Get Paid To Write

A New Home

2007-06-25T15:36:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking for a while that Get Paid To Write deserves its own domain - and now it's got it. I give you Get Paid To Write Online.

The doors are open, the champagne's chilled and it's time for a celebration. If you have subscribed to my feed or taken an email subscription there should be no difference - if you haven't, then maybe now's the time - the links are in the sidebar.

There are still a few boxes to be unpacked, but you'll still get the same content - so join me on Get Paid To Write Online.

Writers, You Need To Get Out More

2007-06-25T08:48:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time, freelance writing was an out and about business. You went out, met people, talked to sources, talked to editors and generally had a range of conversations related to what you were writing. Now, freelance writing can be very different, especially if your main business is writing web content.

As a web content writer, you can spend days or weeks at your desk without ever seeing another person. You can research your articles on the internet, draft them and send them off with very little human contact at all. In some ways, it's like living in a protective bubble, where you don't have to deal with the real world. However, it's a mistake to stay in that bubble for too long.

The reason is that without some outside input your writing will get stale. You will be drawing on the same old sources for inspiration you have always used. No matter how expert your knowledge, you need to refresh it from time to time. In order to produce a pearl, you have to throw in a little dirt.

So how do you do this when your writing job keeps you tied to your desk? Virtuality has advantages as well as disadvantages and one of the advantages is that you can keep up with developments in your field without leaving your desk. You can read news sites, online magazines and ezines, and you can subscribe to blogs in your field. All of this will keep you abreast of what people are talking about and thinking.

Offline, you can get a lot of inspiration from the books you read, the radio programmes you listen to and the television you watch. Anything can spark an idea or create a metaphor that will liven up your writing. The trick is to be alert and be ready to capture these fleeting inspirations – and to get out more. It will do your writing no end of good.

Get Paid Like A Writer?

2007-06-24T09:36:00.000-07:00

Escape from Pianosa has pointed towards this spoof Craigslist ad, titled If all CL Job Postings were for Freelance Writers. Here's an excerpt:

FREELANCE DOCTOR FOR ONGOING PROJECTS

We are a start-up family seeking one or more doctor(s) for ongoing projects. We need a board-certified obstetrician to provide initial services while we expand our family from two to three members over the next few months. ... The winning candidates will provide three monthly office visits of at least 30 minutes (each)... Could work into a full-time gig, eventually. ... Since we're a small family right now, so we can't pay much. We're offering $5 per 30 minute office visit, with the chance for bonuses of $3 for each additional service (such as lab work) you provide. We pay by PayPal once a month.

It's worth a read.

Writing Links 23 June 2007

2007-06-23T05:45:00.000-07:00

Here are seven posts that I thought were worth reading:

How to have infringing contents removed from the search engines on SixFigureWriters.com

Networking within your blog niche from DoshDosh

Make your blog posts readable from BlogTutorials

Are you in love with your own writing from Copyblogger

Web writing: your top five money making skills from Fab Web Writers

Putting Together Ghostwriting Proposals from the Golden Pencil

Contracts and Agreements from AllBusiness.com

Enjoy!

Client Expectations

2007-06-21T08:24:00.000-07:00

Happy Thursday! I was going to write a post about this and found myself putting it on Garden and Hearth instead. Check it out here and drop me a comment either there or here.

Tagged - 7 Random Things

2007-06-20T11:29:00.000-07:00

hifidel has tagged me in the seven random things meme.

The Rules: Each player starts with 7 random facts/habits about themselves. People who are tagged need to write their own blog post with their 7 things as well as these rules. You need to tag 7 others and list their names on your blog. Remember to leave a comment for them letting them know they have been tagged and to read your blog.

Here are my seven things:

1. My favourite movies include Shawshank Redemption and the Sound of Music.
2. The best job I ever had was in a bookstore.
3. I'm a voracious reader.
4. My favourite colour is yellow.
5. I'm a sucker for chocolate cake.
6. I lived in the South of France for a year.
7. I'm in touch with my inner child.

So here are my taggees:

Danielle
gracepub
marleymauve
wordvixen
Katherine
poetically challenged
Inkthinker

Is Your Writing Client Your Boss?

2007-06-19T05:22:00.000-07:00

I was reading the latest issue of the Freelance Writing Success newsletter. Writer Nick Osborne made a very good point. He said if you are doing most of your work for a single client, then you have a boss. That's because you are so dependent on that single source of income that you can't afford to say no. In other words, you're not in charge any more.

That really made me think. I have a great relationship with the clients I work with, but I don't want to depend exclusively on any of them. That's why I keep seeking out new work and I keep promoting myself.

As a freelance writer and ghostwriter, I need to be able to say no sometimes. I need to be in charge of balancing my workload. I need to be the one making decisions about my career. After all, that's why I stopped working for a boss and started working for myself.

A Freelance Writing Journey

2007-06-16T10:33:00.001-07:00

What a difference a year makes. In February 2006 I was into my second month as a freelancing WAHM. I had given up my job the previous August, done some teaching in September to December, and finally part company with my old employer at Christmas. I had made a measly GBP50 for writing some content for one of my old students, and I had just started writing for Inspired Author. Although I was a writer, I wasn't really making any money. I was lucky, though. I had a solid 19 years of writing experience behind me, so at least I had some skills to put on the table.

With IA and my two new blogs, I learned to write for the web, to address my audience directly and to develop a rapport with people I had only met in the virtual world. I was able to use these new skills to write for a number of sites and agency and to make money from writing. It took six months to replace my part time salary from lecturing. (Don't anyone get jealous; freelance writing income fluctuates, so I have had good and bad months since then. However, it was an important psychological milestone, because I knew then that freelancing was viable.)

Just over a year on, things have changed again. I make a reasonable living from freelancing, and have enough work (most of the time anyway) to pass some on to other writers. I didn't expect that deciding to go freelance would lead to becoming an agent for other writers, but I am always open to new opportunities.

I've learned a lot in the last year and a bit. I've learned that if you are willing to invest a bit of time in your future, you will gain something. When I started writing for IA, it was on the promise of future earnings. While I was waiting, I used those articles as a platform for getting other writing work. And I now earn money from those articles every day.

I've learned that it is essential to talk to other work at home writers. They keep me sane. We can share our joys, woes and warnings, which makes the job better for all of us.

Most of all, I have learned that it IS possible to succeed as a freelance writer, even if you are doing it on top of a full time job and while children clamour for attention. All you have to do is look out for the opportunities and grab them - you might get back more than you bargained for.

The most important things I did to jump start my freelance writing career were:

Set up a blog
Join a writing community
Market with articles

What were the most important things you did to start yours?

Night Shift

2007-06-11T20:20:00.000-07:00

Ah - the freedom of freelance writing. The freedom to set your own hours, as long as the client doesn't dictate otherwise. The freedom to take time off, as long as you meet the deadline. The freedom to knock off early, or to work till midnight. Don't you just love it?

I certainly do. I think that there are compromises with every job. Today I stopped work early to take my daughter on a play date, then went to the movies with my hubby. I can do that as a freelance writer. The trade off is that I will be up till midnight so I don't get too far behind this week. Works for me :-) What about you?

Web Writing Skill Building

2007-06-08T07:16:00.000-07:00

When you're starting out as a freelance writer, or even thinking about freelancing, it can be difficult to find places where you can get paid to write. However, there is one way you can build your web content writing skills and earn a bit of money too.

That's what I cover in my new article on freelance writing on Garden and Hearth. It includes tips on how to write for your readers.

Thank You Angela Hoy

2007-06-06T18:58:00.000-07:00

I want to say a public thank you to Angela Hoy. I had a client who had owed me money for a couple of months. On the advice of a group of writer friends, I approached Angela about including his details in the Whispers and Warnings.

She agreed to do that, but she also approached him about my assertion that he had not paid. He very grumpily asked me to invoice him again - and then paid up. Too late, though, I think he will shortly be making an appearance in the next Whispers and Warnings.

Brain Freeze Taught Me A Lesson

2007-06-05T07:04:00.000-07:00

As freelance writers, sometimes we take on too much in our desire to please - and to get paid. Sometimes it's a question of saying yes to something you have no hope of completing; at others it's a case of thinking you can do it until the reality hits.

Then there's the third case. This is when you think your research skills are even greater than they are. Today I am supposed to be writing about car restoration. This is a subject way outside my area of expertise. I looked at the sources and my brain froze. I suddenly thought that I had made a mistake in agreeing to write on this topic.

I've looked at my source material a couple more times and I think I can do it. Luckily the article is short, though the style guide is prescriptive. But I've learned a lesson. Sometimes I need to know where to draw the line - and to draw it before accepting a topic that will make my brain freeze.

UK Writers Wanted

2007-06-02T17:18:00.000-07:00

Some of you may know that in addition to writing myself, I'm also an agent for a small team of writers. That means I get the clients, pass on the work to writers, check it's ok and pass it back to clients. Writers get work without having to bid; I get a small cut - and I do mean small. You do most of the work; you get most of the money - that's my view.

Now I'm on the lookout for a couple more writers, but with specific attributes. First of all, you must be familiar with the UK. I get a lot of UK-specific work. If you are good at writing about consumer finance (loans, credit cards, mortgages, insurance, banking and so on), that would be even better.

I have a couple of regular clients who are increasing their requirements, as well as new ones who are likely to. There's plenty of work for someone who is conscientious, a good researcher and can meet tight deadlines. If this is you, drop me a line through my Writing Lab blog. Tell me about your writing experience.

If it sounds good, I will ask you to write a sample article for which you will get paid if the buyer likes it. (No scams, I promise you - I can even provide references who will prove that I pay up.) If the buyer doesn't like it, you own the rights and can use it elsewhere. Either way, you will know within a couple of days. Hope to hear from you.

Getting Busy With Writing

2007-06-01T09:45:00.001-07:00

Look what happens when you put in a little work. A few weeks ago I decided I wasn't bidding enough, so I decided to place at least three bids for writing work every day.

Fast forward and what have we got?

* a deal with one company to write bundles of articles
* a deal with another company to write real estate articles
* a deal with a third company to write how to articles
* a contract with a UK company to write property articles
* and two ghostwriting contracts in the last stages of negotiation

The lesson for me is that you should always keep bidding. The more you bid, the better your hit rate is likely to be and the less down time you will have.

Of course, I still need to find time to promote.

Snowed Under With Writing

2007-05-31T13:31:00.000-07:00

It's one of those days. All the work I have been chasing has finally come in and now I am officially snowed under. Within the next week, I have to produce articles and blog posts on property, the internet, writing and assorted subjects as well as fleshing out the content for a magazine. I'm also working on two book contracts. I think it will be a busy weekend. I'm not complaining, though. It's good to be busy and it's good to have the income.

How are your writing projects going?

New Writing Community Blog

2007-05-28T16:30:00.000-07:00

If the seeming demise of WritingUp has left you down, then weep no more! From out of the ashes has arisen a site that will be better, stronger and much more reliable. It's called Communati and its mission is to take the best from WritingUp and leave the worst.

Here's what founder Mark Whitbeck has to say:

The philosophy about Communati.com, the way it looks, feels, and works, is to introduce something that is familiar while morphing into something completely new.

The best includes recreating that community aspect; leaving the worst means eliminating those darned trackbacks once and for all.

I signed up for Communati and so far, so good. I have already met a couple of old WU friends there and hope to meet more. So far, I am welcoming Communati with cautious optimism.

Check out my posts there. I'm wahmwriter (couldn't stay away from writing completely, but wanted more freedom to broaden my horizons).

PS. Did I mention that you get 70 per cent of Adsense revenue?

This is cross posted from Sharon's Writing Lab

Made You Think - Yay!

2007-05-28T08:07:00.000-07:00

I've been tagged for a Thinking Blogger award, courtesy of Showintale Journeys. I am pleased and touched, because the award is for blogs that make you think, which is a nice accolade for any blogger to receive.

Now it's my turn to pass it on. I've got to choose five bloggers, which is tough because all of the bloggers I read make me think in some way. To narrow it down, I've chosen five bloggers whose posts I star in Google Reader so that I can find them again.

JenOHaven - a new blog from a trusted blogging friend, with tech tips of all sorts.
Inkwell Editorial's freelance career blog - every time I read this blog I come away inspired and informed
The Writer's Blog by Dana Prince - a freelancer's journey to success.
FreelanceSwitch - there's so much good stuff on this blog it's hard to know what to pick out.
DoshDosh - how to make money online. Every post is detailed and well planned.

All of these are great bloggers, who deserve the Thinking Blogger award. If you choose to take part, pass on the award to five more bloggers, and leave me a link to your post here. Here are the rules:

*Should the bloggers choose to participate, please make sure to pass the rules on to the next Thinking Blogs you tag.

The participation rules are simple:

1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think.

2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme.

3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote (here is an alternative silver version if gold doesn't fit your blog).

This award was begun by ilker yoldas at The Thinking Blog.

Writing Linkfest 27 May 2007

2007-05-27T08:08:00.000-07:00

Well, I usually wait a while before posting collections of links, but I've found some great stuff in the last week that I'd like to share with you.

First of all, there's Inkwell Editorial's series on freelance mentoring. It's in three parts. Parts one and two each cover five things you should look for, while part three considers the most important factor in a freelance mentor. This is a topic that interests me because I have both mentored and been mentored, with positive results for all. I don't know whether I've said it before, but Yuwanda Black's blog is now a must-read for me.

That can also be said of the Freelance Switch blog, which this week had a post on getting more done by working in short bursts. I'm always interested in finding out how to be more productive and this post gives a few ideas. Freelance Switch also has a good post on setting your rates and there's also an hourly rate calculator on the site.

Inklings - The Copywriter's Blog gives some advice on making sure your writing is good, by going over it again and again. There's also an article by Donna Sweat on the Writing For Reason blog - and it's all about proofreading.

Finally, there's an article I wish I had written from Fab Web Writer about five types of writing you can get paid to do.

Happy reading!

Your Favourite Writing Tools

2007-05-26T17:09:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you have to blow your own trumpet, otherwise who else will do it. I've been a member of Helium for a while (in fact, I plan to review the highs and lows one day) and I have a few articles on there. Not as many as some of my friends, but a respectable number. I've recently added two more to the list, and since they are about writing, I thought I would share them with you.

The first is about why writers need other writers. I think this is one that I may expand into a longer article one day.

The second is about setting up a writer's office. It made me think about the things I have in my office that I can't do without. Apart from my laptop and a reliable internet connection, I still find a pen and paper the most useful writing tools I own. Sometimes I need to write something down without having to open a new document or leave the one I am working on. What's your most useful writing tool.

Blog Learning

2007-05-26T08:18:00.000-07:00

Someone paid me a great compliment today. She said that she had learned a lot from my blog. Hearing that from just one person makes writing this blog worthwhile.

When I started blogging, I didn't know that my fledgling blog would turn into this. It turned out I had a lot to say about various aspects of freelance writing, ghostwriting, blogging and promotion. This was mainly because I was doing all of those myself, and sharing what I learned as I went.

I had a lot of places to go to for inspiration. (Some of those are in my blogroll, though not all. I have yet to harmonise my feed reader and my blogroll.)

Since moving my blog to its new home, I have rediscovered my interest in blogging about writing, and it's nice to know that I am able to pass on some of the help I have had from other people.

Positive Thinking For Positive Writing

2007-05-23T07:27:00.000-07:00

Can positive thinking help you attract the kind of writing clients you need? There's a lot of information out there that says that positive thoughts and intentions help you to tap into the abundance that is already out there. This applies to every aspect of your life, including your writing career. If you intend to have well paid writing work, then that is what you have. If, on the other hand, you think that well paid writing work is a pipe dream, then that is exactly what it will be. That's the way the received wisdom on abundance goes.

I don't have a problem with positive thinking. In fact, I have used it to great effect. However, in my experience you have to back it up with positive action. So if I want well paid writing work, I have to write a successful bid that shows my writing skills and past successes, and I have to set a fair price for the writing I will be doing. If I demonstrate why I am worth the money, then the client is usually willing to pay it. That's why positive thoughts need to be backed up with positive actions, in my view.

Thinking positive means that you present yourself in that way and your self confidence will bring rewards. I am already seeing how that works and am grateful for the results. How have you used positive thinking in your writing career?

This post was inspired by Dana Prince's post on The Secret.

Writing Linkfest 20 May 2007

2007-05-20T10:35:00.000-07:00

Time for me to spread some Linky Love and highlight some of the writing related posts that have caught my eye.

First up is 13 Breeds of Freelancer on the FreelanceSwitch blog. It's great fun seeing which category you fit into and the advantages and disadvantages of each approach. A witty post with a serious side.

Codswallop brings us 100 tools to boost your freelancing career, while Inkthinker has released the Freelance Writing 101 handout, with lots of info for all freelancers. Check out the list of online writing resources.

If you work at home, what do you do for Take Your Child To Work Day? Find out from homemom3

Finally, Yuwanda Black advises us on how to use a letter to increase our freelance writing business.

Happy reading.

When Writing Clients Leave

2007-05-18T06:30:00.000-07:00

As a freelance writer, you can't rely on clients sticking around. And it doesn't have to be your fault that they leave. Take this example. I have a client who saw one of my promotional efforts, approached me to do some writing on online business, and paid promptly and well. In fact, he's the dream client. He has been happy with my work over the last few months. However, I won't be getting any money from him this month.

Why? Well, I can only speculate. Over the years of my ghostwriting and freelance writing career, I have found that clients move on for several reasons.

They have come to the end of the current project
They have achieved what they set out to do with a book or series of articles and they don't need you any more
They have run out of money (and I am happy if they end the contract rather than making chase them for payment)
They have another project but think you have only one area of writing expertise.

So what do you do? In the case of my current client, he asked about other areas I was comfortable writing in. That made me think that it's always worth getting in touch with former clients to let them know that you are available and that you can write in a range of areas.
After all, how can it hurt? That way you remind them that you exist and perhaps generate some additional work.

In these cases my approach is simple. I greet the client, remind the client of the last successful project I did for him or her, and ask if they need any more writing work. At the moment, since I have a team of writers working with me, I also mention that we cover a broad range of writing areas.

That's one point, but the other thing about writing clients leaving is that you need to replace the income. That's where regular bidding comes in. The more projects you have available, the less the loss of a single client matters. How do you handle the loss of good clients?

Business Promotion On Squidoo

2007-05-17T15:40:00.000-07:00

Jinger Jarrett wrote a post somewhere about the value of using Squidoo to create a business profile (if anyone knows where, I am happy to link to it). Jinger gives great advice, so I decided to create one for myself. It's a work in progress, but eventually it will bring together all my internet stuff. I present the Sharon Hurley Hall lens. Please have a look and give me some feedback, either there or here.

What's missing that you want to know more about?
What have I put too much of?

I'm looking forward to your comments

What Do You Think?

2007-05-16T17:05:00.000-07:00

Notice the colorful icons beneath each post. They are from a service called Click Comments, designed for those who don't want to comment but want to leave feedback. I'm trying it on this blog. I'd like some feedback from you, though.

1. Would this stop you from commenting if you had been going to comment?
2. Would it make you click on an option if normally you would just leave?
3. Is it annoying?
4. Anything else you want to say.

Let me know what you think.

Get Paid To Write - Not!

2007-05-16T06:42:00.000-07:00

Have you seen this spoof ad for ghostwriting web content? Have a look at this post. Not sure whether it's sad or funny. It makes me think that when we agree to those jobs we're being taken for a ride. (On the other hand, maybe we are also feeding our families). What did you think when you read it?

Freelance Writing Report Card

2007-05-15T05:32:00.000-07:00

It's just about two years since I made the decision to leave my job as a journalism lecturer and become a full time freelance writer and ghostwriter. Well, actually part time, since the point of doing it was to spend more time with my daughter, who's now at school. I have to say that it was the best decision I have ever made.

Although it took me a while to get started, I spent the first few months setting up my site and starting to promote myself as a writer. Then I started getting work, very slowly at the start of 2006. While I was waiting for more work to come in, I did some writing for Inspired Author, and learned a lot from the owner of that site which is still working for me today.

Then, all of a sudden, things took off. By the time summer came, I had replaced my old salary as a lecturer (some of the time anyway) and had enough work to keep me constantly busy. That trend has continued ever since, which is why I now work with several other writers, to whom I pass on the overflow.

Even though at times I have felt burned out and have lacked motivation (particularly when I get to article 100 of a series of 150 on a subject I'm not that interested in), I have no doubt that I made the right move. I am working from home, setting my own hours (in theory, at least) and writing every day. I love my job and I love the freedom it gives me.

I consider that a good start, but it's still not enough. Now that I am in the habit of writing every day, I want to write more of my own stuff as well. I've got ideas for at least three books or ebooks, so over the next year I plan to start on some of them. What's your report card on your freelance writing career? Why not write a post on it and leave a link here?

Why I Work With Other Writers

2007-05-14T07:10:00.000-07:00

The other day I was having an online chat with a friend. I was telling her about some of the problems I had had with some writers. She asked me whether working with a team of writers was really what I wanted to do. That made me examine my reasons for doing it, and at the end of that chat I came out of it with renewed commitment to team building. I want to share my reasons with you.

1. Teaching
One of the reasons I started working with writers is because I have enjoyed helping them or mentoring them through my blogs, sites and chats. I didn't start out knowing this was what I would do, but a few of my friends have said how helpful this was. It's always nice to feel appreciated and my reward is seeing other people succeed. Helping someone to reach their potential is one of the best things about teaching - and I get a real kick from it.

2. Income
I'm not entirely altruistic. Working with other writers means that instead of turning away work when I am busy, I can pass it on to someone else and take a small commission. The writer gets most of the money, as she (they are all women at the moment) is the person who is doing most of the work. The commission covers the time I spend sourcing and bidding for jobs, responding to emails and checking the work to make sure it meets the brief. This gives me a boost in income and gives someone else a helping hand, which means we both win.

3. Giving Back
All through my writing career, there have been people who have taken a chance on me and given me the chance to try something new. I believe in paying it forward, so if I can now do the same for other writers, I think it's the right thing to do. Some writers need the chance to develop some skills and as long as they are willing to learn and can meet deadlines I am willing to let them try new things. It's giving something back to the writing community - and I think it's the right thing to do.

By and large, I'm happy with how it's going. I have met some wonderful writers and made some good friends - who could ask for more?

Happy WAHM Day

2007-05-13T11:58:00.000-07:00

I've just realised something. Nearly every writer I know at the moment is a mom. Some have new babies, some have older children, some even have grandchildren. There are lots of us juggling writing careers and motherhood. Some of us are freelancing full time, while others are combining writing with full time jobs outside the homes. I figure we deserve at least one day. So this post is for all of you (all of us): Happy Mother's Day.

Five Lessons

2007-05-11T07:07:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you need a little help to make a success of your freelancing career. I know I did - and still do. So to make it easier, I've written an article about five things I have learned about freelancing - some of them the hard way. Here's an excerpt:

Any marketer will tell you that the secret to a successful business is referrals and residuals. These are the people who keep coming back month after month, year after year, without you having to sell them on your writing again. And that's money in the bank to a freelance writer.

I hope they'll help you, too.

Read Five Freelance Writing Lessons

Guide To Ghostwriting

2007-05-10T07:33:00.000-07:00

People are always interested to find out about ghostwriting. They want to know what's involved and more importantly, how much you can get paid. As I point out:

In today's virtual world, you don't have to be in the same room or even the same country to write someone's life story. It can all be done by email.

Check out my Guide To Ghostwriting for some of the answers to your questions. And if you have a different perspective on the matter, leave me a comment on the site.

Writing Admin

2007-05-09T11:01:00.000-07:00

Today is one of those days when I'm doing a lot of admin. That mostly means checking my account, checking my list of jobs and making sure that I have paid all Paypal requests that are due. I pay within a week, so I need to keep track of this to avoid writers going hungry. I like it when people pay me on time so I try to do the same for any writers who are working with me. :)

Other tasks include checking to make sure that everything that should have come in today has come in - and that every piece of work due out has been checked and sent on. That can take a lot of time. Tomorrow will be busy because I have two major jobs coming in that will need to be checked.

Finally, I am starting on a job that came in two weeks ago but had to be put on hold because of more urgent deadlines. Of course, that now means that I will have to work faster to get it all done on time. Just as well I love freelancing.

What does the rest of your week look like?

How Do You Promote?

2007-05-07T12:37:00.000-07:00

Promotion is a key aspect of freelance writing success. Here's what I say about it in one of my new articles on Garden and Hearth:

As a freelance writer there are two key elements of success. One of those is your freelance writing skill. The other is letting people know you are there, through promotion.

Check out the full article for my thoughts on writer promotion. What's your best promotional method? I'm finding the social networking sites are really bringing people to my sites - and because they're finding it through tags, they're already interested in the content.

Check out my other posts on promotion.

How To Cope With Writing Burnout

2007-05-05T13:30:00.000-07:00

It happens to all of us at some point. It may be after you have completed 200 keyword rich articles on garbage bins or after you have done the umpteenth rewrite of an article on a subject you find really dull. Even if you're one of the lucky ones, and you enjoy what you write most of the time, at some point you face a moment when you just don't want to write. For a day, a week, a month or even longer, the profession that you rushed to embrace suddenly seems charmless. You feel tired, drained and mentally depleted, but you've still got to make a living. What do you do to recharge your batteries and get interested again?

Some of the things I have tried include knowing when to give up on writing and walking away from the computer. Instead of writing I can read a book, go for a walk, head to the beach, play with my daughter or have a nap. These are all things that are guaranteed to get my mind off the job for a while at least.

But what if the problem lasts longer than a few hours or a day? Sometimes I can feel the mental fatigue coming and I can plan my work schedule to allow some down time. That's the best option. At other times, deadlines loom and I have to write through the pain, vowing never to do this kind of job again. Of course, I will - there are times when any writing job is better than no writing job, particularly if you have bills to pay.

All of the best advice on burnout centres on recognising the signs - stress, tiredness, etc - and on changing the circumstances quickly, by taking a break somehow. What do you do when you face burnout?

Here are some other articles on burnout that you might find interesting:

How To Deal With Burnout - including learning to recognise when burnout is approaching
Recovering from Writers' Burnout - an oldie but goodie, where the advice includes taking a vacation - nice!
Dealing With Professional Burnout - check out the quick quiz at the start
Burnout - including the three sappers of creative energy
10 Signs of Career Burnout - exactly what it says on the tin
More on burnout - if we're juggling then we might burn out, and who isn't juggling?
Avoiding Freelance Burnout - the fact that you're freelancing can help you
Burnout Self-Test - another great tool from MindTools

You Want More, You Got More

2007-05-04T05:55:00.002-07:00

In fact, even if you don't want more, you've still got it. I'm talking about freelance writing articles. Mine. On Garden and Hearth. I am thrilled to announce that my new freelance writing site is open for business, with several articles for you to look through.

I never seem to get tired of talking and writing about writing, and I'll be adding at least one article a month to the list, so make sure to check back. Over the next few days, I'll talk a bit more about some of the articles, but for now have a browse around the site and come and talk to me on the freelance writing forum that goes with it.

Freelance Jobs On IA

2007-05-03T05:54:00.000-07:00

I've decided to set up a thread on the freelance writing forum I manage for Inspired Author to post my overflow work when it is available. The thread is called freelance writing jobs, predictably. There's one gig there at the moment which is great for those seeking experience or those who can write really fast. However, I've got lots of bids out and will be posting more opportunities as they are available.

Three Articles For Freelancers

2007-05-02T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've been harnessing the power of RSS to subscribe to more blogs about writing recently. The trouble is that every time I check out the blogroll on a writing site, I find more stuff to subscribe to.

In my trawl through the writing sites today, I have found three articles worth paying attention to.

First, Angela Booth writes about the cumulative effect of writing for self promotion, making the point that you need to think long term when it comes to promotion. I agree with that, having recently seen one of my old articles find new life.

Second, the EzineArticles article writing blog has a good article template to give you inspiration when you're looking for something to write. Browse around that blog; there are other gems to be found.

Third, thanks to Anne Wayman, I have found this great article on contracts for freelance writers. This is a great article if you're new to freelancing, and even those of us who aren't could use it as a reminder. Enjoy.

Time To Fire The Client?

2007-05-01T07:08:00.000-07:00

Here's the situation. Last year I found a client who wanted me to write keyword rich articles for him. They weren't too arduous, just a couple of keywords a few times each - and the pay was relatively good. He paid two weeks after invoicing and kept to that schedule.

Then came Christmas, and things changed. I did several jobs just before Christmas, so in January I still had three invoices outstanding with that client. All of a sudden I wasn't getting prompt responses to emails. I chased for two of the invoices and got various runaround stories (no-one's in to sign the check, we have paid it into your account [they hadn't] and so on).

So I got tough and when they asked me to do some more work, I said they needed to pay two of the three outstanding invoices first. They did, then they paid the third one and then they asked me to do more work. I did, because they had paid. But then I waited nearly eight weeks for them to pay me. I chased them several times.

In that time they asked me to do more work. I replied that I would only consider it after I had been paid, which they finally did last Friday. Now they have asked me to do more work. But I'm worried. How long will I have to wait for this payment? Can I really afford to spend the time to do the work and not get paid? I don't think so. At the same time I wonder whether I am jeopardizing a relationship with a client who was good, and might be again. My gut feeling tells me it's time to fire this client and find someone new to replace that income. What do you think?

Ghostwriter For Hire

2007-04-29T17:10:00.000-07:00

I've been a big fan of Squidoo for some time, and have three lenses there, including on on site promotion. So it's no surprise when I find quality content that is just waiting to be discovered.

Today's discovery is a lens on ghostwriting. How To Hire A Ghostwriter is aimed at those who are intending to hire ghostwriters and answers some common questions in a clear and simple way. If you're starting out as a ghostwriter, it's a good way to find out what clients might be looking for and what you can charge, though there are other resources that do that too.

I've written a bit on ghostwriting myself, but I found this a really useful lens. Way to go, stevemcc.

Writing For Free Pays Off Again

2007-04-27T09:51:00.000-07:00

Like any other freelance writer, I want to get paid fairly for my work. However, there are times when writing for free can be worth it. You get promotion and publicity and it raises your profile.

Here's another case in point. Nearly two years ago I wrote It's Your House, Don't Give It Away, an article on severance of tenancy (UK legal term for putting your house in joint names), for a friend who was running a legal services website. Since the object was to drive traffic to his site, I put it up on EzineArticles.

Now the friend has returned the favour, submitting my article to a UK legal services firm as part of the flagship content for their new blog. Although the blog is new, this firm is one of the fastest growing legal services firms in the UK, so it won't do me any harm to have my article there, with a link to my site and EzineArticles profile. I may not have been paid in money, but I have been amply repaid in promotion.

WLN May 2007 Preview

2007-04-26T19:14:00.000-07:00

This is cross posted from my Writing Lab. The next edition of Writing Lab News is out in a few days. Here's what I've got planned:

-- How To Promote Your Way To The Top Of Google
-- A guest article on freelance writing success
-- Diary Of A Working Writer
-- Five Essential Reference Tools For Writers
-- An insight into a writing market
-- I Must Be Doing Something Right

and more.

Last month's issue can be found here.

If you want to make sure you get it as soon as it comes out, there's a subscription box next to this post (in the middle of the right column). So go on - subscribe. Lots of good content about writing and I'll only mail you once a month. You have nothing to lose so sign up now.

Professional Pay Please

2007-04-25T09:37:00.000-07:00

When it comes to freelance writing, I have never been too proud to write for peanuts or even for free, but it's time for that to stop. Writing for free has helped me to promote myself as a writer. The articles I have written are still driving traffic to my website. I have also used them to land writing gigs. Writing for peanuts has helped me to pay the bills (when I write very fast) but it is not a good long term career strategy. Not only will I lose interest in writing, but I am likely to burn out quickly. So I need to earn more money from writing.

And why not? After all, I have 20 years' experience of writing for newspapers and magazines. I have been writing good web content of all kinds for the last two years. Sometimes it seems that I have written about every topic under the sun. Although I haven't really, my expertise includes writing on writing, online business, consumer finance, parenting, blogging, promotion and much more. So I think it's fair to say that I have something to offer to my writing clients. In addition, I write quickly, my work is virtually error free and I'm great at following a brief.

That's why I think I should earn more than one cent a word for my writing. I had an experience this week where someone outsourced a project I had given them to writers who were being paid half a cent a word (!). While I'm surprised the writers took it, I am not surprised that the quality of the work was poor.

To be honest, even on one cent a word jobs, I like to maintain my standards, but I won't give the job as much care as if you pay me a living wage. That's why I've decided to actively seek better paying work, where I get a professional rate of pay for a professional job.

And clients like the work they get as a result. One of my recent clients said he had rarely worked with a writer who got his brief so well. He also signed his email with kisses, because he was so happy. And that's the difference you get when you pay the right rate for the job. Am I the only freelance writer who feels this way?

Want A Free Database?

2007-04-25T01:09:00.000-07:00

How would you like to get hold of a free online database? Well, it's easy to do with this new offer. You can try the new online database tool, QuickBase from Intuit. It's free for one month and you don't even need a credit card.

Intuit makes QuickBooks and is now getting into web apps - that's why we now have QuickBase. Not only is it a database, but it is also a customer relationship management and project management tool.

I think this will be especially useful for those who want these features without paying for a huge IT department, so small business owners might be especially interested. Once the trial is over, MavenMapper says that $249 a month will buy a ten person subscription, which is cheaper than some of the competition.

All support is handled by Intuit. When you sign up, a sales rep gets in touch and offers tutorial videos and other help so you can get to grips with the application and give it a real trial. That doesn't cost you a dime, so QuickBase has to be worth a look.

Serving Two Writing Masters

2007-04-24T05:31:00.001-07:00

It's never easy to serve two masters, but when you are writing for search engine spiders and for human readers you are doing just that. As a ghostwriter I write a lot of content that is designed for the search engines. That means that my clients have rules about keyword density (the number of times each keyword is used) and about whether keywords have to be used exactly as written, including spelling mistakes.

The main goal when writing for search engines is to have keywords corresponding to the most searched for terms so that when people search for those terms again they find your site. And it probably works, though search engines are constantly updating their search algorithms so they can't be fooled. That's why the emphasis has changed from metatags to keywords to whatever the latest info is (I'll leave that for another time).

However, there is a problem. Content that is written primarily for search engines may seem turgid and boring to a human reader. After all, web content is about addressing the reader directly in a sort of conversational style, If you were talking about plastic containers, you would only mention it once or twice as you would both know what you were talking about - 15 times would make for a dull conversation.

Some writing clients have caught on to this and allow white noise around the keywords. This is words like 'the' and 'a' and prepositions which help to make the articles better for human readers while still keeping the keywords intact for search engine spiders. In addition, they realise that using the keywords only a few times can be just as effective as using them 15 times, provided they are placed correctly. Search engines want to see relevance. That means that whatever the article title is, you should have the keywords in the first couple of sentences. And if you also have them in the last couple of sentences, that will indicate that there's relevant content throughout the article. Of course, there's more to it than that. You need to think about your subheadings and the content that follows them too.

As a ghostwriter, it can be difficult to write for two audiences, but that's just what we often have to do with web content. Where possible, I try to write something that I would be happy to read, but there are times when you have to bite the bullet and do exactly what the client wants, even if it goes against the grain. The thing that bothers me most is spelling mistakes, so I always check whether the client really means to include them, pointing out that human readers will think less of the content if they are left in - it sometimes works. How do you handle writing for two audiences?

The Art Of The Follow Up

2007-04-21T17:43:00.000-07:00

It never hurts to send another email. Sometimes it feels like you don't have time but failure to follow up means that you could miss out on a contact you need.

Take this example. Last week I sent some info out to a writer who wanted to work with me. She seemed keen, so I was suprised that I hadn't heard from her. Today I was at a loose end and sent an email to see if she was still interested. Turns out she was and had emailed me, but the email never arrived.

Following up has meant that I get the chance to build a working relationship with a great new writer. It does make me wonder, though, whether some of the other people I thought were blanking me were actually waiting for a response from me. Time to do some more following up. :)

Writer Promotion Is Important

2007-04-19T13:42:00.000-07:00

If you are going to get paid to write, then you need to make sure that prospective clients can find you. That means promotion, but it doesn't have to cost you much. I've outlined some of the ways I promoted myself for free in How To Promote Your Way To The Top Of Google. Let me know if you have any tips to add.

Freelance Writing For Professionals

2007-04-18T12:15:00.000-07:00

One way to make sure you are taken seriously as a freelance writer is to be professional. This can mean many things, but for me it's about how I do business to make sure that the client gets what they want and I do too. The client wants work that is produced on time and to spec. I want to get paid to write and get repeat business or referrals. There are four things I do as a professional freelancer:

I don't say yes to a job unless I'm pretty sure I can deliver. Failing to deliver makes me look bad with the client. It also puts me under stress so I have learned how to say no.

However, sometimes there are circumstances beyond your control. If I think the deadline is in jeopardy I give the client plenty of notice and options for retrieving the situation. The rule here is to ask for what you need and make it realistic - there's no point in asking for an extension twice. I give the client a reason why I can't deliver on time and I say how much I can deliver by the due date. I also let the client know that I am working hard to get everything done.

I ask questions up front rather than waste my time and theirs by doing something wrong. Having to do a job twice is bad for cash flow, so I always get as much information as I can before starting the job. I usually explain to the client that he will get a better service if I do this - then it's no problem.

I don't work for people who repeatedly fail to pay within the required time scale. As a friend said to me recently, you have to know when it's time to fire the client. One of my clients approached me recently to do more work. I still have one unpaid invoice with that client and have had to chase him five times for payment. I said to him that I would not feel comfortable doing more work until that invoice was paid and that I would not feel comfortable doing another job until THAT invoice was paid. Time is money - you don't pay me and I don't have time to write for you.

Using this approach means that my clients know they can count on me - and that counts for a lot on the occasions when I need some leeway. It also means that I don't have many non-paying clients (I've had a few - what freelancer hasn't?)

What other advice would you give on being a professional freelance writer? Feel free to drop a link to something you have written on this issue in the comments thread.

Ghostwriting Ethics

2007-04-16T17:22:00.000-07:00

Here's another find from Mom and More, a discussion of ethics and ghostwriting. Here are my responses to the questions:

1. Would you completely write a book, play, or other creative work and allow someone else to have the credit?

This is a tough one. As a ghostwriter, I might be asked to do this and I suppose it's part of my job, so if I agreed to do it I would. However, if I could write a successful fiction piece I would be tempted to write it myself and take the credit.

2. Would you write a blog and allow someone else to claim it as their own?

Yes, I do that all the time. I ghost blog for several people and that's part of what pays my bills. However, I have several blogs under my own name (or recognisable pseudonyms) so I don't feel cheated. I think sometimes people need help with writing and that's what they get from me.

3. Would you use a pen name or pseudonym?

Yes, I would, but I haven't chosen one yet. I do have a couple of internet identities, though.

4. Would you write a nonfiction piece and allow someone (or something as in the case of a company) to have the credit?

That's another ghostwriting one. It's my job, so that's what I do. If I could give the same dedication to my own writing, I would already have finished a couple of novels.

5. Would you write someone’s term paper for them?

Absolutely not! As a former lecturer this makes my blood boil and I won't be a party to anything that smacks of plagiarism.

Bloggerwave Pays You To Blog

2007-04-12T08:58:00.000-07:00

I'm always on the lookout for new ways that you can get paid to blog and I've now found another one. It's called Bloggerwave and it works similarly to other paid to blog sites. You sign up, you get your blogs approved (lightning quick when I did it) and then you take up one of the opportunities. I signed up yesterday and have already written two posts for them.

At the moment, there are only a few opportunities but I am sure that will change. In the meantime, the system seems to work well. The site loads quickly, too, which is a plus for those of us with temperamental internet connections. So far, I like Bloggerwave, so I'm hoping for good things.

My Writing Team

2007-04-12T07:41:00.000-07:00

As you know I started a new venture in January, leading a small writing team. Boy, has that been a learning experience. And it still is. Here are some of the ups and downs of the past three months.

There was a lot of initial interest in the writing team. One person asked to work with me, took a job and then backed out at the last minute, leaving me to rely on the kindness of friends and some hard work to get the job finished on time. This was a big deal for me because I NEVER miss deadlines, though I do sometimes renegotiate.

A few more people were put off by the amount of writing that they had to do. I can understand this, because when I started I was appalled at the rates I had to write for and the money I was making, but I soon decided that if that was the market, then that was what I had to do to start with. And it's been worth it, because I have improved my skills and knowledge and have now started to earn more money for some projects.

Then there were the people who waited until a job was due to tell me that they couldn't complete it. To say I was incensed would be to put it mildly, so I waited till I had calmed down before pointing out that a last minute approach didn't leave me enough time to find an alternative - a couple of days would have been better. And I've also had dealings with people who want to do the job part time or less, which is fine, as long as they don't promise what they can't deliver.

Working with a team means that I spend a lot more of my time checking work than I had expected and it has also affected my cash flow. I try to pay people within a week of invoicing - and sometimes have managed within a day - but if people don't pay me on time, this can stretch me a bit. However, as a freelancer, I am only too aware that people have bills to pay, and I don't want to make writers wait for money when they have delivered the work.

On the plus side, I am developing relationships with some very good writers, who have put themselves out to meet deadlines, even when the money didn't seem great. They know who they are, and I am very, very happy to be working with them. I've also hooked up with a couple of new writers in the last couple of weeks who look very promising.

I've discovered a lot about the inner workings of Paypal including how to pay people when there's no cash in my account. I've made a bit of extra money, though not quite as much as you might think. In fact, there were some jobs on which I made 25 cents for spending 20 minutes checking, giving feedback and rechecking.

Overall, I'm not complaining. Although there have been some difficult moments, I can see that this will be a good experience, so I'm looking forward to what I learn over the next few months.

And here's a final question - as writers, what would you want from the people who supply you work. I think I have an idea, but it would be better to know for sure.

Finding Balance In Writing

2007-04-03T14:06:00.000-07:00

Domestika has set me on the track of this meme about balance in the writing life, forcing me to face some uncomfortable truths about my life as a freelance writer. Of course, I aim for balance. I even have a written plan for the amount of time I will spend writing, with family and on myself. The trouble is that it all goes out the window when I have a deadline. Instead of finding balance, I end up sitting in my chair, typing my fingers off and watching my butt grow larger by the second. But for what it's worth, here's my plan for achieving balance in the writing life:

1. Family time – I try to go with my husband to collect my daughter from school each day. It gives us time to catch up on our day and then to get the latest news from school. I also try to make time a couple times a week to spend the entire afternoon with my daughter, playing, reading, watching television and generally having fun.

2. Exercise – I have lots of exercise machines, which I am trying to use. I go to a weekly salsa class and I try to hit the pool five times a week and the beach a couple of times a week. We also try to walk round the block a couple of times a week, which is more family time.

3. Social time – this is less frequent, but it involves spending time (non child related) with my husband, and also with friends (sometimes child related)

4. Me time – this is the bit that tends to suffer, but occasionally I splash out on a pedicure or spend half an hour reading something that has nothing to do with work or childrearing.

I don't think I've achieved balance yet, but I'm much nearer to it than I was when I worked as a lecturer, with long work days and nights.

Now, who shall I tag? How about Dana Prince, Katherine Huether, Productive Pen, gracepub and suejeff

Making Sense Of Writing It Down

2007-03-29T14:09:00.000-07:00

As a freelance writer, you may well end up having to interview sources and you will need a way of keeping track of the information. I always travel with a recording device, spare batteries, a power cable and a notebook. I'm not talking about a laptop, but an old fashioned notebook with lines in it that you write in with a pen.

There are a couple of reasons for this. First of all the technology might fail, so having notes is a good backup and one I have had to use more than once when my editor was breathing down my neck for a story that had been chewed up by the Dictaphone or simply not recorded.

The second is that writing things down helps to fix them in your memory. As a journalist I would sit on the train on the way back from an interview and start to sketch out my story with the aid of my notes. Very often, I would not need to listen to the tape much, except to check that my quotes were right.

Now, the thing about interviews is that they are not tidy. Yes, you may have a neat list of questions but an interview is a conversation, which mean you may start out one place and end up another. This can get very confusing when you are taking notes, as you may find that you are putting pieces in all over the place, or correcting or clarifying previous information.

However, there is a simple technique that can help you to make sense of the chaos, and it's this. Write on every other line. In other words, leave a blank line between each line of notes. When something comes up that's related to an earlier note, you have space to write it. If something needs to be clarified, you have space to write it. And when you're done you'll still be able to read all your notes. Try it; I promise it works – even for my terrible writing.

Taking The Free Out Of Freelance

Is Freelance Writing The Best Job In The World?

2007-03-22T12:34:00.000-07:00

To some of us, freelance writing may be the best job in the world, but a Money Magazine/Salary.com survey puts 24 other jobs ahead of it.

The job of writer gets an A for creativity, Bs for flexibility and difficulty and C for stress. There's expected to be a 17 per cent growth in the number of jobs for writers in the ten year period up to 2014.

The bit that interested me most was the salary forecasts. I don't know about you, but I'm aiming to be in the top 25 per cent. In fact, I'd like to be in the '5% make more' category - gives me something to aim for.

Here are the figures:

Average pay: $60,519

75% of writers make more than: $50,302
50% of writers make more than: $56,598
25% of writers make more than: $64,762
Top potential compensation (5% make more): $120,823

The Best Freelancing Article I've Read This Year ...

2007-03-15T12:31:00.000-07:00

... and I didn't write it - darn! While I was surfing yesterday I came across a reference to this post. A Comprehensive guide to starting your freelance career. This is a great post, with advice on everything from bidding, to quoting, to warning signals about clients. In fact, it's a good guide to everything about freelancing. If you are freelancing - read it! Nuff said.

Writer Promotion Works

2007-03-11T08:06:00.000-07:00

I'm not really into trumpet blowing, but I had to let you know that all the promotion works. If you read this blog regularly, you will know that I have spent the last year and a bit promoting myself as a writer. Check out my freelance writing index to see exactly what I have done.

Anyway, every so often I do a search on Google to test how my efforts are going. Check out the screen shot to see what I found.

Not bad after a year! Of course, there's still work to do. I need to make sure people find me for the other keywords I use as well. Watch this space - and keep promoting. It really works!

Why I Love My Writing Newsletter

2007-03-04T07:31:00.000-08:00

A year ago I started a newsletter (called Writing Lab News) to bring some traffic to my site. At least, that was the idea. When I started I had a handful of subscribers and I knew most of those personally.

A year later, I have dozens of subscribers, so much so that I am changing to a new ezine provider and have put a new signup form on the front page of my blog.

I've really enjoyed doing the newsletter. I've been able to republish some useful articles and showcase articles and blog posts from other writers, many of them from right here on WritingUp. And the traffic building has become less important. I enjoy creating something useful. It has also become a way to connect with other writers and for them to find me. That means it works as a social, promotional and networking tool.

Here's an index of my newsletter over the past year:

Are You A Writer? - December 2006
Beef Up Your Blogfolio - March 2007
Best Ways to Generate New Article Ideas and Topics - August 2006
Blog Your Way To Working At Home - February 2007
Copyright Law: A Quick Guide For Freelance Writers - June 2006
Diary Of A Working Writer - Monthly
Ebook On Legal Services - July 2006
Feature Writing For Freelance Writers - March 2007
Five Ways to Become Published - January 2007
Free Resources For Writers - March 2007
Free Resources For Writers - May 2006
Free Resources For Writers: June 2006
Freelance Writers - Four Reasons To Get On The Net - May 2006
Ghostwriting Guide For Freelance Writers - February 2007
Great Gadgets For Freelance Writers - December 2006
Guru and Elance: Are They Worth It For Writers? - June 2006
How I Get Paid To Blog - May 2006
How I Put My Site On Steroids - Update - December 2006
How To Get Fair Pay For Freelance Writing - October 2006
How To Get Web Hits And Keep Them - February 2007
How to Grow Your Own Furniture - October 2006
How To Manage Writing Time - November 2006
How To Promote With Article Marketing - September 2006
How To Set Up A Writer's Home Office - November 2006
How To Write Copy That Pays The Bills - April 2006
How To Write Money-Making Copy - July 2006
Making It As A Freelance: The Art of the Interview - July 2006
Paid Blog Posts - And Not With Blogitive - September 2006
Press Here To Make The News - August 2006
Quality Pays Off In Freelance Writing - January 2007
Remind Me Why I’m Still Awake At 2 a.m.? - September 2006
Resources For Writers - April 2006
SEO Tricks - August 2006
So You Want To Be A Freelance Writer? - April 2006
Standard Rates for Freelance Writers - November 2006
The Revamping of My Freelance Writing Career - October 2006
What I Learned From Writing Reviews - February 2007
Writer promotion course - May 2006
Writing Articles for Newspapers - January 2007

Back issues can be seen at SharonHurleyHall.com, with the last few available as PDFs.

Why I Blog

2007-02-20T09:36:00.000-08:00

I've been tagged by danahinders to give five reasons why I blog, so here goes:

Reasons For Blogging

I started blogging because I heard it was a good way to bring traffic to your site. That worked well, though it took longer than I thought.
Then I found WritingUp and fell in love with the community aspect of blogging. At that point I no longer cared about traffic, I was just having fun.
I also blog because it's like an online portfolio, which I have used to show my writing ability to various people.
Blogging is a good way of fostering creativity - and of taking a break when I'm mentally exhausted
I blog because I get to write in my own voice - which is nice for a change after a day of ghostwriting.

Whose turn next? How about Inklings, kohuether and merryone?

At The Mercy Of My ISP

2007-02-05T09:34:00.000-08:00

While I'm writing this, my internet connection is down - AGAIN! As a freelance writer, I depend on having a reliable internet connection. Most of my work is for websites, so I have to visit clients' websites to see what content exists, and to get a lead on the tone they might expect. This is usually a useful supplement to a client's brief, which is not always as detailed as I might like. In addition, it helps me to see the context in which people will see my writing. The internet is where I do a lot of my research. Not all of it, because then I might be regurgitating the same content as everyone else, but it's certainly where I look up information about subjects I know very little about so I can write a competent article.

I have to visit websites to bid on jobs. IFreelance is my favourite, but I also look at work on Guru (though I rarely bid) and on Deborah Ng's excellent site. Usually, this involves looking at the profiles of project providers, checking out the details of jobs and perhaps doing a quick search to see whether the person who is posting has been mentioned in connection with any scams.

I also like to keep in touch with what's going on in the freelance world. That means visiting other freelancers' sites and blogs to see what they are talking about, and perhaps to participate in the conversation. There are two reasons to do this. The first is to get me out of my work at home bubble; the second is to promote myself by creating links with other relevant freelance professionals.

My email is online, because I couldn't cope with the spam any longer. Even Thunderbird wasn't catching it all, so I moved to Gmail for domains and have not regretted it. (Note to self: the next time you think you should download an email straight away, just DO it!).

Many of my friends are online. Some of them are right here on WritingUp; others are in the many places where I have created profiles. It's nice to have a chat with them from time to time. Usually, this helps me to relax, but I may also learn something useful. Chat with people like gracepub often enough and you are bound to learn something you didn't know that you can put to practical use.

So when my ISP is down, it is a major pain in the behind. It has been down a lot recently. Last week, the ISP that my ISP uses went down for 12 hours; another day it was for four hours. Today, my ISP's DNS thingummy is down. Almost every day, I have to reboot a couple of times, because of some weird thing they have in the system. (Correct me if I'm wrong, but you shouldn't have to restart an 'always on' connection every 12 hours.) Normally, when it's just the ADSL that goes down, I can connect with dialup, but not if it's a DNS problem. Ho hum!

Today was supposed to be a relatively light day. I have a few consumer finance articles to do, a couple of home articles, a business article to start and then a rewrite project for a client and friend. I also have to do an assignment for an online course I'm doing. However, this glitch means that while today will be even lighter than I thought it would be, tomorrow will be difficult, because I will have to add most of today's work to tomorrow's.

In the meantime, every cloud has a silver lining. While I'm waiting for the internet to make a miraculous reappearance so I can post this, I'm going to take some time off, go to lunch with my hubby and enjoy the sunshine.

How Writing Reviews Helped Me

2007-01-28T09:33:00.000-08:00

One of the things I did when I started my freelance writing career was to write reviews for consumer sites. I learned a lot from that experience, and I've collected in all in an article entitled What I Learned From Writing Reviews. Here's an excerpt:

On the paid to review sites, what people want most of all is your opinion on a product or service. They want to know how you used it, what worked, what didn’t work and how you felt about it. They also want to know what you get.

What I learned from that experience gave me the blueprint for much of the web content writing I do today.

Read What I Learned From Writing Reviews and see if you agree with me.

Freelance Writing: 2007 Career Goals

2007-01-25T09:32:00.000-08:00

Whether you're freelance writing or in any other career, it's important to have goals. They keep you focused and, in the tough times, remind you why you're churning out articles at 1 cent a word. I have a lot of goals for my career - and not all of them involve writing. In talking to a friend recently (more on that another time), I realised one important thing: I was working hard so I didn't have to work so hard."

Setting Career Goals

What I mean by that is that my short term career goal is to make enough money to pay my bills. That's also my medium term goal, with the addition of enough money for holidays and other small extravagances. I also want to improve the pay rate, so I get more money for less writing (who wouldn't?) But the reason I am doing this - and the reason I work at home - is to be able to spend more time with my family and to have a better quality of life. Those are things that I think most people want. (And don't think life is perfect, because there are some family members I can DEFINITELY do without!)

So this was what I had in mind when setting my goals for 2007. My perfect day would involve about four hours of writing for others, about two hours of teaching and about one hour of dealing with the other writers I work with. I would do this Monday to Friday and on weekends I would spend a couple hours a day working on my own stuff. I would be able to spend every evening playing with my daughter, and I wouldn't get stressed.

Living The Perfect Writing Day

Someone suggested that I try living (and writing) that way now instead of thinking about all the things that get in the way. So I tried it yesterday - and guess what? Yesterday I did as much writing in four and a half hours as I had done the previous day. I spent two hours on a new course, spent an hour on some admin - and took the rest of the day off to spend with my daughter. And I didn't get stressed even once. I'm going to try this for a couple of weeks and see if it works. I'll keep you posted. In the meantime, I'm curious - how do you plan to change your writing life this year?

Freelance Writing Motivation

2007-01-19T09:31:00.000-08:00

It's hard to maintain your motivation with freelance writing sometimes. Take today. I am nearing the end of a long assignment for a discerning client (no, you did not hear me say picky). The articles are on mortgages and there are more than 140 of them. I have 26 more to write. But those 26 are the ones with the difficult keyword phrases, which must be used exactly as written. (Ever try to make a sentence with six nouns and no verb?)

Freelance Writing Originality

Freelance writing assignments often ask you to be original. This person wants original content, but there is only so much to say about this subject - and I have already said it 120 times in different ways. I'm quite proud of myself - but I am also discouraged by the thought of the last few articles. Every original thought on this subject has already left my brain and been put on paper. The last 26 will be more difficult than the other 120.

Freelance Writing Discipline

This is when you really need discipline as a freelance writer. I have to force myself to write through the inertia. I need to go back to the sources I have used before (press releases, websites and occasionally my ex-IFA husband) and mine them for new information. But most of all, I have to write - even if I don't feel like it. I may be living my dream, but it's not always easy.

Read Of The Day: The One Minute Writing Lesson

Freelance Writing And Promotion - My Master List

2007-01-17T09:30:00.000-08:00

Trick Falls asked for a list of blogs, lenses and websites. I do a lot of promotion, so it took me a while to collate this. In fact, I'm still not sure that I've got everything. There are many article directories that I submitted only a few articles to and many social bookmarking sites that have fallen by the wayside. Anyway, here's the list so far.

Websites
http://www.doublehdesign.com
http://www.sharonhurleyhall.com

Blogs
http://www.writingup.com/blog/sharon_hurley_hall
http://www.doublehdesign.com/blog
http://wn.goldenprose.com/?q=blog/50
http://blog.myspace.com/sharonhurleyhall
http://www.blogchex.com/writinglife
http://www.inspiredauthor.com/blog_v2/blogs/index.php/freelance
http://getpaidtowriteandblog.blogspot.com/
http://bloggerparty.com/blog/sharonhh

Sporadic/inactive blogs
http://bb.goldenprose.net/blog/2
http://itmightbeverse.blogspot.com/

Profiles
http://www.myspace.com/sharonhurleyhall
http://www.ryze.com/go/SharonHH
http://www.linkedin.com/profile?viewProfile=&key=7633856
http://rappinhood.stumbleupon.com/
http://www.ifreelance.com/provider/detail.aspx?providerid=9879
http://selfpublishing.lifetips.com/expert-guru/1068-sharon-hurley-hall.html
http://ezinearticles.com/?expert_bio=Sharon_Hurley_Hall

Lenses/hubs
http://hubpages.com/profile/rappinhood
http://www.squidoo.com/freelanceinspiration/
http://www.squidoo.com/siteonsteroids/

Books
http://todaybooks.com/product_info.php?products_id=145
http://todaybooks.com/product_info.php?products_id=142

Newsletter
http://www.sharonhurleyhall.com/?p=27

Other stuff
http://s.hurleyhall.googlepages.com/home

Freelance Writing Friends - A Big Thank You

2007-01-11T09:29:00.000-08:00

What do you do as a freelance writer when you are in danger of missing a deadline? I have to say that I don't usually miss deadlines - it's bad for business. But this week, I was let down on a job, which left me with too much work to do to meet one of my writing deadlines. I could have pouted and cried (and maybe I did inside) but that wasn't going to help me meet the deadline. So instead of wallowing in my distress I asked for help. And I got it. That's why I'd like to thank marleymauve and kohuether, who helped me out of a really tight spot - and burned the midnight oil to do it.

And this is part of the power of WritingUp. Those of us who have been here for a while (and maybe those who are new) have found a supportive community. I have met other people who are doing the same thing I am doing - building a freelance writing career. WritingUp is a great place to talk about things that matter to you with other people who also care about those things. And it's a great place to make friends and meet people who offer help and mean it.

One To Read: How Blogging Helps Writers

Help, I Need A Writer

2007-01-04T09:28:00.000-08:00

Freelance Writing Is Funny

Freelance writing is a funny business. What a difference a year makes. At the start of last year I had been freelancing for only a few months and had yet to make any decent money (or any money from writing). I was about a month into blogging and my writing site was just starting to get some traffic.

Searching For My Writing Site

Fast forward to this year and things have changed a lot. The best news of all is that people are now using searches like 'freelance writing', 'ghost writing' and 'freelance editor' to find my site, so all that promotion has paid off. The number of unique visitors to my site has more than doubled. The number of page views has more than trebled. That means that there are more people coming to the site and they are looking at more stuff. That is good news. Traffic to my WritingLab blog is good and my newsletter has a healthy number of subscribers.

So You Wanna Do Some Freelance Writing?

I also have more freelance writing work than I can handle. I am having to turn down work and it's killing me. So I had a thought - what if I don't turn down work and pass it on to someone else instead? The person - or people - would need to have a great command of UK and US English. The topics I am asked to write about are quite varied, but I have a lot of people asking for people who can write on loans, insurance, mortgages and credit cards. There are other subjects as well, so if you're an expert in something let me know.

Get Paid To Write

The pay is middling. Typical articles are around 500 words and the average pay is around $5-$7. Not the best, but not the worst. However, I have also had ebooks that paid more than 4 pounds sterling for a 300 word page. It evens out in the end. I should know. One month I made nearly $4,000 from writing and blogging. Of course, I didn't see my family for a month, but that's another story.

Anyone who's interested has to be good with deadlines. If you're interesting in giving it a try, contact me through my blog (http://doublehdesign.com/blog/contact/) or website (contact page on the main doublehdesign.com site). I'll send you some more information and we can sort out an assignment for you to start on. Happy New Year!

First Steps In Writing And Publishing

2006-12-18T09:25:00.000-08:00

I didn't always want to be a freelance writer. When I was little I wanted to be an architect. I loved creating new things out of nothing, putting pieces together and changing them around so they made more sense. My favourite toy was Meccano, which I liked for the same reasons - a girly girl I definitely was not. As it turned out, I couldn't draw, which is a major disadvantage in the architectural field.

Luckily, right about the time that my art teacher was trying to disown me, I discovered that I was good at something else - languages - and that's how I got to know the people who would join me on my first publishing venture. I was already hooked on reading (and really enjoyed English Lit classes), and this would get me hooked on writing (in spite of my English teacher's criticisms of my poetry).

When I was 16/17 (in lower sixth, which for my American friends is the class before your final year of high school), a friend and I took over the defunct school newspaper. When I say defunct, I mean that it had appeared sporadically throughout my five years at that school. C and I decided to take it on and run it. We learned the hard way what it takes to create a publication:

We had to commission writing from other students
We had to edit it
We had to rewrite it if it didn't meet the brief or write it if someone missed a deadline
We had to arrange for illustrations
We had to learn to price the paper to recover our costs

Now these were the bad old days before desktop publishing, so putting together a school newspaper meant using a Gestetner machine. It was time to outsource. We drafted my mother and anyone else who could type to type the content we had on stencils. Where that wasn't possible, we got someone with excellent writing to copy the content onto the stencils. We found a way to incorporate the drawings (don't ask me how; I can't remember) and then we began the messy business of inking the machine, attaching the stencils and getting the number of copies we needed. In the process we got covered in black ink, but that didn't detract from the thrill of our first publication. Once we had stapled it all together, we were able to sell our first issue of Breakthrough for a paltry sum.

This experience got me hooked on connecting with readers through writing and publishing. It was kind of like early blogging, without the technology. We put material out and got almost instant feedback, which we used to improve the next issue. We were in touch with our readers - heck, we were our readers! I can still remember the thrill of seeing my name in print for the first time - and I still love it now. And even though a lot of my freelance writing is ghostwriting, I still get satisfaction from writing something that others want to read.

How Freelance Writing For Free Pays

2006-12-06T09:24:00.000-08:00

Freelance Writing Is Not Easy

Freelance writing is not an easy job. You have to spend time writing things you are not interested in because you're getting paid, and you are always worrying about where the next gig is coming from, at least at the start. And if you're ghostwriting, you don't even get the credit for your writing. That's why promotion is so important for freelance writers. It keeps your name out there and keeps the freelance writing work coming in. I'm always saying that writing for free isn't writing for free if you get something out of it - and now I have a concrete example to show you.

Freelance Writing History

When I started freelance writing, I wrote an article called Freelance Writers - Five Reasons Why You Need A Website. Some of you may recognise it as Freelance writers - four reasons to get on the net. I didn't get a dime for this article. It was picked up by freelancewriting.com and has been read by more than 3,000 people. It has also resulted in 120 visitors to my site in the past year. That's 10 a month since I wrote the article.

Freelance Writing Promotion

That's one freelance writing article. I know that's not a lot on its own, but I have about 50 articles out there, at least 33 of them unique and all with links back to my site. That's potentially a lot of traffic and may be part of the reason that I'm now getting more than 1,000 unique visitors a month to my freelance writing site. I am also getting Adsense money because some of those visitors like what they see. And people are starting to contact me about writing work (in fact, some of them are contacting me FOR freelance writing work, but that's another story). My point is this, one free article has made a big difference to my profile and to the money I make from freelance writing. Why not try it yourself?

Blogitive: The Party's Over For WritingUp

2006-12-04T09:23:00.000-08:00

I was an early user of Blogitive, back in the days when it used to be fun. I made up rhymes and other bits of nonsense and included a link as well. It was good for creativity and gave a few people a laugh as well, but it looks like the Blogitive party is over.

It seems that blogs on WritingUp, BloggerParty and a few others are no longer going to be accepted from today. If you have a blog on one of those sites and have already had your post accepted, you will be paid, but they're not planning to issue any more offers. Here's the post that lays it all out.

I have mixed feelings about this because it started as an easy source of income, but it's not so easy now. I haven't been posting as many Blogitive posts here because of two of their rules (the 'only write about the press release' rule and the 'two posts in between rule'.) Apart from that, I haven't had much time, so writing three posts to make $5 is less cost effective than writing one. I know some people can do it, but it's been difficult to fit it in with my other writing work. Other paid posting sites don't impose those rules (at least not yet, and I can write a fun post in five minutes and get paid).

Maybe Blogitive has done me a favour. I won't waste time looking for WritingUp offers that I have to reject. It may also be the kiss of death for my BloggerParty blog. Who knows? On the plus side, I've still got a couple of other blogs they will accept, if I can be bothered to write anything for them. I hope you do too.

(Thanks for the heads up, abi.)

I Was Unfaithful To Adsense

2006-11-28T09:22:00.000-08:00

I was unfaithful to Adsense. I admit it. My faith wavered in the face of suspected click fraud and I removed my Adsense ID. I was seduced by other advertisers, too numerous to mention, but I have learned my lesson. I have gradually replaced all the false tempters on my blogs and sites with my Adsense ads. I have turned away from temptation and I have had my reward ...

... or at least I will, in about two months. That's how long it takes to get your money after you have racked up the magic $100 figure. I could have had it earlier, if only I'd believed.

I still don't think it's the be all and end all. Frankly, I make more money from paid posting. But I've noticed something. It's about a year since I started blogging. Now that I have hundreds of posts and have done lots of promotion, I'm starting to get some clicks. So I've concluded that it's all about being patient, something I've not been that good at in the past.

Shameless self promotion
The new edition of Writing Lab News is out on Thursday. It's got information for writers and tips and tricks that anyone can use to promote themselves. Check out sharonhurleyhall.com for the back issues and sign up to get your copy of the December issue.

Recent articles include:
* How To Get Fair Pay For Freelance Writing
* How To Promote With Article Marketing
* Get Relevant Links For Your Website
* How To Write Money-Making Copy

Freelance Writing: Trading Pennies For Dollars

2006-11-24T09:21:00.000-08:00

As a freelance writer, there comes a time when you have to start chasing dollars instead of pennies. When you start out as a freelance writer, every commission is important, no matter how little it pays. That's how you get contacts and get a selection of clips that you can show to anyone who asks. It's also how you learn to write fast, because at 1 cent a word, you have to do a lot of writing to pay the bills.

To give an example, I had one task that I do that consisted of writing about 3,000 words a day. It's news, which meant minimal creative effort, but it still took time to write. When I started the contract, it took me half a day to write that amount. By yesterday, when I ended it, I was able to do the same amount in two hours. That was important, because it didn't pay very well and I needed to leave myself time to get some jobs that would make some money. There was also a small problem of successive late payments. (My golden rule is, don't let someone get away with that too often or it could become the norm.)

Don't get me wrong - I still do some low paid jobs, because it keeps the cash flowing, which is what cash flow is all about :) but I am also on the lookout for jobs that pay better. One of my recent opportunities gave me the chance to double what I usually get for ghostwriting, but I want to do better than that.

That's why I'm trying to change the balance of my writing. I have a couple of jobs which keep me going and I do a lot of paid blogging for various blogging ads places. But getting rid of one contract means I now have time to look for a few higher paid jobs (Deborah NG tries to have a $10 minimum payout on the jobs on her site). And replacing it with something that paid more means my bank balance won't suffer while I'm doing it. For me, this is all about working smarter, with the ultimate goal of freeing up more time to write my books, play with my daughter and go to the beach. I'll let you know how it goes.

So, I'm interested to know, as a freelance anything, how did you make the move from the peanuts jobs to the ones that really paid?

Freelance Writing Hub

A Hub For Promotion

2006-11-18T09:19:00.000-08:00

I'm always on the lookout for somewhere new to promote my writing and other skills, and a few months ago I made a couple of Squidoo lenses, one on SEO and another on freelance writing. Lo and behold, one of my current clients actually followed me around the web before contacting me through one of the lenses. So I'm a firm believer in trying lots of new forms of promotion, because you never know which one will pay off. Of course, that can make it difficult to identify the really effective ones, but I'm working on a way to solve that. A few weeks ago, I got a lead on a Squidoo like site, which I bookmarked and forgot about till last night.

It's called HubPages. Like Squidoo you add modules which you can fill with text or images. I haven't explored all the options yet, but it doesn't seem to have as many advertising options as Squidoo. The interface is clean and it works fast. It took me only a few minutes to make my SEO hub, which is similar to my Squidoo one. Even if I'd had to do it from scratch, I don't think it would have taken more than half an hour.

You can also earn money through your hub with Adsense, Amazon and Ebay. This didn't work as well as it could have. I couldn't get my Adsense account to talk to HubPages and my Amazon affiliate account is with the UK site, which doesn't seem to be supported. But for those of you in the US it would probably work well. There's not much more to say about it so far - I've only been on the site for a day. I'll keep you posted on what kind of traffic it brings.

Working on Self Promotion

2006-11-12T09:18:00.000-08:00

I spend a fair bit of time on self-promotion - or at least I did before I got so busy writing. One of the things I find is that I try things and create profiles, then lose track of where they are. So I created a little ready reference for myself, which I plan to add to as I take up new writing and promotion opportunities.

The other good thing about this list is that when I go to a new site, I can create a profile in seconds. I use the intro from my main site and this list to let people find out more about me while I'm filling in the details. It's in three sections. The first is a list of the places where people can see my work. Of course, since I do a lot of ghostwriting, almost half my work isn't there.

Where I Write:

doublehdesign.com
Sharon's Writing Lab
Freelance writing advice blog
Writing Life blog
Lifetips.com
Freelance writing on Inspired Author
My freelance writing lens on Squidoo
My SEO lens on Squidoo
Ifreelance profile
BloggerParty blog
Free to reprint articles on EzineArticles

The second section is my recent publications. Of course I've got articles going back nearly 20 years in other publications, but people want to know what's up to date.

My Books and Publications

The final section of my quick ready reckoner is borrowed from gracepub, who suggested somewhere that this was an easy way to let people find your stuff. This is where the benefits of article marketing really pay dividends.

Search For Sharon

Find me on Google
Find me on MSN
Find me on Yahoo

This doesn't have all my work by a long shot - and after this week's efforts I'll need to do some updating, but it's a useful promotional tool.

MySpace For Business

2006-11-12T09:16:00.000-08:00

I'm always on the lookout for new places to promote myself as a freelance writer - and I found another one this week. I'm a bit of a sucker for email newsletters, though I'm trying to break the habit. Anyway, one of them passed on the following information about a new place to promote yourself and make contacts.

It's called Bizfriendz (affilate link). It bills itself as 'MySpace for business' and it is remarkably similar in the way it works. Like MySpace, with BizFriendz you can set up a profile, including personal, education and professional information. Like MySpace, you can add multimedia to the account. Unlike MySpace, you can earn money by referring people, and more money when your referrals refer other people. I haven't earned a dime yet, but I've only been there a few days.

Bizfriendz has only just gone live, so there's no way of telling whether it's going to be huge or another flash in the pan. I've had a couple of friend requests so far and I'll be monitoring my site traffic to see what it brings. Check it out for yourself and see what you think. And if anyone knows more about it than I do, please feel free to add more info in the comments.

ReviewMe: A New Paid To Blog Opportunity

2006-11-10T09:15:00.000-08:00

This is a sponsored post about a new way to make money online. I first read about this site on Believin's blog and rushed over to sign up. When I visited ReviewMe I saw an attractive site with an laughably easy sign up process. In fact, I was able to sign up while chatting online with a couple of friends. I put in my name, address and Paypal address and was good to go. You can also opt to be paid by cheque.

The way it works is that you submit your blog to be considered for reviews. I haven't yet figured out what criteria they use, but I suppose they want a blog that is indexed and gets a decent readership. I submitted three blogs for consideration and had two accepted, this one and my Writng Lab blog. The other blog was not accepted, but that's no surprise, because although it's been going for months, even Technorati won't accept that it exists. Something's strange there.

Anyway, back to ReviewMe. The blog submission form is simple. You need a name, URL, feed URL, category, six tags and a description. Your site is checked and accepted or rejected straight away - no hanging on waiting for confirmation emails. You can submit six blogs and do unlimited reviews on each one. Once you're set up, your blog is assigned a value per review based on its popularity and other factors. You earn half of that price for writing a review. My blog was assigned an initial value of $40, which means I should get $20 for this review. I'll keep you posted. They pay once a month at the start of the month.

So far, I like what I see. ReviewMe insists that bloggers disclose that posts are sponsored. I like that too. Watch this space. I'll keep you up to date with my ReviewMe Adventure.

Blogitive: More Posts, Less Time

2006-11-09T09:15:00.000-08:00

I've always been a big fan of getting paid to blog. I've written posts on how I get paid to blog and getting more out of Blogitive. But now this is getting to be hard work. $5 for 10 minutes work was fine, but $5 for an ad and two posts in between is less cost effective.

And, wouldn't you know it, this has coincided with a flurry of offers. I'm hoping that other paid blogging sites are not going to go the same way.

I wrote to Blogitive to complain (I won't put a gloss on it) about their new policy and to say bloggers needed more time to do all those posts. This is what they said:

We had to do this to increase the quality of the Blogs in our network. Clients don't like to see Blogs that just have posts written for our clients. Blogs should be about many random things and this forces everyone to write about different things that might interest them beyond our offers. The time to write posts isn't an issue for most Bloggers and we have even considered shortening it so more Bloggers can get offers easier.

Looks like my Blogitive days might soon be at an end.

Too Much Writing, Too Little Time

2006-11-09T09:14:00.000-08:00

One of the issues many writers face is time management. I read a good suggestion today about using a timer to make sure I spend time writing instead of checking email or blogging, which are my two favourite distractions. I always deliver on time, but I tend to work unsociable hours. One day, I'd like to fit the writing into a shorter space of time. What are your writing goals?

Giving Freelance Writing Work Away

2006-11-08T09:13:00.000-08:00

I was tickled to read one of gracepub's posts where she referred to me as 'giving work away'. I hadn't thought of it like that. It's probably the first time in my freelance writing career that I've been in a position to do that.

Normally, I take on all the jobs and work too hard trying to do them all. But when I got the latest one, I realised I'd have to write 9,000 words a day for the next four months. That's just too much, especially if I still want a husband, a daughter and friends at the end of it. So that's why I posted the opportunity yesterday. I spent a lot of time getting the contract and figured someone else might as well benefit - and someone will.

Freelancing can be precarious and it's tempting to say yes to everything when the work is coming in, but sometimes you have to learn to say no. After all, if you work yourself into the ground, there would be no point in earning any money. So, although it doesn't come naturally, I'm going for balance.

What similar choices have you had to make, if any?

New Ways To Make Money From Blogging

2006-11-08T09:10:00.000-08:00

One of the things my blog is about is how to Make Money from freelance writing. One way that works well for me and brings in some nice pocket change is Blogitive. But in order to qualify for the program you have to have a blog that's indexed in the search engines and one that is popular.

There are lots of ways to do this, including submitting your site to directories, burning a feed with Feedburner and doing what you would do anyway - visit people's blogs and comment on them in the hope that they will comment on yours. That part isn't difficult and at $5 a time for writing about a web release, it's a nice little earner, particularly during the slow writing months.

Now they've got a few more programs. One of them is to put news headlines on your blog (which probably wouldn't work here), but the other is more exciting. It's ghost blogging, which I do anyway, so I'm looking forward to the chance to make more money with fewer ads.

Why I'm Happy That I'm Not Finishing My Novel

2006-11-04T13:28:00.000-08:00

Everyone's got NaNo on the brain - everyone except me, that is. For about four years, I've had a novel outline languishing in a corner of my desk. It has stared at me reproachfully as I have done other jobs and written other things. I've felt guilty because I feel I haven't stuck to it - or even got started properly, but yet every time I sat down to write it, my brain froze and I couldn't manage more than a few desultory sentences. As you can guess, that has done nothing for my self image, especially since I am a prolific freelance writer and ghostwriter.

So it was because of this that I decided to attend one of the Inspired Author Friday night online workshops. The reason was that writing coach Lori Chance was going to be there, and I figured it would be a great opportunity to finally kickstart that novel writing.

It was an interesting session, in which I got very public therapy for my novel writing malaise. Lori was great, talking me through all the reasons why I might not be getting started with the novel (time pressure, fear of failure, perfectionism) and the qualities I had used in the past to successfully step out of my comfort zone (focus). We talked about ways of getting support with novel writing (courses, critique groups and so on). But the upshot was not what you might think.

At the end of the session I felt exhilarated and liberated because with Lori's help I had finally given myself permission to let that novel go, at least for now, and to concentrate on writing one of my other ideas instead. I have now put some regular writing time in the diary (only once a week, but once I get obsessed, as I will, I'm sure it will be more often) and a friend has offered to set me up with her writing group.

So I want to say a public thank you to Lori. I also want to let you know that you can benefit from her experience for free. Lori's got a site at DestinationWords and a free writing life coaching group on Myspace. Browse around Lori's profile and you'll find a lot of useful and interesting stuff - and some of it can be applied to anyone, not just writers.

Writing And Loving It

2006-11-02T13:27:00.000-08:00

Gracepub recently wrote a post called Are You A Writer? and it got me to thinking. Yes, I am a writer, partly because I couldn't imagine doing anything else and partly because that's my job. It's what I do and who I am. However, what I'm doing now is a far cry from what I imagined a writer's life to be when I first had the dream in my teens.

Like many aspiring writers I dreamed of writing the great (fill in the country) novel or becoming a famous poet. Neither of those things has happened yet. Instead, I spend my days writing about mortgages and finance, camping, language teaching and (best of all) working in the movies. I write about a variety of topics, some interesting, some less so, but although fame is still distant, I'm still happy.

That's because even when I complain about a particular writing project - and let's face it, some of them are hard - I still get a kick out of making my living from writing. I would never want to go back to working for someone else or working in an office. This is what I wrote in a comment on gracepub's post:

Writing is a strange profession; if your face isn't on a dustjacket or your byline in a national magazine or newspaper, then many people don't take you seriously as a writer. I guess you have to learn to do without the approbation of your peers and write anyway.

I suppose that's where I am now. I know that one day I'll get around to writing more for myself than for others, but for now I'm enjoying beign able to pay the bills. How do you feel about how your writing career has developed?

The Long Reach Of Article Marketing

2006-10-25T13:26:00.000-07:00

Finally, one of these things that I can write about legitimately. Do you know that one of my most read free article marketing articles on EzineArticles has to do with funeral flowers? I'm not making this up, I promise. Here's how it happened. About four years ago my husband got into a new financial venture, selling prepaid funeral plans in the UK market. He had a partner and things went swimmingly for a while. I did a website for them and it seemed to do the trick. It was simple (which was just as well given my skill level) and professional.

A few years later, they wanted to drum up some publicity, so I suggested article marketing. I took the original website content, most of which I had written or edited and (with their permission) turned it into eight articles relating to funerals and funeral plans. One of them is about planning your funeral, including thinking about flowers for saying goodbye, as Dotflowers mentions.

Even though those articles have nothing to do with my main business of freelance writing, ghostwriting and teaching, they're still out there working for me. The reason is that part of the deal was that in the three link resource box, one of the links pointed to my site. Depending on the search engine you use, you can find the article (called 'It's Your Funeral: Why Not Plan It Properly') at least a hundred times. That's a hundred inbound links to my site. OK, so some of them are probably not the best quality, but at least they are there.

My point? Even if you write about something like funeral flowers and even if the article is old, you can still get some benefit for the resources and sites you are promoting.

Freelance Writing Myths

2006-10-16T13:25:00.000-07:00

Freelance writers hear a lot of things from their clients - and they shouldn't believe all of them. The things clients tell you, as a writer or ghostwriter, are often designed to get you to provide your best work at the lowest possible price, and to give them something to measure your work against if you don't hit their target.

Freelance Writing Myth 1 - There Is Lots Of Info On ...

Clients always say things like:'There is lots of information out there, so you shouldn't have any trouble with this' and 'I found lots of links on Google'. Clients who do this are often trying to lowball me or have been fooled by the 1 million links on Google. I must admit, when I hear this, I'm often tempted to say unkind things such as: 'if there's so much great info out there, why am I the one that's looking for it?' I don't, though, knowing better than to bite the hand that might feed me.

Because the thing about search engines is that one million web pages does not equal lots of good information, not in a research sense anyway. What you've got instead is the same information one million times - and you're the sap that has to make sense of it. So if you have to research something outside your niche and write more than a hundred articles and make them all sound different, that can be a tall order.

Freelance Writing Niches

Gracepub has been quite vocal about the benefits for freelance writers of finding and staying within your niche. When you do, you have knowledge at your fingertips and you can write fast and earn more money. When you don't, you can end up having wasted your time and be out of pocket. I write about UK finance and I've done this before, in a series on credit cards. All of the articles were different, though much of the information was the same. (By the way, I had a funny experience the other day when I was researching a subject and some of my own ghostwritten material came up). But with other subjects, it's not so easy. If you don't know the subject well enough, you can't always differentiate between the articles.

This happened to me with a project. OK, the client was picky, but he had a point - some of the articles were very samey. And the reason - there wasn't loads of information out there. When I looked into it, there were a few facts repeated ad nauseam. I tried my best, but I just couldn't make the articles different enough and I didn't have enough inside information to make the difference.

So now I've revised some of the articles and I'm playing a waiting game. If the revisions are OK, that's a quarter of the money I want to earn this month taken care of. If not, it's back to the drawing board and looking for another freelance writing job.

Related freelance writing information

It Shouldn't Happen To A Freelance Writer
Rejected? Don't Be Dejected
Five Questions Every Freelance Writer Should Ask

This is the first in an occasional series on freelance writing myths. Feel free to join in on your blog or to let me know of myths you've experienced in your job.

Freelance Writers Need Time Off Too

2006-10-06T13:24:00.000-07:00

I am taking a day off today. I have been busy for months, and not just with freelance writing. In the last three months I have completed an international move and done more writing than I ever thought possible. I'm so busy that I have very little time to promote - and promotion is part of what has made me so busy. So why am I taking a day off?

It's simple. Every now and then you need to remind yourself of the reasons why you work at home. My reasons (in no particular order) include being able to set my own schedule, not having to dress up and spending time with my daughter and family. This week I've been particularly busy having done a panic acceptance of too much work the previous week. My daughter has been asking me to play and I promised that if she could be patient (as if!) I would play on Friday afternoon. So that's what I'll do when she gets home from school.

Before she gets home, I'm also going to do some stuff around the house, because we've still got a fair number of boxes everywhere and it's driving me crazy. And maybe I'll also go to the beach and go to my favourite coffee place with my husband. And maybe ... And maybe ...

Days off come so rarely that it's tempting to fill them with stuff. I've always been a hard worker, but I work harder now that I'm at home than I ever did as a lecturer - and that's saying something. The danger of that is that you could burn out, as a good friend warned me. So I'm taking some time to chill before that happens. WAHMs are high risk candidates for burnout because they never have any time off.

Yesterday, I sat at the computer from 8am till about 9pm, with only a couple of short breaks. When I got up my eyes were blurred and my wrists were aching, but I had met my deadlines. I'm only behind on one thing now (here's why) and I'm sure I can catch up over the next week. I've written three articles this morning (1500 words in total, which is just a warm-up) and now this freelance writer is out of here. Time to relax.

I Can't Write Like This

2006-09-29T13:23:00.000-07:00

Do other freelance writers have to put up with this? As I type this, someone is drilling in the background (but it might as well be in my head). Someone else is fitting a smoke alarm which is beeping once a minute. I'm sure someone else will come knocking at the door in a minute. That's what happened yesterday and that's why I was up till nearly midnight so I wouldn't get too far behind on my writing work.

The story behind this is that in April we came to look at the house and left a list of jobs that needed to be completed. Four months seemed a reasonable time scale, but when we arrived they hadn't been done. One month in, we were still waiting, so two nights ago my husband crafted a strong email, the gist of which was that we were tired of waiting for the contractor to get his act together and we might consider legal options if he didn't get the jobs done. So yesterday, we had people popping in every five minutes to do the jobs they should have done four months ago.

Writing Deadlines

So today I am really fed up, because I have too much writing to do in the next week, and every time people are in the house I lose at least half a day. Now, of course, I'm glad they're doing the work, but if they had done it when they were supposed to it wouldn't be interfering with my writing deadlines.

I have an ebook due in two days, some Lifetips due in four, some blog posts daily from Monday and 95 articles of a series of 100 to do over the next couple of weeks. This was already going to be a manic schedule as I'm fitting it around my daughter's school day. Now it's nearly impossible. Ok, rant over - somebody say something to cheer me up, please.

Setting Freelance Writing Goals

2006-09-25T13:21:00.000-07:00

Freelance writing is like any other business - you have to set goals to make it a success. When I went freelance a year or so ago, my goal was to make enough money working from home to replace my former salary as a part time lecturer. It was five months before I made any money at all. In that time, I concentrated on creating my website, writing a few children's stories, entering writing competitions (only two, neither of which I won) and writing free articles so I would have some up-to-date examples of what I could do. This helped me to polish my writing skills.

Finding Freelance Writing Jobs

I also looked at many of the sites that listed freelance writing jobs and started applying. That was a difficult time, because bidding is hard work for little reward. I learned a couple of things about bidding, while I was doing it:

First, I learned to have some text ready that I could cut, paste and change around to suit any job with only minor editing. This included a paragraph about the job and my proposal, a paragraph about my relevant experience, a paragraph with links to examples of my work and a paragraph with contact details. That's enough for most bids (and too much for some - some people only want the figures). That didn't help me much with winning bids, but it did help with learning to blow my own trumpet and promote.

Second, I learned that if you're competing with people who will write for peanuts, you will never earn what you think you're worth. So I swallowed my pride, dropped my prices and vowed that one day I would get better paid writing jobs.

Freelance Writing: The First Job

My first freelance writing job (paid) came from one of my former students. I suspect it gave him a thrill to be in the driving seat, but I didn't care. He was pleasant, polite and paid on time - everything you want from a writing client. The next big job came from someone who wanted to take advantage of my experience as a teacher. The job was ghostwriting a lesson. Again, done and paid promptly.

At the same time, I was writing for a new venture that I first heard about here on this site - the revamped InspiredAuthor. Over the course of four months or so, I wrote 75 articles for two new topics I was managing, one of them on freelance writing. I was able to use these as examples of my web writing and that suddenly put me in a whole different league where writing jobs were concerned.

The next thing I knew I was writing for a whole slew of sites on a variety of topics and 10 months after I went freelance, I had achieved my first goal. I was pleased about it, because I was doing it part-time, fitting it around childcare and other family responsibilities. I now have a couple of regular writing clients who pay above the minimum, though I still take the 'peanuts' jobs as well. If I write fast enough, I can make enough from the job to make it worth my while.

Freelance Writing Goals

It has to be said that I managed that first freelance writing goal with only a minimal amount of planning and quite a lot of learning, from people on this site and others. What I have learned in the process is that unless you turn your ideas into goals they may never happen. That means prioritising and detailing the steps that need to be taken to achieve those goals.

For example, I know that in 10 years' time, I don't want to be scrabbling around for 1 cent a word jobs, so I have to raise my profile further and do some writing that will bring in residual income. I can also use my teaching experience to do the same thing. So my plan for the next year is to try to find a few more of those higher paying jobs, and to convert my offline journalism courses to online courses. I've also got a few plans for books. I'll let you know how it goes. If you're a writer (or in another business), I'd love to hear about your process for setting goals and how you've done with achieving them.

Writing Gold

2006-09-21T13:20:00.000-07:00

While I'm stting at my desk writing, Monex is trading in gold, which apparently has held its value. Bully for them. What I value, especially at the moment, is my brand new ADSL connection. Living with 56k has been difficult, especially when my last writing job required me to download several large files as background information. Not only did the dialup drop out several times during the downloads, but it also downloaded a couple of them twice. So that was a couple of hours during which I could surf the net even more slowly than usual.

Since a lot of my work is for the internet and researched on the internet, life in the slow lane has been a trial. Add to that the minutiae of setting up a new home and you'll see how inconvenient it has been for the rest of my family to have to do without a telephone while I've been working. So a working ADSL connection (even though it's only 512k) is like gold to me. It will make my writing life so much easier.

Writing For Money

2006-09-20T13:18:00.000-07:00

That's what freelance writers do. I've popped in from time to time and read the debates about the ethics of putting ads on your blogs. But here's my position. I'm a freelance writer, which means I get paid to write. If someone is going to pay me $5 or more to put an ad on my blog, that makes me a well paid writer. I do the post in five minutes, which gives me an hourly rate of $60. At the moment, I'm the main breadwinner at home and I can't afford to turn down that kind of money.

Paid Freelance Writing

If I asked most people to pay that for my writing, they would laugh in my face and go to someone who will write for less than 1 cent a word. Granted, I hope not to have to do this forever. There are also a few ads I've turned down. Today I've been lucky. They want me to write about search engine optimization and a press release from USWeb about Google's Accessible Search.

What most people question is whether putting an ad for SEO on my blog lessens its quality. Judge for yourself. On all my posts I make it clear that there is sponsorship so people can take that into account when forming a judgement. But the people who pay for ads on blogs pay for links. The rest of the content is up to me.

I was amazed to see a link on another web page (I'll post it when I find it again) referring to me as 'working for Blogitive'. I think whoever posted that missed the point. I work for myself - and that's why I have ads on some of my blog posts. That's also why I can take the time to craft a detailed blog post about an important freelance writing issue.

Making Money From Freelance Writing

2006-09-15T13:16:00.000-07:00

Freelance writing is like any other business. Any business person (or affiliate marketer) will tell you that the bedrock of the business is in repeats. That's the people who keep paying year after year without your having to do anything more. That doesn't work well for freelance writing. But what does work is getting repeat business. As with any business, work where you don't have to resell yourself is money in the bank.

Freelance Writing - Show Me The Money

For freelance writers that means one of two things. Repeat work from clients who know your writing and use you as their first choice, or a regular writing contract that means there's a bit of your income you don't have to chase as long as you keep delivering. The less time you have to spend promoting, the more time you can spend on writing (promotion IS important, too, but that's another story).

I've been lucky. Since I started full time (ish) freelancing a year ago, I've met a few people who liked my writing and brought me new work. So much so, that it's been about two months since I've bid for any work. The less time I spend bidding, the more I spend writing. Then, just before I left the UK, I hit the mini-jackpot. Someone saw my site and my CV (this is where my promotion paid off) and approached me to write daily blog posts on the UK financial market. I can't say who, because it's ghostwriting, so it's confidential.

Freelance Writing Lessons

I broke the payment into an upfront retainer (small, but enough to make sure that if I don't get paid at the end of the month, I won't be too far out of pocket) and a per-post fee. This should ensure that I make just under a quarter of my (rockbottom) monthly target from that source. (I make a slightly lower proportion of my get rich quick and retire target). Lesson number one is to work out how much of your work time you will spend on the job and price to match.

By the end of the first week, I was asked to increase the length of the posts and the quantity. I said yes to the first but no to the second. The reason is that I need to earn a certain amount of money to pay my bills and this client cannot pay me enough of a retainer for me to give up the chance to do other work. So lesson number two is to make sure you don't get so much repeat work that you have no time to do lucrative writing jobs when they come up.

Then my client asked me a question: 'what happens if you're sick or go on holiday?'. Yikes, I hadn't thought of that - and I should have. We all assume we'll always be ok until we aren't - and then it's too late. So I asked a friend with experience in the market whether she could cover for me in those cases. And I also asked whether she wanted to mop up the extra work he had going. So I did both my friend and my client a favour. Lesson number three: always have a contingency plan for your freelance writing work.

What I'd like to find now is another client who will operate on a similar basis. I'd like to have at least half my income come from this sort of work. That would mean I could almost always pay the bills (because my job is portable, I'm the main earner at the moment) but wouldn't be too dependent on one source. Lesson number four: diversify.

So to recap, I've now got:

an agency that puts lots of work my way
a client on contract who should (fingers crossed) pay me for the next year
two clients who give me writing work when they have it
occasional work from Lifetips
some paid blog postings

And I didn't do all this alone. Some of it was promotion, but a lot came from tips and introductions from other writing friends, gracepub in particular. Lesson number five is: you never know how or when the contacts you make will help you. One of the things I've enjoyed most about this site is the friends I've made here. They've given me advice on everything from website development, to networking, to publishing. And I've met a lot of fellow freelance writers who have shared their tips and experience. Thanks, everyone.

Freelance Writing on Inspired Author

Check out the revamped freelance writing pages on InspiredAuthor. And subscribe to my free writing newsletter, WritingLab News. Lots of good content and absolutely no spam.

Doing It On The Floor

2006-09-04T13:15:00.000-07:00

It's amazing what you can do when you have to. I moved into my new house on Wednesday and that's all it was - a house. Not a stick of furniture. Lucky for me we had the piece of cardboard the fridge came in and two of the most uncomfortable airbeds known to man. Air? More like rocks! I haven't slept this badly since my daughter was born.

We were lucky, though. Thanks to a little foresight (and some help from a friend), the phone was connected on Tuesday. Getting an internet connection was a little trickier, though. On Tuesday I went to the bMobile office (the mobile arm of Cable and Wireless, not known around here for their customer service). I asked whether I could get a dialup connection that day. They took my details and my money and said I'd have a connection that afternoon. Hah! Did I heck!

I went back the next day and went through the same thing again. Still no joy. So on Thursday I went to the rival company, Sunbeach. They set up my service straight away and when I got home I was able to connect and wade through more than 200 emails. Oh joy!

Now I have a dilemma. Do I get ADSL through Cable and Wireless (cheaper but with shoddy service) or through Sunbeach (a pleasure to deal with)?

And in case you're wondering what I've been doing on the floor, it's working on my computer. No furniture, so I put my laptop on an empty suitcase, the keyboard in my lap and started typing. Today I'm in luxury, because a friend has lent us some plastic chairs.

So now my laptop is on two suitcases and the keyboard is in my lap. I have deadlines every day this week, but I'm feeling good. I had positive feedback on the first blog posts I did for a new contract, the sun is shining and it's a beautiful day. Hope you're having a good day, too.

Freelance Writing From Anywhere

2006-08-25T13:14:00.000-07:00

Can you really write from anywhere? I'm about to find out. For about four years I've been planning a move to the Caribbean. Now the day is finally here - my last day in England for a while.

I'm packing my bags and selling my car and tomorrow I board a plane. My trusty laptop will be with me, so I can start work as soon as I arrive. Or at least I could. What I'm really going to do is have a few days off, go to the beach and relax, if only for a few days.

I've got deadlines in the first week of September, so I can't slack for long. Wish me luck - I'll be back here in early September (provided my Internet connection is up) with an update on freelance writing on an island. In the meantime, all my other writing is linked here. See you soon :)

Four Secrets Of Freelance Writing

2006-08-17T13:13:00.000-07:00

I've been freelancing for the last year and I've been reasonably successful for the past three months. This doesn't mean that I'm getting rich, but that I have managed to replace the salary I was earning as a part-time lecturer. In fact, now that I've cleared the overdraft I built up over nine months of earning a pittance, my account is in the black. During this time, I've learned a couple of things about freelance writing. I'm sharing those with you for whatever they're worth.

Freelance Writing Is Not A Get Rich Quick Scheme

Many people see freelance writing as a glamorous life. You get to write and earn shedloads of money. Wrong. Freelance writing - successful freelance writing - is a job. Even if you love it, you still have to work hard to pay the bills. More than that, you have to promote yourself feverishly in the hope that someone will give you that first break. And once you start to build up relationships with people, you will still have periods where the earnings are lower than you want.

Freelance Writing Gigs Are Like Buses

The thing is, freelance writing gigs are like buses (or taxis in North America). Nothing for ages, then three or four at once. Every writer has slow periods. The people who run freelance agencies will tell you that writing work slows over the summer and around major public holidays. Freelance writers have to prepare for these slow periods by taking the work when it comes. The upshot of this is that you balance times spent twiddling your thumbs with times where you can't leave your computer long enough to eat. With practice, you learn to estimate how long jobs will take you and when you need to start bidding. Right now, for example, I've stopped bidding for jobs, because anything I get is likely to be due either while I'm mid-air or while I'm wrestling with an Internet connection setup. I've told everyone that I'll be unavailable for a week from next Thursday. But, I've spent the last month preparing for this by taking on lots of work to build up some cash reserves.

Freelance Writing: You Have To Give To Get

As a freelance writer, sometimes you have to take work at much less than your preferred hourly rate. Even if you are worth $50 an hour, the realities of the internet marketplace mean that you will rarely get it unless you have an established relationship with a buyer. Instead, you may have to write for as little as 1 cent a word. This is not a lot, it is true, but if you are getting lots of work at that rate, it will soon add up. The faster you write (and your speed will improve) the better that hourly rate begins to look. Where this pays off is that you earn the trust of someone, who may well be prepared to pay you more the next time round.

Always Say Yes And Panic Later

When the writing work comes in, I sometimes wonder how I'm going to do it. I have a three year old and I do most of my writing three days a week, plus naptimes and evenings. At the moment I say yes to most writing jobs, and then I fit the writing into whatever time I have (in fact, I should be writing an article on credit cards right now). The reasons for this are:

to earn some money for writing
to increase my writing speed
to write about new topics and build up expertise
to build relationships with people who might give me more writing work

The next step is to weed out the non-payers and accept more work from those who consistently have jobs and pay on time. That will make it even easier to make a success of freelance writing. The

Freelance Writing On The Move

2006-08-09T13:12:00.000-07:00

How do you keep writing when you have to travel? Here's my situation. My freelance writing career is going well. I have been incredibly busy for the past couple of months. All that is great, except that I am trying not to lose my mind while planning a transatlantic move. After four years of planning, it's almost crunch time. The house is covered in boxes, the shippers are coming tomorrow and we're hassling the lawyers to give us the dates we need to get other things booked into the calendar. Meanwhile, I've had to keep writing.

Organising My Writing Life

I was relatively organised. I scaled back on most of my work so I could help with the packing (my DH has been doing most of it). But the dates kept shifting, so I said yes to things that I thought would be due after shipping (which should have happened two weeks ago). However, nothing ever goes to plan - and this is no exception. So I've found myself with lots of writing to do while the house was being dismantled around me and while trying to keep my three year old from getting stressed. She knows we're moving, but she doesn't like seeing her things packed away. Although we're trying to keep things normal, there's no way they can be.

I kept writing and met most of my deadlines, writing by day and packing by night - until after midnight, some nights. Eventually, yesterday, I caved. For the first time in a long, long time, I told a client that I could not meet her deadline, explained why and asked for some flexibility. She was very understanding and even offered me a day more than I had asked for (which is good, because I'd added a day more than I thought I needed). I didn't like doing it, but it was more professional than missing the deadline without explanation. I've also told a couple of other people that I can't do any more work this week.

Clearing My Desk

All my desk paraphernalia has gone. I'm down to my laptop, with an external mouse and keyboard. Tomorrow we're moving into temporary accommodation and I've got to set up the wireless router so that we can all have access to the internet and I can meet my new deadlines. Surprisingly, I am managing well without a printer - I just print to PDF and save it for later. I realised that I don't need as much stuff as I thought I did. I don't have to print out much because I proofread on screen (I do print out some things, but not as many as I did. After all, I've got to do my part in conserving some trees).

Once the move is complete, I can start work again, but this is only part one of the move, so I'm still keeping new work to a minimum. Part two of the move comes in about two weeks when we finally leave the country. Fingers crossed, our internet connection will be set up when we get there. Then I can unpack my laptop, keyboard, mouse, router and extension cord, set them all up and get back to work.

What are your essentials for writing on the move?

It Shouldn't Happen To A Freelance Writer

2006-08-06T13:12:00.000-07:00

Now that I'm a freelance writer, I'm happy doing what I've always wanted to do, but that doesn't mean it's always easy. For the first time in a long time (and I mean LONG), I had a piece of work returned to me for revision. It's a research job, looking for additional information to accompany articles. The irony is that I'm the one who set the standard for this particular type of work, so you'd think I'd know how to do it right. Not necessarily - and here's why.

The Writing Brief

As a freelance writer, the writing brief is the most important part of your job. After all, how else are you to know what to do? But briefs aren't always clear and when you're working through an intermediary (as in this case) you don't speak to the person giving the brief. So it's a bit like pin the tail on the donkey. You might get it right, but you have an even greater chance of missing the mark completely. (By the way, this isn't the intermediary's fault, but if the client doesn't brief the middleperson correctly, then the middleperson can't brief the writer correctly.)

Now, don't feel depressed by this. Once you're an experienced writer, or you have experience with certain types of writing, your chances of getting the job right first time increase. But this job is an example of being lulled into a false sense of security. See, I did the sample topics, found lots of info and links, but what I didn't realise is that I was tapping into the client's unspoken criteria. And those are the ones that bite you in the butt.

Some clients know what they want and give a clear brief, but they are in the minority. Others have an idea of what they want which becomes more defined when they don't get it. In this case, the client wanted a certain number of links in a certain number of categories, but this had never been put in writing or articulated. The upshot of that was that I submitted one article (that I couldn't find a lot of links for) and had it bumped back to me.

Working Through Rejection

I'm only human. I don't like having work returned. It wasted my time, because I had to spend time redoing work that I thought I had finished. That stopped me from doing other jobs. As a professional, though, I have to be prepared to revise work if it's not right. If I do it quickly and without complaining (except to you), then I'll continue to get work from that source.

The good thing is that now I know what the criteria are. That means I can work more efficiently. And I hope I won't get any more work returned for this particular job.

The moral of the story:

Try to find out as much as possible about what is required (it never occurred to me to ask how many links the client wanted).
Where possible, deal directly with the client (middlepeople sometimes make for misunderstandings)
If you have to do a rewrite or revision, don't complain or argue, just do it (freelance writers need thick skins).
Even an experienced writer can have work returned

Have you had work returned for revision? How do you deal with the knockbacks?

1000 And Counting - Website Promotion

2006-08-04T13:10:00.000-07:00

Website promotion works. I love the sound of this number. 1000. It rolls off the tongue and gladdens the mind. I'll tell you why. That's the number of unique visitors to my freelance writing site in July. These are my best figures yet and it's all been done through free promotional techniques (and the contacts I've made here on WritingUp). Now, I know these are small figures compared to a lot of big league sites, but they're not bad for a freelance writer's site that's just over a year old.

To get to this point I have used self-promotion of all kinds, including blog carnivals, writing free articles, and looking around for any articles that will help me find out what the next step is. I've taken advice from Mitch, Haven and gracepub and many others.

But this is not just about blowing my own trumpet. The thing is that you can do this too, if you want to. There's no big secret (especially since I've been blogging about it for a year). It's just a matter of taking the time to do it.

And by the way, just so you know, not everything's going my way. One job has stiffed me for GBP150 - so I need to figure out how I'm going to recover it.

Stepping Into Self-Publishing

2006-08-01T13:09:00.000-07:00

When I signed up with Lifetips several months ago, I didn't know what I was letting myself in for. Within a short space of time I had written on fruit, video chat and conversational Spanish. Spanish meshed well with my previous experience and fruit was general knowledge, but to do video chat I had to step out of my comfort zone and I mean way out. I'd just about heard of webcams, but had no idea, until I did this site, about their history and the many things you could do with them.

In the last month or so, I've done a couple more sites for them. I did an intro page to freelance writing (not live yet) and some tips on educational travel. Freelance writing was relatively easy, while educational travel was done late at night and in a hurry after my laptop trauma. (Not my best work, it's safe to say, but it was competent and it was delivered on time.

But now I'm really happy, because I've become their expert on self-publishing. To do this, I had to assess the existing site, write 10 new tips and advise on how the site could be improved. In return, I've got a link to my blog and to my new ebook. It seems a good deal to me. Self-publishing, here I come!

Where I Get Paid To Write

2006-07-30T13:07:00.000-07:00

I'm going to be terribly un-British today. In the UK, people don't talk about what they earn. They mask the true picture behind phrases such as 'could be worse' (meaning, I'm not on the breadline yet) and 'I do all right' (meaning, I'm rolling in it). But today I'm going to talk about cash for writing. Specifically, the places I've written for in the past six months to a year that have helped my freelance writing career and my bank balance by paying cold, hard cash. I hope you'll manage to make these sources pay you, too.

Get Paid To Write With Lifetips.com

Lifetips.com is a tips site where you get paid to write tips on just about everything. After doing 10 free tips you get access to the paid tips jobs. For these you have to write up to 100 keyword based tips for up to $1000. You also have to write up to 30 sponsored tips for $10 each.

My only gripe with Lifetips is that what you get paid per tip depends on the editor's assessment of their usefulness. However, if you're happy with earning about $850 for 100 tips of about 150 words each, then this will suit you. New tips sites come up every week and if you're in a slump you can answer users' questions at $3 a pop. I plan to write about Lifetips in more detail in another post, but what's important is that they pay on time. Cheques go out on the 1st of every month and in my best month with them (2 tips sites and several user questions), I netted over $1,600.

Get Paid To Write With ExquisiteWriting

ExquisiteWriting.com is an agency that lets me get paid to write, but frees me from the pain of bidding myself. It's run by Julie-Ann Amos and works really well. Whenever jobs come in she sends emails to a few people offering them round and you get a commission and a pay rate. Julie-Ann offers a basic pay rate plus more if the job pays more. She also seems to have an endless stream of work, so it's worth contacting her through the site.

Pay from this site has been around $800 a month - and I could have had more if I'd been working full time. I like writing for this company because they pay twice or three times a week by Paypal or (if you live in the UK) credit transfer. You write, you invoice, you get paid. As a freelance writer, that works well for me.

Get Paid To Write With Blogitive

I've had a lot to say about getting paid to write with Blogitive in the past, so instead of repeating myself, I'll just say this: $500. That's how much I've made from them. OK, it was over four months, but within that period there was almost a month when there were no offers, and occasionally there have been dry weeks. I reckon that Blogitive is about $100+ a month, which isn't a lot, but makes a nice addition to the monthly income. Here are the links to my previous posts on Blogitive:

Deborah Ng's Freelance Writing Jobs List

This site does not pay me directly, but it is a great place to get paid freelance writing jobs. I've already reviewed this, so I won't say more, but leads from this site have led to a couple of paying jobs at around $100 a pop. The most recent one is likely to lead to repeat work.

These are the top places that are paying me at the moment. I hope they work for you, too. If you're freelancing, which places have you found the most profitable? Thanks for reading.

Paragraphs - Who Needs Them?

2006-07-28T13:04:00.000-07:00

Some things in life should be easy - and reading a blog is one of them. I don't know about anyone else, but when I see a huge chunk of text on the home page, I skate right past it. My eyes transmit the lockdown code to my brain. Too much visual information assaulting the senses. Trying to read an unbroken block of text is like trying to eat a whole cherry pie in one bite. Some people may be able to do it, but most would choke. So that's why we need paragraphs.

You see, the thing is, you've got to make it easy for your readers. If you want them to get your point quickly and move on to the next one, it helps to break up the text. The brain copes more easily with small chunks of text, and my brain could use all the help it can get.

Every blogging system is different, so you'll have to do it in different ways depending on which one you use. On WritingUp, a couple of returns (hit the 'enter' key twice) usually does the trick. If it doesn't, you can use the letters
. That gives you a line break.

As a sub-editor and editor, I spent a lot of my time making long paragraphs into shorter ones and each paragraph had to have a point. This is a good rule for blogs as well. I won't go on about the paragraph thing, especially as a couple of other writers have written about them in detail. Instead, I'll just point you towards Majansa's post on blog formatting and Gracepub's post on paragraphs. Both are well worth a read for the new blogger.

This post has been sponsored by the Volunteer Editing Support Team.

The FT Is Haunting Me!

2006-07-26T16:05:00.000-07:00

A long time ago, I worked for a small division of the Financial Times (yes, THE Financial Times). I edited stock exchange announcements for financial reports on UK and European companies. It wasn't the most interesting job I've ever had, but I learned to read an annual report and became familiar with a plethora of financial terminology.

After, I'd done that for two years (it was in the middle of the UK recession, so I couldn't afford to be picky), I was happy to move on to a more traditional journalism job, and I put that period behind me. The only reminder of it was a two line entry on my CV. It looked good, and I'm sure it got me many interviews I might otherwise have lost. However, I didn't work on financial matters again for a long time.

But recently I've been getting lots of work from a freelance agency, and I've found myself writing about financial matters again. Loans, mortgages, credit cards - you name it. Some of it's interesting, some is not, but I reckon I'm getting it because of that two-line entry on my CV. And at least it's regular, paid work. I've worked in a lot of different industries. If they go in turn, then I could find myself writing about metals next. Watch this space.

What about you? Have you got any jobs in your past that have come back to haunt you?

How To Prove You Can Write When You Have No Clips

2006-07-21T16:04:00.000-07:00

The other day someone asked me a question. It was: 'How do you apply for a writing job when you have no writing credits?'. I knew the answer because when I relaunched my writing career last year all my writing credits were old. They proved that I used to be able to write, but there wasn't any recent history to show that someone had thought my writing was worth publishing. The advice I gave is based on what I did. Here it is:

1. Use your blog as an example of your writing. Point editors towards it and they'll be able to see your writing and people's responses to it. That will give them an idea of how popular you might be with their readers.

2. Turn some blog posts into articles, sign up with EzineArticles and upload them. The next time a job comes around, you will have clips you can show. Also, find a few places in your genre that are looking for free content and offer it to them, provided they link to your blog or site. This is a short term strategy (I don't advocate writing for free long term) designed to get you some clips. This worked extremely well for me, and it's great for promotion too.

3. If you know the publication you are approaching for a job or writing commission, write a short piece of the type they publish and send it as an example of what you can do. If you haven't got a lot of publication credits, this at least shows you've read the mag and thought about what they might want to publish.

4. Practice, practice, practice. While I was doing the EzineArticles thing, I also wrote reviews for three sites. I didn't get paid directly, but I learned a lot about what people found useful and what type of writing they responded to best. It's a good way to start to find your writing voice.

These strategies worked well for me. At the moment I have more writing work than I know what to do with, and it's only taken a year. Admittedly, I had a headstart in terms of writing experience, but in the case of clips, five year old clips are worse than nothing, so I was starting from scratch.

Now, this is just a start. I'd love to hear from the rest of you what worked when you were getting started. And editors and publishers (you know who you are), what are you looking for in a new writer?

A final question, not quite related. I'm thinking of offering an article spot in my monthly newsletter to anyone who writes about writing. No money, but a short bio with a link to your site or blog. I'm looking for 6-12 articles of 300-400 words initially. I don't mind if they've been published before as long as you own the rights. What do you think? If anyone's interested, drop me a comment

My Path To Writing

2006-07-19T16:03:00.000-07:00

I was inspired to write this by a recent post from Trick Falls on writing inspirations. I haven't always wanted to be a writer, though I have nearly always written. When I was a child, I used to mess around with drawing house plans and I thought I might want to be an architect. My high school art teacher finally put an end to that when I was 14 by requesting that I not waste her time by returning the following year. (Shame really, I enjoyed art, but even I must admit that drawing wasn't my strong point.) I also enjoyed playing with Meccano and experimenting with buildings, but it would have helped if I'd had either a good science teacher (for the laws of physics) or some aptitude for scientific subjects. But I didn't. So that left me with words.

Don't get me wrong, words were not something that I settled for in lieu of the other two options. In fact, they had been a part of my life for as long as I remember. My mother remembers me as a little girl who never stopped talking. And what I remember is that as soon as I started getting pocket money (maybe around the age of seven), I started spending it on books.

I was a voracious reader. I started with Enid Blyton, moved on to Richmal Compton (William stories), Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, Biggles and various children's classics. Once I'd exhausted those, I took a brief swing through some teenage fiction (Judy Blume and the like), before heading for my parents' bookshelf. Now they had a lot of books. There were books in the hallway, in the dining room, in their bedroom and in every spare space, so I was happy. At first I took the books I was allowed to read (lots of mysteries - Agatha Christie, Nero Wolfe etc) and then I raided the shelf for other books (Jacqueline Susan among others). Don't worry, I was quite a bit older than seven by this time. Not everything I read was great literature, but it made me appreciate a good story. And though my reading tastes have changed, I still do.

The reason I mention this is because most writers worth their salt are also readers. So reading was a crucial part of my development as a writer. (And let me take a moment to plug Scrabble. I started playing the junior version at around six and the adult version at eight with my grandfather. There's nothing like it for enouraging a love of words and boosting your vocabulary.)

At school, I always enjoyed writing stories, but I never thought much about that enjoyment. There were two experiences that set me on the road to writing. One was pleasant, the other not. The first one was growing up with an alcoholic father. By the time I was 15 I had a lot of anger and sadness to write out and that's when I started writing poetry and keeping a journal. I'm not saying it was any good, but it was writing. The second thing was becoming co-editor of the school newspaper at 17. Now, this was in the old days. We used a Gestetner machine, commissioned people to do illustrations by hand and got covered in ink. That was when I first felt the thrill of writing for publication and managing a magazine. I really loved it.

But I'm slow on the uptake sometimes. So I did nothing more than the occasional poem while I was at university and away in France. When I got back home, a local paper was looking for someone with language skills. I applied, got it and started work as a journalist. In that job and in all my other journalism jobs, I got to write about a variety of things and to do a variety of publishing related tasks. Although I didn't always like my bosses, I loved the job.

Then came my last boss. He was a bully and for the first time, I contemplated leaving journalism. So when a chance came to teach it at university, I jumped at the chance, thinking that I could freelance as well. That didn't work out, because of the amount of preparation a new teacher has to do and then childbirth and motherhood.

Throughout this time, I'd continued to write the occasional poem, but it was when I went back to work after maternity leave that it struck me. I wasn't happy. I wanted to write full time (or at least part-time so I could spend time with my daughter). Finally, a year ago I made the jump after listing the pros and cons. The pros were that I had lots of experience as a writer and would be able to work from home doing what I loved. The cons were that I didn't have many recent contacts and I might not make any money for a year.

So now, here we are. I'm getting paid to write and I'm happy. Inspiration is all around me. My daughter has inspired children's stories (five to date) and poetry. My nomadic life has inspired books on moving (still half-finished). And blogging at WritingUp has inspired lots and lots of writing, most of which you have seen.

Blogging For Smarties

2006-07-16T16:02:00.000-07:00

Blogging For Smarties is not the opposite of Blogging For Dummies, a book which tells us how to do what we already do here at WritingUp.If you want advice on smart blogging, try Performancing.com, Problogger.com or read Seven Essential Blogging Habits. This is about a conversation with my three year old which made me think about the life of a WAHM.

Like many people, I used to go out to work. For my daughter, work was something that you did when you were out and when you were home you were off duty. But last year, when I went freelance, that started to change.

Of course, the change didn't happen overnight. Freelance writing success rarely comes quickly. But with all the writing I've been doing in the last couple of months, something major has changed. I'm never off-duty, though I force myself to spend family time (that IS why I'm a WAHM, after all). All you writers will know, though, that when a deadline looms, everything gets shoved aside so you can deliver on time. And that somtimes means children, too.

Like most three year olds, my daughter is the centre of her universe, and she doesn't like my work stealing the limelight. She knows I'm a writer (thanks to five unpublished children's stories which I've tested on her and her friends with great success) but she doesn't always understand that it means I have to sit at the computer. But she IS beginning to understand about money, so I came up with a way to explain my blogging and writing habit to her. The conversation went like this:

Me: You know that Mummy's a writer, don't you?
T: Yes (smiling)
M: Writing has to be done at the computer, because that's where people write. Do you understand?
T: Yes
M: Do you remember Daddy explained to you about earning money to buy treats?
T: Yes (warily)
M: Well, that's why Mummy has to write. So she can earn money to buy food and treats like Smarties (Smarties are small chocolate sweets wtih a bright coating, like M&Ms but smaller). They are her favourite treat at the moment.

So that's where the notion of writing for Smarties came in. And since I also earn money from blogging, I must be blogging for Smarties too.

Funnily enough, I think my daughter understood what I was getting at. And it gives me a handy way to explain why I'm sitting at the computer sometimes when I would rather be playing with her.

What about all you other WAHMs? How do you explain your work to young children - or older children? I might need to come up with something new in a couple of years.

PS. If you haven't already read it, check out Mitch's post on backing up - it's great advice for any writer. I wish I'd read this before my laptop died.