I recently got a job as an in-house grant writer, but am also establishing a freelance service on the side, which I eventually want to run full-time.

This may have been addressed elsewhere, but if anyone has any advice on how to make time for client calls w/o interrupting your day job, I'd greatly appreciate it. Assuming your potential clients have the same 9-5 schedule, how do you communicate or address the fact that you won't be able to work with them during normal business hours?

Many thanks in advance,

Ryan

RYANCARR.NET

Hey Ryan,

I had the same challenge a few years ago when I got into web design and I managed to return calls on the hour I had between my lunch and AM and PM breaks, but most of my communication was via email so it was no problem doing that at night.

I was also upfront with my clients and some even prefered to chat in the evening when they had more time and weren't surrounded with other business headaches.

Cheers,

Steve

Hi Ryan,

Before I quit my day job (and said goodbye to a horrendous commute into the city), I did all of my freelance copywriting on the side. If a client insisted on speaking with me during business hours, I'd simply take my cell phone out to my car. If I had to explain why I wasn't in my "office", I'd simply say that I was on the road meeting with clients.

I did this for about 6 months before I went full-time. Like Steve, most of my contact was via e-mail so it never really became an issue.