WRITING. FREELANCING.

Having 60,000 Followers Brought Me in My First Freelancing Job

Because numbers do shine

I’ve been talking about the negative sides of having so many followers but no reader engagement. But today I want to talk about something positive. Something I received and achieved because of that number at the top of my profile.

The email — spam or real?

It was at the end of summer when I received an email regarding a collaboration offer. The email was written in a way it could be both. Spam or a real opportunity. The message excited me while I was trying to remain on the ground in case it all turned out to be false.

I’ve received those spammy messages on Instagram before where some company or brand is offering you a discount on their products for you to write about them in return. Most of them were about jewelry and fashion which was for me immediately a turn-off.

If you know me just a little, if you just followed me for a while you’ll know that I do not wear makeup, have no designer clothes and the only jewelry I wear are the colorful bracelets on my left arm.

So no. I am not interested in your collaboration offer because I will not promote anything I do not stand for.

And this is the exact point where this email stood out. It wasn’t about fashion. It wasn’t about makeup. It was about a stand-up paddleboard. Yes, that is true. In this email, I was being offered an inflatable paddleboard if in return I’d write about my experience with it.

Really?

This just seemed too perfect to be true.

I love paddleboarding. I love trying out new boards. And I sure love writing about my experiences on the water.

So to write that paid article I wouldn’t even be selling anything to my readers that weren’t what I stood for. I would just be writing about the fun I had with the new board.

Sure, I’m in.

“Too many people are thinking of security instead of opportunity. They seem more afraid of life than death.” — James F. Byrnes

How they found me

The marketing person I was talking to said she found me through this article describing paddleboarding as a joyful sport. This piece hasn’t gotten much attention on Medium but got a decent amount of traffic from Google. And it seems like it landed me a job.

Together with the number of followers seen from the marketing officer of said company. While readers can’t see my stats of articles or how much traffic they draw, they can surely see the total numbers of followers.

This is now where it comes in handy of having so many fake or dead followers (even though Medium confirmed all followers of mine were real). To marketing people out there, those numbers do talk.

The beginning of the collaboration

And there the endless email conversation started. At first, I just enquired if I understood correctly and if I would be getting sent an inflatable SUP (stand-up paddleboard).

I wanted to know if I should be selling the board or just reporting about my use of it. I wanted to know if this would be a once of payment or if I would include the writing of several articles.

The lady on the other side was very friendly, answered all my questions promptly, and left me asking where the mistake was. Since I still couldn’t believe this was happening to me. I had never gotten anything sponsored before and have never done a freelancing job.

Then it was time to finalize our agreements when I suddenly knew I was scammed. I was asked for my address and the credit card details for the payment of the service.

For sure not. Not my credit card details.

While I was convinced I picked up the scammer, I still send my address for the shipping of the paddleboard and said I’d send an invoice to them once I received the board.

The lady agreed to that, said the board was being sent and then I didn’t hear from her or the mailman in a long time.

I’d say almost a month later she was asking me if I received the board and could test it yet which made me think. Why would she ask me that question if she never sent it?

I requested the tracking number and found out the package was lying already for ten days in a nearby shop waiting for me to be collected. I just never got informed about it.

Is it for real?

The arrival of the board

Yes, it was. I went to pick it up the very same day and couldn’t get over my excitement. I got a brand new paddleboard. Including paddle, pump, and all the accessories.

While I had purchased an inflatable paddleboard from a high-end American company about a year ago and absolutely loved the board, I was very curious to test this new one.

The only issue was, that by the time I had the board, we were way into fall. And while even this past summer in Germany wasn’t very warm, the weather now was incredibly cold and wet.

But that wouldn’t stop me from going on the waters. Two days after I received the board, the sun was shining despite the chilly 10°C, and off I went. Together with my husband who wanted to test fly the new drone, we drove to a nearby lake we hadn’t been to before.

I did one more paddle session after that initial one before I began to write the article I was supposed to get paid for. I wrote it, edited, proofread the piece and send it to the company asking for corrections or if it could go online like that.

It got approved, I send them my invoice, got the money about 2 weeks later into my account, and published the article.

So here I am now, with two inflatable paddleboards as my own and with the first writing freelance job in my pocket. Even without ever having had a viral article, I still managed to showcase my work to the right crowd of people.

I call that a success.

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.” — Herman Cain

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