At any given time, I’m juggling way more than a handful of clients. 

Right now, I have 10 recurring monthly clients, and 3 I do ad-hoc work for. 

I admit, it *does* seem like I do a lot of work.

I know a lot of freelancers who only write one or two pieces a week, and that’s totally cool too. There’s no one-size-fits-all.

But I’ve been doing this for 8 years now (my freelance anniversary is coming up this month!) and I’m now a pro at predicting how long things will take and knowing exactly what I’m capable of each week.

Most of the pieces I write are for retainer clients I’ve been working with for a long time (some for over four years!), so I know their businesses inside out and can write pieces relatively quickly.

The REAL pro-tip, though, is that I’ve niched down so much that I tend to write about similar topics for each client, albeit with a unique spin to align with their business/clients/customers/you-get-the-gist.

I understand the industry inside out so, most of the time, I don’t have to run hours of research before I actually put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard).

Why do I do it to myself? 

I like the variety. Or, at least, that’s what I tell myself. Mostly, I’m a sadist who likes to keep busy. I also struggle to say no to awesome, ideal clients when they come my way 👀

The second thing people say when I tell them how heavy my client load is, “how do you manage all that?!?!”

And that’s exactly what I’m going to share today: how I manage 10+ clients a month.

It’s a vibe. Actually, it’s more of a well-oiled machine that I’ve honed to perfection over the past 8 years, but we’ll call it a vibe because that sounds cooler.

First of all, here’s a breakdown of the number of pieces I write for each client:

• 4x 1 piece a month
• 4x 2 pieces a month
• 1x 3 pieces a month
• 1x 2 pieces a quarter

​And then there’s the ad-hoc work, which might result in an extra one or two pieces a month depending on the client’s requirements.

Now that’s out of the way, let me tell you about the 7 things that help me keep this circus running without a hitch.

​1. Trello boards ​

I use a trusty Trello board to map out my work each month. I have a column for each of my retainer clients and a column for “ad-hoc pieces”.

I’ll add cards for each piece in the relevant client column when I’m assigned them (usually the first week of the month) and then I reserve 3 ad-hoc cards for one-off projects that come in throughout the month.

Each card includes the post title, the date it’s due, a link to the brief, and any other information the client has given me.

When each card is filled, I know that my schedule is full and I can’t take on any more work that month. It’s simple… (although, sometimes I go rogue and try and slip in a few smaller pieces for some of my favourite clients if they need it! 👀)

When each piece is on the Trello board, I assign it to a specific day that’s usually about 3-5 days before the hard deadline to give myself some breathing room (this is always Monday-Thursday since I don’t do client work on Fridays).

I add an “orange” label to the relevant Trello card when I’ve submitted the first draft of a piece and it’s with the client.

When it’s been signed off, I add a “green” label. Being able to see how many green pieces there are throughout the month keeps me in check and on track.

Finally, at the end of the month when (hopefully!) every card is green, I add each piece to an invoice and archive its assigned card ready to start again the next month.

2. Paper diary​

I think I was born in the wrong era. I still use an old-school paper diary and I LOVE it. It’s my most prized possession because I use it to plan my days (trust me, I’ve tried all sorts of calendar software and nothing does it for me quite like a paper diary).

Each day includes what I need to write, who I need to email, and any other small admin tasks. It gives me an overview of what my week looks like and helps me identify gaps and downtime too–yay for gaps and downtime!

3. Buffer time​

I ALWAYS schedule a piece at least 3 days before the deadline.

This gives me buffer time in case something comes up (less likely) or I want to take impromptu time off (more likely).

I’ve made the mistake of scheduling pieces the day of or the day before they’re due and it’s just stressful. What if my brain decides not to work properly that day? What if I wake up sick? What if, what if, what if?

As you can see, I’m a lil bit of a worrier, so I really like to plan things in advance and give myself plenty of breathing space in case things go wrong (because, life!).

4. Limit my daily word counts​

My brain goes to mush at precisely 3pm every day.

​I will only ever schedule one piece a day (every two days if it’s a longer piece). Pretty sure none of my clients want rushed incoherent pieces. It usually takes me about 1-2 hours to conduct research and outline a piece and then about 2-3 hours to write it.

However, I’m one of those weirdos who tends to carry out a lot of the research part alongside the writing part so I can get a feel for where the piece is going. Either way, one piece a day is more than enough for my brain, but I WILL do edits, outlines, and emails on the same days as a piece because they don’t technically count as “words”.

5. Get a head start​

Talking of cramming multiple things into one day… I like to get a head start on tomorrow’s piece today.

So, I might write a piece between 8am-1pm and then start the outline for the next day’s piece from 2pm-3pm so I’m ready to get started the following morning.

I follow a pretty rigorous structure when I’m doing research, so I manage to shave off time by being very efficient. It looks a bit like this: 

• Add relevant info from the brief to a Google doc (like internal links, keywords, any descriptions, etc) 
• Use Surfer or SEO Minion to find top-ranking posts on the topic and pull the outlines from those 
• “Find the gap”, which is where I look at Google’s PAA section, customer support questions (if I have access), FAQs, and forums to find out what the top-ranking outlines are missing 
• Put a call out from experts and real people to contribute quotes to the piece 
• Find relevant stats and real-life examples that illustrate the key points I want to make
• Plot the outline structure and drop my research into the relevant sections (I will probably have already started writing the piece at this point as well)  

6. Schedule calls strategically​

My best writing times are between 8am-11am and 1pm-3pm so I won’t ever schedule calls during these hours.

My fave times to schedule calls are 11am-12pm and 3-4pm. Obviously, this is subject to change depending on where in the world my clients are. If I’m working with a client on the west coast of America, calls are usually at 5pm my time, 9am their time. 

What I don’t do, is have an open Calendly where people can book my time willy-nilly. 

7. Get briefs upfront ​

The vast majority of my clients send me briefs at the start of the month so I can map out my schedule and know exactly what I’m going to be writing and when.

This gives me time to get expert quotes and collect examples.

I have yet to miss a deadline (*frantically touches wood*) and this is a method that works for me.

It’s taken a while to hone it, but it doesn’t FEEL like I have 10 clients a month because I run such a well-oiled machine (most of the time 👀).