Question for people working in an office/for a company in some way

Business Entrepreneurship
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First, I have no idea if this belongs in the working in Taiwan section or this one. Figure the mod can make that judgement call.

Anyway, I’m a freelance copywriter. Moved here in February. I work pretty exclusively with sustainability type companies, businesses working to mitigate climate change, industrial hemp companies–bioplastics, fiber, building, etc. (I’m not here to discuss if climate change is real. If that’s your jam, please do it somewhere else. It was 52.2C in Iran three days ago.) My client roster is all western companies and my business is registered in the US.

But I’ve been flirting with the idea of pitching some Taiwanese companies, since, after all, I live here, and it seems like an interesting challenge. Do they work with freelancers? I know remote work isn’t much of a thing here. I won’t work in an office. Fuck that shit. Where would I find Taiwanese companies that do that kind of work? LinkedIn doesn’t seem to be used much in Taiwan. Also, although I’m learning Chinese, for the purposes of this, my skills are zilch.

Is it dumb to even be considering working with Taiwanese companies? Should I just pop on over to the why are foreigners so weird thread? I know that marketing isn’t always valued here.

Any insights from people who know more than me would be helpful. Thanks in advance.

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Do you have a company that issues Fapiaos? What’s your ARC?

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I had to look up what fapiaos are. But yeah, I send invoices for projects. I use Stripe for my invoicing. Don’t really understand the question about my ARC. It’s an ARC. I’m married to a Taiwanese and as far as I know I can work here.

4

If that’s your ARC, then you can get any job in Taiwan, even at 7-Eleven, if they’ll hire you.
If by freelance copywriter, you mean maybe editor of other people’s English writing, then there are plenty of jobs in Taiwan for that, with some even posting here. Though, you may not get lucky to get WFH jobs. If by freelance, you mean you are writing articles and selling to others, that’s a whole other ball game.

1 Like
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Considering this:

I’d say it probably wouldn’t be worth the aggravation of dealing with companies that will lowball you mercilessly and don’t really care that much about the quality of their English copy. The ones that do already have inhouse people for that.

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Idk… I would describe it like an airplane.
His day is filled with empty seats (time). If someone is lowballing him, but he still has free time to do it, maybe while watching TV in the background or swilling some beer, then it’s still money in the bank, albeit at lower wage. Certainly there would be a limit to what he’s willing to do, knowing his own sector’s typical wage in US and maybe in Taiwan. :2cents:

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True. I guess it depends on how you value your time. Also may just want to tap into the local ecosystem since he’s living here.

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Yes, my company hired freelancers for technical writing before they hired me. Spent a pretty penny on it too.

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I write marketing and advertising, with editing as a service too if that’s what people want. I write articles too, but for the purposes of this question, those can be ignored.

That’s a big part of what I was wondering.

This is not exactly what I do all day. I wish, but alas, no.

This is it, right here. Just thought it would be a fun challenge since I live here. But if it’s not worth it, so be it.

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Which part do you want to delve into? Writing marketing material or vanilla editing?

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If that’s your motivation, I’d say go for it then. No harm in taking on a few projects to get a feel for the local market. Just keep your expectations low.

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I know a few people who do freelance copywriting and make bank, without issuing fapiaos. I do it on the side too sometimes, for Taiwanese companies.

The key is having a strong portfolio.

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I don’t do line editing. I’ll clean up a there/their/they’re if I see it, but true editing is about framing the message coherently and consistently.

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Which is part of my question. If LinkedIn isn’t used much here, where would I find companies, and English speakers at those companies?

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Can’t really help you there. 100% of my work has come through connections developed over the years. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Mostly the nephew of the owner. :wink:

I think there very few foreign copywriters in Taiwan, although there are some.

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yes, companies work with free lancers, but the pay is probably lower than what you get from western companies.
for comparison, our company pays between 3NT and 8NT per word, so you can benchmark this vis a vis your existing rates and see if its worth it to look for TW companies, or try to increase your USA clients.

I would look for TW companies in your industry first, try and find their marketing manager and then pitch to them. that way your product to market fit will be better.

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That’s about 25 cents USD. Not bad.

That’s what I do for western clients. I just don’t really understand the landscape here for this stuff.

Ok, I think I have enough of an answer here to just keep doing what I’m doing, and put this on the backburner again for a while. If something comes up, I’ll look into it more. Thanks everyone.

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unfortunately i dont know anything about your industry (climate change etc. ) so i can’t give any advice.

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It’s just companies working to curb climate change in however they operate. Whether that’s shunning plastic and developing bioplastic. Solar and wind energy. New building technology. Basically trying to break us free from the addiction to fossil fuels. A lot of new materials stuff/super old, rediscovered materials. Hemp, miscanthus, bamboo, algae, etc…Carbon tracking systems, etc…Increasing biodiversity, preventing deforestation. Bunch of stuff.