Yesterday, my friend asked me how she can market her freelance business — she just started this journey two months ago. I told her, “one of the most effective ways to do that is joining an online community for writers. Then, share what you know and learn from them.”

Her jaw dropped.

“Other writers are your competitors. What do you do in that community? Did you share your secrets? Someone will steal your ways and scoop your clients right behind your back. I have no clue why you do such a thing!”

I’m familiar with that reaction. In fact, it’s…

Editor's note: This article is part of our Salary History series. Want to submit your own? You can do so (anonymously, if you'd like!) here.

In October 2019, I moved to Australia to study for a Master of Business Management (MBM), Marketing major. My husband wanted me to focus on studying, but I knew I had to do something else because his salary wasn’t enough for my tuition fees and our living expenses, not to mention a $20K (USD) debt we had to pay back within one year.

Since I did some freelance work as a side job before, I…

In 2017, two Canadian young women Connie Lo and Laura Burget put together $4,000 in savings and launched natural beauty brand Three Ships Beauty (or Three Ships). Fast forward today, Three Ships earned $1.4 million in sales, sold in approximately 1,000 stores across North America, including Whole Foods, Hudson’s Bay, and more than 500 Target locations in the US, as Connie shared in an interview with Glossy.

In 2020, Connie and Laura were named winners of the Women Entrepreneurship Knowledge Hub Micro-Business Award, a category of the RBC Canadian Women Entrepreneur Awards that honors Canada’s most accomplished and impactful women…

Some people think a freelance writer has a stress-free life. But as someone pursuing this career for over 4 years, I must say sometimes things don’t look as they seem.

Freedom, that’s for sure. But no stress? Not quite.

Changes are all in a day’s work for a freelance writer. And when changes occur, stress often comes.

Think about these:

• A client adds new requirements to the original project when you almost finish the final draft.
• A client sends an email asking you to edit an assignment that was completed two months ago (at that time, no edits required).
• A…

It’s pretty common that when Pride Month comes, brands start running a lot of promotional programs. Huge discounts, social media giveaways, free shipping — Google “Pride Month sales” or “Pride collections,” and you’ll see these offers all over the internet.

But the thing is, while brands love doing that, their customers don’t understand what exactly they are supporting. What makes a brand now support the LGBTQ+ community after years of doing nothing? Or what will happen to their donation?

Here’s a sad truth: Many brands are doing Pride marketing wrong. As Vox’s senior culture reporter Alex Abad-Santos wrote:

“Some companies…

Yesterday, my friend asked me to help her become a freelance writer. She has a full-time job but wants to leave it as soon as possible — her reason for that shocked me.

She said:

“You started from zero to become a freelance writer. You make a lot of money. You’re my model. I dream of being like you one day. Work from home, write and make money, wake up at any time you want, no stressful meetings, no tough conversations with boss, no orders, no work on the weekend. You control your life and everything you do. It’s easy…

Today my friend told me that he set a goal to write and publish on Medium every week, from Monday to Friday. He wants to get Medium’s $500 bonus in two months.

I asked if he was trying to make more money for a reason.

He laughed and said, “I want to get this bonus because I want to use it as a motivation to practice writing every day. I put the number ‘500’ in my goal, but it’s actually not my goal.”

He showed me his five drafts he wrote in the last two days — I read some…

In October 2019, I left my beloved country Vietnam and came to Sydney, Australia to study for a Master of Business Management, marketing major.

Excited, thrilled, and hopeful. That was my feeling before the first day at school. Lacking foundation knowledge about marketing and wanting to experience a new culture, I had a lot of hopes and expectations when studying in Australia.

Time flies. I’ll graduate in July this year.

If you ask if I regret my decision to study there, I can say, “I’m not.” …