Freelance Writing

As a freelance writer you are responsible for not only writing, but also the organization of your work. After all, if you take a scatter gun approach there is a chance that you will forget an important client, and end up without the work in the future. And obviously this is not something that you want to happen.

The question is: how do you divide your time among clients? This is an important detail to consider, but one that a lot of freelancers never take into consideration.

Here are three tips when trying to divvy up your time.

1. Spend the most time with your top paying clients. But of course, this does not mean that you should neglect the others. Simply put, you should make sure that you never lose your high paying clients because they are the ones that you rely on the most. Obviously, you do not want to get so caught up on them that you neglect smaller jobs.

2. Set a schedule. This will allow you to make time for every client that you have. While you may have to stray away from your schedule from time to time, having a basic outline is better than attempting to complete all your jobs by memory.

3. If you feel that you have too much work to handle, start to phase out your lower paying jobs. This is a tough thing to do, but remember, it is your duty to treat each client with the respect they deserve. And to go along with this, each client will expect your best work. You need to deliver!

These three tips will help you to divide time among your clients. This may not sound important, but to run a top notch freelance writing operation it is essential.

Since starting this blog, I have posted new content at least once per day; that is until yesterday. Trouble with my ISP held me back from posting new content for the first time in about three months. While this is not a huge deal, it can be disappointing. After all, I take great pride in updating this blog every day.

So what did I learn from this? First off, using the WordPress time stamp feature is a great idea. If I would have had a time stamped post waiting, the lack of an internet connection would have made no difference.

Additionally, I also learned that blogging can be an addiction. I was checking my internet connection all day long in hopes that I could sneak in a quick update for all my readers. Unfortunately, this never happened, but none the less I spent a lot of time Saturday thinking about this blog.

When it comes down to it, not updating your blog one day is not going to kill your readership. But remember, this is not a habit that you want to get into. Hopefully I can start another long streak of at least one post per day!

When you start a new blog, do you set a deadline for success? In other words, do you know that you will give the blog one year (or some other time frame) to hit all your goals? I think that it is very important to set goals for your blog, but as far as setting a deadline for success, this is another topic entirely.

I don’t know much about search engines, but from what I have been reading, it appears that there are two things a blog must do in order to achieve success with them. First off, posting unique content seems to be the best thing you can do in order to catch the eye of the major search engines such as Google and Yahoo. To go along with this, I have read on three different blogs that you need to be consistent for at least six to twelve months to see solid results. As mentioned above, I have no idea if this is the case or not.

Personally, I have no timeline for the success of this blog. I enjoy writing at least one post per day, and as long as that does not change, ChrisBlogging will live on!

If you are going to put a timeline on your blog’s success, there is one very important thing that you must do. You need to know what the word success means when applied to your blog. Does success mean attracting a certain number of readers? Or are you like most bloggers who measure success with dollars and cents? Once you know what it takes to meet your expectations of success, you will at least have a chance of meeting your deadline.

While I am not one to put a timeline on the success of a blog, you may be different. Just make sure that you know what you are working towards before you set a deadline for success.

Being a freelance writer does not mean that all I do is write all day. While I wish this was the case, it is far from the truth. I spend a lot of time on administrative tasks, and of course, trying to locate new jobs from time to time.

There are two ways that I get new work. A client either comes to me via my website or a referral, or I find them in one way or the next. But no matter what, I will have to work with them in order to come up with a mutually agreed upon price. The best clients are those who ask for my standard rates, and then do not attempt to negotiate them. Unfortunately, this does not always work out.

Weighing a freelance writing job offer can be difficult for a number of reasons. While payment is always something to consider, there are other factors that should go into your decision.

1. When it comes to payment you need to be careful. There is nothing wrong with taking a lower paying job if you have the time for it, but you do not want to find yourself in this habit. Remember, if you complete one low paying job for a client, they will expect the same treatment for each subsequent project.

2. Does the client come across as difficult to work with? If you get a bad feeling about a client from the start, you may want to walk away instead of accepting the work. Of course, make sure that your concern is valid. In the past few months I can think of two occurrences when I went against my gut, and then ended up burnt by an unruly client.

3. Anytime that you take on a new freelance writing job, you need to have time to complete it as specified. Even though an overloaded work schedule may sound like a dream to some freelance writers, take it from me when I say that this is not the case. I have done this to myself in the past, and the result has been 10 to 12 hour work days.

When you receive an inquiry to complete a writing job, use the tips above when deciding whether or not to accept.

When it comes to freelance writing jobs, I will pretty much take on anything that I can handle. This is not to say that I know everything about every last topic, but I am always willing to try. With that being said, there are some niches that I seem to write for time and time again. They were not my favorite topics upon starting my freelance writing career, but over the years they have definitely carved out a special spot in my mind. After all, you cannot help but to learn about certain topics after writing about them for months on end.

Here are my top three freelance writing topics at this time.

1. The insurance industry is hopping, and I have been cashing in on it for a couple years now. It seems that both agents and insurance companies are interested in increasing search engine rankings through quality content. One of my biggest clients that accounts for $800/month is in this industry.

2. Gambling has always been of great interest to me, but even then, I have only been to the casino a hand full of times. Additionally, I never gamble online. But all in all, this has not stopped me from writing hundreds of gambling related articles this year alone. There are a lot of people who are attempting to cash in on online casino affiliate programs. In turn, they hire me to write content which will increase their odds of success.

3. Investing in real estate may not be as popular as it was a few years back, but I have not noticed a difference in this niche of the freelance writing arena. I have several clients within this industry including: webmasters who run real estate sites, agents, and companies.

One of the biggest benefits of freelance writing is that you will learn a lot about industries that you never paid attention to in the past. Before I became a freelance writer I did not know much about any of the niches listed above. But as of today, I can confidently say that I have an above average amount of knowledge in these areas.

Do you know what it means to be a productive blogger? If so, you are halfway home. But guess what? Just because you know what it takes to be a productive blogger does not make it easy to fit this mold at all times. 

There are many bloggers who try hard, but when it comes down to it, a lack of productivity never allows them to succeed at a high level. Does this sound familiar? Do yourself a favor and try out the three tips below. They should help you to increase productivity in one way or the next. And if you are serious about blogging, it is imperative that you are as productive as possible at all times. In fact, that statement holds true no matter what type of career you have.

1. If possible, turn blogging into a routine. In other words, write your posts and market your blog at the same time every day. Once you do this for a week or so, you will find that you always leave time for blogging. And when this happens, your productivity is sure to increase.

2. Do you ever find yourself in a writing groove? This is when all the right words come out smoothly, and ideas are flying out of your ears. The next time that you hit a groove like this, go with it. Instead of writing one post and quitting, keep going until you have compiled several quality articles. I am not a big proponent of this, but when I am in the writing groove I always push my limits. After all, this is a much better situation than running into writer’s block.

3. The biggest way to become unproductive is to become distracted. This goes along with number one which states that you need to set time apart for blogging. When you are working on your blog you should turn the television off, put away the potato chips, and get to work. The bottom line is this: if you have an excuse to not concentrate on your blog there is a chance that you will get off track.

You may be surprised to find out that increased productivity will do a lot for you. Not only will it make you feel better about yourself, but it will also go a long way in increasing traffic.

For the second month in a row, posting my freelance writing income stats has resulted in an increased number of emails in my inbox. This time around, after only a day, several readers have asked why I do not attempt to monetize this blog. As I have mentioned in the past, monetization is important to me, but not until I reach certain traffic levels.

Now that I have built a solid readership, surpassed my traffic goals, and have the okay of my readers, I think it may be time to add some Google AdSense blocks. For the most part, when I decide to do this it will be more or less an experiment. There are two things that I will be looking for.

1. How much money can I make with Google AdSense? Is it really worth adding, or will it do nothing more than make me a few pennies every day?

2. My readers are important to me, and although they are known as “traffic stats” they mean more to me than that. Will Google AdSense affect my reader base either negatively or positively? This is what I will really be keeping my eye on.

With no technical skills, adding Google AdSense to this blog is not going to be easy for me. In fact, it will be a trial and error process. While I do have other blogs that use this advertising program, I have always paid others to help me out with adding the code, etc. But on this blog, my goal is to learn this kind of stuff on my own. So bear with me if there are some changes along the way that are not as they should be!

Related Link: Sabahan.com offers plenty of information and tips on Google AdSense.

Ever since the big response to my freelance writing income last month, I have been looking forward to disclosing my earnings for August. Well, the time has finally arrived!

Over the first 10 days of August I was slightly concerned that my income was going to stay just about the same as the previous month. But as the month wore on, I began to pick up a lot of repeat work. Additionally, I also secured a few new jobs through referrals.

Listed below are my freelance writing income stats for the month of August 2007.

Number of Completed Projects: 30
Payment by PayPal: 28
Payment by Check: 1
Payment by Bank Wire: 1
Total Income: $5,705.61

As you can see, I earned $810.83 more in August than in July. This is not a huge jump in income, but a good sign nonetheless. I am still several thousand dollars away from my highest months earlier in 2007, but once again, setting up other income streams and working on new projects has cut into my time.

After posting my freelance writing income in July I received 51 comments; the record by far on ChrisBlogging. Additionally, the article was stumbled time and time again. Even though comments and stumbles are nice for me, they are even better for the people out there who want to reach this income level as a freelance writer. So once again, I hope that you guys and gals can add some great comments, and stumble this article if you see fit!

Related Link: Subscribe to my RSS Feed so you don’t miss future income posts!

Yesterday was the 100th post on this blog. The first one was on June 4, 2007, and since then I have been going strong at a pace of at least one post per day.

Even though I have a lot left to accomplish, I am glad that ChrisBlogging has built such a strong readership in just about three months. After all, there are millions of blogs that simply die down after a month or so.

Here are three tips that have helped me during my first 100 blog posts, and are sure to guide me from here on out.

1. Posting at least one time per day is essential. Yes, it can be difficult to stay on this pace, but if you want your blog to succeed, you need to put the time in. Remember, readers come to your blog to get updated on fresh content. You need to give it to them on a regular basis.

2. One post per day is important, but one quality post per day is even more crucial. Making quality and quantity work together will help you to grow your blog from day one.

3. I try my best to stay on topic with each post that I make. Even though this can be difficult because I have so many thoughts to share, it is not something to be taken lightly. If I start to post about off-topic subjects it is safe to say that readers will start to look elsewhere for their information.

Try to keep these tips in mind know matter how experienced you are, or how long your blog has been around. They will help you to reach 100 quality posts in no time at all, and hopefully 100 more just as quickly. 

Since starting this blog I have wanted to write a post on “who to freelance write for.” Yesterday, one of my favorite bloggers, Michael Kwan, beat me to the punch. Even though I plan on touching on this topic next week anyway, I wanted to direct everybody to his post entitled, Freelance Writing for a Niche or for the Masses. The title pretty much says it all, and I urge all of you freelancers to read this article. It gives great information on this topic as well as a unique point of view.

Related Link: Subscribe to my RSS Feed so you don’t miss my August Income report to be released Monday, September 3, 2007.