2011: 12 Lessons My First Year Working For Myself Taught Me
Over the last year I’ve done a lot and learned a lot. But how do I get all that into a blog post that doesn’t feel like making you sit through a dull slide show of my life? Like this I hope (but I’m going to follow this up with some more in depth posts about certain points):
January: The month I quit my job. FACE YOUR FEARS
At the end of 2010 I found myself in a financial and personal position to take a huge risk and break out on my own. But after 8 years working full time as a graphic designer in a job I loved taking that step was scary. What if it didn’t work out? What if no one bought my stuff? What if I couldn’t find any work? What was I doing?! I needed to face my fears if I was going to make this a success. But how? Three things worked for me:
• Planning – I did as much reading, research and thinking as possible before making the leap
• Acceptance – things were going to go wrong, no doubt about it. But were they really disasters?
• Flexibility – I made sure that I could change what I was doing or how I was doing it quickly and easily.
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February: The month I had a holiday. RELAX YOUR MIND
Going on holiday straight away probably doesn’t seem like the best move but I knew that once I got stuck in I wouldn’t want such an extended break. Three weeks in New Zealand visiting friends and family was a fantastic chance to really switch off and relax – something I’m not great at doing. I have a busy brain, it rarely shuts up and that can be a cause of stress, especially when you work from home. Over the years I’ve found a few things that work and this year I’ve found a few more:
• Exercise: It’s simply not possible to worry about your new product line or why that client never got back to you when you are on a long run or sweating through spin class.
• Note it down: I carry a notebook and sketchbook with me everywhere. Getting things out of your head and onto paper frees up space for thinking about nothing. Bliss.
• Spit it out: I find talking to people about what is going through my head really helps. My boyfriend calls it wittering and to be honest it usually is, but hearing things aloud means that you can tell the good stuff from the nonsense as if speaking it gives you some perspective. Just try and vary who you rabbit on at!
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In March my sister Kim, who runs Knockout, and I did our first craft fair. It was a disaster, but since then we’ve learned a few things about how to give the fair, and you, the best chance. It’s important to choose the right fair for you, this involves research. Who else will be attending? Are all the items hand made? Where is the fair? Does it have a good reputation? Secondly consider the promotion of the event, what are the organisers doing? Adverts in local papers, posters and banners around the local area, social media and leaflet drops are all great ways of advertising, but the more creative the better. You should also promote the fair yourself, use your networks, both online and in real life and think about how you can make your stall as attractive and customer friendly as possible. (I’ll expand on these points in a future post)
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This is possibly the most important lesson I learned this year, there is only so long that you can muddle through without some simple systems in place to deal with the huge amount of paperwork that even the smallest business creates. I read Making Ideas Happen which has some great tips but how you choose to organise your paperwork is entirely up to you. Being organised isn’t just a business thing though, when you have lots going on in your life it being constantly muddled adds stress where it’s not needed. Pinpoint the areas that need work and create a system to deal with it, whether it’s storing your receipts or planning your weekly meals. A little bit of organisation can be fun. Honest. (I’ll expand on these points in a future post)
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In early spring the call went out around my town that there was going to be a music festival in May (Music In The Park) and the organisers needed help. I offered my services to design the printed promotional material and I am so glad I did. I got to meet lots of great people, had great fun and even got some work out of it. We’re currently organising the 2012 festival which will be even bigger and better. Making a difference doesn’t have to be quite so involved, it can be as simple as saying hello to your neighbours. Or think beyond your local area, organisations like Good For Nothing need people to give their time, energy and creative minds to help solve global problems. Get involved, give something back, it makes you feel all warm and cuddly inside.
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By June I had picked up quite a bit of work and was nicely busy, but working totally on my own was a very new thing for me. There was no one to turn to ask their thoughts, no one to run decisions by and no one to carry the responsibility with me. I felt this most acutely when making business decisions, what was my hourly rate? How much bearing did the time it took me to do a job have on the cost? Should I quote for 2 ideas or 3? Can I invoice this? Should I say yes to that contract? With my busy brain I could go round and round in circles with this for ages but I quickly learned that you need to make a decision. Almost any decision is better than no decision. Trust your instincts and do what feels right. You’ll lose more clients and money by dithering over decisions and if it turns out to be wrong you can chalk it up as a lesson learnt.
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I made a decision to supplement my income by doing some agency freelancing. This was work I knew and I would miss it if I never did it again so it made sense, especially while I was building up my other income streams. This kind of freelancing requires people sills – dropping into different agencies for short or long term contracts requires the ability to get on with people quickly and easily. Luckily I can hit the ground running without too much briefing and pick things up quickly so can concentrate on these softer skills. The best thing I’ve found is to make sure you leave your ego at home, no one is going to warm to some crazed design manic with a personal agenda arriving in their studio, so play nicely, add value and be helpful.
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I opened an online shop on Etsy in late 2010 and had been gradually filling it up with
prints and cards over the course of the year. By August I had about 25 products listed and my sales really started to tick over. In July I got a mention for my Formula 1 prints on Sidepodcast (a big motorsport blog) which sent sales of those prints into overdrive. So I set about getting more promotion for my products. Press releases were picked up by papers and a few more blogs and although Etsy isn’t an answer in itself being more active on the site seemed to help. With Kim I went to networking events and promoted my shop heavily on my site, twitter and facebook. It took me a while to get over the self-conscious feelings that self promotion can create, why would anyone care what I’m doing? Won’t this just annoy people? But if you don’t tell people how will they know about them? There is no point creating all these wonderful products and not sell any of them because you were a bit shy. (I’ll expand on these points in a future post)
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The most exciting bit of learning this year is that despite all the research, planning and preparation (and I do quite a lot) sometimes you just can’t predict what’s going to happen. For instance, I created a poster for the Rugby World Cup. After the relative success of the motorsport prints I thought it might do OK. I wasn’t prepared for how well it did. My link was retweeted by several famous rugby players and so I started to do some promotion around it as well and soon I was shipping the posters all around the world as well as sending dozens of email versions everyday. It wasn’t really part of the master plan but it was working and some of the things that were on my plan weren’t working, so I tore the plan up and decided to see where this route took me. Just because things weren’t going the way I thought they would didn’t mean they weren’t right.
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Having never really worked in retail I only had a vague understanding of how far in advance of big occasions the wheels start turning. It turns out that even in October I was already well behind on Christmas. I spent the month furiously making Christmas cards, prints and gifts and then went straight into promoting them on various blogs and through my networks. It was relentless and I should have planned better. So for 2012 I have scheduled in each of the big celebrations, from Valentines day through the Jubilee to next Christmas, making sure I note dates that I want to start and finish designing, how long production is going to take, when I’ll start to take wholesale orders and when and where I will be promoting everything. It’s probably a bit overkill but maybe that’s a lesson for next year. With these big blocks in place I’m hoping I can be more flexible and spontaneous with anything that falls outside them. (I’ll expand on these points in a future post)
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By November I was selling my prints, cards and gifts in 2 high street shops and both opportunities came – to a greater or lesser degree – through my networks, one virtual, one real life. I try hard to nurture relationships, to return calls, reply to emails, meet up whenever possible, to keep the conversation going. I’m not always great at it, but I try to stick to some basic rules:
• Be real: Forget businesslike nonsense speak. I hate it, I’m sure clients hate it and it gets in the way of relationships. I speak in my own voice, with my own opinions and sense of humour - unashamedly so!
• Be generous: I like to overdeliver, to do a little extra. Be unexpected and create goodwill. I’ve ordered things from Etsy and Folksy and been blown away by the care taken in wrapping and the additional gifts and discount codes people include. I will remember them when it comes to buying again.
• Think of others: Be kind, forward on a funny link, recommend them for a job, cut them some slack. It’s nice to be nice, but this is actually the hardest one of the three!
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So this brings us to the last of the 12 months and to Christmas which gives us all a chance for a little break and to take stock. It’s very easy to get so caught up in what you are doing that you don’t take the time to stop and look around, as Ferris said “life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while you might miss it” I’ve used the Christmas break to take stock of what I’ve done and learnt this year – partly due to writing this post and partly due the tax return that needs doing (eeekkkk!) – and it’s made me really aware that sometimes you need to stop and celebrate when things go right for you, enjoy the little successes in life. Pat yourself on the back and use that as a foundation to build the next load of amazingness!
Merry Christmas and a very very happy New Year to each and everyone of you! In the coming days and weeks I’ll be posting a few posts that lead on from this discussing some of the lessons I’ve learnt in more detail. Follow me on twitter and like my facebook page to be the first to know about these!
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I’m a witterer too; be proud.
Don’t be shy; all your doing is top-top
Scheduling ahead; never overkill
Tax return; do it!
Fab and probably most informative and entertaining ‘review of the year’; better than ITV!
Good luck in 2012: excited about where you’ll take me!
Hi! Found your through the Etsy team :0 Loved this post and am happy you seem to have done well this year, i’m on a bit of mission this year and am resigning from my managerial position ive done for 8 years in order to conentrate on things i love wish me luck!!
Claire,
So pleased you enjoyed the post, it’s been a hard year with lots of learning but I’ve enjoyed every minute of it. Great to hear about you taking the plunge this year, hope everything goes really well for you
S
This is a really well written and far from boring post! I think you have done amazingly well in a year. You have priced if you get yourself out there and DO it the rewards are good!! COngrats and here’s to even better 2012!!
Opps that’s meant to say proved yourself not priced?!
Thanks Sue, so glad it wasn’t boring
Here’s to a mega 2012!!