Making Money Without a Job (Freelancer Edition)

Making money without a job is easy peasy nowadays. With the ability to work from anywhere through the power of the internet, you have no excuse. How do you go about making money without a job? The answer is freelancing.

How to Make Money Without a Job as a Freelancer

Enjoy the audio version above or continue reading with me below.

Dylan Madden here. Show me a person with a laptop, skill, and with a little guidance; they have a full-time income sitting in their lap. No boss or time card to punch. With the ability to work from anywhere in God’s green earth.

You see, I have traveled the world over the last 2 years. My employment has been as a freelancer. With the way the world is going, more and more people will seek to leave their country as well. I am of the opinion based on what I’ve seen with my own eyes, that freelancing is the future.

Why?

Because freelancing gives anyone of average skill the ability to make money remotely. I know students of mine who make a nice living $3k to $5k per month doing work even a monkey could do. I say this not as an insult but as a way to show you ANYONE with a brain and laptop can do this.

While what I do takes more skill (email marketing), I know plenty of people doing resume building and reposting content for brands.

However, you and I will talk about specifics in another article. Today I am sharing with you how to make money without a job through freelancing. To do this, you need to see the full picture.

Employee vs Freelancer

Right now, you are an employee. There’s nothing wrong with this at all. It is just a waste of energy from a monetary standpoint for most people. If you’re pulling in $100k a year working a job you like, then more power to you.

I know that most of you aren’t making that kind of money though. If you are, you feel like you are living in purgatory.

You see as an employee you are a placeholder. They need spots filled for certain amounts of time. By you working for them, you agree to give your time to the allotted time slots in exchange for money.

Your employer profits from the time you are there. An example of this is the old job I had managing a small engine shop. The average sales day for them through my direct effort was $3,500 a day. My pay was $8 an hour which amounted to $1,280 each month before taxes.

Take into account they had overhead and other expenses so they weren’t making $3,500 profit each day. However, they made enough for the owner to have 2 brand new trucks, a beach house, a lake house, and his main residence.

He took on the risk and investment to build this company. Meaning he created more value than I did so he deserved every last penny.

So, don’t take this as me bashing a business owner like is popular these days.

I tell you this to simply point out how you’re playing a losing game. Assuming you want to get rich. No matter what you do, your money is limited. I tried my hardest to work 50-60 hours a week. Once you hit that amount of time, they by law have to pay you more than the normal wage. Meaning most employers try to limit you to 30 to 40 hour a week.

When it comes to freelancing?

You aren’t limited to how many hours you can work. Rather you are only limited to how many clients you can handle and deliver results for.

You see my average retainer is $3,000 per month. If I wanted to make $9,000 a month that’s simply 3 clients. If I wanted to make $50,000 per month, that is 17 clients. There’s no way unless you worked in sales or had a highly-skilled job that you would hit that working a 9-5.

In the 9-5 world, you wait 6 to 12 months for a $5 raise.

In the freelancing world, you simply take on a new client.

— Dylan Madden (@Moneybaglives) July 14, 2021

Why Being a Freelancer is Better than Being an Employee

As you can see, employees are limited to the hours worked. As a freelancer, you are only limited to the clients you can gain and retain. Mathematically you can make more money as a freelancer because you can always reach out to more clients. With a job, you can’t take on more hours unless you want to take on a new job in most cases.

Being a freelancer is better than being an employee because you can make more money much faster. But it isn’t just about the money part of the equation. Let’s take into account the lifestyle aspect.

What is the Major Advantage of Freelancing?

Working as a freelancer has many advantages, but my personal favorite is the ability to work from anywhere in the world. I’ve worked in cafes in Budapest, skyscrapers in Qatar, and beaches in Brazil.

All I need is a wifi connection, coffee, and I’m good to go. There’s no being stuck in an office or having to sit through endless traffic twice a day. The only lines I get stuck in are getting onto an airplane.

So what is the major advantage of freelancing?

It is the freedom you have. Whether you want to work from home or fly off to some distant land, you can. This gives you the ability to always have some kind of adventure to go on.

However, nothing in this world is all sunshine and rainbows. There is always darkness for every good thing.

The Traps of Freelancing Explained

While there are many traps related to working a 9-5 job. There are also traps to freelancing as well. One is your mental bandwidth. That is why I stopped posting nearly as much as I used to here. When you are working with 6 clients, your mind becomes a hub for their ideas.

It is your job to get them results on day to day basis. Whether you’re generating massive sales for them through your emails or whether you are being paid to create a website for them.

Your bandwidth is being used on a daily basis to help your clients. Meaning you won’t have much bandwidth for other things. If you are building another business alongside your freelancing business, good luck.

I made 6 figures outside of freelancing in my second year. This isn’t normal for most people though. I’ve been in the game for many years so have conditioned my mind and skills to be able to do this.

For you, focus on 1 thing, and that 1 thing is your freelancing business. Get very good at outreach, delivering results, and retaining clients. Build this up to $8k to $10k per month minimum before going into something else.

This leads me to the next trap…

Don’t get stuck being a one-man show. My income doubled when I stopped doing everything myself. Too many people stay in the freelancing phase of doing all of the work themselves. While you can hit the high 5 figure range in monthly income like this, it just isn’t efficient.

At some point, you will need to build a team around you. Your focus should be on what you are the best at doing and later only on the higher level moves. Hire people who are better than you to handle everything else within the business.

This is how you make more money, much easier, without having to work more than you did as an employee. Because when you first get started, you will have many long hours at certain points. When I first started building there were days I’d work 18 hours. Now I can work 2-4 hours a day and I am set. You will have to get to this point though.

Replacing Your Job with Freelancing Clients

What you are doing now for your boss is fine. However, if you want to make good money while having your freedom and traveling the world. Now is the time to replace your job with freelancing. Don’t skip the line though.

As with everything, it takes time and effort to make happen.

For me, it took 6 months of work to finally pull off the freelancer gig. Then about 1.5 years to feel like I was in a good place. My intention for you is to help you get there much faster.

You will replace your job with freelancing clients. Which based on the average income most people make is only 2-3 people paying you a monthly retainer of 1,000 dollars. It is always getting your first client that is the hardest.

Just like the first time you do anything, it is about figuring out how to actually do it. Once you’ve bagged your first client the next 2 will come effortlessly.

Next read: How to Start a Profitable Freelancing Business

Always the best,

Dylan Madden