How Failing Miserably In digital marketing made me rediscover freelance writing
By: Mwagiru Karongo
Tags: Digital Marketing, Freelancers, Startup, Freelance, Freelance Writing

How Failing Miserably In digital marketing made me rediscover freelance writing Mwagiru Karongo Mar 11·4 min read

Hands typing on a home office desk, freelance writing

I was a freelance writer. No. I am a freelance writer. Nowadays, I wear this badge with honor, it has become my source of livelihood and joy. Writing is my passion. I am also a poet, a creative writer when I need to impress people. I stick to regular writing most of the time because it pays my bills. But I am still contemplating penning down a creative fiction collection. That’s a story for another day.

Cumulatively, I have written for about six years but four of which were spent in digital marketing. I was a full-time digital marketer. How I bumped into the online, if you like digital space, was due to frustration.

One day a few years ago, I woke up and searched for freelance writing jobs on Google. I sent a pitch and I got a reply. I was excited. But the problem was I didn’t have much experience in online writing.

I was honest with the client and he was patient enough with me. Over time I discovered SEO, bidding sites such as Upwork (formerly Odesk), Freelancer, Peopleperhour, and Guru. I went on a bidding spree. I achieved moderate success.

I was doing a lot of SEO writing which piqued my curiosity. I took some training on SEO. I consumed everything I could lay my hands on that was related to SEO. I felt SEO was my get-out-of-jail-free card.

I was frustrated with freelance writing. It seemed like a lot of work for very little pay. After just one year of freelance writing, I quit. I was now ready to execute my SEO skills for local clients.

I sourced for clients through cold emailing and calls, through social media platforms. It was a total mess. I even contemplated going back to my low-paying freelancing gigs after three months.

During that period there were no forthcoming clients. During our conversations, I discovered that most of my clients needed an overhaul in their marketing. This included revamped websites, social media strategy, and SEO. I was only good at SEO, moderately at best.

I teamed up with some web developers and social media marketers. I realized that when we presented our services as a package it made more sense for clients.

The only issue was that the pay grade was still minimum by all means. I was targeting anyone who would listen, mostly the small and medium enterprises. Some of them didn’t even have a marketing budget.

After the third month, we had our first client, a lady who was running a bakery. Once the developers were done with the website I was to start work on SEO. We disagreed with the developer which spilled over to the client.

I lost the SEO gig. I did not give up. I sent more pitches and was lucky I got three more clients on retainer by the end of the year.

I took a web development course and refined my SEO skills. I hired two digital marketers and moved into a physical office within 14 months. I was excited. I was now officially a digital marketer. I even updated that on all my social media platforms.

I was still writing a lot of content for clients and websites. For a while, it felt digital marketing was my calling. I breathe the very essence of the trade and espoused its mannerism in everything I did.

I would confidently pull out my business card and exclaim “Hi, I am…….I am a digital marketer!” In industry events, I was perhaps the loudest fellow because it felt so good to be a digital marketer.

We were adding more clients to our duty roaster and it felt like we were on steroids. I can’t even remember how many cups of coffee we took to our offices. We had so much fun and we presented ourselves as the quintessential digital marketing enclave.

We threw around creative talks and even had a website to match. You know, with all the vague, digital marketing stuff.

After the honeymoon period was over, the relationship became gloomy. Clients were complaining hard and you could see the strains in the team. Again, it started feeling like hard work instead of the passion we had anticipated before.

Soon clients started dropping us in droves. What could be wrong? In the end, we were left with only a handful. They were just enough to maintain the office but the strain was getting on me. Once more, I was frustrated with digital marketing.

There was no longer a kick to run a creative campaign. There was no longer inspiration to motivate the team. Everyone looked tired. The growth hunger had disappeared. The motivation had been deflated.

Even I knew it was time to call it quits. It started with one team member leaving and soon all over us were recalling memories we had in that faithful office. It was a passionate 3 or so years of our lives. How did this happen? One day, I’ll share how we lost our digital marketing passion and then our livelihood.

I am partly to blame but I am forever grateful for the lessons I learned during the time I was a fully-fledged digital marketer.

Last year, I resumed freelance writing fully. Now I consider freelancing as my business. I’ve gotten deeper into the trade and I am hoping to make big bucks in the process. However, I want it to be more than my source of livelihood, I want it to remind me of the passion and the joy of creating beautiful pieces.

If I get an opportunity I’ll write more stories about my struggles as a freelance writer. The struggles shall be accompanied by successes to ensure I tell a balanced story.