Designers: Stop Calling Yourself a Freelancer

1. The fact is: freelancing is owning a business.

• It doesn’t matter if you’re just one person or if you bring in collaborators.
• It doesn’t matter if you’ve just started.
• It doesn’t matter if you’re only freelancing on the side.
• It doesn’t matter if you’re working directly with clients or doing white label work for agencies.

1. Regardless of any of this, if you’re facilitating your own design services, you are a business owner.

• I started working for myself when I moved to a new city. I was starting fresh, and it seemed like there’d be no better time to try self-employment. Originally when talking about my job plans, I told family and friends I’d be “freelancing.” When I first introduced myself at networking events, I described myself as a “freelance designer.”
• But I quickly realized that I needed to shift my mindset around what to call self-employment for two reasons:

1. Professionalism
2. The job duties

On professionalism:

• The truth is, the word “freelancer” has gained a connotation of someone who’s kind of puttering along, trying to figure things out along the way, lacks process, and lacks structure.

1. People tend to think of freelancers as people who work odd hours or all day and night, and who will take on just any project and act as pixel pushers. But if you’re anything like me, you don’t want to be seen as a disorganized amateur, as someone who’s desperate or unprofessional, as someone who hasn’t quite figured it out yet.

• Referring to yourself as a business owner adds a layer of professionalism and helps people take your seriously. It tells people that your work is not just a hobby or a side gig.

On the job duties:

1. When you facilitate your own design services in any way, you take on all of the same admin tasks as any larger business. When you sell your services, you are responsible for:

• sending proposals
• sending contracts
• sending invoices
• holding consultations
• managing projects and tasks
• organizing files
• fleshing out processes
• phone calls
• emails
• networking and events
• paying taxes
• paying invoices
• paying yourself
• financial planning
• client communications
• troubleshooting
• technology
• getting clients
• marketing and promotions
• design
• + more!

1. This is a LOT of work! I spend maybe 20 hours a week on actual design work—if I’m having a relaxed week! The rest of my time is spent on admin tasks, keeping my business running and my clients happy, and building valuable relationships.

• On the financial side, even if you’re only making a small amount of money on the side of a full-time gig, you still need to be very aware of your finances and treat it like a business. If you expect to owe at least $1,000.00 in taxes to the federal government from freelance work, you are legally required to pay quarterly taxes.* If you don’t, you’ll be fined at the end of the year. If we estimate that the average person pays a third or a quarter of their income back in taxes per year, this means that you only need to make about $3,000.00-$4,000.00 on freelance work per year in order to fit this requirement.

*I always recommend getting professional financial advice from an accountant.

• When you freelance, you need to embrace the business side. You have to manage all of these tasks yourself (or pay someone else to do them for you). With the amount of work that goes into self-employment, it doesn’t make sense to call yourself anything less than a business owner.

1. So when writing and talking about what you do as self-employed designer, don’t shy away from owning the title of Business Owner! You’re serious and professional. And your operations are the same, even if you’re just one person.

Thanks for reading!

• This blog shares my completely transparent thoughts and experiences, what has and hasn’t worked for me to grow my business and feel fulfilled as a self-employed graphic designer.

1. But not everything works for everyone! There are a lot of opinions out there on how to grow a design business, and mine is just another one. I encourage you to find what works for you, to explore other opinions and viewpoints, to ask questions and try different things out for yourself.

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