EFA Conference 2025 Recap
15-minute read.
Introduction
Filled so many pages of my notebook!
On September 5 and 6, I was able to attend the annual Editorial Freelance Association (EFA) virtual conference. It was two days of sessions, networking, and feeling relief from being with other book people! One thing I often experience, not only as a freelancer or a remote worker, but that as a publishing professional, it’s hard to meet other publishing professionals. I also enjoyed the conference format of using both standard Zoom sessions for each presentation, and getting to mingle in the meeting platform Gather. I had never used the digital meeting space before but I love how gamified it is and the creativity that goes into the space. It was a great alternative to awkwardly networking as a talking head in Zoom.
A little background. The EFA is just what it sounds like— a group of freelancers working in editorial. We are a worldwide organization and respresented occupations include editors, copyeditors, indexers, beta readers, and so much more. Many of the speakers at our annual conference have their own businesses, whether they’re sole proprietors, LLCs, or something else. Everyone brought something unique to the table, and no two presenters had the same exact background or skillset. Many EFA members, like myself, base their hourly or per-word rates on the standard set by the association every year. It’s not only resources like the rate calculator that make the EFA helpful, but also their member directory, consistent online classes, and local chapter subgroups.
This was my first time attending the annual conference, as I am a relatively new member to the EFA. I learned a lot from these sessions that tackled topics ranging from steps to locking in clients to what the environmental cost of AI usage means in publishing. In this blog post, I’ll go over some of my key takeaways and shout out the expert speakers who made each session knowledgeable and worthwhile. The sessions I attended can be broken down into three categories, business management, efficient working tips, and editorial ethics.
Down to Business
Any small-business owner, solo-prenuer, or serious side hustler knows that at the end of the day, you’re responsible for a lot when you are your own boss. There’s liberation when it comes to freelancing (whether that be full or part time), but there’s also trepidation. I have now been a full-time freelance editorial worker for one year (!!), and even though I have the business basics down (hopefully!), I still learned so much from these operations-focused sessions. Particularly when it came to pricing and business goals, as well as business operational health and the importance of financial statements.
Pricing and Goals
One aspect of freelancing that I think a lot of people struggle with is not just what to charge clients for services, but how that pricing structure ties into our overall business goals. Every professional’s style of work and services offered are different, so pricing the work you do is going to be unique on some level. My preference is to charge by the word as opposed to hourly or a flat project rate. That doesn’t work for some people, and that’s okay. But no matter how we charge, it’s good to look at what the annual income goal for your business will be and have a guideline for how much you need to be charging not exclusively per project, but per month or quarter.
Michelle Guiliano of Line by Line Editing, and founder Indexer Indexing, taught us editors that it’s important to follow our needs, not just the standards or norms for pricing. What this means is that while it’s helpful to use typical rates put forward by associations (thank you, EFA!!), it’s also good to take a macro-level view of your business needs and assess each project’s complexity to find a realistic price point. Michelle showed us an extremely helpful tool that some might have used similar versions of. I typically use the EFA’s rate calculator when getting a baseline quote for my projects. There is another calculator created by Indexer Indexing that is similar to the EFA’s tool but takes into account a few more considerations, like income tax, business expenses, billable hours, and working weeks.
To me, the Indexer Indexing calculator is that macro tool for yearly planning. What do my business expenses look like as a person who works from home?What do I consider my billable working hours versus my nonbillable working hours? How much do I need to make in a year to maintain my lifestyle and grow savings? When you have these important pieces, using a tool like this rate calculator helps one understand target goals per project to reach success.
This concept can be applied to any freelancer or business owner, not only editorial workers. But both the EFA rate calculator and the Indexer Indexing rate calculator are great resources for our industry. Later in this post, I will delve into the importance of sticking to one’s value when negotiating pricing, but that concept also applies to general goal setting. If you are working on complex projects, do you raise your price based on the complexity?
Operations and (Scary) Statements
I was pretty confident when learning about pricing and goal setting. I was less so during the operations and financials presentations. These, to me, are scary. Personally, I tend to not think of myself as a business at all. I just see myself as an editor who has a pretty low-key work setup. But Rachel Thompson of Daring Studios (and editor at Teal Edits) shifted my perspective. All it took to flip the switch was the idea that a lot of what I do day-to-day or week-to-week is actually “business-facing work” as opposed to editorial work. This can include bookkeeping, admin, tech, contracts, invoicing, and social media. It’s not anything I charge for…but it’s all work. If I was working at a full-time job, I wouldn’t be doing any of this (unless my specific job was in one of those departments, which it would not be).
In addition to categorizing the work I do just for my own needs, I want to do it so I can thoroughly conduct business operations assessments. Rachel recommended doing this roughly every six months, but this can be done as frequently as needed, on a small or large scale. The main purpose is to get an overview of how your business is doing in terms of processes, systems, and goals. It’s helpful to break it up into business foundations, engagement (clients, partners, leads), outreach, and action items. This is something I am excited to take time and think deeply about in order to have a full understanding of where I am as a freelancer and where I want to be. Rachel also offers a free 20-minute discovery call to learn more about her assessment techniques and other business-building tips. I highly recommend, as her session was helpful!
Now, the even scarier part for me…the finances. I track what I make per job, track what I might spend on business needs, and try to keep track of what platform each revenue source comes from. That’s about it. Kimberly Johnson and Kina Morgan from Your Balanced Partners taught me I have a lot of other financial aspects to think about, including statements. While much of their presentation covered key facts and definitions (gross profit…net income…liquidity…oh my!), the biggest takeaway for me was that even as a sole proprietor, having some kind of financial statement handy is not only helpful for any possible outside review, but to uncover my professional financial health, identify trends and risks, and prep for expenses (like taxes). My next steps are to sit down, utilize the tools I learned from other sessions (e.g., planning my target service charges for annual income goals), and figure out which type of statement is right for me. This could be a balance sheet, an income statement, or a cash flow statement. Oh, and I am repeating my new mantra “don’t forget that nonbillable hours are operating expenses!” until it becomes second nature.
Working Efficiently
This was the bulkiest category for me, as I gravitated towards sessions that blended business know-how with specifics on how to succeed as an editor. I try to work as closely to a “regular” workday (9am-5pm) as possible, but even when I worked full-time for publishing companies, life gets in the way. And I find that I work better with flexibility, something only freelancing really gives you. Intentional time management, winning a client by authentically selling your services, and email marketing techniques are all areas I do aim to improve on and feel like I can now thanks to what I learned.
Intentional Time Management
I am an organized person. Or, I think I am. I have a physical planner (my go-to brand is Agendio because it is so customizable), I use Notion for digital planning, and I have my calendar app(s) as synced as possible. But at the end of the day, all that goes out the window if I’m not intentional with my work time. Katie Chambers from Beacon Point led an excellent seminar on how to not only be organized in a typical sense, but how to break down and assess what your work looks like so you can be thoughtful with how you are spending your time as a freelancer. And the key here is that no two freelancers will have the same schedule.
One of Katie’s points that had the biggest impact on me was that work time can be viewed as 70% billable and 30% admin. This is for work in general, including project-specific work and work that is just for the sake of the business (like me writing this blog post right now). What that breakdown looks like to you is going to be different, and if you are truly embracing the flexible work lifestyle, it might be different every day. But having a rough goal of how you are working each day will help with the intentionality, even if that is subject to change. For us editors, a lot of our breakdown is very project dependent. Thinking back to what the overall goal for our annual income might be, it’s helpful to see not just how long it’s taking us to work on projects, but what we’re getting done during that time. If I developmentally edit 20 pages one day, and it takes six hours, how many working hours did I use and how many do I have left for the week?
Katie has a project tracker she created for editors, whether you have set hours or no set hours. What I like about her tracker is that the option for not having set hours tracks by word. I have set hours, but charge by the word, so this is a great tool for me.
Securing a Client by Authentic Selling
There is so much nuance when it comes to promoting your services as a small business or individual. At least, that’s what it’s felt like for me. Even writing this blog is a type of promotional connection, as I’m hoping that circulating my writing helps bring awareness to my website. And all of that marketing work means piecing together the content I want to grow, how I want to grow it, and what avenues I’ll take to get there. Many of us, myself included, think of social media as the easiest way to promote. While I do enjoy my weekly social media posts, two sessions during this conference helped not only expand my idea of advertising as a freelancer but also how to use these tools to really win over a client through authenticity.
The two sessions really worked in tandem with each other to tackle the idea of securing a client through “authentic selling.” Erin Brenner of Right Touch Editing gave us the tools to practice active listening with our prospective clients. She also reminded us all that part of fostering authentic connections with your clients is to be honest with yourself about what the value of your work is. Negotiate your work, not your value. Lowering the price of a service should mean lowering what you are putting into that service, as to not be underpaid for your skills. I think this concept is especially difficult for us freelancers because we want to close the deals, get the job, and make sure our business is moving forward.
Part of this, in my opinion, is also a sign of respect towards the client. Being honest with the services you believe a project requires when discussing the work with your prospective patron shows that you listened to their needs and are identifying solutions to any issues. What the client is comfortable paying for and having done to their material is up to them, but the honesty on our side as editors goes a long way. This idea does tie into the concept of saying no and passing on jobs that aren’t right for us. And that’s okay!
While these conversations are happening, it’s also important to take time to properly track and manage the different touch points. Jeanette Smith, AKA Jeanette the Writer, taught us how to qualify leads, be helpful with our information, and track and nurture these leads. When an author and I are first communicating with each other, it’s almost like an interview on both sides. They want to know if I am the right editor for their project, but equally, I want to know if this project is right for me. Again, we have the idea of saying no when it’s the right thing to do, and being okay with the loss. One key element that I learned from Jeanette was that tracking leads really does go a long way. Even if you aren’t turning that contact into a client directly, having authors remember me and what I provide will help foster connections to other authors.
Email Marketing
Note that I am loosely connecting marketing, promotion, and advertising together, when in reality, I know they are all separate functions that require dedicated time and skills. While I mentioned that I do like social media posting, I don’t do lot of other outreach outside of the platforms I use for work, like Reedsy, Thumbtack, and the EFA job board. While this is an area I need to think about and see if it’s really right for me, Jennifer Navarre of Navarre Editorial Services gave an excellent introduction to email marketing for book professionals. I learned so much, like the legal requirements of email marketing (you need to have a visible unsubscribe option and a visible mailing address), and ideas for lead magnets (reasons why people sign up to your newsletter).
Email marketing in the form of a newsletter seems potentially fun, as I do enjoy writing. But it also seems like it’s something that you should be more certain of before jumping into. I’d like to increase my trust factor with my community of authors by showing that human, personal side of me. And I’d like to expand my clientele and grow my business.
Editorial Ethics
These were some of my favorite sessions! I learned a lot from the business and workflow sessions mentioned previously, but getting into the deep dives on genuine issues I face almost daily really helped round out my experience over the two days. The two sessions I went to were on the environmental impact of artificial intelligence (AI) in publishing and on conscious, inclusive language choices.
The Cost of AI
I’ll be honest, I do not use AI. I do use some programs and software that implement AI features, but I avoid using those features if I can. I do my best to not participate in AI usage on the whole. You can dig deeper into my some of my thoughts on AI in the book world in January’s blog post on the assessment of 10 reading tacker platforms (Goodreads, StoryGraph, etc.). This session was, admittedly, more of a confirmation on what I already knew, but from the perspective of professional in the field and how this issue tends to relate to publishing specifically.
Amy Frushour Kelly of Frushour AI Consulting & Editorial gave us one main takeaway, among many important pieces of insight and data. The takeaway— if you are using AI, please use it meaningfully. Every prompt you put into an AI generator has a cost. Output of an AI piece of media means a data center is using electricity and cooling elements. Different locations around the world have varying levels of carbon footprints. Places that rely on coal power for energy will have a higher carbon footprint than a place that relies on solar power. But nothing is 100% clean energy. And the complexity of your prompt means more joules (unit to measure energy) used.
Editorial usage with AI can include generating text, images, music, and video. That doesn’t even include administrative features like note taking or summarizing. As editorial professionals, I agree with Amy’s belief that we have a responsibility to be mindful of out environmental footprint, as much as we are mindful of things like copyright, accuracy, or bias in writing. While I might not use AI tools, a lot of editors and authors do. What should we do, as editors, to ensure our work is as environmentally conscious as possible? How can we influence those around us to make sure their AI usage is meaningful and not just convenient when it is marketed as a tool for convenience?
If you’re interested in learning more, Amy does a free, monthly ethics in AI discussion via Zoom the first Monday of every month.
Inclusive and Conscious Language
What I have found during my time not only as a freelance editor but as an editor in general is that conscious, inclusive language choices not only help shape how we see marginalized groups, but also make our writing much richer and more enjoyable. There are many authors who try to implement this practice in their writing and need some help, as we all do time to time, with words and phrases they might miss. But there are authors who see this practice as censorship, believing they are entitled to write whatever they want even at the expense of others.
Dayna M. Reidenouer of True Love Editorial Services showed me that so many other editors have similar situations I do. We editors work with clients who, I’ll be honest, have varying degrees of intentionality, but we do feel it is our responsibility to ensure the writing is as inclusive as possible. Dayna opened the session stating a key takeaway from the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis: The way we use language can and will affect the way we perceive the world. Once I heard this, I knew I was in the right session! Dayna focused a lot of their session on disability, and how disabled characters are often depicted morally (as props), medically (in dehumanized manners), or socially (is the goal to change the person to fit society, or change society to help all people?). While this is important on its own, I think this mindset can be used for a range of marginalized demographics in writing. And how we, as editors, should be doing our best to keep a look out for conscious language swaps.
Conscious and inclusive language, to me, also means more exciting and dynamic writing. Showing the reader rich scenes and depictions as opposed to telling them something is going to make for an inherently better read. Thinking carefully about language is for the benefit of the reader, giving them a fully formed, evocative reading experience. After this session, I am interested in being more upfront about including conscious language checks (I am doing these already, but I like the idea of being upfront with the term as part of my service). I’m looking into purchasing the Conscious Style Guide (Little, Brown Spark, 2024) from Karen Yin to reference.
Recap
As a first-time attendee of the annual EFA conference, I had a great two-day experience. I not only learned a lot from the sessions, but also got to connect with other editors and learn about their businesses. While the conference was virtual, it was a great reminder that there are so many freelance book professionals out there and that I’m not really alone, even if it feels like it sometimes. Many other people share similar issues with clients, dry spells when work isn’t as plentiful as we’d like, and love for reading and writing.
The concepts that resonated with me the most included:
Following my needs when it comes to pricing, workload, and type of work provided.
Assess my general business operation roughly twice a year.
Financial statements help uncover my business’ financial health.
Work can be, roughly, broken down into 70% billable hours and 30% nonbillable hours.
Negotiating your work, not your value, is not only good for me as a worker but also more honest for my client, and that is part of client-centric thinking.
Tracking leads can pay off in the long run, even if something didn’t work out immediately.
The legalities of email marketing campaigns (and why they are important!).
Environmental footprints are our responsibility as editors, just like other ethical issues in publishing.
Be clear with conscious language checks, because it’s important to make it known.
I can’t wait to attend next year’s conference and learn from some informative presenters. I look forward to taking what I learned this year and applying it to my work as an editor, and as a first-time business operator. Thank you to the EFA staff and volunteers who organized and managed the conference, and to the speakers!