorial community is vibrant and generous, nothing beats getting in front of people, talking with them face to face, when it comes to building relationships and trust. 7. Cost it out and save up Work out what it’s going to cost. It’s all very well my talking about the benefits of international networking and learning, but I’m not going to pretend there isn’t hard cash on the line here! Costing it out is the first step to creating a savings plan. That way you can prepare ... if not for this year’s meetup then for one a year or two down the road. Start with the basics:
Summing up International conferences require more planning and a bigger investment of time and money, but if you’re canny about your preparation, think in the long term, and use them as opportunities to speak, they’re hugely beneficial. Where will you go next? Maybe I'll see you there!
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.
Denise and Louise talk to Beth Hamer, a professional proofreader and the Society of Editors and Proofreaders’ conference director. Beth chats about how to organize a successful editorial conference.
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Music credit ‘Vivacity’ Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.
In this episode of The Editing Podcast, Denise and Louise discuss how to find an editor if you decide you want professional help.
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Music credit ‘Vivacity’ Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com). Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and an Associate Member of the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA). Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.
Does standing up in front of a room full of editors terrify you? I know that feeling. Still, I learned how to love it, which rather took me by surprise. In this post I show you how I did it.
Let’s talk about nerves
I haven’t conquered my nerves about speaking at editing conferences, but that’s okay. Nerves are normal, even for presentations experts like my friend Simon Raybould. More on him later, but for now it’s enough to say that feeling nervous is not the same as suffering from a level of anxiety that renders you unable to step out of your comfort zone and try something that could push your editing business forward. Pushing your business forward Speaking at editing conferences will push your business forward. You’ll get yourself seen and heard. People will understand more about who you are, what you specialize in, and what you stand for (your brand). That will lead to opportunities: work referrals, awareness about courses or books that you offer, discounts on the conference registration price (even payment for some gigs), and invitations to speak at other conferences taking place in cities that require a little more effort to get to. Take me. I live in Norfolk (the UK one). On 7 November, I’ll be speaking at the Society for Editors and Proofreader’s mini-conference in Toronto (register here if you want to join me – it’s now open to non-SfEP members). It’s a massive honour to be invited. I get to talk about my two editorial passions – fiction and marketing! In 2016, I’d probably have shied away from doing this, despite the opportunity to hang out with my favourite Canadians (and a few of my favourite Americans). The words ‘I’m busy’ would have flown from my mouth just in time to curb the nausea. In 2017, I might have agreed to do it as long as I was sharing the spotlight with a pal, though the thought would still have made me queasy. But it’s 2018 and, to my surprise, I’m more than happy to fly solo. 
One way to learn to love it
Loathing turned to love because I changed one thing: I dumped the script. This is where I get to talk about Simon again, because he’s the person responsible for making me love speaking at editing conferences. In May 2018, he wrote a blog post for me called 6 tips to help you speak in public with confidence. Tip 4 asks us not to use a script. I was gobsmacked. There was no way in hell I’d dare stand up in front of a group of my peers without having every word of my presentation memorized! We had a long chat about it over Skype, and by the end of that conversation he’d convinced me it was worth testing. And so when the SfEP’s conference director, Beth Hamer, asked me to do a two-hour session, on my own, at the annual conference in Lancaster, I promised her I would. And I promised myself I’d do it without a script. 3 snags with scripts Scripts are inherently problematic. Snag 1: They take time to learn, especially if you’re going to be talking for an hour. Unless you have a brilliant memory. Which I don’t. Snag 2: They’re hard to remember. If they were easy to remember, more of us would be on the stage. Which I’m not. Snag 3: They’re difficult to deliver well. If they were easy to deliver well, more of us would have Oscars and BAFTAs. Which I don’t. No wonder so many of us cringe at the thought of speaking at editing conferences. Even if we manage to learn the damn script, what are the chances that we’ll remember it, given how nervous we are? And if we’re uptight about remembering, what are the chances that we’re going to deliver our script in a way that’s engaging and informative? This is the kind of stuff that’s always been in my head when I think about presenting. All of which can be summed up as follows: at what point will I fail? Going scriptless You can’t fluff a script that doesn’t exist. That in itself gets rid of snags (1) and (2). All you can do is talk about the thing you’ve agreed to talk about. We’re not in the pub or having lunch with our mates, so we still need a structure. I am not a perfect presenter, not by any stretch. But I have embraced an approach that means I will present, and I will enjoy it. This is how I do it:
Because you’re talking rather than delivering a script, you’ll sound more natural. And because you can’t forget any of the key learning points, you’ll feel more relaxed. That’s snag (3) dealt with. There are caveats, of course. You must know your stuff. And you should rehearse. Each rehearsal will be different because you don’t have a script, but you will prove to yourself that you can talk through every one of the key learning points. 
Being imperfect – audience expectations
Will you stumble if you’re scriptless? Maybe. Probably. I stumbled several times in Lancaster. But I loved every minute of that workshop. I felt relaxed, and as I talked I was in the moment, not tuned into the next thing I needed to remember. And the delegates gave me some amazing feedback. That they enjoyed it is the most important thing of all. I’m sold on scriptlessness! Plus, having a script doesn’t mean you won’t stumble. You’re human, after all. The difference is that when you’re scriptless, you get to stumble just because you stumbled, not because you forgot anything important or because you were distracted by the pressure of having to remember what’s up next. Here’s something Simon told me during our Skype chat: Your audience will forgive you if you trip up over a word. Your audience will forgive you if you stammer. Your audience will forgive you if you fluff a line and have to restart the sentence and explain something in a different way. Your audience will forgive you for just being an editor rather than a TED Talk speaker. What your audience will not forgive is your failing to deliver the key learning points that you promised you would ... for wasting their time. At the larger editing conferences, delegates have to choose which sessions to attend. So I know that when someone chooses to come to mine, they’re probably missing at least two workshops they’d have learned something valuable from. That I don’t teach them what I promised is unacceptable. And that is the only way I can fail. When will I see you again? If you can get to Toronto on 7 November 2018, please come and listen to me talking about how to build a knockout home page, getting fiction editing work, and marketing an editing business. Will I fluff my words? More than likely. Will I fail? No. I’ve already created slides for my key learning points and rehearsed what I’ll chat about. I might well stumble and stammer, but I will smile at you as I do so, and I will deliver what I've promised!
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and an Associate Member of the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA). Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.
If speaking in public gives you the heebie-jeebies, professional presenter Simon Raybould has some advice that will improve your performance and calm your nerves.
Over to Simon … 
You edit words for a living, right? It’s a cool job, I admit, and not one I could conceivably aspire to.
As someone once put it, 'Simon, being your proofreader must be like being Seán McGowan’s dentist.’ And yes, it’s true. She once sent me an email with the words ‘… first paragraph alone! Are you doing it on purpose? Are you trying to annoy me?’ But I think I have an even more cool option for you. Instead of editing words, why not edit minds? I’m not talking about some sci-fi concept – it’s what I do for a living. A good presentation will change someone’s mind ... and with it, their world. A good presentation is a form of telepathy – sending ideas from your mind to someone else’s. The upsides are awesome, but the downsides are pretty serious too:
But all is not lost – there are cures … or at least things that will help. Here are a few quick-to-master ideas and tools that will help you to present at conferences (or anywhere else) with confidence. Some are easy, some are harder, but all of them work. 
1. The least popular tool – just doing it
Let’s start with the least popular option. When I ask people why they want to be confident, I often receive answers such as ‘If I were confident I’d be able to XYZ.’ And that’s great – they have a specific thing in mind. What’s not so great is that they seem to think that confidence alone will mean they don’t have to invest time in doing XYZ. I’m going to be blunt … you can’t shortcut your way to confidence. Don’t try to get confident before you do something. You can only get confident by doing that thing. Think about how you learned to ride a bike. Did you look at it, thinking, Cool! What an awesome bike. As soon as I’m a confident cyclist I’ll hop right on and go for rides in the hills? Nope. What you did was sit on it, fall off, get back on, fall off, get back on … and so on. Presenting is like that. Of course, with bikes you have stabilizers (and parents) holding you up. Stick with the analogy for a moment and figure out how you can make presentations in safer ways and places – stabilizers, as it were. How about making presentations under the following conditions:
I’m sure you get the idea. To mix my movement metaphors … don’t run before you can walk. 
2. Know what success looks like
We all know what could go wrong, right? People might laugh at us; we could fall off the stage; cold sweat might drip down our backs or melt our mascara. And that’s the thing… we know what the bad things look like. But what about success? Not fainting on stage doesn’t count. Things like this count:
Define it. After all, if all you can identify is failure, that’s what you’ll concentrate on. But if you can define success, you stand a chance of concentrating on that instead. (Defining success also helps you to design your conference presentation more effectively. If you don’t know what you want to achieve, you’re more likely to omit core material.) 
3. Sentence zero ... the breathing tool
When we’re scared, we breathe from the top of our lungs. Air comes out in a rush, making our voices sound thinner, breathier and – frankly – less authoritative. Hold that thought in your head for a moment and think about this: Lots of people tell me that once they get going in a presentation, things get better. So the important thing is to start well, right? Right. If you can control your breathing at the start, things are going to go better. Sentence zero is a handy tool for doing just that. Get the very first sentence of your presentation straight in your head. Be specific. For now, let’s pretend that Sentence One is ‘Hello, my name is Simon.’ Now think of a sentence that could go before it, finishing with the word ‘and’. For now, let’s pretend it’s 'Goodness, what a hideous lime green that back wall is, and …' We’ll call this Sentence Zero. Now, as you start your presentation, say Sentence Zero+Sentence One in one breath, but only use your voice for Sentence One. What that means is that your audience only hears Sentence One but you’ve already used the high-pressure, anxiety-sounding breath from the top of your lungs on the silent Sentence Zero.
4. Ditch the script
Writing is difficult. That’s why authors need you, right? So what on earth makes you think you can write a script for your presentation? If it was that easy, we’d all be writing massively successful West End and Broadway plays. Don’t try. Instead, define your structure.
Then, when you stand up to present, use the keywords as markers around which you improvise. Trust me, you’ll sound more natural and be much, much more interesting. Plus, you won’t spend time worrying about the massive confidence-drainer that is 'Did I get the wording absolutely right according to the script?' As an aside, the answer is no. No one does unless they’re RSC-grade actors. What you’ll lose in the occasional fumble you’ll more than gain in sounding more relaxed and natural. Plus, you won’t commit the ultimate presenter’s sin of using Latin words. It’s an over-simplification but we’re more likely write using the Latin-orientated words (‘commence’ rather than ‘start’) and speak using the Saxon versions (‘guts’ rather than ‘intestines’). Ditching the script means you don’t speak like a textbook. 
5. Wasp-swatting: The power of the list
A while ago, my team and I sat down for a meeting. Pizza and wine might have been involved. One of the things we asked each other was what made us nervous. It turned out that about one-third of our conference nerves came not from the presentation but from the logistics that went with it.
Logisitical/trivial problems are like wasps. One seems manageable. A swarm’s a different matter. Each issue might be negligible on its own, but all of them together have a noticeable impact. Similarly, each on its own is easily dealt with, but taken together the problem loses its perspective. The solution is simple: a list. At least two weeks in advance of the conference, create a simple checklist – one line for every issue. For example, I don’t have a 'cables' tick box on my list; I have entry for the power cable, another for the VGA adaptor, and another for the HDMI adaptor, and so on. Before you go live, check the list. That way, when it’s time to perform, you can do so confident that you’ve not forgotten anything. It also frees up the parts of your brain you’d otherwise have wasted on trying to remember things. 6. Practice and rehearsal This is so fundamental it probably shouldn't come last. It also needs the fewest words. You will perform better if you go over your presentation and practise improvising using your keywords. Wrapping up There’s a lot more you can do to conquer your nerves – ideas range from breathing techniques to standing in certain positions – but these are good starting points. So go change the world and edit people’s heads!
Want to know more?
Simon's a presentations expert and productivity guru. He's running a session at the SfEP annual conference in Lancaster in 2018 so you can meet him there. If you want to get in touch beforehand, here's what you need:
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in helping self-publishing writers prepare their novels for market.
She is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors, and runs online courses from within the Craft Your Editorial Fingerprint series. She is also an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. Louise loves books, coffee and craft gin, though not always in that order. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, take a look at Louise’s Writing Library and access her latest self-publishing resources, all of which are free and available instantly.
If you're looking for an online network of fiction and creative nonfiction specialists, the Association of Independent Publishing Professionals (AIPP) is worth checking out. I became a member earlier this year after being drawn to the organization's global outlook and creative niche.
My guest today is AIPP co-founder Crystal Watanabe. Here's what she has to say ...
The power of private networking Being a freelancer can be an amazing experience. You get to work at home, you have no commute, you can work in whatever clothing you like, and if you’re an introvert, you really don’t have to talk to anyone. That said, with those wonderful benefits usually comes the inevitable problem. Or worse, an irate client. Ask any editor who has been in business for longer than a year whether they have a Client from Hell, and the likely answer is yes. After all, we’re in the business of pointing out other people’s flaws. It’s a touchy subject for many. Usually when something like this occurs, the foremost thing on a freelancer’s mind is to feel lost. Like you’re alone, and no one but you has been through such a terribly stressful ordeal. This is where networking becomes an invaluable resource. There are many networking options open to people working from home: Twitter, Facebook, Facebook groups, LinkedIn, and forums. But oftentimes these methods of communication are open to the public, and if there’s one thing to learn about airing frustrations online, it’s that you never know who is silently reading your negativity and judging you for it. This is where more private modes of communication come in handy, and to find the most relevant and helpful discussion and advice on any problems that come up, a professional organization is more often than not the best place to go. When I had my first problem client, I’ll admit, I was sobbing on my couch, feeling awful and alone. After I wiped my tears away, I went searching for people like me, and I ended up at the Editorial Freelancers Association. I joined, began interacting, and learned a lot from other members. But at the same time, I wasn’t sure the EFA was exactly what I needed. The AIPP – focusing on fiction and creative nonfiction I work primarily in fiction, and I found myself skipping over a number of discussions pertaining to a variety of other editing fields. In the end, I helped cofound the Association of Independent Publishing Professionals (AIPP) with fellow editors Anne Victory and Nikki Busch in 2016. Starting an organization is no easy feat, but nearly two years later, we’re still growing. The AIPP is dedicated to freelancers who work primarily in fiction and creative nonfiction, including both self-published authors and authors hoping to submit their manuscripts to traditional publishers. Our membership includes but is not limited to:
Membership benefits and fees In addition to a wealth of wonderful benefits (discounts on Merriam-Webster, PerfectIt, Deposit Photos, 17Hats, FreshBooks, and more), the AIPP has introduced a new lower membership fee in 2018. Applying to the AIPP is just $45, including a nonrefundable $10 application fee. Renewal is just $35 per year. Whether you’ve recently opened your business or have worked on more books than you can remember, the AIPP may be the right organization for you. Our members praise the sound advice given when problems arise and in general enjoy the feeling that they’re not alone. Click on the button below to find out more about the AIPP. 
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in helping self-publishing writers prepare their novels for market.
She is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors, and runs online courses from within the Craft Your Editorial Fingerprint series. She is also an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. Louise loves books, coffee and craft gin, though not always in that order. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, take a look at Louise’s Writing Library and access her latest self-publishing resources, all of which are free and available instantly. How do I turn my literature and creative-writing teaching background into an editorial business?25/10/2017
This week’s reader question is from a teacher of English language, literature and creative writing. She’s looking for a new direction – something beyond the school environment that will allow her to use her educational experience and existing knowledge base.
Here’s what Noella had to say:
Dear Louise, I'm a UK-based secondary-school English teacher of language, literature and creative writing, and am looking to move into editing or publishing. I feel that I already have some of the skills required but I'm also on a budget and would like to know how someone like me could perhaps sneak into this area of work via a recognized route that isn't too costly. Essentially, I want a better work/life balance and to feel more in control of my career. Hope you can advise me. Hi, Noella! Thanks so much for your question. Work/life balance Given that flexibility is important, I’m inclined to recommend the path of independent editor (freelancer), rather than working in-house. Running your own business will give you control. Setting up on your own will require a lot of hard graft at the outset (as I’m sure you realize). However, it will provide you with the freedom to choose your own hours, set your own rates, and decide which projects you wish to take on. The different levels of editing I think it’s worth summarizing the different levels of editing as this will show you where your current skills might slot in.
There’s more information in the following articles:
What would suit you? Given that you’re already immersed in teaching creative writing – albeit to a younger audience – you might do well to focus your training on big-picture work because you could utilize an already-developed skill set. Another route to consider is offering private writing tuition. Many first-time authors want to develop their craft, and if you enhance your existing knowledge base with specialist professional training and professional society membership, you'd have a powerful key selling point not only to local writers but those searching online too. And if you enjoy working with secondary-school students, there’s nothing to stop you offering private tuition to them too. You’ve already proven yourself within the school sector, but this option would allow you to continue teaching while achieving control and flexibility over your working hours. Training I’ve covered the issue of training in previous Q&As so take a look at the following articles for information about high-quality courses that focus on the broader practice of editorial work:
If you do decide to focus on big-picture editing, I’d recommend specialist training. Perhaps you’ll discover nothing new, but that will be a huge confidence booster. And if there are gaps in your skill set, you’ll find out where they are and be able to rectify the problem before you begin working with clients. Sophie Playle of Liminal Pages is an experienced developmental editor who runs two relevant courses: Also take a look at the Society for Editors and Proofreaders’ Introduction to Fiction Editing. Note that the SfEP assumes basic copyediting knowledge for this course. Getting noticed One of the biggest challenges for any new editorial business owner is getting noticed. Again, I’ve discussed marketing in previous Q&As, so you might like to review the following:
If you were to go down the route of offering creative writing courses for beginners, consider researching local writing groups; and talk to local bookshops to see if you might publicize the courses through them. How about your local chamber of commerce? Is there support there – perhaps local contacts who are involved in self-publishing? You might collaborate with the chamber to provide a beta course or seminar series that would help you learn what works and what doesn’t. This would enable you to mine your existing teaching skill set while expanding your local network. And, of course, self-publishers aren’t the only market. Mainstream publishers are a superb client base with whom to build your portfolio once you’ve completed your training because they already understand the value that professional editors bring to the table. It’s worth bearing in mind, too, that there are fewer specialist developmental editors than copyeditors and proofreaders. Moving in this direction would mean you have less competition once you begin actively marketing your new business. Budget One thing I can’t advise on is whether my suggestions are ‘too costly’! Price is always relative in any case. My recommendations are based on quality rather than affordability because I see no sense in suggesting training that won’t help you achieve career independence and fitness for purpose. Your career background will offer you a strong foundation on which to build your editorial business, and if you’re prepared to combine those skills with additional professional development and a commitment to marketing, I believe you could do very well indeed. Good luck, Noella!
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in helping self-publishing writers prepare their novels for market.
She is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors, and runs online courses from within the Craft Your Editorial Fingerprint series. She is also an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. Louise loves books, coffee and craft gin, though not always in that order. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, take a look at Louise’s Writing Library and access her latest self-publishing resources, all of which are free and available instantly. How to use social media with intention If you're an editor, proofreader, translator or indexer, you're probably already using social media. If that's the case, but you feel like you're struggling to keep it under control, this training course could be just what you need. Social media is great for chattering – updates about our kid’s first day at school, little notes about how badly we need coffee, pics of our cats sitting on our keyboards. It’s all great fun and long may it continue. But when it comes to using social media for business, we need to think about intention. Otherwise the dreaded rabbit hole will beckon. Laura Poole and Erin Brenner of Copyeditng kindly invited me to present an online masterclass for editors and proofreaders on social media marketing and engagement. I'll be your instructor for Social Media with Purpose on Tuesday, December 19, 2017, 11 am–12:30 pm Eastern Time. Key learning points In this 90-minute masterclass, we'll cover the following:
Registrants will also receive a free 53-page, 10,700-word ebook that addresses all the learning points, plus a list of links to recommended resources to help make your social media engagement persuasive, emotive and productive. 
I do hope you'll join me for the class. Details of registration fees and how to sign up are available on the Copyediting training page.
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader. She curates The Proofreader's Parlour and is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors and proofreaders.
Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, you might like to join Louise’s Writing Library. Members receive monthly updates featuring self-publishing news and resources.
How does one go about building a written-communications business from scratch? The person who got in touch is looking to break into a sector that I have almost no experience of, so I wondered whether it might stump me.
However, it soon became clear that the problem is not the sector itself but the challenge of being visible in that sector. 
Those of us who started out by targeting the publishing industry know that there’s an advantage – that sector knows who we are, what we do, and why it needs us. But what do you do if your target clients are corporates?
Jo says:
Firstly, thank you so much for your extremely helpful articles. They’re all I seem to read at the moment. Secondly, a question! You kindly offer to help people solve their business problems, so here’s mine. I recently set up a communications business offering copywriting, proofreading, editing and social media services. I have a professional background in science, business and education, but not specifically within the communication arena. My last role, as a communications manager, was my first within this sector. I’ve spent 15 years helping my partner with his communication requirements, from proofreading and editing to copywriting, so I feel as experienced as I can in this field without having any ‘official’ training. Now comes the hard bit! I am spending each and every day at the computer, emailing companies that I hope will be able to utilize my services, and the one question I keep hearing, time after time is ‘Can you please send me examples of your work?’ Herein lies the problem. Even though I have worked for many years with my other half, I haven’t built a portfolio of any kind, let alone kept any of the work I contributed to. I’m stuck in that cycle of no provable experience so no work, but no work so no way of demonstrating what I can do! Tricky! How would you suggest I get around this? Thanks for taking the time to read this, and for your insightful advice!
Hi, Jo, and thanks so much for your question!
Your problem is essentially one of visibility, competition, and the lack of a stand-out brand identity. Your website looks lovely, but that’s no longer enough to get you found or noticed. Written-communications businesses are ten a penny, so you’re operating in a marketplace that’s highly competitive. You’re also up against specialist editors (like me) and specialist copywriters (like my pal John Espirian), and a ton of big-brand agencies who offer service packages to corporates (your target market). Currently, despite your pretty website, you’re basically an unknown supplier writing to companies who’ve never heard of you and have no way of working out why you’re special, why you’re different, why they should pick you over anyone else. And none of that is a reflection of your capability. It’s simply a reflection of the fact that you can’t prove it. The consequence is that, at the moment, your message is all about you. You’re not the first supplier to be in the position of having a small or non-existent portfolio. Many of my colleagues have to sign non-disclosure agreements that preclude them from advertising the fact that they’ve worked for corporates. And while my fiction writers are more than happy to make it known that they’ve hired me, I’d never send another author a sample of the work I’ve done on behalf of a former client. It would be a breach of confidentiality. Becoming visible and standing out So what to do? My view is that you need to commit to a content marketing strategy that will build trust and get attention. The briefest definition of content marketing I can give you is this: Creating useful stuff that solves problems … and giving it away. That’s because when you help people, you get noticed. You know this is true because that’s why you contacted me! Let me quote you; ‘Thank you so much for your extremely helpful articles. They’re all I seem to read at the moment.’ Think about it … you’ve never met me or seen a sample of my editing work, and yet you devoured my blog and sent me a long email outlining your problem in the hope that I could help you. Then you agreed to let me publish your name, your question and my response in a public place. Somewhere along the line, I made you trust me. And that, Jo, is what you need to mimic with your own business. You found me, which means my clients can find me. Now you need to enable people to find you and make them want to engage with you and your written-communications business. We’re already 690 words in and I haven’t even got started on the nuts and bolts of content marketing, and there isn’t room to do it justice here. But here are the basic principles. My basic principles of content marketing 
Copyright Louise Harnby, 2017 (first published in Content Marketing Primer for Editors & Proofreaders)
When you create solutions to people’s problems – based around these principles – you begin a journey that puts you top of mind and top of the search engines. Changing the focus of the message Remember above how I talked about your message being all about you? When you start content marketing, the message becomes all about the client – their problems, their challenges, their business. And when you offer solutions to those problems via your content marketing strategy, you present yourself as the expert you are – someone with 15 years’ experience of working with a corporate. No one will be looking at your sparse testimonials page if they’re too busy drooling over the free resources you’ve offered them. Then, when it comes to the stuff they can’t do themselves, you’ll be ready to help with paying work. It’s hard graft, make no mistake. There are no quick fixes or overnight solutions. The strategy requires commitment. The principles I outlined above are from my Content Marketing Primer for Editors & Proofreaders, which I wrote at the end of 2016 and published in January 2017. I stand by everything I wrote in that ebook, but I’ve learned a whole lot more since, because I decided to get help from the pros. After all, I’m a professional editor not a professional marketer! And if you want to get serious and make inroads as quickly as possible, you might decide to go for the pro option, too. An example of how content marketing worked … on me The story of the pros I chose provides an example of great content marketing in action. I was looking for free online help with branding and design. I came across a couple of guys on Twitter who were creating video tutorials about how to do just that. They were fun, young (younger than me, for sure!), seemed friendly … and their stuff was brilliant … and free. I watched one vlog after another, and signed up for their mailing list so I’d know when something new was out. For about three months, I took all that free guidance and implemented it. And then I bought from them. Just a book at first. It cost about a tenner. And all the time, I kept thinking: if the free stuff is this good, and this cheap book is this good, what must their membership group be like? By the time April had come around, resistance was futile. Like the Borg. And I joined.
So, you see what happened? They gave away a load of stuff that I found useful, and it got my attention and persuaded me to trust them. And then I became a client because when it came to making the big decision about whom to choose, they were top of mind. They'd blown everyone else out of the water.
So who are they? Regular readers of my blog will be bored rigid of hearing me talk about Andrew and Pete, and their group Atomic, but I won’t apologize because they’ve made a difference to me. What they teach works. If you decide to go down this route though, do your own research first and make your own decisions. Find what’s right for you. An example of a colleague’s content strategy My colleague Natalie Hailey owns a digital marketing agency called Hot Content. And she uses content to drive her marketing strategy, just like I do, just like you can. Natalie has a blog, a vlog and a newsletter through which she’s building an audience of business owners who are interested in her services – her solutions. But she’s not just creating visual and written online content. She’s also delivering those solutions face to face – by speaking at regional events (via her local chamber of commerce) – and by hosting live training sessions and workshops in her area that focus on helping, educating, building relationships and engaging with local businesswomen. She focuses on a core audience and makes sure that the content she creates and delivers speaks to that audience at every touchpoint of her business – from the font she uses for her logo to the colours she chooses for her blog images; from the way she dresses at speaking engagements to the gentle warmth of her voice when she vlogs; from the tone of her blog posts to the way she engages in forums. Those are the things her potential clients focus on. And, ultimately, they choose to engage with her because she makes them want to. And why on earth wouldn’t they? She’s nothing but helpful. 
Back to you ...
I think you can do what I do, what Natalie does, what John does, and what Andrew and Pete do, so that you and your written-communications business stand out. By focusing on your target clients, what their problems are, and how you can solve them, and in a way that’s based purely on being helpful, by making them ‘feel smarter or happier’, as Andrew and Pete put it, you can move out of the catch-22 you find yourself in. That’s because this type of marketing is about relationships rather than résumés, about problem-solving rather than portfolios, about answering with solutions rather than asking for work. It’s not that testimonials, portfolios and experience aren’t great. They are. They’re wonderful. But, as you know only too well, they’re what you get at the arrivals gate. Content marketing is the departure point. Do it yourself, do it with books, or do it with pros. But do it. (Gawd, I sound like a Nike advert!). Then you'll be irresistible too. Like the Borg. Good luck!
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in helping self-publishing writers prepare their novels for market.
She is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors, and runs online courses from within the Craft Your Editorial Fingerprint series. She is also an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. Louise loves books, coffee and craft gin, though not always in that order. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, take a look at Louise’s Writing Library and access her latest self-publishing resources, all of which are free and available instantly.
Here's why new freelance editors and proofreaders need to commit to marketing, rather than relying on word of mouth to grow their businesses.
In 'When one client isn’t enough – emergency marketing for editors and proofreaders', I offered an emergency marketing plan for proofreaders and editors who’d either lost their sole source of income or ended up in a situation where they were reliant on one client.
The first stage of the marketing plan asked for a commitment to active marketing. If you’re simply waiting for a solution to present itself, you’re merely involved. And that’s a very different proposition from being committed. I love this quotation from Martina Navratilova: The difference between involvement and commitment is like ham and eggs. The chicken is involved; the pig is committed.
Editorial freelancers, especially new starters, need to be the ham. Committing to marketing as soon as we set up our businesses ensures that we’ll never be client-reliant or, worse, lose our sole source of income.
Acquiring work: commitment versus involvement Involved: being passive Most experienced editorial freelancers take advantage of passively acquired work. I have a number of repeat clients who fill some of my schedule. If you’re highly visible, experienced, trusted and respected, this strategy could well be effective for you. For the new entrant to the field, though, it’s a non-starter. That’s because these opportunities are a consequence of active marketing. Passively acquired work might come through a variety of channels. Here, for simplicity, I’ve focused on three:
Committed: being active Active marketing is the work you do to generate these passive opportunities. Here, again, I’ve focused on three: A. Networking with colleagues and clients (e.g. on editing forums, at conferences, professional society meetings, social media platforms). This kind of marketing leads to an awareness of what your specialist skills are. If a colleague needs to direct a client or prospect to someone with skills or availability that he or she doesn’t have, you’ll be in the running (see 1, above). B. Cold-calling and writing letters/emails to target clients (e.g. publishers, packagers, businesses, marketing agencies). This is direct marketing and if you do it extensively you can quickly build a solid list of similar client types. If the clients are satisfied with the work, they’ll rehire you, which leads to repeat work (see 2, above). C. Just creating online profiles in itself is not enough to make you discoverable. Action that maximizes the visibility of those profiles in the search engines is key. This is where content marketing comes to the fore – creating and distributing (via your online platforms) advice, knowledge, tools and resources that your colleagues and clients will find useful, valuable. Examples include blogs, booklets, video tutorials, checklists and cheat sheets. High-quality content offers solutions to problems and makes your online profiles more findable (see 3, above). In a nutshell, being active enables you to reap passive rewards later (if your office buddy will give you the space, that is). 
Charlie, my Labrador, enjoying the passive approach to life.
Why word of mouth (WOM) is often misunderstood
‘But my colleague said that all her work is via word of mouth.’ I don’t doubt it. But if she’s been running her business for 20 years and has a portfolio and client list as long as your arm, she’s not in the same position as the new entrant to the field. She’s benefiting from 1, 2 and 3 because she invested in A, B and C. New starters should indeed commit to WOM marketing. What they shouldn’t do is assume that it’s a passive approach that requires no effort. Nor will there be short-term results. Top-notch WOM marketing requires an intense level of commitment to action and an acceptance of slow-burn impact. Awareness and trust aren’t built overnight, especially in our field. Editorial freelancers aren’t selling a product that promises something that swathes of people have wanted forever – an anti-aging cream, a painless leg-waxing treatment, a broadband connection that never, ever buffers even if you live out in the sticks and there’s more chance of getting a wi-fi signal on Mars. Our services have to prove their worth. For the editorial business owner, WOM marketing is like creating a garden from scratch. If you’re proactive, it will take many months to knock it into shape. If you hold back, it’ll take years. If you’re passive, the garden will remain barren. WOM and colleagues There are a lot of us, and many have already developed niche networks of friends and colleagues to whom we refer work. When an editor or proofreader ends up on my radar, it’s because they’ve instilled trust in me.
WOM and clients As for client A telling client B about you, you’ll need a lot of mouths to share the good news if you want to have a full schedule! That’s not where you’ll be if you’re a new entrant to the field, not because you’re not an effective editor or proofreader but because you don’t yet have a large enough bank of clients. Effective WOM Find out which networks (online and offline) your clients and colleagues recommend and join in the discussion. There’s nothing wrong with asking questions but be prepared to offer solutions too. Even new editorial freelancers have specialist skills and background experience that are relevant and valuable to the debate. In 'Why word of mouth marketing is the most important social media', Kimberly A. Whitler, Assistant Professor at the University of Virginia's Darden School of Business, breaks down WOM marketing into the three Es:
Action first, passivity later Clients can come via active and passive marketing strategies. It’s not a case of the right strategy but the right order. If you’re a new starter, make active editorial business promotion a standard part of your working life, just like copyediting or proofreading, invoicing and updating your software. Assign space for it every week so that it becomes commonplace rather than a chore or, worse, something to be feared. Be active. Be committed. Be the ham! Once your business is established, you’ll be able to take advantage of the passive benefits that result from your effort. Just take care not to hand over the chill space to your Labrador!
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, connect via Facebook and LinkedIn, and check out her books and courses.
This article is for editorial folk who currently choose to operate their businesses in isolation. There's nothing wrong with that at all if that's your bag, but I hope this will show you just some of the benefits of networking.
In ‘The rates debate’ and 'The highs and lows of editorial fees', I argued that colleagues shouldn’t be the primary determiners of the price we set or accept for editorial work.
They are, however, our go-tos for much else, and the professional editor and proofreader would be bonkers not to take the opportunity to exploit the myriad learning opportunities on offer from those with different skills, levels of experience, subject specialisms and environments! Rather than just writing a list, I thought it might be more interesting to give you a few examples of how some of my colleagues have helped me to develop my editorial business. The list isn’t exhaustive – it would be a book if it was – but it should give you a flavour of what’s on offer.
Learning a new macro
I like to consider myself pretty strong on the editorial tech-tool front. And yet I’d lost count of the number of times I’d forgotten to switch Track Changes back on after I’d toggled it off. I needed a solution – some sort of visual or audio reminder. My pal Gordon Hooper came to the rescue. Gordon’s a fellow member of the Norfolk SfEP local group. Turns out that my other colleague Paul Beverley had already tackled the problem with a macro: if you fancy trying it for yourself, you can read about how it works and how to install it at ‘How to never forget you’ve switched off Track Changes!’. 
Tightening up my marketing message
Last year, I spent some time thinking about how I could better present my services so that they reflected the reality of what I spend most of my time doing – proofreading and copyediting for indie authors. I understand perfectly well the traditional definitions of these skills but in the real world they’re rather tangled (see, for example, ‘The proofreader’s corner: Untangling proofreading’). Again, it was my professional network that came to the rescue.
Understanding another skill
Development editing isn't a service I offer. That doesn't mean I'm not interested in learning about it, though. I've started to expand my knowledge via colleagues who have experience in this macro level of editing.
Using Word more efficiently
In the past 18 months, two editorial colleagues have written blogs that have had a significant impact on how I use Word.
Using a gadget
One of my bugbears has always been having to use hyphens for en dashes on my iPad and iPhone. A discussion on the SfEP forum, started by Lisa Robinson, showed me that Apple has provided en and em dashes – I just hadn’t realized that if you hold down the hyphen button a small window opens and you can slide your finger to your preferred dash. I was delighted, and I wasn’t alone! That thread was full of useful tips. If you’re an SfEP member, you can access it via ‘Dashes’. 
Discovering new tools
I love any editorial tool that can increase my productivity or enhance my professionalism. Colleagues alerted me to two particular favourites.
Maxing out an existing tool
I hadn’t been getting the best out of PerfectIt, even though I’m a long-time user. At another SfEP Norfolk meeting, Mary Sheridan and Sarah Patey taught me how to use the wildcard function more effectively. This, combined with Jack Lyon’s Wildcard Cookbook for Microsoft Word, has been a real productivity enhancer. PerfectIt tends to handle wildcards a lot better than Word when Track Changes is switched on, something else Sarah taught me via Facebook! 
Quoting mechanisms and publicizing rates
Pricing issues affect every editorial freelancer, and although fee setting needs to be done using a deeper level of analysis than just following what colleagues are doing, there’s still a lot a colleague can bring to the table.
These two examples proved to be excellent reminders that testing is essential for the editorial freelancer who wants to learn whether a colleague’s way of doing things is appropriate for their own business.
Making friends
My colleagues can do something a book or a course can’t. They can become friends. I’ve made so many edi-buddies that I can't even begin to list them all. What I can say is that Kate Haigh's campsite spag bol borders on legendary; the AFEPI crew at last year's SfEP meeting almost made me want to emigrate. I wish Sophie Playle still lived in Norwich because I miss having coffee with her. I wish Rich Adin lived in the same country so that I could have just one coffee with him. Nick Jones has made me laugh via Facebook Messenger too many times. Janet MacMillan's soup ... You get the point. 
Sourcing professional help
I decided to hire a couple of proofreaders for my blog in 2016. When I’m writing, I don’t behave like a proofreader. I have my authorial head on. That means I’m too close to my own words to spot all my errors. I bit the bullet and decided to work with some fellow professional proofreaders. Whom to pick though? I needed some recommendations. John Espirian, in his capacity as guardian of the SfEP directory, had a couple of names up his sleeve and they haven’t disappointed. Cally Worden and Anna Black are my go-tos. They’ve done a fantastic job for me and I wish I’d sourced them years ago. Of course, I still have to upload their gently edited work to the Parlour, and, I’ll be honest, sometimes I just can’t help making a little tweak here and there, post proofreading (I know, I know!). So if a typo has slipped through, it’s my fault. 
Finding your tribe
There’s a tonne of other stuff that colleagues can help with – I’ve only scratched the surface. If you’re reading this and you’re not connected, consider the benefits of changing the situation.
Ultimately, editorial freelancing is about running your own business, but there are plenty of people who’ll support you in its growth if you find a comfortable space in which to meet them!
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with independent authors of commercial fiction, particularly crime, thriller and mystery writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, connect via Facebook and LinkedIn, and check out her books and courses.  My new Content Marketing Primer for Editors & Proofreaders is now available to order. The Primer costs only £3.99, so grab yourself a bargain! Simply click on the button below to go to the book's dedicated page and order form. I'll email your book within 24 hours (though probably a lot sooner if I'm not asleep!) Louise Harnby is a professional proofreader and copyeditor. She curates The Proofreader's Parlour and is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors and proofreaders. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.  I'm delighted to announce the forthcoming launch of a new editorial freelancing tool for February 2017: Content Marketing Primer for Editors & Proofreaders. The Primer shows you how to create and deliver value-adding content that embraces engagement with colleagues and clients and enhances your editorial business's visibility. This 40-page book includes guidance on the following:
Louise Harnby is a professional proofreader and copyeditor. She curates The Proofreader's Parlour and is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors and proofreaders. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. 
Freelance pricing, marketing, testing/tracking and terminology
This article is a summary of what I learned along the way: the effects on my own business and how I responded. For some of you, what follows will chime with your own experiences. If that's not the case, perhaps you'll be inspired to test some of the issues I discuss. What I learned
1. Prices – to show or not to show I went public with my pricing structure for one month in November. The results were interesting; my explanation was uncertain; my response, however, was unequivocal. I’ve been tracking my new-client contact data for over a year, so I could compare some numbers. In November 2015, I received 25 requests from new clients to quote. In November 2016, it dropped to 14. Of those who did get in contact, the number who became paying clients increased by 50%. On the surface, that’s good news – lower contact numbers but a higher rate of conversions. Dig a little deeper, though, and there are a couple of problems:
At the end of December 2016, I compared the new-client contact data with that from December 2015. This time, the figures were similar – two more in 2016. At first sight, this might imply that the public prices were an issue. But, again, I only have one year-on-year figure for comparison, which I don’t believe is enough to warrant anything more than a ‘Hmm, interesting. That’s worth keeping an eye on.’ Data from at least five previous years would have given me the confidence to make a statement one way or another. As it is, based on my experiment and limited data, I’m not prepared to conclude that public pricing is either beneficial or damaging. My response for my business: I removed my prices from my website. This is the approach I feel comfortable with at present, and I’ll continue as such until I have enough information to make an informed decision. I’ll continue to track my new contacts so that I can better understand the patterns of enquiry throughout the year. 2. Content marketing over gin and pizza I plan to write more about content marketing (or adding value, as I prefer to call it) this year. There’s a section about it in Marketing Your Editing & Proofreading Business if you want to dig deeper. Here’s the thing – many of us think of content marketing in terms of blogs, booklets, tutorials and templates. In other words, stuff that can be read, watched and touched. In 2016, I was reminded that great content marketing – great value – is sometimes as simple as a conversation. At the 2016 Society for Editors and Proofreaders’ annual conference in Aston, I made a new friend (Victoria Woodside) and caught up with an old one (Sophie Playle). I’d already spent several months thinking about what it is I actually do (see Section 5 below) and how I present it to potential clients. The language used to define editorial services is tangled. Editorial professionals don’t define proofreading, copyediting and line editing similarly, so why should our clients? I was comfortable blogging about the confusion but I hadn’t managed to solve the conundrum for my own business. I was going round in circles. Victoria and Sophie came to my rescue – not in any kind of formal consultative manner, but just by giving me their time and sharing their expertise over gin and Fiorentinas. They told me how they defined their services and helped me to unpick my own. From those conversations, I found a way forward. I doubt either woman would define her conversation with me as content marketing – yet it was. Both had valuable, useful stuff (knowledge, time and expertise) and shared it with me. Later it would put them both top of my mind when I was in need of people to refer specific clients to. One of those referrals turned into paid work. And that’s really what good content marketing is – sharing useful, valuable stuff so that it puts you top of mind (or top of Google) when there’s a client in need of a solution. That client might come via a colleague, which means your fellow editorial pros are your customers too. Meeting and talking to colleagues, online and face-to-face, is great content marketing. Many of us do it without even realizing. And it costs nowt but time and effort. You just need to be a nice human being. My response for my business: This experience was a great lesson in just how far content marketing stretches. It was also a strong reminder that learning takes place in a range of environments. I already attend my Norfolk SfEP group meeting on a regular basis. I’m now committed to attending the annual meetings too – to speak (if I’m asked) and to listen to others speaking. Two conversations helped me align my business in action with my business in words. That alone made it worth the registration fee. 3. The hard graft and the full schedule I’ve had an active marketing strategy in place since I set up my business back in 2006. It’s worked well for me. I have as much work as I can handle and am often booked up several months in advance … And there’s the rub. Some clients will wait, but many won’t. To put so much time into marketing – all those booklets and guidelines and other bits and pieces of valuable stuff that I hope my indie authors will find useful – only to hear, ‘Sorry, I can’t wait that long,’ is frustrating. It feels like wasted effort. I’m all for a referral – I can put a client in touch with the perfect specialist. Legal editor? I know one of those. Fluent French speaker or Italian translator? I’m friends with the former and related to the latter. How about a proofreader who also has experience of scientific indexing? Yep, I have a phone number. The thing is this – it’s a busy week and I’m up to my neck in deadlines. I don’t have the capacity to be thinking about who would be the best person in my extensive network of experienced colleagues for this or that bit of proofreading or light editing. That’s time I should be using to earn a crust for me, not someone else. As a result, from early 2015 I’d stopped actively recommending named colleagues for general proofreading or light-editing work. If an enquirer actively asked for a recommendation, I’d point them to a directory. If they asked for specialist help (e.g. legal, medical, scientific), only then would I recommend a named colleague. All in all, I felt that a lot of hard-graft was generating a lot of missed opportunities and missed income. My response for my business: A trusted colleague whose company subs to experienced editors and proofreaders offered me a referral deal. I get a cut of any converted leads. This hasn’t replaced my specialist referral network; rather, it’s a two-pronged approach. Named specialist referrals earn me nothing, whereas more generalist referrals earn me a small passive income. Now I feel like my marketing’s working for me again, and for others too. 4. Data, data and more data I talked above about the problem I encountered with not having enough data to make an informed decision on whether public pricing is good or bad for my business. Data limitations also became apparent when I introduced several contact forms on my website early in 2016. I was interested to learn whether clients preferred contact forms, email, texts or phone, and whether it was necessary to provide all of these options. My initial observations were as follows:
My response for my business: I committed to continue my monitoring of new-client contact methods. I’m nearly a year down the line now so I have more data. Good job too. Now, my observations are as follows:
5. More than a proofreader Well into 2016, a couple of things had become blindingly obvious:
My response for my business: I wrote, I pondered, I talked to myself. Then I had a conversation with two friends (see Section 2 above). Clarity emerged from confusion. I redefined (and repriced) my service packages so that they reflect the reality of what I’m providing. I’m confident and clear about how my services are differentiated. More importantly, I’m no longer worrying about what my colleagues are doing, or what definitions they’re using. My friends gave me the confidence to carve out my own way of doing things. Summing up I hope you’ve enjoyed this personal review. I’m sure you’ve had many of your own ‘Hmm, that’s interesting’ moments over the past 12 months. Perhaps you’ve shared some of the same experiences but responded differently. No matter – there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to any of these issues. The important thing is that we use the review process as an opportunity to see not what we’ve done badly but what we can do better.
Louise Harnby is a professional proofreader and copyeditor. She curates The Proofreader's Parlour and is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors and proofreaders.
Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. A note from Louise: In 2013, I published my first book – an introductory editorial business-planning guide entitled Business Planning for Editorial Freelancers. I wanted to provide readers with a real-world view of what it’s like to enter the world of editorial freelancing. Three of my colleagues were kind enough to act as case studies, sharing insights into their experiences of building an editorial business: Johanna Robinson, Mary McCauley and Grace Wilson. At the time of publication, all three were relatively new to the field (their start-ups were under two years old). Each of them created vibrant, successful editorial businesses, working with a range of clients across the UK and Ireland. Their candid accounts illustrated the challenges of editorial freelancing – but also suggested how the path to success could be achieved through determination, skills acquisition, strategic planning and targeted marketing. Here we are three years later in 2016. My colleagues left behind their new-starter status a long time ago. They’re now established editorial business owners who are not only working for paying clients but also helping less experienced colleagues navigate their way through the world of editorial freelancing via training programmes and conference presentations. It’s therefore with great pleasure that I hand now you over to Mary McCauley of Mary McCauley Proofreading. Below, Mary tells us what’s changed and what’s stayed the same; how her business has developed; what she’s learned; and what her plans are for the future … It’s nearly four years since I first wrote a guest article for The Proofreader’s Parlour on how I set up my editorial business, and subsequently appeared as a case study in Louise’s debut book Business Planning for Editorial Freelancers. It feels like a lifetime ago; back in December 2012, I never imagined how my editorial journey would continue. Thankfully, it has been a good four years for me. What has and hasn’t changed since I started out in 2012 Business hours I have moved to full-time hours and my work schedule has been more or less fully booked up for the past two years. However, I no longer regularly work weekends unless I have agreed a premium rate with my client. As for most people setting up a business, the early years involved long hours of work and weeks without a break. This worked for a while, but I learned that I cannot work that way indefinitely; I need regular time away from my desk or I can’t do my best work. And as my turnover has increased year on year as my business grows, I’m now able to take proper holidays at Christmas and during the summer. Services offered When I started out in 2012, my main service offering was proofreading and a little copy-editing; now copy-editing work has overtaken proofreading. I also offer some project management services (including liaison with typesetters, designers and illustrators; picture research; and artwork coordination), as well as e-book conversion review services. Additionally, I’ve become involved in training delivery. In June 2014, I was invited to present an editing masterclass for fiction authors at our local Wexford Literary Festival. Not long after, I presented a Marketing Tools for the Freelance Editor seminar at the 2014 SfEP conference and, while it was a daunting but exhilarating experience, I learned a lot from it. Last year I was approached by Irish writer and lecturer Claire Keegan to teach a two-day course on grammar, punctuation and style to her students. It went well and we ran the course again earlier this year. The Wexford Literary Festival invited me back this summer as a panel member for an Industry Experts Q&A discussion and I’m also a regular guest speaker on my Local Enterprise Office’s Start Your Own Business course. More recently, I’m signed up as a speed mentor at this year’s SfEP conference. So through contacts and referrals I’ve slowly gained experience in editorial and editorial-business training, and I’m interested in how I might further develop it as a business offering. My clients At the start, I cast my net wide in search of clients – anything to get experience. I have since narrowed down my client base. On the fiction side, the majority of my work is for independent authors. Not all of these wish to self-publish; some are preparing their manuscript for submission to an agent, publisher or competition. On the non-fiction side, while I also work with independent authors, the majority of my clients are businesses, public sector bodies and publishers. Due to schedule constraints and short turnaround times, for the moment I no longer work for students. Continuing professional development (CPD) Investing in quality training has been a priority for me over the past four years and my short-term aim is to continue to invest in learning new skills in a bid to expand the range of services I offer. I’ve completed six editorial courses (SfEP/PTC/Publishing Ireland) since 2012. Each has directly helped pay for itself; for example, the SfEP’s On-screen Editing 1 helped me work more efficiently and thus earn a better rate, while the Publishing Training Centre’s (PTC) Rewriting and Substantive Editing course gave me the confidence to take on an well-paid editing project I otherwise wouldn’t have. Recently, AFEPI Ireland members have been able to take advantage of the PTC courses now running at the Irish Writers Centre in Dublin. Ireland-based editors can now avail themselves of these without travelling to the UK as many would have done in the past. The courses also have the added benefit of presenting an opportunity for freelance and in-house editors to meet. I regularly learn new ideas and tips from the AFEPI Ireland/SfEP/EAE forums and save shared links for future reference. I find these forums an invaluable source of CPD. Professional membership and networking Though it is one of my larger yearly expenses, I value my membership of both AFEPI Ireland and SfEP. The support of Irish and UK colleagues, and colleagues further afield, has been one of the most warming experiences of setting up my business. Catching up with AFEPI Ireland friends and colleagues at meetings and training courses in Ireland has been wonderful and energising, and I always come away having learned something. Attending the 2014 SfEP conference in London was an unforgettable experience and I finally understood what ‘finding your tribe’ means. Marketing I joined Twitter in 2012 and continue to find it a useful learning platform that has helped me meet and interact with publishing professionals in Ireland and abroad. When I receive business enquiries I always ask how the person found me, as I need to know which of my marketing efforts are working. The majority of my enquiries come via my website, which enquirers say they found following a Google search. My website’s probably due an overhaul but I’m pleased with how it has worked for me. I also started my own blog, Letters from an Irish Editor, at the start of 2014. I admit I really struggle to find the time to post regularly (it takes me several hours to write a single article!) but as there is always increased traffic to my website when I do, I’ll battle on. When I upgraded to Professional Member status, I took out an entry in the SfEP Directory and I’ve seen some enquiries and work from this direction. After my website, most enquiries come via my AFEPI Ireland Directory entry and from referrals from colleagues. I think my AFEPI Ireland entry is more successful than my SfEP one due to my location, both in terms of my Irish clients preferring an Ireland-based service, but also from a currency point of view. I have had a listing on Find A Proofreader since 2012; as well as receiving the regular job postings I’ve also had direct enquiries and work from it. While a lot of the jobs have too short a turnaround time for my schedule, my entry helps with my website SEO, so at the current advertising rate I find it’s worth the cost. What I’ve learned since 2012 While I’ve continued to work extremely hard to grow my business and client base, the most important thing I’ve learned is to recognise valuable clients and to pursue a client base that offers me the best rates and projects. As I’ve gained experience and undertaken additional training, I’ve become more confident in my editorial and business abilities and in the worth of my service offering when quoting to clients. I’ve come to realise that some clients cannot afford or are unwilling to pay for my services and that if I clog up my schedule with low-paying projects, I won’t have the capacity to work on a more desirable project when it presents itself. Keys to success The following are key ideas/values that I believed in and tried to pursue from the start and which have proven invaluable to my business during the past four years:
Personal highlights of the past four years
Plans for the future
Mary McCauley runs an editorial business providing project management, copy-editing and proofreading services to authors, publishers, corporate clients and public sector bodies. She is a Full Member of the Association of Freelance Editors, Proofreaders and Indexers (AFEPI Ireland) and a Professional Member of SfEP. She has taught self-editing courses as part of the Claire Keegan Fiction Clinic series, and has presented seminars at the Wexford Literary Festival and the SfEP’s 2014 conference. She is a regular guest speaker on her Local Enterprise Office’s Start Your Own Business course. Mary lives near Wexford in the south-east of Ireland. You can contact Mary at info@marymccauleyproofreading.com, through her website Mary McCauley Proofreading, or via LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook and Google+.
When starting an editing or proofreading business, it’s important to ask questions and seek advice about the big picture. The key is to not get stuck in a position where we’re incapable of moving forward without seeking validation about the detail.
The thought of taking on all the responsibilities that come with owning and running a proofreading or editing business can be daunting to the new entrant to the field, and to someone who’s technically experienced but who lacks confidence. One of two problems can arise:
This article focuses on the second problem. If you’re a new editorial business owner and need advice on editorial business planning, a list of valuable starting-out resources is provided at the end of the article. Why working for yourself is different Many people come to editorial freelancing after years of successfully working for other businesses. When we are employees, someone else takes care of actually owning and running the business in which we work. I was like that – I was one cog in a large engine. My cog was an important part of the business’s machinery but I only had to worry about me and the bits of my cog that touched the cogs nearby. Someone else owned the engine and worried about how it worked as a whole. Then I set up my own business and I was in charge. I had to make the whole engine run smoothly. Taking charge of the whole thing meant acknowledging 4 truths about owing my own business. 4 truths about editorial business ownership
Business owners take ownership of their businesses … It’s important to ask questions and seek advice about the big picture. The key is to not get stuck in a position where we’re incapable of moving forward without seeking validation about the detail. If I ask 50 colleagues how many pages a website should have I will end up with 50 personal answers. Some of the information I glean from 50 people will overlap but some of it won’t. There won’t be consensus. An inability to make your own decisions, based on your business model and your client's needs, can paralyse you. Paralysis means you’re not in a state of mind where you’re making the final decisions about your business, but hoping instead that someone else will do it for you. That’s potentially disastrous because other people’s decisions are based on their business models, their brand identities, and their clients’ needs. You’re the best person to make the detailed decisions about your business precisely because it’s your business, and your business serves your clients. A business owner, by definition, needs to take ownership, and that means finding the courage to act. Effective advice-seeking vs inertia-inducing thinking … Here are 2 short case studies that demonstrate the difference between effective advice-seeking and inertia-inducing thinking. These are fictional but are based on conversations that I’ve had with real new starters.
Effective advice-seeking
Ali has decided to set up a proofreading business. Let’s assume he’s completed high-quality training, and followed through with a mentoring program. In the course of his business planning he's recognized the value of having a website that can operate as his shop front. In the process of building the website he reaches out to editorial colleagues whom he’s met via his national editorial society and online editorial forums. He asks them about their experiences of website building and the choices they’ve made:
Ali’s colleagues provide a range of responses.
Overall, the answers to Ali’s questions supply him with insights into his colleagues’ experiences. And although the decisions he makes are influenced by these experiences, his final choices need to be based on his business requirements. These might be the same, similar or different to any one of the colleagues who contributed to the discussion. Inertia-inducing thinking Josh, too, has set up a proofreading business. Like Ali, he’s completed the requisite training and believes he has the technical know-how to provide a high-quality service. Josh is seeking similar guidance to Ali, but he frames his questions differently and in a way that could lead to inertia.
The answers to Josh’s questions are just more questions because:
Because Josh’s questions focus on the detail of his business requirements, which are known only to him, he doesn’t receive any definitive answers. As a result, he is paralysed by indecision. While Ali’s website is now live, and operating as a shop front that he can link to via a number of other online platforms (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Yell, and several specialist editorial directories), Josh is still digitally undiscoverable because he’s waiting for other people to make the decisions for him, decisions that are based on a business that isn’t theirs. Too many cooks … Even a well-asked question that generates lots of responses can be problematic for the new entrant to the field because they don't have enough experience to evaluate the usefulness of the responses. In Ali’s case, 15 colleagues could advise having a separate blog, and 15 could advise attaching a blog to his business website. But how does he work out which is the best approach for his editorial business? Professional networks are fabulous resources, often rich in content, but we need to recognize that the responses we receive to well-asked questions are still dependent on who’s online that day, who bothers to join in the discussion, and what their particular experiences are. Sometimes there are too many cooks in the kitchen; sometimes the best cooks aren’t even in the kitchen. This can lead to confusion rather than clarity. If you’re a new entrant to the field who’s asking lots of good questions but feels overwhelmed by the diverse opinions on offer, consider consulting a business coach or mentor who can spend time focusing specifically on your business requirements and help you sift through the all the advice you’ve received. There’s no one true way to furnish a house … As the two examples above demonstrate, there’s no single way of building and designing an effective website. When we look at various successful editorial professionals’ websites, we see that there are a hundred different ways to do it. None of these is right or wrong; they’re just different ways that people choose to express the information they want to communicate to a client base. We each have to work out what we want to say and decide whether the information looks appealing, is easily navigable for our readers, and communicates a clear message that says we can provide solutions to our clients’ problems. In Josh’s case, it’s not about what I think or like – it’s about what what Josh believes his clients will think and like. This applies to all aspects of editorial business ownership. The editorial business is like a house. More established editorial pros can give us sensible advice on how to locate a plot, dig the foundations, construct the walls, and lay on a roof to prevent us getting wet during rainy days, but only we can furnish our individual houses in a way that suits our financial requirements, our particular skills, our backgrounds, and our clients. Seek advice by all means, but don’t wait for others to make decisions about the detail of your business. Research, ask, learn; consult a business coach/mentor if you’re struggling to clarify your thinking. Then place information within the framework of your own editorial business needs, and act.
Louise Harnby is a fiction line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in supporting self-publishing authors, particularly crime writers. She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders (SfEP) and an Author Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi).
Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn.  I'm delighted to announce that Marketing Your Editing & Proofreading Business is now available in print. Full information is available on the book's dedicated page here on my website. You can buy it direct from CreateSpace and Amazon. (Do check which option suits you best in terms of postage.) At 300+ pages, it's well over twice the size of its companion volume Business Planning for Editorial Freelancers, so there's plenty for the reluctant or nervous marketer to get their teeth into. Enjoy! Louise Harnby is a fiction line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in helping self-publishing writers prepare their novels for market. She is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors, and runs online courses from within the Craft Your Editorial Fingerprint series. She is also an Advanced Professional Member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders and an Author Member of the Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi). Louise loves books, coffee and craft gin, though not always in that order. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader & Copyeditor, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, take a look at her Self-publishers’ Writing Library and access her latest self-publishing resources, all of which are free and available instantly.
If you’re building your editorial business, you can’t afford to sit back and hope the work will come to you – too many colleagues will be taking a more proactive approach.
So, this time round I thought it would be fun to pretend to be someone else – someone with a different educational background and career history.
I’m going to pretend that I’m new to the field but that I have completed some sort of recognized training in proofreading/editing and have joined my national editorial society. My technical skills are there but I’ve got to work out how to get myself noticed. So who am I today? My name’s Basil Rhoueny [it’s the best anagram I could come up with – alternatives on a postcard].
So how am I going to create awareness of my new business? I know it’s not going to happen overnight, but I have a plan! At the moment, this is who I am: My name is Basil Rhoueny and I’m a fully trained copy-editor and a member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders.
Market
I write, I blog, I run, I (used to) manage staff, and I scamper around the garden with my kid (and the guinea pig when it escapes). I’ve retrained as a copy-editor, but which element of my experience will help me develop the best editorial business brand? All of them? Perhaps later on down the line I can expand my portfolio but right now I need a focus, something that I can really get my teeth into so that I can target my services. As I said, I have 20 years’ experience of working for a large financial services organization. I understand the language of business: money, insurance, capital, funds, investments, portfolios, stocks, shares, corporate culture, management, organizational behaviour. Those terms trip off my tongue without a second thought. I can edit this stuff with my metaphorical eyes shut. So that’s how I’m going to sell myself. I want a tight message that I can sell to people and I don’t want to confuse potential clients as to what my niche is. I’m not going to talk about running, or writing, or blogging. Not yet, anyway. So, now, this is who I am: My name is Basil Rhoueny and I’m a fully trained copy-editor specializing in business, finance and related disciplines. I have 20 years’ experience in the finance industry and I am a member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders.
Clients
Now that I’ve sorted out how I’m going to brand myself, I need to think about who my potential clients are.
Now, this is who I am: My name is Basil Rhoueny and I’m a fully trained copy-editor specializing in business, finance and related disciplines. I have 20 years’ experience in the finance industry and I am a member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. I offer copy-editing and proofreading services for publishers, professional societies, companies, independent business professionals, academic researchers and students.
Subject areas
I now need to think about widening my net to make my niche as comprehensive as possible. A quick browse through the management sections on only two large publisher websites tells me a great deal about the sub-disciplines that are being written about. The world of business and finance has a lot of options that I can focus on – key words which will demonstrate that my specialist knowledge is wide-ranging. Now, this is who I am: My name is Basil Rhoueny and I’m a fully trained copy-editor specializing in business, finance and related disciplines. I have 20 years’ experience in the finance industry and I am a member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders. I offer copy-editing and proofreading services for publishers, professional societies, companies, independent business professionals, academic researchers and students. Specialist subject areas:
Getting the information out there
Next, I need to decide where I’m going to put this information.
Networking
I need to think about networking, too. Fellow freelancers who have established businesses may be able to refer work to me once they get to know me. I’ve decided to join the local chapter of my editorial society so that I can meet some of my colleagues face to face. I also aim to build up a network of freelance colleagues on Twitter and Facebook. I might pick up some good business-building tips as well as make some online friends who’ve taken the journey that I’m now on. But I’m going to take it further than this …
Being interesting
... I’m going to take a look at what’s being tweeted about in the business world, both from an academic and a trade angle. The aim is to build up a Twitter network that stretches beyond the freelance world and into the world of my clients. If I want to get followers who are potential clients, I need to give as much as I take. I need to tweet about news, tools and resources that will make me interesting to these business people. Since I’m branding myself as an editorial specialist in the fields of business and finance, I’m putting JogMeBlogMe to one side and attaching a new blog to my editing website. I might call it BazBiz (then again, maybe not!). Regardless of the name I choose, it will feature links, news, articles, resources, tips and tools related to business – about business people, and for business people. Some of the features/links will cover editing and proofreading, but from the point of view of a client (tips for report writing, good-grammar guides, working with a freelancer, etc.); others will focus on business tools and tips based on my previous career knowledge (financial planning, good management practice, staff motivation, time management tips, latest research, etc.); still others might explore useful tools and apps for on-the-go business professionals. The point is to make the content interesting to the kinds of people who might also use my services. And it might drive up my Google rankings because the freshness of the content will generate juice for my site. I have a lot of work to do, but I’m focused and I know what I need to do. The results of my labour may take months to bear fruit but I’m investing in the future success of my business so I believe the hard work is worth it. Now I’m off for a run. Did I mention that I’m good at running?
You don’t have to be Basil to try out the strategy above. You can take the same principles and apply them to your own background with a little bit of tweaking.
Maybe you’re an ex lawyer, teacher, accountant, sales manager, soldier, nurse, or social worker. Perhaps you have a degree in politics, biomedical science, or psychology. The point is to focus on your specialist area and then mine the field to see what the associated areas and sub-disciplines are. In this way you can develop a core profile, rich in description, which can be displayed across a range of media. That profile will provide a comprehensive list of key words that will help you get found when potential clients are searching for editorial freelancers with specific skills. It’s not the only strategy by any means – it’s simply one for you to consider if you’re starting out. I’ll not claim the ideas above are mine alone – they’re more a culmination of time spent watching, listening and talking to my successful colleagues about how they network and market themselves to fellow editorial freelancers and potential clients by making the most of their specialist skills. They are editorial professionals now, but they came from a variety of career backgrounds: science, law, academia, education, management, publishing, journalism, and much more besides. I’d name each and every one of them if I had the space, but there are far too many. I thank them, anyway, for their wisdom and their knowledge sharing.
Louise Harnby is a fiction copyeditor and proofreader. She curates The Proofreader's Parlour and is the author of several books on business planning and marketing for editors and proofreaders.
Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, or connect via Facebook and LinkedIn. If you're an author, you might like to join Louise’s Writing Library. Members receive monthly updates featuring self-publishing news and resources.
The Editorial Freelancers Association is the largest and oldest US professional association for editors, proofreaders, indexers and related specialists.
There's a wealth of information on their website, some of which will also be of interest to editorial pros from outside the States. One of my favourite resources is the transcripts from the EFA's Twitter Freelance Fridays. If you follow @EFAFreelancers you'll be able to join in with the discussions and see notifications of when the transcripts are published. Other resources include the training/education catalogue, resource links, society and chapter meeting information, and the EFA searchable membership database. If you are based outside the US and want to contact your national editorial association, take a look at this international list: Editing & Proofreading Societies. 
Solitude vivifies; isolation kills.
Joseph Roux (nineteenth-century priest and poet) I worked in an office for nearly fifteen years before I went freelance. I’d stop and chat with friends and colleagues by the water cooler or coffee machine. There was always someone to talk to; sometimes it was difficult to knuckle down to the job, so social was the environment. Now that I’m freelance, I work from home. I don’t have colleagues in the traditional sense. I’m on my own from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. Non-freelancers have frequently asked me how I deal with the isolation and are often surprised when I reply, “I don’t feel isolated.”
The experience is certainly different from that of my prior office life and it requires a different mindset, but need it be isolating? Or was Roux onto something when he reminds us of the different ways of being alone? I asked some of my freelance editorial colleagues about how they manage a life of working from home.
The following is a summary of our collective wisdom on how to generate your very own freelance water cooler when you need it, and bathe in the quietness when you don’t. The challenges Many of us become freelance because it suits our needs – moving house, moving country, redundancy, parenting, disability, and caring for dependents are just some of the reasons why people move their work base from the office to the home. These changes can bring rewards but also challenges, forcing us to withdraw from the traditional and easily accessible friendship and professional groups that we’d previously relied on. Some of the contributors to this article highlighted how having young children has provided them with much-needed human contact at the school gates. But many of us still miss the “office banter”, the “colleague” element – Jo Allen summed it up well, referring to “those people who do the same or similar jobs so you can swap and share ideas: the manager who always supports your ideas; the people who are there to confirm your decisions; the security of responsibilities understood; and the confidence of knowing how to do the job”. Online networking Our discussions highlighted one thing above all else: Facebook. Yes, editorial association-based discussion lists, LinkedIn boards, Twitter and Google+ all came up as recommended spaces for connecting with like-minded colleagues in similar working environments, but Facebook stood out as the place to go to meet, chat, share ideas, and let off steam. Facebook is the ultimate freelance water cooler. Several people actually wondered how they ever coped without it, and one person commented that he’s not sure he’d still be freelance were it not for Facebook. I particularly like the fact that it’s so easy to differentiate one’s public image from the more personal posts that might be limited to friends, down to the private messaging options for the one-on-one chat. Using online networking forums means you don't ever have to feel like you’re working on our own even if there's no one else in the room. Face-to-face networking The other favoured resource for combating feelings of loneliness was the good old-fashioned face-to-face meet. It requires a lot more effort than dipping into your Twitter account, but the rewards are huge. Several contributors commented on the benefits reaped from regular attendance at their local society chapter, and Eva Blaskovic lamented the fact that she didn’t have as much time as she’d like to take advantage of more workshops and functions. If there isn't a local group near to you, you could always follow the lead of Helen Stevens and set one up! Joining your national editorial freelancing society may be a critical first step in accessing colleagues who face the same professional and personal challenges as you, as well as providing excellent social and learning opportunities. To find your local, regional or national freelance editorial group, visit the Editing & Proofreading Societies page. See also the Networking section of the Copyeditors’ Knowledge Base, curated by Katharine O’Moore-Klopf – a hugely comprehensive resource for freelancers. Of course, you needn’t limit yourself to editorial groups. “I’m also looking into various local small business networking groups – there seem to be quite a few nearby that are specifically for women or mothers,” commented Abi Saffrey. And another colleague is pursuing an MA, which gives her valuable face-to-face time with adults. Sara Peacock emphasized the value of joining hobby-based groups, such as a choir or knitting group, and Wendy Toole explained how, prior to the internet era, she took a series of minor part-time jobs, which gave her both additional income and social contact with other people. Cafe culture “Scope out a decent coffee shop – having the odd couple of hours working in a different environment with people around makes you feel a lot less isolated and a lot more like you're just your own boss,” was a sound piece of advice from Gaz Haman. That got the thumbs-up from many of the discussants. It’s all about a change of scenery. Even if you’re not directly interacting with other people in a particular place, time spent outside your usual work space is an effective refresher. You can even incorporate your java time with your work – the cafe may not be the best place in which to do editorial tasks that require deep concentration, but it may be a space where you can catch up on emails, invoicing or any of your more general house-keeping tasks. Co-working One of the most innovative solutions was highlighted by both Sally Fildes-Moss and Kristine Hunt. Co-working is “where freelancers meet up to work alongside each other in places such as cafes” , enabling them “to feel less isolated, pick each other's brains, bounce ideas off one another and so on – or just to work in a less solitary environment”. Sally emphasized the fact that there is less pressure to market oneself in these situations, providing instead “a bit more of an office atmosphere than a networking atmosphere”. For an interesting case study of co-working, she recommends the following article: Co-working Could Bring Inspiration. Kristine points us towards Meetup, an online resource that helps you to join or create relevant local community groups – absolutely worth a gander if you’re feeling that isolation is getting on top of you and you’re stuck for ideas of how to move forward. Pet paradise I’m not joking – having a dog can be a sure-fire way to combat feelings of isolation. No, they won’t be able to bounce business ideas around with you and they won’t be able to advise you on how to deal with the frustrated author of the book you’re editing, but pets still make wonderful companions. My trusty Lab is always ready with a tail wag whenever I’m stressed by a deadline or tackling a particularly demanding proofreading job. And as Wendy Toole reminded us, dog walkers are usually sociable and you get work on your health – keeping you work fit and body fit. They keep your feet warm in winter, too. Other options If you don’t fancy any of the above, consider the following:
Is it isolation or solitude? The first question my colleague Kristine Hunt asked during our discussion is: “Why assume isolation is bad? I don't miss the office politics, formal clothing, jockeying for time off, etc. I'm not so much antisocial as one who enjoys quiet time alone, so freelancing at home is ideal in that regard.” Many of us felt the same way. Freelancing from home does require a different mindset, but once you’re in it, it can be quite hard to revert to old ways of working. Others commented that the solitude that homeworking brings allows you to work at your own pace. “I can get so much work done just focusing at home and taking breaks only when I need – or don't need – them,” noted Eva Blaskovic. And Hester Higton remarked, “I love being able to shut myself away from the world and have my own space where I can beaver away at my own pace.” To round off, Sarah Wright points to an illuminating article from Susan Cain in the New York Times Sunday Review, The Rise of the New Groupthink, in which she reminds us that being alone, and enjoying the attendant privacy and freedom from interruption, can be an intensely creative and rewarding experience. Many of us do need our water coolers, online or off, but we can also enjoy the solitude that our freelance homeworking status brings us.
Do you work on your own? Do you have a set of tips or tricks to combat feelings of isolation? Or do you revel in the solitude you derive from home-based freelancing? Please feel free to share your experiences in the Comments section.
Contributors: Many thanks to my generous editorial colleagues who took the time share their thoughts and experiences: Abi Saffrey, Corbett Brown, Eva Blaskovic, Gaz Haman, Helen Stevens, Hester Higton, Jo Allen, Kristine Hunt, Sally Fildes-Moss, Sara Peacock, Sarah Wright, and Wendy Toole.
Louise Harnby is a line editor, copyeditor and proofreader who specializes in working with crime, mystery, suspense and thriller writers.
She is an Advanced Professional Member of the Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading (CIEP), a member of ACES, a Partner Member of The Alliance of Independent Authors (ALLi), and co-hosts The Editing Podcast. Visit her business website at Louise Harnby | Fiction Editor & Proofreader, say hello on Twitter at @LouiseHarnby, connect via Facebook and LinkedIn, and check out her books and courses. |
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