Chris Orzechowski
Freelancer Chris Orzechowski working from home at his standing desk.
- "Working from home" means a variety of things for freelancers, whether it's working from a coffee shop, library, or beach.
- For the ones who hunker down in the house, five experienced "homeworkers" recommended making spaces to physically and mentally separate your business and family lives.
- They also said to practice blocking out your schedule, prioritize tasks, and create "themed days" for certain to-dos.
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The term "work from home" is often used more loosely than literally, especially among freelancers.
While some independent workers may say they work from home, what they really mean is that they work from their local cafe, a library, or with WiFi by the public pool. They might also mean that they work while traveling, from the offices of their freelance clients, while commuting on public transportation, or from a coworking space.
Yet some freelancers really do work from home, literally getting the job done from their own sofa, home office, dining room, or even a converted closet or bathroom in their house - and many make good money doing it.
Five "homeworkers" shared how they get their gigs done while earning the big bucks.
Physically and mentally separate work and home time
Solopreneur Laura Frnka-Davis, principal at her marketing firm LFD Communications in Missouri City, Texas, offers freelance writing and public relations services to her clients - and she does so 100% from home. It's paid off for her financially: In her first year, from 2018 to 2019, she grossed over $100,000 in revenue.
Laura Frnka-Davis
Laura Frnka-Davis.
"I will go to a client's office for a meeting; otherwise, I'm here," Frnka-Davis said. "I love working here. I have an awesome set-up with a printer and all my files. I don't really like working anywhere else."
She shared that she works from a proper home office, not from the kitchen table, and keeps regular hours just like she would for an employer - starting her workday bright and early, shortly after her husband leaves for his job in the morning. Once she turns off the TV to begin her client projects, she doesn't turn it back on - or do any chores - during her weekday workdays.
And as far as the housework that can be hard not to notice when working from home, Frnka-Davis doesn't let it bother her.
"I really don't find any distractions here - we send our puppy to daycare three days a week to increase my focus," she said. "I have clients counting on me to deliver and I know I need to come through for them."
Her biggest challenge is that it can be occasionally hard to get started when it's time for the workday to begin.
"It's tempting to continue to watch CBS This Morning," she admitted.
Marty Fahncke is the president of his own firm FawnKey & Associates, which offers marketing and strategic business consulting services. Fahncke, whose yearly income is over $225,000, told Business Insider that one strategy he has leveraged working from home for the last 20 years is taking pains to minimize the classic interruptions of a house by working in a spare bedroom with a locking door.
Marty Fahncke
Marty Fahncke.
"No kids, pets, or other distractions allowed," Fahncke said.
Also similar to Frnka-Davis, Fahncke sets clear boundaries between his personal and professional life to help him hone in on client projects, as well as take breaks from them.
"When it's work time, it's work time," he said. "When it's not work time, turn everything off and walk away."
However, Fahncke doesn't see every work-life conflict that happens while working from home as a problem. If his kids have a school activity or sports event, he attends everything possible.
"Some distractions are OK, and are among the benefits of working from home," Fahncke said. "I try to be fully present with my 'life' so that I'm not stressed about being fully present with my work."
Austin Iuliano
Austin Iuliano.
Social media consultant and public speaker Austin Iuliano - who speaks on social media marketing and how he went from homeless, sleeping out of his car with 43 cents to his name, to one of the fastest-growing live streaming influencers - made $125,000 last year in revenue. Iuliano has designated a couple of main areas in his house as his freelance workspace.
"I have a desk that I do all my editing at, and I have a second bathroom that I've turned into a recording studio," Iuliano said. He uses this unique freelance space to record video content for his new YouTube channel.
Practice time blocking and task prioritization
Six-figure freelancer and digital marketing expert Cassady Dill, who is the CEO of Marketing For The Rich, made $173,000 last year after taxes and expenses. Dill has been a digital marketing freelance manager for four years, helping executives of large corporations direct their marketing teams and small business owners execute all of their marketing functions.
Cassady Dill
Cassady Dill.
Dill faces many of the common challenges of working from home, which include explaining to her family how even though she is physically present "at home," she is still actually "at work" during her freelance work times.
"It's easy for my spouse or visiting friends and family to assume I'm avoiding them when I'm in the pit of a big project," Dill said. "Also, sales calls must always be protected by being conducted in adequate space, which can prove difficult based on others in your environment."
To navigate these types of conundrums, Dill relies on two popular and proven productivity techniques. The first is known as the E/N/D Formula.
Dill keeps a notebook lined in five columns, with the middle two columns for her to-do list and the clients those tasks are delivered to. The first column is a list of numbers from one to three to indicate the priority level of her projects. The fourth column, however, is labeled E/N/D, to help Dill determine how different activities affect her energy levels.
"E stands for energizing or those tasks I feel excited/invigorated by completing, and N mean[s] neutral, and D is for the tasks I find draining," Dill explained. "The last column lists each task's actual deadline."
From this filled notebook, Dill then populates her physical and digital calendars first with tasks that are of high priority and invigorate her, then with tasks that are of low priority and drain her.
Cassady Dill
Dill's notebook.
The second productivity method that Dill uses to help her stay focused is called the Pomodoro Technique. She sets a timer on her cell phone for 25 minutes and focuses on a single task. Each time she gets distracted, she writes down what the distraction was and flags it to revisit later and examine the cause. After each 25 minutes (or one "Pomodoro"), she takes a five-minute break before beginning another Pomodoro, followed by another five-minute break.
"After four Pomodoros, I take a 15-minute break, and by the time I've done a day of this, I am usually 75% more productive than without the method," Dill said. She also circles back to evaluate her list of distractions each day, then brainstorms ways to eliminate everything on that list to improve her future productivity.
Fahncke uses a slight variation of this time-block method, where he works with focus and intensity for 50 minutes, then takes a 10-minute break (for example, to take a walk outside, meditate, or eat a snack). Then it's back to 50 more minutes of no distractions.
Iuliano was inspired toward a creative way of time blocking to overcome the biggest household distraction that he faces: his year-old puppy who loves to play.
What Iuliano did to work around this was to use the dog's distractions as a "focus timer."
"I know after I take her for a morning walk, I'll have roughly 90 minutes to do deep-focus work," he shared. "I'll do my most creative, most urgent work first. She will want to play again, I will take her for another walk and use that time to respond to social media comments, do phone calls, and the like."
Create 'theme days'
Freelance copywriter and ecommerce email marketing strategist Chris Orzechowski earned just north of $274,000 in 2019 working exclusively from home at his standing desk, tucked away in the corner of his living room. (Sometimes he works on his couch as well, he shared.)
Chris Orzechowski
Chris Orzechowski.
Thirty-year-old Orzechowski - whose previous jobs before starting his freelance copywriting business included being a teacher and a bouncer - shared that he can "count on one hand" how many clients he has met in person over the past seven years since he started freelancing under this model.
He admitted that it can be challenging to stay at the top of your game from a home environment - if you don't take initiative to maximize your performance.
"Some days, you just don't want to get out of bed," he shared. "It's hard seeing my couch and a collection of pillows and throw blankets 10 feet away - especially when I'm not feeling motivated that day."
To help stay focused in a home environment that many freelancers find simultaneously distracting and monotonous, he first became "militant" with his working hours, keeping a consistent routine. A big part of this involved developing what he refers to as "theme days."
"Some days are business development days, where I work on building out pipelines and assets that attract clients," Orzechowski explained. "I'll write articles, record videos, tweak ads - all things that are designed to bring me more clients." If he needs to just focus and write without any distractions, he will block off the entire day.
Tuesday is usually his "call day," reserved for booking calls with his mastermind group and any potential clients. He then has Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays as dedicated days for client work. If he finishes early on Friday, then he's done for the week.
The freelancer believes that "themeing" his days has helped him accomplish twice as much client work in half the time, because he isn't losing focus with task switching.