The Freelance Ads Club Podcast
Whether you're a seasoned freelance ads manager or are just thinking about taking the leap, this podcast is for you. The bite-size episodes will help you whichever platform you specialise in and no matter your niche. We will give you tips on how to find, win and retain your ideal clients, hear from other freelancers in our 'Freelancer Spotlight' episodes and help keep you up to date as the ad industry goes through some of its biggest changes in a decade.
The Freelance Ads Club Podcast
#6 Freelancer Spotlight - One year on as a freelancer, how it's gone with SJ Thomson
The first year as a freelancer can be a rocky ride. Tune in to listen to SJ Thomson's freelance experience as her business turns one.
SJ shares her biggest lessons and biggest surprises since taking the leap as a freelancer.
Tune in to hear all about it!
SJ Thomson is a Social Media and Digital Marketing Consultant with over a decade of experience working at brands like NET-A-PORTER and Covent Garden. SJ specialises in supporting brands to achieve their objective through creative storytelling, actionable insights and an empowering environment.
Email: Hello@SJThomson.com
Instagram: @SJ.Thomson
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To join, you MUST have training in ads management - whether you work in-house for a brand or agency or are already freelancing. Whilst we are always sharing knowledge in the group, this is not for beginners looking for a career change or to make a quick buck.
We have two free resources to help you in your freelance ads journey:
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- The Freelance Ads Club Offers Matrix™ - get inspired here.
If you're an agency owner, struggling to hire for your client projects, you can access our member directory with all of our current highly trained ads managers here: https://thefreelanceadsclub.com/
Welcome to the freelance ads club podcast with me your host Aggie Meroni. Whether you're a veteran freelance ads manager, or just thinking about dipping your toe into the world of self employment, this podcast is for you. Every week I'll be speaking about my own experiences as a freelance as manager, sharing a freelancer spotlights where I'll have a chat with one of the amazing members of the freelance ads Club, where I'll be asking guests to share their knowledge and experience in ads across all platforms and business. Don't forget to follow and subscribe on your favourite podcast platform so you never miss an episode. Today, in our freelancers spotlight episode, I'm going to be speaking with Sj Thompson. SJ is a member of the freelance ads club. And she's very kindly agreed to chat to me about her first year as a freelance ads manager. So I delighted that she has shared her story with me. So for anyone that is thinking of going freelance, a bit nervous maybe about taking the leap. There are lots and lots of nuggets in here to practical things, but also things that you know, to help you practically prepare for making a switch into a freelance career. So listen in and hear what SJ had to share with me. Hey, SJ, thanks so much for joining me today.
Unknown:Thank you so much for having me really appreciate it.
Aggie Meroni:So do you want to get started by telling us who you are? And just briefly, how you got to where you are, because this is going to be the whole topic of what we're going to be talking about is your journey, your first year as a freelance ads manager, because I'm sure there are so many people on the fence, thinking, Should I do it, I really want to do I don't know what to expect, blah, blah, blah. So that's why Australia has kindly agreed to come on today to give us the rundown of the last year. So before we dive into the detail John's just give us a little summary.
Unknown:Absolutely. So I guess nicely mentioned, I am SJ Thompson. I am a social media and digital marketing consultant. I have been working in this field since about 2010 After moving down to London, for an internship down from my home of the Northeast, and that three month internship has turned into 13 years in London working at the likes of netspot A and M i haitch. And Covent Garden, and has now led me to the place of being one year freelance.
Aggie Meroni:So when you came down to London or fresh faced and bushy tailed, and what was what was kind of like the niche that you went into or what were the marketing but you started doing
Unknown:social media straightaway. I was a I was a journalism degree out of Northumbria University. And, you know, I had gotten through my degree with Twitter, the birth of Facebook, and I really was the age that grew up with social media and the I very much have the vivid memory of sat in my childhood bedroom on Facebook, and I saw that Netta portait were looking for a social media intern I remember saying to my mom, do you think I should apply for it? My mom said What have you got to lose and it was from that moment and then two weeks later I moved to London to start the internship for social media so I went straight Internet Party and it was the moments of you know, setting up their proper Facebook page their Tumblr page their WordPress and really kind of hashing out this global iconic brands online presence which was talked about very much being within the the deep end of it and I had you know three really amazing years that letter party working through all their social media Doing this will make me really old if anyone remembers this when when Facebook pages used to be like gated no I don't remember so you couldn't get in. So you used to not be able to get into a brand page on Facebook without liking it first. And what I did next party was basically got them to give me 250 products that were going into sale. And we like gated the Facebook page and if you got into the Facebook page, you could shop this edit of the sale before anyone else. And then we did a whole piece on like the retention the management from there, what kind of shoppers there were with a new shoppers, what was the kind of acquisition rate from it and that really just spurred me on in terms of this power of social and the content you can create and the audience around it. And then from there using augmented reality and that's part eight and Take the window shop, which was just for Fashion's Night Out If anyone remembers that in London that used to be here, and then going on and launching Karl Lagerfeld brand with with the window shops that basically came out of mine and my team's passion for social media and new technology and taking with that and running it to a smaller brand called MIH, where I got to do everything for their online marketing, from their social from customer service, affiliate marketing, emails, influencer management, everything. And from there kind of always coming back to social media as my first love. What I always call is my bread and butter or social media, because it's what I've been in for years. And I left my house in 2014, and then went to spend another eight years at Capco Covent Garden, which is the footsie 250 property company, who own over 2 billion pounds worth of property in Covent Garden and now have recently merged with the rest of the West End. So for me, it was really working at what social can do for people and how that can build your audience. And when I left Covent Garden, I was managing the entire digital portfolio. So it's quite a familiar one. Instagram followers is Tiktok. It's Facebook, its email scheme, its website, its whole brand online presence, which led me to be incredibly burnt out.
Aggie Meroni:And I guess that's gonna just tie in really nicely to my next question, which is what led you to go freelance? Because I mean, that is an incredible, like career, you know, I guess in house career. There's like big names there that everyone will recognise and sort of great for your profile as well, in those niches kind of touched on it. Was it the burnout that made you think there must be another way that I could just can't sustain this?
Unknown:Yeah, it was that thing of, you know, I was sad. You know, I think, you know, during the pandemic, we all sat with ourselves, and, you know, weather we all had little lockdown epiphanies. And I think for me, it was, you know, being able to sit and look at what I've done in my career so far, and especially at Covent Garden where, you know, I had spent the entirety of lockdown relaunching the Covent Garden website, I had got that bounce rate to drop from 65% 27%, I had increased online sessions by 11%, I was the most followed Instagram account of any location in the world. We had over 1 million pitchers hashtag Covent Garden. And it still wasn't good enough. It still wasn't enough. I was producing daily content I was, you know, during Christmas, I'd respond to about 600 DMS on a weekend and the assumption that there was a giant team behind me helping me do that. I started to question whether this was the role whether this was the correct career, whether this was the correct choice for me, what else could I be doing? And it was that moment where I actually quit my job, not intending to go freelance. I just wanted to stop and I realised that I had basically worked every day, from about the age of 15. Because I'd gotten through school and had jobs. When I was in uni, I did my degree and had a 36 hour a week job and three placements during work experience all at the same time. And I'd never take more than one week off work. And I never had given myself that opportunity to sit and go. What do you want? What do you want to do? So leaving that role, and having the time to think and everyone always laughs at me because it took me about two hours on my first day of being officially unemployed, to start going through. I made myself cup of tea, had my breakfast and got bored. And I started getting phone calls and emails from people I'd worked with that I'd heard I was leaving, they were asking if I was going freelance and the market here in me went well if people are calling up and demanding for it, and there's an audience for it, then there's a business for it. And I could be that business and it's you know, over the next couple of weeks I realised that I love what I do. I'm damn good at what I do. I didn't want to do it the way I was doing it anymore. I didn't want to work that way anymore. I wanted to do it on my terms, which is where freelance really came in for me.
Aggie Meroni:Definitely. So two hours in to be unemployed. You've already got a client. I think that's a record. If I if ever I've heard one, okay, that's a testament as well to the network you built around you when you were working in your I like to call it your previous career because you were hot you were employed by someone else. But is there anything now that you've kind of your you've, you've had your one year anniversary now of being a freelancer. And I know that always makes people but will retrospective and you look back on what you've achieved in the past year and how it's gone. Is there anything that was a shock to you, when you went freelance that you weren't really prepared for
Unknown:the freedom I had lived, you know, I had, I had lived my last decade, getting up in the morning, getting ready, going to work sitting at a desk, even during lockdown. It was, you know, I wasn't on furlough, I worked all the way through lockdown, I was getting up in the morning, getting dressed, going to work commuting, the couple of hours it took and coming home and and then I'm suddenly sat with all this time. And it's the freedom of being able to choose what I do when I do it, how I do it, but also not having the guilt if I'm not sat at my laptop at nine o'clock in the morning, because if I don't need to be there, and there's no deadlines. You know, one of the things I say to a lot of my friends, especially friends who are self employed, is that the only person putting the pressure on you is you. And as soon as you can take that pressure away or alleviate some of it, it just becomes a bit easier, easier, you're just a bit nicer to yourself, if you just take that pressure off, I can
Aggie Meroni:totally relate to that. I'm three years in and I still struggle with being institutionalised after over 10 years working in corporate, even like on Monday, I went to the hairdresser for like three hours in the afternoon. And I was like, This is really bad, like should be working. But I'm at the hairdresser. And I was like, actually, I can do what I like, doesn't matter.
Unknown:I always had this. I always had this conversation with people I worked with, especially like coming up in my early 20s. You know, working in London working as an internship, you know, lowest paid entry level. And you just you think that there you think you have to be there for the longest. I always talk about like, desk chicken that would happen in the office, you know, the first one to get off is, you know, the one who's not working the hardest. And you know, the way that corporate culture we have this glorification of busy, and it's really bad for us. And it just it feels really self destructive. And I absolutely had those moments where I would be on the phone or I would you know, be going out for a walk or I'd be going to do chores now. I almost feel like I'm playing hooky. And I'm like, but who I'm doing my work. I'm meeting deadlines. My clients are happy. I'm happy. You know, this is the reason I've done this is to be nicer and better for myself.
Aggie Meroni:Yeah, I think it is a massive adjustment, though, isn't it? And I think it's something that you work on constantly because you still get those thoughts.
Unknown:Oh my god. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I will tell you the day but yeah, my friend really wondered the biggest pleasures has been being able to be there for a lot of my friends who you know, who work different hours and need support system. And you know, I spent about six hours with a friend the other day, walking through Harrods. We had a great day, went for lunch, tried on different things. It was a lovely day. And, and I sat there in the back of my head feeling feeling lucky rather than putting pressure on myself to be like, Oh, you didn't do this today. And you didn't do that. And I was like, how fortunate I am. That I've worked so hard that I can do this and have a lovely day.
Aggie Meroni:Yeah, definitely. I think the one thing that has been good for me is that obviously I have a son and he gets ill a lot because he's a toddler and it happens but for me I know that if I was employed I'd be a lot more stressed because I have to explain to people why suddenly couldn't come in. I'd be seen as unreliable bla bla bla bla Yeah, but now I literally just clear my diary rearrange everything and yes, it is very stressful because you feel like letting people down. But you know, it's just in your mind and you can make it up in evenings weekends, whatever. Like your it's your schedule now. Yeah,
Unknown:absolutely. It's I think it was something where one of the one of the catalysts of me leaving my role Lima previous career is and I didn't realise it until I started paying attention to myself is that I was in chronic pain. And I got diagnosed in the March so I left my my job at the end of February 2022 and in the March I got diagnosed with endometriosis I got diagnosed stage two stage Through endometriosis and had to prepare for surgery because of the chronic pain I was in. And I didn't realise how much pain I was in because I just been living with it for so long. And you're sat there going, oh my god, I'm currently now looking at how I'm gonna pay, you know, my mortgage and start this business. And I now need surgery. And I now need to deal with this. And as much as that was really terrifying. I have had an incredible support system. And also I was remembering that, you know, the, my clients I have being honest and open with them and managing their expectations, and treating them with courtesy and kindness to say, Hey, I've got this going on, I'm going to be you know, I'm forward planning for it, you're not gonna be able to reach me for these these couple of days. What can I do now to make sure that that we're working together, and to get everything done. So that customer satisfaction that customer service is still really up there, which I think is really crucial and important. And even Yeah, during pretty horrendous time, I would have still preferred to go through freelance than to have to deal with, you know, going into the office and having to make a to do my but I think about all the times I've been ill or broken bones and had to take time off work, and how much longer it took me to recover, then how long it took me to recover from this surgery.
Aggie Meroni:Yeah, it's crazy, isn't it? I think that's it's so true, that it's so much about the stress that you have around things that happen in your personal life. And one thing like I've had to rearrange things so many times with clients, and I'm always so scared about how they'll react and they've never been anything but supportive ever. So never had a reason to worry. But I think again, it's just like when you've been badly treated at a job, you just have that fear, I think it must be like PTSD or something completely.
Unknown:And I only think that the two things that we stand up for me in my life was like, during like college and uni, you know, I worked in shops, I was new luck and Marks and Spencers growing up. And you know, being on the shop floor. Having that level of customer service, I think is made me a better marketeer. Because how you interact with people the level of service they expect, how that that rewarding feeling comes in, and then pairing that with working in a corporate culture, where there's a lot of agency reliance, and I'm sat there going, this is how I treated agencies and as soon as you start to see them being Miss tracked, or vice versa, in terms of agencies, you know, just looking at some companies, like they've got bags of money and just expecting them to pay up, you learn from that. And you know how to treat people how you want to be tracked how you, you know, have that mutual respect for each other, which is crucial in working environments, especially but it's how we get through this. But it's been a lot of fundamentals for me of how I how I treat people how I work. And you know, I'm very, very fortunate that majority of the clients I have are from people who know how I work and what I deliver and how I deliver it.
Aggie Meroni:So just on what you deliver, how did you get into ADS management was that through the property company that was
Unknown:actually through NetSupport originally, when it all started out, I feel like a dinosaur when I talk about 2010s You know, Facebook ads and things like that coming out. And I remember I remember very vividly starting out ads. Big because netbiter wanted a million Facebook fans, that's what they want. So the first ads God if I remember right this far was follower ads. And they used to sit on the right hand side of the screen. And I basically came up with a social paid social strategy, where I shop the next party website to find the most iconic of via pieces that I could in order to do that level of advertising. And you know, my favourite thing I've always ever said when it comes to content creation is if you can really simplify what your audience want. And apologies for a very slight swear word. But if one comment came across one of the first ever ads I ran and I remember the exact shoot it was a cobalt blue Lu baton and it was a 121 40 which is one of the highest that they do and it had gold studs all over the shoes peep toe. And the angle of it was so you saw the red soul with the heel. And I mean, this was you did it by 90 pixels by 116. So it was tiny. And that ad went everywhere it did incredibly well. But the top comment on it was a guy going Bitches love shiny shit. And that was that was my ad strategy going forward. So delving into it back in, you know, 2011 2012 of doing these level of ads and trying to work out this the simplest way for your audience to understand what you're trying to get across to them. You know, it's a thing where you're looking at, you're interrupting their their journey you are trying to interrupt but seamlessly combine your content into what they want to see. And you're trying to find the right people. And from that moment, it was really trying to blend the organic with the paid from that. So then, moving forward, when I went into all the other different brands, it was working out how is the best way we can get across what we do, what kind of content manage the expectations of our potential audience to get them on, on the way and over and then when I joined Covent Garden, there was there was no digital marketing budget when I started, it was not and when I left, it was a very, very healthy budget when I left and a good percentage of that went through to paid social and working on creating ads, really. So you know, I love e commerce ads, I think you can be really clever with them. And I think you can be you can make some really beautiful content, making ads creating ads, creating a strategy for a location in London that people might visit. Might not visit might visit one see it might visit every weekend. One of the things I always said about Covent Garden, and I always loved and hated it about the area was that Covent Garden was for everyone. Everyone could come to Covent Garden. If you wanted to buy a Rolex and go for dinner at sushi Samba, you could do that. If you wanted to bring your pack lunch and watch the street performers not spend a penny you could do that. So how would you market it? How do you advertise that proposition? Have an emotion of a feeling for place? It's been there since the 1600s. That's
Aggie Meroni:so true. I never ever thought of it like that, especially from a marketing perspective. Maybe I'm a Londoner, so I just it's just always been on my radar. But I know that it's something that so many people visit from all over the country all over the world. So yeah, no easy task.
Unknown:Now and you know, it was one of the things we're actually I've always said, being, you know, working for the brands that I have, being a northerner being slightly outside of the London scope, but then living in London for the length that I have, especially working for Covent Garden, able to blend that audience demographic so how we would market Covent Garden to a London it is not how we would market it to a domestic audience focusing on the big train station city so you're Birmingham you Manchester's you Edinburgh Newcastle's that people could come in for a day trip or a weekend away, that's not the same way you market them. And they're going to come from very vastly different reasons. So it was being able to get into paid, and especially for brands that might already have preconceptions might have certain connotations around them, being able to deliver your point of view, your USP, your most valuable piece of content to them in that way for paid, just, you know, it became a real crucial strategy, pays for Covent Garden and all the brands that I've been working
Aggie Meroni:with amazing. So you've definitely had very broad experience, like broad but also niche, you know, I mean, because you've specialised in certain things. Oh, yeah. So how has that translated now to your freelance career? What do you offer to your clients?
Unknown:Well, I suppose that was one of the biggest challenges for me going into freelance asking yourself that question of like, what are people going to pay you for? What what do what do people want from you, especially someone like me, where I had kind of worn many hats, my biggest hat being social, but around that I had many other abilities and expertise and knowledge base on Especially coming out of Covent Garden where I worked with over 300 brands during my time there and all the way through from like indie niche startups all the way through to, you know, the Chanel city, also Tom Ford's of the world looking at it and being like, what is? What is my most valuable product? What? What are people going to pay me for? And now being able to work with brands big and small in terms of their social strategy? A lot of people need just an extra set of eyes, they get an expert's eyes on how you performing How you doing? What could you be doing better, you know, the budgets might be small and time might be short, but what can you do at the moment to put a bit more impact on it. So working with people in terms of strategies and audit pieces that can, you know, really help them move forward and drive value, and then also working with them from a organic content creation process, a social media management channel, and then a paid opportunity as well. And you know, what I've what I've learned over my time is I create everything bespoke for people who want to work me. So every proposal almost has a shopping list of all the things I could do for that brand. And then I packaged up in terms of deliverables, because for me, you know, I remember working corporate and being like, you know, I got this many hours from someone, which is great, but at the end of the day, what are those hours going to deliver for me, what is my end product that I'm going to get every week, month, quarter year, whatever else it is that I can then take back to the business and report back on. So for me, it's being able to deliver those different aspects as aspects of social and then deliver it in a way that works for the brands for whatever they need at the moment. So has
Aggie Meroni:it been quite challenging? Working with brands that have smaller budgets to what you been used to in the past? Because as a freelancer, you really do work with a spectrum, don't you from like, complete startups almost, to really establish brands that do have a healthier budget? So it was that something that you had to adapt to?
Unknown:Great question and one that, that for me, it was always a thing of no one, no one's ever going to have as much money that they want to spend on these things, especially when you've got the best intentions. And for me, it's been really to look at clients and understand what value I can drive. And be really honest with them that if you know, if they're coming to me and saying, right, this is my monthly budget, this is all I can, this is all I can spend. And then being able to take a look at their business and say, right, this is where you're gonna get the most value from that spend, then and you know, budgets big and small, will will come and go. But if you're able to what I've been working with people is if you have that consistent spend, whether it be a consistent spend on on your organic or your paid, or any form of support system that you have in place for your marketing. As long as you're consistently doing that, rather than turning it on and off, you will find a lot more consistency, you will find a lot more results, tangible results and insights that you can be able to pull from. So it's being able to really for me make sure that I can drive value regardless of the budgets. But it will never ever be easy. I don't think it'll ever be easy for me to ask for money to price these things, you know, asking yourself, How much are you worth? How much is your time worth has been one of the scariest things I have done this year. And I still hate it.
Aggie Meroni:I don't think it gets easier, though, to be honest. Because as a freelancer you everything you do is bespoke. So even though just from an ADS perspective, yes, you'll probably have to pricing or percentages, whatever you charge when it comes to certain ad budgets, but then things get murky when you suddenly just do a project based thing or suddenly the budget massively increases, because you've suddenly done really well with the performance or maybe someone approaches you for specific training or maybe it's a certain consultancy package and suddenly like oh, I've not been asked to do that before but I can do it. I just don't know how long it will take me or how much prep I need to do or how I need to price it or what other people charge because even though there's a lot of talk about charge your worth which you should like you should never underpriced yourself. You also have to be aware of what is kind of acceptable in your niche. Because if if most people are charging it 1000 pounds for something, and you go, Well, I'm worth 10,000. Unless you have a huge personal brand, and you're kind of like a celeb in your niche, it's gonna be really hard for you to come on that price. So that's another lesson on get visible, because then you can charge more. But oh, yeah, yeah, it's just I think it's really important. And I'm going to tie back to the freelance ads club here, just because I think it's important to have a community that you can just bounce things like this off, just say, is this like, does this package sound right? Is this pricing? Do you think I've undercharged or under quoted? Or do you think I should? Is there anything I should be thinking of in this that I should include to make it better for me and the client? So I think it's really important to have community around you when you're freelancing for that.
Unknown:Yeah, absolutely. Couldn't agree more. And I think it's something where I'm a big fan of check yourself before you wreck yourself. Is that thing like, do one more Google do you know, ask one more question, you know, very firm believer, there's nothing, it's a silly question. And being able to have things like the freelance ad community around, being able to jump on that slack and say, help, you know, just is this right, and it's a safe, friendly community. Because the thing is, with freelance it does, it does feel like you're on your own a lot of this time, and you need to find your people. And I'm really, incredibly grateful for the community that I've discovered this year. And I know, I wouldn't be in the position that I, I am now and I wouldn't be as happy and as secure in what I do without having that support system.
Aggie Meroni:Yeah, that's what I like to hear. So we're just gonna, like, reflect again, on your last year. So if someone came to you now and said, Oh, I'm in house somewhere, or I'm, I'm employed by someone or, you know, they're thinking about going freelance as an ads manager, is there a piece of advice that you would give them at this stage,
Unknown:go and have a look at your finances personally, when I decided to quit my job, I had looked at my finances and worked out that if I didn't get a job, for six months, I could pay my mortgage, I could be okay, I could survive. And the worst thing is someone who has been absolutely broke on her ass in London, not sure how she's going to pay her rent, you're not going to be able to focus properly on your work on yourself on what you do, if you are not a little bit comfortable in where you are. And I think especially if it's your job, like redundancies and everything just suck. And you know, the amount of businesses I know who have been born out of redundancies and have hustled hard, has been phenomenal. And I'm proud to know a lot of women who have have pulled through that. But if you're sat there thinking, Could I do this? Go and have a think about where you are in your like not to sound like your mother. But you know, do you want to buy a property in the next year? Because mortgage rates are not fun? Can you pay your rent? Can you still comfortably live and be okay? If you can work out what you want your proposition to be what your niche if you want to niche down if you don't want to niche down, get that kind of in a row in terms of what you're selling, treat yourself, like your clients, in terms of what is the advice you would give to a client right now and give it to yourself as hard as that is. And then know that you're not alone go and go and find the community that you need to go and set yourself up in to ask the questions and to find out what you need to know. Because you're not going to know everything straightaway and you don't need to know everything straight away. But you need to be happy and secure in the decision. You're making
Aggie Meroni:such good advice. Yeah, I mean, some people are pushed before they get the chance to put the plan in place. But if you're in the situation where you have the choice, and you're planning for your move, I can't agree with you more to get your finances in place because it's just that security blanket isn't there to say it's one less thing for you to focus on. So you know, I'm you know, I can feed myself I've got a roof over my head. Now I just need to cane that LinkedIn accounts to get a client.
Unknown:Yeah, and everyone's going to struggle with the EQ of like marketing yourself. That will come from it. I don't know anyone who doesn't have that little bit of of butterflies at first for most putting you out but again, the great thing about this world is there's so many people out there to help there's literally a freelancer for that kind of business and one of the best things I did was a getting them Using accountant, I love my accountant. He's phenomenal. He will answer all my questions. I have an incredibly supportive, I got someone to help me write my bio and my proposition to clients because as much as I write, copy, and create content all day, suddenly writing about myself was like pulling teeth. So you know, there are so many people out there to help. And yes, even if you are pushed, and fall into this, know that there are people around you who can do the exact same thing who can all help you out? It's a wonderful community once you once you found us.
Aggie Meroni:Yeah, definitely. I think I'm gonna just touch on one thing that you said. But it's not it's a topic that could be a whole new podcast episode. And that is the mindset around paying for help. So you know, you mentioned that you got some support you with your bio, and you hired an accountant and things like that. When I first went freelance, because I'd been in corporate for so long, it was the bit alien to me that I had to spend money on my business. But as you go through your freelance career, you realise this is a business expense, and it's writing down my tax. So you just end up spending a lot a lot in your business, which is good, because it helps you grow. But that's a massive mindset shift that happens. And once prepare yourself for that, I that was just my insight into that in my personal journey, just like the mindset around spending money on the business. But oh, yeah, yeah, I'm very aware that we are like 35 minutes into our chat. And I honestly could, I could chat all day about this, actually, though, but this has been so insightful. I'm sure that anyone who's on the fence or is craving to break through and just needs a bit of reassurance that it's gonna be fine. It's not gonna be easy, but you'll make it it'll be okay. Just from hearing your personal story. And if you are thinking of going freelance and you're very nervous, you're unsure about your road ahead. Obviously, the freelance ads club is will welcome you with open arms. So come and check us out. I'll leave the link in the bio. But before we go, SJ, how can people find you if they want to just get in touch or connect?
Unknown:Well, very northern, I'm always here for a copper anyone wants to chat anything through to me the kettle's always on. And you know, if anyone can learn from my experiences, you know, I can help anyone with any questions or anything. Cup is always on. I am on Instagram at at SJ dot Thompson. That is Thompson, t h o m s o n, I need to work on my own personal SEO because I don't have a P in my Thompson, which is one of the fun things of my own business is learning that people can't spell my name. So you can find me SJ thompson.com. You can find me on Instagram. And yeah, DMS are open if anyone wants to chat,
Aggie Meroni:or so thank you so much for your time. There's been so many nuggets in there. And if anyone wants to get in touch with this, Joe, I'll leave her links in the show notes. So thanks very much, SJ.
Unknown:Thank you so much.
Aggie Meroni:Thank you for listening to this episode of the freelance ads club podcast. If you're a freelance ads manager, don't forget to download the free Client Onboarding Trello you can find in the show notes. If you're a brand or agency looking for support from one of our community, visit our website at the freelance ads club.com to access our member directory. Tune in next time