We recently connected with Amy Hayes and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Amy, thanks for joining us today. Have you been 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? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

I have been earning a full-time living from my creative work for over 10 years now. I actually started out in interior design, having studied in London and Paris before ending up in Melbourne, Australia working for a boutique design firm. That design firm had a WordPress website, which is what spurred the idea for me to create my own website once I returned to the States and started looking for work. What began as a design portfolio evolved into a travel blog, and ended up being the platform that launched a freelance career in not only graphic and web design, but also travel media and freelance writing for magazines. That first website was called Créatrice Mondial – French for “global creator” – which became my company name when I decided to focus my creative skills and open The Global Creator Studio as a full-time web designer in 2016.

The key aspect of my success from my creative work, from my perspective, is personal relationships. My blogging and media days helped me to increase my digital knowledge and form connections with individuals and companies across a variety of industries, who were all active in the digital space. My blog acted as my first portfolio piece, allowing me to showcase my design skills and begin developing a reputation for my aesthetic eye. These personal relationships also lead to opportunities to collaborate with other highly talented creative talents, further expanding my reach and reputation.

Today, personal relationships are still the primary driver of The GC Studio, with 100% of my clients coming from referrals.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I jokingly call myself an “accidental web designer”. I was often focused on building my own platforms, while exploring various business models, and people in my network kept asking me for help with their websites. Eventually it dawned on me to embrace what people were already asking for my help with, and own my career as a web designer.

Today, I am the lead web designer and creative director at The Global Creator Studio, where we help entrepreneurs and small companies elevate both the impression and impact of their online presence. I like to use the phrase “digital organizer” to explain what I do, as my specialty lies in combining strategy with design in order to move a client’s digital “puzzle pieces” around until things just click.

I look at each touchpoint as part of a whole, and craft a high-level strategy for inviting people further into a client’s world, and then tailor each piece of content – whether it’s a website page, social profile, or email campaign – to match where that person is on the client journey.

I also take into account a client’s longer term vision, so that we can make sure that whatever we build today for a website and tech stack will be a great match for where that client’s business is today, provide a foundation for the brand to grow, and support those future goals.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

I’ve pivoted several times in my life and career, but the one that sticks out most in my memory is when I pivoted from freelance writer and blogger, which launched my creative career, to full-time web designer. Being a writer and travel media professional meant that I needed to be more visible – building social media profiles, pitching editors, having my name in bylines. I loved being a part of the media world, but it also extracted a higher cost as far as energy, unpaid legwork, and producing at volume. I started to find that career didn’t align with my own longer term vision for my life. People were already asking me for help with building their websites, so it felt natural to slow down on the freelance media hustling, and say yes to more web design projects. Being “behind the screen” allowed me to focus on supporting my clients in growing their platforms, drawing from my years of experience “in the trenches”. Making this pivot never felt like a tremendous amount of effort or work, I think because I was fine-tuning my own definition of personal and professional alignment, which is exactly what I get to help my clients with today.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I don’t have a goal to grow my company to a certain amount of team members or a certain number of projects per year. My mission has truly been to use my combination of creativity and tech skills to help my clients be better able to step into their highest superpower, and show up and serve. Everyone DIYs in the beginning stages, but eventually you don’t need to be the one building your website, or your landing pages, or your email automations, and figuring out how all those things integrate to play nicely. I love being able to remove those tech headaches, and do so through simple strategies and elevated design.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thegcstudio.com/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amylynnehayes/