RVE 181: Going from Freelancer to Agency with Amber from Road Warrior Creative

Eight weeks after the birth of her daughter, Amber went back to her full-time job and spent her workdays away from her baby. Shortly after, her husband, Chris, was offered an executive chef position at a new restaurant which meant working from 7 AM to 1 AM most days.

As you can expect with a new baby, this was really tough. They wanted to spend time with their growing family (something I can relate to now :P).

Because of this, Amber quit her job to give freelance web development a chance and in this episode, we really dive into where that one decision has taken her family. She has grown from a Wordpress freelancer to running a full-fledged marketing agency offering services like website development, branding, SEO, design, and much more. Now with multiple employees, Chris was even able to quit his job and came on as the COO managing business operations.

One of my favorite parts of this interview is when Amber shares how she started her freelance work without any prior business experience. For so many people—myself included—freelancing is something we jump into as a great way to make money on the road even if and especially when we have no other entrepreneurial experience. In this episode Amber covers all these early roadblocks she experienced when starting out, everything from finding new clients to figuring out how to bill them.

The other thing that stuck out to me in this episode was how Amber decided to create a specific niche for her agency. Niching down is something we all like to say is a good thing, but in reality most people struggle to niche down and end up trying to be all things to all people. We talk about how Amber and Chris were able to hone in on a specific vertical of businesses they would serve with RoadWarrior Creative.

What else we talk about in this episode: Amber's entrepreneurial journey from freelancer to managing multiple employees Their solution for not spending time with their kids Amber's secrets for how to attract higher volume clients How Amber intentionally (and unintentionally) paired her business down to two specific niches of client The tools Amber says are worth paying for when running a real business (AKA once your business goes beyond just you and has multiple employees) The travel strategy that allows them to stay available to their clients