2023: Annual Business Review

This post was original posted on Elevate Data Visualization Learning Community behind the paywall and is now available here for free as Elevate closed its door in 2025.

The context

I have been freelancing for  6 years (with moments of full-time jobs temporarily). In January '23, I quit my job at Pentagram after 10 months as a FT employee, to go back to being full-time freelancing!

I just moved back to Los Angeles, the 6th most expensive city in the world. After living for a year in New York, the 3rd most expensive.

I’m financially responsible for my husband and I. He has been unemployed for 3 years, without financial support because the U.S. pretty much does not have social security. This means I’m responsible not only for bringing in all income but also for health insurance as we have no sponsored benefits.

The numbers below are in USD $.

Let's talk money

The hot topic: how much did I make this year?

Let's be real.

This is a ton of money and I don't understand what this means, especially coming from a country where a six-figure salary in the first place is considered very very wealthy. I can't believe I have doubled my income in a couple of years.

This was my first year investing in my business by hiring freelancers.
I hired a brand designer, an icon designer, and a part-time junior designer for three months. It has been a blast and I'm excited to continue working with more creatives in the next year.

I'm excited about this! These ranges emphasize what I've been feeling about my income for a while. Digital projects and guidelines are way more financially viable than illustration work. This evolution from 2021 truly reflects where I want my business to go. Despite my love for creative campaigns, I've become very passionate about digital products and platforms, as well as data visualization guidelines & systems. I found them to be more impactful projects than awareness campaigns and it is likely to become my new niche!

Key numbers:

• ‍Best paid project: $40,720 for Urban Ocean Lab Brand identity & Website. However, I have not yet been paid completely, as the project will only be finished next month and the final payment will come then. However, this project was a lot of hours, and is actually the least profitable one when I look at my hourly rate.‍
• Least paid project: $0 for a long COVID data piece (published in the New York Times). I started this project as an employee at Pentagram and continued it for free as a freelancer for three reasons:
  
  • Pentagram did not have a budget since the piece is considered a personal project for Giorgia
  • This project and topic are important to me at a personal level and I truly believe in the story Giorgia had to tell
  • It was likely to be published on a big platform like NYT and this would be great for my portfolio

Lesson from this year's finances

This was a very big year of growth for me on the financial side of things.

For the longest time, I refused to take a deep look at my finances in the long term. Then I discovered Ramit Sethi on Netflix and have been a huge fan ever since. It transformed how I approach money for my business and personal life.

I fully separated my personal and business finances this year:

• I opened a business checking account to receive payments, a business savings account, a high-yield savings account, and an investment account! Instead of only having one personal checking account.
• I automated all my finances: 32% of every payment goes automatically into the business savings account for tax purposes, and then I transfer everything else to a “cashflow” bucket in the high-yield savings account.
• Every month from the cashflow bucket I wire myself a set personal salary, a % to my savings, a % to my investments and I wire my business a set amount of money to cover expenses.

Making more than ever and struggling to pay the bills.‍

With the move, inflation, NYC high cost of living and higher taxes as well as three months of traveling across the U.S. as part of the move (while working!), I put almost no savings aside. We used it all for daily and moving expenses.

I struggled with large projects having longer periods between payments. I sometimes didn’t see much money for three months in a row while still paying my personal expenses and contractor fees. It was stressful and it taught me that I need to plan for even more cashflow to be set aside.

Clients & Projects

I decreased the number of projects from 30 in 2021 to 22 this year, spread out among 16 clients, which am VERY happy about. My project length increased quite a bit. The majority of my projects are now months-long, rather than weeks-long, and this is a rhythm that I find quite rewarding.

A lot of my projects are subcontracts, meaning I am contracted by another agency (often design) to do the work. I feel like the distribution on the right, based on the type of project I'm working on, is truer to the nature of my work.

If anything, I'm so excited to see that my love for supporting others in their data visualization journey and my focus on design for social change is showing in these numbers.

Favorite client moments

• Landing a $120k project with the Urban Ocean Lab. As you read above, UOL was my best-paid project with $40k. However, I shared the income with dataviz studio Infogr8. Why? Because I could not handle the entirety of the project by myself, specifically the web development part. I'm particularly proud of this project because the client came to me first with a small $15k budget for a rebrand and I converted them to a larger project by pitching them a collaboration between Infogr8 and me, winning the pitch against another notable brand agency.
• Rebuilding The American Opportunity Index. This was what you'd call a "difficult" client. Infogr8 had worked extensively with the Schultz Family Foundation before and it had been hard for them to get their design decisions approved. With a lot of work put into preparing the client, listening to their needs, and talking through things with them using my favorite communication techniques, we turned the client around. I feel proud that my soft skills have become such an asset for this type of project and client. Shout out to Duncan for being such a sport and helping me during the whole project!
• Doing fun illustrations for Eli Holder's research. Eli and I have a shared love for research in the field of communication for impact and I loved putting my skills to work to help me share his insights!  You will likely see more of us and our common goal in 2024.

Biggest client disappointment

• EarthRise Studio contacted me for a potential project with Google Arts & Culture. I am a massive fan of their work and have been "warm stalking" them for years. However, Google cut the budget by 2/3 so the studio had to keep it internal.
• I was somewhat forced to take on a project that goes against my values: a "campaign" around climate created by a big bank that funds fossil fuels. The bank's data was accurate but the bank was trying its best not to have to call out any fossil fuels or issues that they are related to. Luckily, the project ended up being canceled because the client couldn't figure it out.

Lessons learned from this year's project

I am ready to grow into a studio.

‍I can land those big clients all on my own. More than ever, I've proven to myself that I can handle really large projects and take a creative director role, managing the project, the team, and the client.

Cultivating relationships is key.‍

Part of the reason why I work with Infogr8 so much is due to my close relationship with Stewart Pickering, Infogr8's head of sustainability. I've found a friend but also an incredible collaborator for all projects. He complements my skills in creative direction and design, with his in strategy, client, and contractor management while keeping an eye on our overall shared vision: design for social change. This type of relationship that I also have with many other collaborators is what keeps me excited about collaborating with other agencies.

As much as ever, I've relied on communities throughout the year, from the other mentors in Elevate, to other creatives (Talia Cotton, Sarah Kay Miller, Emma Fanning) and through online communities like The Futur. Elevate was created to help YOU find some of the support I found in all of them.

I've recommended other creatives 11 times this year. I hope this number grows! I get a lot of joy in connecting my clients with talented designers or developers. This is also close to my heart when it comes to growing the studio: part of the reason why is being able to help other freelancers get the budget and the treatment they deserve to do their art.

My lead-generation efforts are lacking.

‍It's time that I put more work towards the studio website and share more of my vision for the data visualization field. Hopefully, you'll see more of me in the coming months!

The future

This year I have one main focus: a better work/life balance.

What you don't see in those numbers is how much this growth has cost my personal life.

In 2023, I worked an average of 51 hours a week and I did not take any vacations. I track most hours when I work for clients, less when it comes to my work so this number is probably higher in reality.

I want to change this and better prioritize my health and my relationships with friends and family.

To do so, I just accepted a temporary six-month full-time contract at Block to build their data visualization design system which I am PUMPED about. Block's team is a joy to work with, but this project gives me the chance to get a stable high income without having to destroy my health for it. It should also give me the time to slowly build the studio in the next few months.