The Golden Pencil: The Freelance Writer’s Resource

Writers, Get Comfortable Talking About (gasp) Money!

by Anne Wayman on January 16th, 2008

When I think about how I learned to charge clients what I’m worth, I realize a major part of it was becoming comfortable talking about money. I mean really comfortable - with everyone.

I don’t know where I got the notion that nice people don’t talk about money, but somewhere I picked that up. When I coupled that idea with my then inability to manage money well, or even at all, it’s no wonder I didn’t know what to charge or how to ask for it.

Part of the problem, it turned out, was my lack of clarity about my money. I hardly knew from one month to the next what was coming in and what was going out. If I received a bill, I assumed it was correct and even if I doubted it was often too embarrassed to ask questions.

Today, my story is different. I keep track of my earning and spending and that helps me feel comfortable talking about money. For example, I told a ghostwriting client I expected to honcho the book through to actually getting the book self-published. He said something like, “I don’t want to take advantage…” I realized I hadn’t spelled this out in my contract and told him I had actually expected to do so all along. Then I laughed and said, “of course, you can always pay me a bonus.”

I actually felt him relax. He’s really good with money, and talking about money is comfortable with him, and with me. I don’t know if he’ll give me a bonus or not, that wasn’t the point. I just wanted a way to make him feel easy, and it worked.

So today’s advice is get comfortable thinking and talking about money. It will do your freelance writing career a world of good.

Write well and often,

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POSTED IN: Musings From A Freelance Writer