My 2024 in Review: Top Lessons, Reads, Advice & More

Plus what's in store for my business and this newsletter in 2025.

Author

Taylor Cromwell
January 01, 2025

In case you missed it, I wrote about what’s in store for 2025 and this newsletter in the last edition — you can read it here.

Happy New Year!

I’m one of those people that loves Jan 1. (Now going out for a boozy night on NYE, not so much.) And unfortunately, I’m also one of those insufferable people that likes to chart out detailed goals.

I love the opportunity to look at a fresh slate, take stock of my actions/habits/goals, reflect on what’s happened in the past year, and make a plan for getting to where I want to be.

I had a low amount of client work in December, so I’ve taken advantage of the slower weeks and have spent a ton of time doing this review and strategizing for the year ahead. And I feel SO excited! 2024 was a year of chasing growth and finding stability and trying to learn as much as possible — and now I feel ready to apply some of this and take my business to the next level.

So consider this my 2024 Wrapped — I’ve gathered some of my top lessons, favorite reads/podcast episodes, some goals/intentions for 2025, plus some annual review resources that you can use, too! 👇

5 Lessons from 2024

1. Know when to pivot.

I feel like this was THE theme of my year.

I’ve written often about it, but I truly feel like this mindset was the driving factor of growth for me. I leaned into ghostwriting and then didn’t feel like I was creating the business that I really wanted. I leaned into writing for a variety of companies and realized that I actually wanted to focus in on creator companies.

Instead of seeing each pivot as a failure, I reframed it. A pivot is an opportunity to refine what I enjoy most and where I am seeing the most results. Now, I feel empowered by those decisions and ready to carry that energy into next year.

And although I have a strong vision for 2025, I’m expecting some more pivots along the way.

2. Your personal brand is your most valuable asset.

I’ve spent much of the past two years helping other leaders, authors, and founders build their personal brand through LinkedIn posts and communities and newsletters. But as a ghostwriter, of course, my influence goes unseen.

Yet I’ve seen how powerful a strong personal brand can be. It opens up the door to new possibilities, 10X your network, and builds trust among your audience. Whether you’re raising funding for your startup, an executive for a Fortune 500 company, or a freelancer just getting started, the truth is that we all need a personal brand.

One lesson I remember so clearly is this: in the age of social media, everyone has a personal brand whether they like it or not. What do people think of when your name comes up in a room? Why would people follow you on line? The opportunity is to actively shape this in a positive direction to help you achieve your goals.

I’ve also had to learn to follow my advice. I’m preaching these tips to the clients I work with, but I’m investing little to no time actively shaping my own personal brand. That feels cringe. My LinkedIn posts are spontaneous and often a result of what I want to say right now, not because of a wider thought out strategy.

But I know that what got me here won’t get me to the next level. So in order to grow this newsletter, connect with more dream clients, I need to be a more focused and consistent in this department.

3. Follow the 80/20 rule.

You’ve probably heard of the Pareto Principle. This rule teaches us that 80% of results often come from just 20% of our efforts.

So, for example, when you’re running a business, your attention is likely scattered. You’ve got admin to do, invoices to chase down, client work to complete — all while trying to stay consistent with your personal brand (see point above.)

If you don’t take stock of where and how you’re spending your time, you can easily get lost in the weeds and not focus on the things that are actually driving the business forward.

For me, that meant realizing that my long form work for SaaS companies was actually bringing the majority of revenue for my business. Yet, if you were to look at my client books, that only represented a small percentage of my client work at any given time. I had thought that if I spread myself across different types of projects I would protect myself from risk. But to apply this rule meant channelling more of my efforts to my highest value work.

And it worked! It’s been so cool to see what happens when you really lean into what’s working and eliminate all distractions. To be honest, I still have a ton to learn in this department so I’m sure it will be an ongoing theme for the new year.

4. Invest in communities and resources.

For the first two years of my business, I avoided spending business money like the plague. With my inconsistent income, it felt impossible to tie myself to recurring expenses. And I hated the thought of wasting money for another flashy tool that I didn’t really need.

But around the second half of the year, I started to have a huge realization. When I hit a plateau in my work, I was limited by my current network and skillset. What I needed to expand my business was actually other people to learn from and actual educational resources to teach me the things I hadn’t yet mastered, like building an email funnel and securing retainer packages.

I spent months agonizing where and how I would spend my money. I gave myself a limit of $150/month to invest in personal development — from communities to online courses.

When I finally decided to commit to a few, I feel like I saw results almost instantly. I joined Rachel Meltzer’s Pop Club and binged all of her freelance business resources. It gave me the confidence to refine some of my offers and I’ve found some client leads through this community. Also having a space to join workshops and chat online with other people at a similar stage has been so so helpful to me.

Here are a few other resources/communities I’ve invested in:

Now I’m just beginning to see the fruits of these communities I expect this is going to be a huge focus for me in the next year.

5. Roots and stability are underrated.

This one is gonna be a hot take for the digital nomad community. Although this one is more personal, it’s also had a huge impact on my business, too.

For the past few years (I left NYC in April of 2022), I’ve lived as a digital nomad — traveling, untethered, and avoiding a rental agreement at all costs. I saw these as signs of freedom. And while it was absolutely the experience I needed, I realized that I was also fearing what it would mean to slow down and actually commit to a place.

That would be far less exciting.

But this time, for the first time, I slowly embraced the idea of building roots, finding consistency, and embracing where I am right now.

And it’s felt so good. The stability has unlocked new levels of creativity and has given me space to build my business — without constantly trying to juggle when my next flight is and where I’m going to live a month from now.

In my social media feeds, this digital nomad life is extremely glamorized. Fleeing to far flung places, working from the beach. It’s all exciting, yes, and it’s still something I recommend to people if they have in their heart to do it. But I also want to add some levity and nuance to the conversation around the digital nomad life.

Because it turns out that having a home and staying in one place is actually pretty awesome.

Top Reads/Listens from 2024 💡

This is a mega-hard category to narrow down. I’ve spent much of the year trying to learn as much as I can about the creator economy world, entrepreneurship, startups, personal branding, and so much more. But I’ve saved a few favorites along the way of episodes and articles that really resonated with me.

Podcasts

Reads

P.S. I’ve used Readwise to organize most of these links throughout the year. I highly recommend trying it if you want to keep track of things you’re reading and want to come back to.

Annual Planning Resources

That’s all for this week! Stay tuned for more updates from Creator Diaries.