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Kendall Cherry had what a lot of people would consider a dream gig: a six-figure role in the C-Suite of a Fortune 100 tech company, where she worked as their executive ghostwriter.

The problem with this "dream job", however, was that it was more like a nicely packaged road to burnout. The endless hours and soul-crushing politics left her feeling totally empty.

So she did what any reasonable millennial would do and started secretly building her escape route by posting on Instagram where her boss wouldn't find her. 😉

When she dropped $1,000 on her first online business course, she was like a lot of new freelancers, believing the gurus who promised that building an online biz would be easy peasy lemon squeezy.

Spoiler: It wasn't.

The first eight months went by without a single sale.

And when she finally did land her first client, she accepted it out of pure desperation… building both a website and custom gym software for a cheerleading facility.

(Never mind that she'd never cheered a day in her life, and her only experience with gym software was booking the occasional Pilates class.)

It was wildly out of character for her — a glaring sign that something needed to change. Fast.

Then, after hitting her first $10k month (which, btw, Kendall called a total fluke month), she quit her corporate job.

And lived happily ever after!

… Just kidding.

She still took plenty of wrong turns after that, including posting content that didn’t bring in leads, and building up a huge agency, only to burn it all down and return to solo services.

So let’s flash forward to today, where Kendall runs a crazy successful solo writing business.

Kendall brings in over $250k annually through B2B ghostwriting services.

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When I asked her to reverse engineer the steps she took to build her writing business, I was expecting her to say something like this:

1. Niched down
2. Got great at pitching
3. Good referral network

But her answer cut through all the typical freelance advice I see online.

It wasn’t declaring a niche. It wasn’t fancy networking events. And it wasn’t building a following online.

✨ It was what she calls “sales touchpoints that glitter everywhere in my content.”

That, and really important mindset work.

She’s too good to paraphrase, so let’s hear from the queen herself:

"My biggest frustration with this whole 'creator economy' thing," she says, her voice rising with the kind of intensity that only comes from lived experience, "is that everyone is so obsessed with growth hacks and these little tricks they think will create more money.”

“I've tried it all — and you know what happened? I only got more burnt out and didn't make any f***ing money. It was insane."

"Truly, the only things I've ever done in this business to actually see the money in my bank account, see the time free up on my calendar, and work with dream clients was making sure my content wasn't just 'good content' – it was always selling.”

“Every touchpoint.

Every email.

Every LinkedIn post.

Everywhere on my website."

(And the mic drop moment:)

“I'm not a 'creator'. I'm a business owner who happens to create content. There's a difference."

With less than 1,500 followers (at the time we first talked) and just over 500 newsletter subscribers, she maintains a steady stream of high-paying clients through this approach of subtle selling everywhere.

If you want to see what a service-based content ecosystem looks like in action, spend some time reading Kendall's content. It doesn’t always get a ton of engagement, but it brings in a TON of leads behind the scenes.

I recorded a Loom video breaking down three examples of how she sprinkles "sales touchpoints" throughout her content.

Here's what I noticed 👇

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These days, Kendall’s business runs on boundaries that would make any recovering corporate girl proud:

• She spends ~90% or more of her time in her zone of genius (writing/storytelling)
• Restricts calls to preserve her creative energy
• Closes sales without taking sales calls
• Maintains a highly leveraged sales and content ecosystem instead of creating fresh content weekly

And it works.

She's ghostwritten for heavy hitters like Codie Sanchez and Kit, with two books in the pipeline for next year.

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🤫 The Secret

Kendall didn’t just wake up one day with the sudden ability to sell her services like a boss. It took a lot of mindset work behind the scenes to believe that what she had to sell was actually worth it.

And that’s the real gold that not enough people talk about online.

Because let’s be honest… it way more fun to post top-of-funnel content online. It takes less planning, it usually gets more engagement, and gives us a nice little dopamine hit when new followers roll in.
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But real secret isn't about growth hacks on LinkedIn, or any platform for that matter. It's about having the courage to SELL YOUR STUFF like glitter everywhere.

And for Kendall, this was:

1. Treating every piece of content as an opportunity to sell — but doing it so naturally that it feels like a conversation (remember: ✨), not a pitch
2. Taking time for the messy, uncomfortable work of believing in your value instead of searching for the next growth hack
3. Building a business based on what actually works for you, not what the creator economy says you "should" do

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Now, of course, there's always room for nuance here. You might be a freelancer who wants to eventually run a creator business instead of offering services.

Or maybe you're not even sure what path you want to take, and you’re just having fun making content right now. There's nothing wrong with that.

But, it’s important to know the difference.

Are you running a creator business, or are you a business owner who happens to create content?

If it's the latter, take a page from Kendall's book and sprinkle those sales touchpoints into your content like glitter ✨.

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💜 A Few Cool Things in Freelanceland

1. I'm creating a "Write a Better LinkedIn Bio" workshop and looking for 5 beta testers who get first (free) access in exchange for honest feedback. Reply to this email if you're interested!
2. Sign up for Kendall Cherry's newsletter, Wallflower Fridays, to learn more about growing your business by telling stories that sell.
3. My friend Renee Frojo is hosting a retreat in Mexico for service-based solopreneurs who want to grow strategically and intentionally. (Please sign up to go so I can live vicariously through you!)

Thanks for reading, Reader! I'll be back in 2 weeks with more freelancery stories.

Talk soon,

Erika

Ps - If you're also a writer, you know how long this took me to put together. Can you help me grow this newsletter by forwarding this link to a freelancer friend who would dig it?

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Thanks for hanging out! I'm Erika, a fractional content strategist, content lead @ ZenMaid, and freelance ghostwriter. When I'm not writing this newsletter, I'm probably watching Bluey with my daughter (why is it so good? 🥹).