Doubling one’s income is quite a feat. Tripling it? Better yet. I did it in one year using LinkedIn, current clients, a job board, and synchronicity. Here’s the low-down on my three-tiered marketing angle.

Job Board

I don’t spend a lot of time on job boards, but I do use them to fill gaps in my writing time. I’d been looking for a way to get into law firm writing based on my stint as a newspaper editor recognized for legal reporting. One job board ad presented that opportunity with a lower-than-expected per-article rate. I accepted the terms of this assignment for two reasons:

The high volume increased my monthly income significantly, and

I could use the clips as samples for future law firm prospects.

LinkedIn

Using LinkedIn’s Advanced People Search, I tracked down senior managers and executives I thought would make ideal clients. One such individual was the VP of marketing for a global career management company. Shortly after securing the above law firm writing client, I sent a letter of introduction asking if the VP of marketing  if she wanted to see my clips. As it turns out, her company was actively searching for a writer.

This VP referred me to a subordinate marketing director. After speaking with her, I was on my first project within the week—at $1 per word, the most I’d ever been paid for writing.

At first, it started as one blog post per week. After a month, they bumped it to two per week and asked me to edit a 50-page e-book at $25 per page plus some original content. These two projects alone doubled my income during the four-month term. We’re in the process of renewing right now.

Client Referrals

Keeping current clients happy is a top priority for me. One satisfied client referred a prospect with a niche news website. After a few months of providing great in-depth content, he offered me a position as editor of the news portal and a sister website. Curating both sites takes up about four hours of my time each day, but the retainer income is equal to the total monthly income I had a year ago effectively tripling my income overall.

After a hard 10-year struggle as a freelancer, I’m poised to make 2017 my best income-producing year yet.

Allen Taylor is a content strategist in the FinTech, legal, and career management niches. A former newspaper editor, he currently edits Lending Times and VisionAR, both niche news portals serving the alternative lending and augmented reality niches, respectively. His home on the Web is at Taylored Content.

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