You have NOT lost, you are NOT too old to do better

A letter I wrote to help a friend in need. Perhaps it will help you, too. “ You have internet and I can see that you can type and spell.”

Write up your resume, put it onto LinkedIn.

I can tell you more about LinkedIn and why you should use it in my next letter to you. (Do NOT start using LinkedIn like social media, I recommend you don’t comment on people’s posts there nor hit the like buttons because your past activity is publicly visible and you want to build your professional profile, clear of any tiny thing that could negatively influence your professional appearance)

Then advertise on your local Craigslist (or similar platform) with this offer:

“I will help you to edit, correct, improve your English language text & documents.” If you have to pay $5 to place your service offer then pay it.

Your target clients are people whose first language is not English. Charge per hour until you get a better idea how slow or fast you are able to work. Your future goal is to charge per project, per full day or 1/2 day. At the beginning you may not be able to estimate your speed, which will also change as you get practice and as your workflow becomes smoother.

At first you might only get a couple of hours work a week but value this extra money and invest it into your health or back into improving your service offer to be able to charge more for your time and work in the future.

What to charge for your service when you get started and are anxious?

What you should charge: To get started keep it low to keep your anxiety & stress low: 1.5x the minimum wage should be your lowest offer. If you are comfortable then raise your fee to 2x / 3x minimum wage. It is very important that at the start you focus on providing the most professional service that you can. Don’t be concerned with profit at this stage. This is your learning opportunity, your time to perfect a tiny little part of yourself.

Essential personal conduct for your new service project!

Be punctual, be positive, be tidy, prewrite every communication in a Google doc and spellcheck. Go have a sip of tea and then re-read your message before sending: Check your tone. Is it accommodating, kind, respectful, helpful, informative, clear, precise? Never write a reactive message to any client. It doesn’t matter if you are right. Breathe instead. Let it go.

What to do if the client doesn’t pay?

Better to have worked 5 hours and not be paid but not have done anything that can be held against you. Imagine a stressed out message of your reappearing on social media when a perfect new client is just considering to start working with you. Don’t ever leave negative traces of your emotions on the internet. Call a friend instead or write it in your journal.

Your attitude must appear positive and a little sprinkle of the American can-do-spirit will always make a good impression. Lean towards finding solutions together with your client rather than avoiding trying your best for them. Keyword: together. Sometimes working with a client side by side (on a video call) is helpful for you to understand them better and be able to better support them.

Treat your work and clients as an opportunity to escape from everyday stress.

Even if you struggle in your personal life , even if you are facing an eviction. Look at your clients as the place where you escape from life’s stress and where you get the opportunity to be professional and seen in a light that maybe nobody else sees you in.

“I am worried about not getting paid. How do I avoid not getting paid for work I do?”

And please ask for payment deposits to avoid negative experiences. Deposits set clear signals to both your client and you that your client is committed and so should you be.

How to make sure clients are happy with your work.

Ask them to tell you what outcome they are hoping for. When they set the parameters and clarify their expectations and when you meet them then you both know that the work was a success. Lack of clarity in communication is often to blame for glitches. Ask questions, confirm expectations. Be realistic about how much can be done in any given time. If in doubt do NOT take on tight deadline work. It’s ok if this means that you have to turn some down.

Never over-promise but always deliver the kind of value and experience that would make YOU happy if you received it. Don’t promise more than you can guarantee but do try to over-deliver on the client’s expectations more often than not. In time this will become your superpower. Be true to your word. Make the world a better place: one little interaction at a time.

I speak from experience

I recently worked 260 hours for just 40% (that’s right 70% UNDER) of my local minimum wage. You might think that this makes me crazy but I was determined to check my value and to develop my repertoire and workflow. Doing all this work and bringing value to my clients helped me to reawaken and build on my own, previously straggling, confidence.

My own next step is to launch myself into a new career path. The 260 hours were an investment in myself. I only earned the equivalent of stale peanuts but I also only worked the hours and times that suited me, I got to set my own schedule and fit my clients around my life. Thanks to all this work that I did I received an incredible amount of feedback and positive work experience. The next step for me is to now build a 10x minimum wage business on the back of the work I put in.

It is not too late for you. That’s it. I think you can do this, too.

You struggle in life and perhaps you always will but you can do better than you are doing right now and it can be somewhat on your own terms. Can you overcome what is holding you back?

What CAN you do? How many hours a week can you dedicate? Which of those hours can you offer without the likelihood of you needing to reschedule? Offering concrete time slots that don’t change helps getting and keeping clients.

If your confidence is too low then charge modest prices until you have some experience and trust yourself that you can deliver. Narrow your offer into what interests YOU the most and simultaneously is most within your knowledge field.

Is this helpful? Sometimes life sucks. But it doesn’t have to stay that way.

I experienced multiple years of sliding from one challenge to the next and being on the struggle train and basically just barely surviving. But I was able to prove to myself that I can snap out of these chain-events of apocalyptic disasters and that is why I believe in YOU, too.

YOU can build your financial side-income, too, and it’s ok if it isn’t the ‘Golden Honeypot of Fabulous Riches’.

Every $10 helps, doesn’t it? You can do it. I know you can. I can see from your typing that if nothing else: You CAN write and you can do it in English. If you can’t think of an additional skill that you already have then use my tip above. Go on your local (or nearest larger town/city) Craigslist and advertise.

You can also advertise for dog boarding in your own home (ONLY accept small dogs, I will explain in a separate post why, ask me to write it and I will) or childminding or small housekeeping tasks support. (Remember YOU set your available hours and say NO when the request you receive doesn’t work for your wellbeing or anxiety levels.)

1. Make a Craigslist account (write down your password)
2. Choose the resume section = free (but if it looks like an advert Craigslist may take it down, but it’s worth trying)
3. Choose the services section and pay $5 for your post to be visible for a month.

Good luck.

Please let me know what you are struggling with and need support with and when I have time I will write a personal reply to you below this post or in a separate one.

Please subscribe & share it with a friend if she / he is struggling.

• Do you need help with your LinkedIn?
• Do you know how to use your social media accounts to support your job search rather than hinder it?
• Do you know that most of your social media interactions can be googled? It may be good to go back into one forum at a time to delete any opinion related comments you may have made that could reflect not advantageous to your professional appearance.
• Keyboard Activism can affect your professional opportunities. It can affect them positively but also negatively. Choose your public use of language carefully and purposefully.
• Do you know how to use Google Docs and share a document to work on it collaboratively with a client?
• What do you need help with? What can I help you understand?