We were lucky to catch up with Heather Martin recently and have shared our conversation below.
Heather, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Are you able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen?
Yes! Much to my surprise. I had freelanced as a writer and an editor off and on for years but never felt like I had the financial resources or entrepreneurial chutzpah to hang out my own shingle. But in 2007 when I left a job as publisher of a business weekly in Dayton, Ohio, to write curriculum for a small organizational development company, I had the flexibility to start freelancing again. I ended up building a small base of repeat clients and started to imagine that I could make a go of it on my own. It took me eight more years to take the leap, but in 2015, I jumped into the self-employment waters—mostly. I kept a quarter-time communications position at the tech company I moved to in 2013. So there was a bit of a safety net there. I don’t think I would change anything about my journey, really. I held onto that quarter-time position for a couple of years, for the money and the security, until I found enough clients and was getting enough word-of-mouth referrals that I could go 100% freelance. Not that I haven’t worked hard for what I’ve accomplished, but I do feel like there’s been a lot of luck involved. There have definitely been times when I’ve said “Yeah, I can do that” and then had to research and teach myself how to do at least part of it. And then it would work out and the client would be happy and would hire me again or refer me to other clients, and now here I am. Writing this at a desk in a spare bedroom in a house on a quiet street in Dayton. I’m living my best life. (:
Heather, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I’ve been a professional writer and editor since 1991, when I graduated from Wittenberg University with a bachelor’s degree in English. For the next year and a half, I was a reporter at a community newspaper in a suburb south of Dayton, Ohio. I covered school board meetings and zoning meetings and combed through police reports. I did person-on-the-street interviews at community festivals and went to a lot of ribbon cuttings. I made close to zero dollars, but still, someone was paying me to write. In 1992, I went back to school, and earned a master’s degree from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. After that, nearly every full-time job I had was as an editor or a writer—I’m grateful that I have always been paid to do what I went to school for and what I love. I think what sets MartinInk apart is that, especially since my husband left his job as an English teacher to work with me, we have an unusually wide variety of skills. He is a curriculum development expert—partly because of the teaching job and partly because he worked for an educational publisher in the early 2000s. I have experience as a factor checker, a proofreader, a copy editor, a writer, a graphic designer, and an executive coach. On any given day, we might be proofreading conference proceedings or coaching (even ghost writing for) an author or writing and designing everything from websites to annual reports.
I think I’m most proud of the fact that we’re a spouse team with complementary skills and that we work as hard as we have to to make sure our clients are delighted.
Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?
My husband is my business partner. We met in a stock room behind the bookstore where we both worked in the early 1990s. I was about to leave for the day, and he came in to grab some books for his section. I was an expeditor and I’d heard the store had hired another one, so I asked him, “Are you the new expeditor?” He answered, “No. I’m just an old bookseller.” And 30 years later, here we are, editing books together.
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
Referrals from current clients. That’s why we work so hard to make sure everyone who hires us is delighted with what we deliver, and if they’re not, we do it again until they are.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.martinink.net/
Image Credits
Allie Gambill Photography