I’m mid 40s. I have an Oxford degree and a masters from UCL (social sciences) and 20 years experience. Until my little girl was born 7 years ago I worked in senior comms rules in the charity sector. HoD level. Went back to my pre-kid job P/T for a year then relocated outside London.
Since then I’ve been freelancing in communications consultancy and some creative copywriting. This seems to top out at £330 a day but is often less, or to do something properly I need to spend 2 days on it where I can only bill for one. I’m based near a city but a lot of the work is remote. I have a specialism in the arts and lots of experience here but the sector has no money.
In the meantime, I’ve built up another side of my career (writing for theatre) which is going extremely well and I would like to continue to spend 2 days a week on that - so I accept I’m slightly hostage to the flexibility of freelancing. Ideally I’d spend 3 days a week on my money job.
I feel like I’m scrabbling round for fees and tiny contracts and doing work like social media plans that’s often quite junior. It’s all really un-strategic and I’m not earning enough for my age and experience level. I’m thinking about setting up a business shop-front as a creative copywriting studio but I don’t know if this is a good idea. I probably need to find other sectors and pitch for work but I don’t really know where to put my energy.
If you were me, what would you do?