Marijana Kay – Project planner for freelance writers

The simple + powerful tool to manage your workload, plan future projects, track your income, and run a balanced freelance writing business.

Problem 1: You’re overcommitted and burnt out.

When a new potential client comes your way, you don’t want to miss the chance to work with them. You want the revenue, the byline, their logo on your website—so you book that project for next week even though your plate is already full.

Do that a couple of times each month, and you’re stretched too thin and slammed with unrealistic deadlines.

And do that month after month, and freelance writing no longer seems like a job you want to do.

Problem 2: You don’t want to take a break because of lost income that comes with it.

It’s the issue every freelance writer faces: when you don’t work, you don’t get paid. It’s hard to take a break—even a few days, let alone weeks—because you still need to pay bills and live a life.

Problem 3: You’re not sure what’s the exact income you’re making monthly, quarterly, and yearly.

The proof of the income you earned from your clients is in your proposals, invoices, and emails. You might know how much you earned this month or last month, but you’re struggling to gauge your earnings from the past 6 or 12 months because there’s no easy, quick way to find that figure.

The solution? A central place to track your workload, income, bandwidth, and future projects.

With this project planner, you can:

• See your true capacity for the month. You’ll have quick access to everything on your plate for the current month: the clients you’re working with and the number of projects you have with them.
• Book new clients and projects into a realistic next project opening. See what’s already on your plate (including retainer clients and other projects you’ve already confirmed) so you can stop overbooking yourself.
• See the status of each project. Mark projects as confirmed, completed, invoiced, and paid. You’ll never forget to update a client or follow up on an invoice again.
• Take time off regularly. By seeing natural ups and downs and by tracking your average income for the whole year (instead of just individual months), you can see patterns of natural ups and downs and the best times to take a break. You can also create cushions of income in certain months so months with less income won’t be such an issue.

Instead of tracking your projects in random digital notes, sticky notes, notebooks, and emails, you’ll have a central place for everything you’ve confirmed and done throughout the year.

What You’ll Learn In Project planner for freelance writers

YOUR PROJECT PLANNER

• Download: Project planner template
• Where to start with your new project planner
• Project planner demo: see my planner in action!

CUSTOMIZE YOUR PROJECT PLANNER

• How to add your own clients to the planner
• How to expand or shrink your planner based on your needs
• How to change your planner currency
• How to track projects if you’re invoicing in multiple currencies
• How to make sure the planner is always up to date [text + screenshots]
• How to use the work tracker tab [text + screenshots]

TIPS FOR SUCCESSFUL PROJECT PLANNING

• My tips for successful project planning as a freelancer [text]

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