Are Your Assumptions Hurting Your Freelance Writing Business?
How to avoid the bubble that can cost you time and money.
Many years ago, when I first began doing freelance work, I was asked to do some editing on a series of articles.
This would be my first paid editing position. To prepare, I spent some time refreshing my grammar and my knowledge of MS Word and its editorial features.
The client sent the series and I edited the first one meticulously, especially for spelling errors and improperly used words. I sent it to the client for review.
Imagine my surprise when the client responded indicating my markup was incorrect. As it turns out, my client was located in Australia and using British English, not American English. He didn’t think to mention it in our initial correspondence and I didn’t know to ask.
You don’t know what you don’t know.
My own bias
My first mistake was assuming all my freelance clients were in the United States, just because that’s where I lived. My second mistake was not realizing there was a pattern to the spelling errors and misused words.
If I had noticed the pattern, it may have clicked. Instead, I had to basically start the project over.
