I often get questions from writers about retainer clients. Writers want to know how to find them. Or they are stressed that they don’t have any. Writers often assume that, in order to earn a high income, they must have retainer clients. 

I personally don’t think that’s true. Yes, it’s great if you can get a retainer. But I’ve earned six figures since 2015 (except for 2019) and $200K/year for the past two years. And I’ve only actually had one retainer client in my entire career, which lasted 8 months and ended in 2017. Yes, that means I earned six figures without any retainer clients. And I honestly don’t think not having a retainer client made my journey one bit harder. 

And I’m not the only one. I know many $100K freelancers and $200K freelancers who have none or very few retainer clients. But each of them does have reliable and regular anchor clients. 

So the short version of my answer is that I think that having anchor clients is a million percent the secret to earning a high income. And if one of your anchor clients happens to be a retainer client, then that’s a *ding ding* bonus. 

What is the difference between retainer and anchor clients?

Many writers think that the term anchor and retainer clients are interchangeable. But they actually are pretty different things. In a retainer agreement, the client pays you upfront for your services to reserve your time and you are paid regardless of if you work all (or even any) during the given time period (usually monthly). The client pays for you to be available if they need you. Many retainer agreements for writers include a set number of hours, but they could be set up for a certain word count, number of blog posts, or some other type of deliverable.

For example, a bank client hires you on a retainer agreement for 20 hours a month for blog writing. Some months they send you 10 hours of work and some months you work all 20. But they pay you for the full 20 hours even in those months that they don’t use all the hours. They are paying you to guarantee that you will have the time in your schedule to do their work. 

On the other hand, anchor clients are those who regularly send you work, but do not have to pay you if they do not send you work. You may even have a contract for X blogs per month but they pay you for the work you complete, not to reserve your availability. Other anchor clients don’t have a set volume of work per week or month, but they regularly send you assignments. 

For example, I work regularly for the IBM Security Intelligence blog through Industry Dive, which I consider an anchor client. I don’t have a set number of articles a month, but I’ve earned $20K a year from this project for the past two years. Sometimes the client assigns me stories while other times I pitch stories I want to write about. I consider them one of my main anchor clients. 

However, the downside is that the work isn’t guaranteed. Another of my anchor clients went on pause at the beginning of the month. So instead of $3K a month in Feb that I expected, I got zero from them. The client expects it to pick back up soon, but who the heck knows what will happen? 

Retainers can be hard to land

You are probably wondering at this point why I’m not recommending retainers as the ultimate holy grail since they have more guaranteed income.  The reason is that they are pretty hard to land and relatively rare. But if you can get a client to sign you up on a retainer agreement, then you should absolutely consider whether it makes sense for your business, especially if it’s a longer retainer like 6 months or a year. 

Many clients are hesitant to hire freelancers on retainer for exactly the same reason that freelancers love them – it’s guaranteed payment regardless of if they have any work for you that week or month. That’s a hard sell, especially in today’s uncertain economy. And it’s hard for companies to fully predict their needs right this moment as well. 

I think many writers think of retainers as the key to success and say no to potentially great anchor clients in favor of waiting for retainer clients, which makes it hard to build a business. And I see many writers spend way too much time marketing for retainer clients, which means that they are not getting their message in front of other clients who may hire them and turn into amazing anchor clients. 

Even more challenging, most companies are not going to hire an unknown-to-them writer on retainer because then they are stuck with you. So in my experience retainer agreements are MORE likely to come from existing anchor clients than brand-new clients. 

I also personally find retainer agreements to be stressful. I find having to hold my time makes it hard to plan my life and other work. I prefer that straight model of getting paid for what I do. But that may just be my own personal preference. During the retainer agreement that I had, I worried that the client would end the arrangement because they weren’t using all the hours. Spoiler alert – I was right. But I know many other writers who find a lot of comfort in having retainer agreements.

Anchor clients are the key

In my personal experience, it’s totally possible to earn a crapton of money without a single retainer client. And if you are wondering how to land an anchor client, check out my recently updated post on turning current clients into anchor clients. 

I personally think anchor clients are the key to success and that as writers we should aim to only take clients that have anchor client potential – meaning that they have ongoing work, we expect to like enough to want to work with for years, and they are a client where we are likely to succeed and turn into their favorite freelancer. 

Then if one of those anchor clients offers regular work and wants you to have consistent availability, then bring up the option of a retainer. And, if one of your anchor clients wants to put you on retainer, then absolutely take the time to see if it’s the right move for you. 

But I would consider a retainer as a bonus. It’s a great option when you can make it happen (most of the time, you have to proactively suggest it). But don’t stay so focused on retainers that you miss out on some really awesome and high-paying anchor clients that just may be the cornerstone of earning a high income. 

What is your experience with anchor clients and retainers? Any tips for landing retainer clients?