Freelance Writing

If you want to earn a living as a copywriter, you need to learn how to approach business clients. In other words, you need to cold call on businesses as opposed to hoping that they find you; which very rarely happens. Luckily, there are a few things you can do that will make calling on potential business clients easier.

First things first, you need to make a list of the businesses that may need your service. Even more so, narrow down this list based on the industries that you are most comfortable serving. For instance, I do a lot of work within the insurance industries. Naturally, if I were to actively look for new work, I would start with insurance companies and agents in my area.

Moving on, you need to have samples to show potential clients. If a company is interested in hiring you, before they do anything they will ask for samples. This will not only show them your skills, but it will also give them an idea of what to expect. Remember, not all clients are going to know as much about copywriting as you do. In many cases they will want to see a few samples so that they know what to ask for, etc.

Finally, the actual approach is the most difficult part of this process. There are two routes that you can take; with one being considerably easier (and less effective) than the other. Most copywriters decide that email is the way to go. They find an email address online, compose a great letter, and hit the send button. There are three problems with doing this.

1. You never know if you sent your email to the right person. And if you didn’t, there is not a very good chance that it will get to the person in charge.

2. Many businesses do not like receiving unsolicited email from those trying to sell a service. In fact, they may see it as spam and become angered. This will pretty much kill any chance that you have of winning a new client.

3. Simply put, the response rate via email is much lower than when calling prospects on the phone. When you make a phone call you will at least be able to find out who you need to speak with. From there, it is up to you to get them on the phone and sell yourself. With an email, you will never have this chance.

From the above, you can probably tell that the other way to contact prospects is via the phone. Again, when you call instead of emailing you can be rest assured that you will at least learn who you need to speak with. This will allow you to leave a message for the appropriate party, or call them back at a later date.

It is safe to say that you will get to speak with more prospects when you use the phone. Although this may be intimidating at first, over time you will learn that cold calling is not that difficult.

As a copywriter, the more businesses that you approach the more success you will have. Just like any sales job, this is nothing more than a numbers game. Make a list of potential clients, put together a portfolio, and start calling!

By openly posting my freelance writing income, it always leads to questions of how much I charge clients, etc. When it comes to copywriting rates, there is really no standard to rely on. While I feel that I charge a fair amount for my copywriting services, I do not command nearly as much money as many others. Of course, there are others who are not charging as much as me.

With that being said, it is always good to see how much other copywriters are earning. Not only will this show you where to start, but it will definitely motivate you at the same time.

This year alone I have written in excess of 10 sales letters. A few of these have been used for direct mail, but most are for online purposes. Even though I try to charge a set amount for each job that I take, things rarely work out this way. For the above mentioned sales letters, I earned anywhere from $200 to $500 each. This work consisted of researching the topic at hand, and then putting together a compelling sales letter that would convert. Generally speaking, all of them fell between 500 and 1,000 words.

Let’s take a look at another common copywriting job: press releases. If you can collect some press release samples, and show that you are good at writing these, you will definitely be able to find work. Almost every business uses press releases to announce new products or services, etc. But guess what? Not all businesses have somebody on staff that can effectively put together a press release; this is where you come into play. While some copywriters charge up to $500 or more for a press release, I am much more reasonable. My rates usually range from $75 to $150. Could I earn more? Probably. And if I think the job will take more time, I definitely quote a higher price. But over the years I have found this range to be acceptable.

Keep in mind that your copywriting rates will be based largely on experience and skills. When I first started, I was not charging clients nearly as much. At that time, my main goal was to first build a portfolio. As far as skills are concerned, this usually comes with time. Even though you may be a good writer, it takes a bit of practice and patience to become a good copywriter. Once you have a solid portfolio, you can then use your past work to secure new clients.

Overall, every copywriter has their own rates. As you can see from some of the stats above, there is money to be made. Just make sure that you set your copywriting rates based on experience and skills. Remember, you can always make adjustments over time.

There are many different ways to make money as a freelance writer. While some people think that “writing is writing” nothing could be further from the truth. The fact of the matter is that writing keyword articles is not the same as copywriting. With that being said, most people feel that being a copywriter is much more glamorous, as well as profitable. Are they right? To a certain extent, yes. But of course, you can make good money with any type of freelance writing.

Generally speaking, copywriting is much more difficult than putting together simple keyword articles. This entails strategically placing words and sentences in hopes of eliciting a reaction from the reader. Copywriting is a way of promoting a business, person, idea, service, etc.

As you probably know, copywriting is popular both online and off. Remember that credit card offer that you received in the mail last week? The letter that you read was composed by a copywriter. Their job was to make the offer look as good as possible so that you and many others sign up for the card.

If you are interested in online copywriting, you have probably heard the phrase “SEO copywriting.” This is the art of writing copy that not only suits the needs of readers, but will also rank high with popular search engines. When it comes down to it, SEO copywriting is an area that is becoming very popular. If you can put together compelling copy, while also including well placed keywords, you should be able to find work.

Just like anything else within the freelance writing industry, finding copywriting jobs can be difficult. If you are serious about becoming a copywriter, take the time to contact companies within your industry of expertise. When doing so, explain who you are, what you do, and how you can help them. You may be surprised to find out just how many companies hire freelance copywriters from time to time.

After leaving my 9-5 job, I contacted several of my clients to ask them if they needed the service of a good copywriter. Since I already had relationships with them, they were more than happy to help me out. From there, I took these jobs and turned them into more opportunities. Once you successfully complete a couple of copywriting jobs, you will definitely have a better feel for this type of freelance writing.

As a freelance writer, you may want to specialize in the area of copywriting. If so, begin to tweak your skills in this area and market yourself in this manner.

I have been reading a lot lately on how long blog posts should be. Some bloggers say that more words are better, whereas others are of the thinking that fewer words help to get to the point sooner. Personally, I am a bit divided on this subject. For this reason, I tend to mix in both long and short posts, and really never think about this when I am writing.

When I am composing content for this blog, I do not constantly think about the word count Instead, I concentrate on the overall quality. But even then, having an idea on the average length of each blog post is very important.

As you may have noticed, I began to post more than one time per day as of late. In fact, some days I have posted as many as five times. And if everything stays on track, I plan on continuing at a rate of two or more posts per day for the foreseeable future. Obviously, with posting so many times per day, the length of each one is something that I want to get right.

The majority of my blog posts as of late range from 350 to 700 words. Of course, sometimes I only hit a couple hundred words, but other times I close in on 1,000. I have come up with several pros and cons for both long and short posts.

First off, let’s take a close look at shorter blog posts. The main advantage is that your readers will not have to sift through information that they do not want to read. In other words, you can get right to the point without rambling on. But at the same time, can you really say what you need to in only 200 words or so? In some cases, the answer may be yes. Just make sure that you do not end your post without telling readers what they want to hear. Leaving them unfulfilled is never a good idea. This is something that I am working on with each post that I make.

On the other side of things, longer blog posts have pros and cons as well. To combat what was said above, a longer post allows you to include more information. But again, this information is only useful if it is fact filled as opposed to fluff or filler. A big downside of long blog posts is that they take longer to write. In turn, you may not be able to produce as much content as you would like. This is why you will see that some blogs only post twice a week, but they are in excess of 1,000 words each time.

All in all, I do not think that quality and length are directly tied together at all times. Many bloggers will tell you that shorter posts are not of high quality, but I do not feel this way. As long as you are offering useful information that is interesting to your readers, you should feel as if you are achieving a high level of quality. 

By the way, this post came in at right around 500 words.

Starting a freelance writing career can be full of fun and optimism. But unfortunately, a lot of people who start a career in freelance writing give it up sooner rather than later. While some people are not cut out for this industry from the start, others make too many bad decisions to stay on track until they reach success.

Here are three of the most common reasons for freelance writing failure. Avoid these situations, and you will better your chance of making it with this career.

1. Not knowing what you are getting into is a huge mistake. Guess what? There is more to freelance writing than actually producing content. Many aspiring writers think that they will simply secure some clients at national publications, write a few feature articles a month, and live the work at home dream. Could this happen? Yes, but only after you put time into building your career. When these goals do not come to fruition within a month or so, these misguided freelance writers often times hang up their boots.

2. They forget that marketing is a huge part of success for any business. You may have great writing skills, but to use them you need to let others know that you are available. Just as you will have a plan for starting your writing career, have a marketing plan in place as well.

3. Simply put, giving up too early will lead to failure every time. If you are going to be a full-time freelance writer you need to stick with your dreams through the rough times. I have said time after time that I only made $50-some my first month. Giving up would have been easy, but heading back to a 9-5 corporate job would have been a nightmare. If you truly want a career in freelance writing, do not give up. Continue to work at your writing and marketing until you breakthrough to the other side.

Do you have what it takes to avoid these common reasons for freelance writing failure?

It is very important for freelance writers and internet entrepreneurs alike to set up multiple streams of income. While the way you do this is different depending on your career, it is an important detail to look into nonetheless.

As a freelance writer, there are two ways of looking at multiple streams of income. First off, you should do so within your writing career. As a general rule of thumb, you do not want to have one or two clients making up the majority of your income. This may never turn into a problem for you, but what would happen if that one client no longer needed your service? It is ideal to have several clients accounting for your income. This way, if you lose one client you only lose a portion of your income; not the entire business.

Another way to look at the subject of multiple streams of income has to do with diversifying into other fields; most commonly, blogging. Managing a blog that makes some money is a great way to supplement your freelance writing income. This way, you can have two separate money making streams working for you at the same time.

Other streams of income for freelance writers include editing, proofreading, and design among many others. Do any of those fit in with your current knowledge base?

Remember, if you are a freelance writer you do not want to entirely neglect your core competency. But with that being said, if you have the chance and time to set up multiple streams of income, you should definitely consider doing so.

Doesn’t the title say it all? Asking freelance writing clients for a raise can be a touchy subject. Doing this is every bit as difficult as marching into your boss’s office and telling him or her that you need more money. Not only does it take guts, but you must also deal with the fact that you will be told no. To go along with this, you may aggravate your freelance writing clients by doing this, and in turn push them away. As you can see, this is a delicate situation to say the least.

With that being said, you deserve a hike in pay from time to time. After all, you cannot expect to work for the same rates year after year. If you do, you will find your income staying the same, but the economy passing you by.

So how do you go about asking your freelance writing clients for a raise? I have not had to do this often, but do have some advice from the times that I did. Before I get to that advice, let me first say that you may get lucky in the way that your client may offer to pay you more. Yes, this is rare, but it has happened to me with clients that I have a long history with.

Follow these three tips if you are going to ask a freelance writing client for a raise.

1. Like most freelance writers, you will probably ask for a rate hike via email. Make sure that you are careful about the way you word your message. You want to ask for more money, but at the same time you need to make sure your message does not come across as bossy or snippy.

2. Back up your request with some details. Furthermore, touch on how much of an increase you are looking for, as well as why you deserve it. For instance, you may have a client that pays you $.10/word for one feature article per month. You could ask for $.15/word, and explain that you deserve the increase because you have been working with them for several months, etc.

3. Do NOT make threats. Many freelance writers make the mistake of saying something such as: “I enjoy writing for your company, but will have to move on if my pay rate does not increase.” It is safe to say that your client may take this as a threat of sorts. Again, you need to be careful with the way that you word your correspondence.

As you can see, asking a freelance writing client for a raise is doable. You may not get the answer you want, but if done tastefully, it usually doesn’t hurt to ask.

Would a freelance writing career make you happy? While you may think that you know the answer on the surface, you really need to dig deep in order to determine if this is the right career choice for you. Even though there are many benefits of freelance writing, the drawbacks can be just as plentiful. If you are not willing to deal with both sides of the industry, you may be better off sticking with your current line of employment.

In order to determine if a career in freelance writing is right for you, check out the three pros and three cons listed below. These are things that I looked at when getting started, and to my amazement, they still hold true for me today.

Pros

1. If you are looking for a job that offers flexibility, freelance writing could be the right choice. Take my work schedule yesterday for example. In the morning, I worked from 7am until noon; and that was that. The rest of the day I spent time working on this blog, as well as several others that are just getting underway. Obviously, I could have spent this free time however I wanted. But of course, I had to do something work related!

2. There is money to be made. There are many freelance writers who are earning in excess of $100k a year. While I have yet to reach that plateau, I currently earn in the range of $5,000 a month. For me, this is a good income for all of the perks that go along with it.

3. Are you a good writer? Do not overlook the obvious when considering a freelance writing career. While it may sound like fun, if you are not a good writer you will soon get frustrated. Anybody can become a solid writer in time, but those who have a bit of natural talent usually find the road to be less bumpy.

Cons

1. If you are used to a steady income, and can’t live any other way, freelance writing is not right for you. Some months I earn more than $8,000, and others this number will dip to right around my average of $5,000. Is this something that you can deal with?

2. Most freelance writers work at home, independent from others. Will you be able to concentrate when working from home? Will the lack of outside contact begin to wear on you over time? These are questions that you need to answer. Even though I love working from home, other people hate it because they never get to talk with co-workers, socialize face to face with clients, etc.

3. Until you are established, a career in freelance writing can be stressful. It was not until my third month of freelance writing that I broke the $2,000 mark. Do you have enough money to keep you afloat while you work on building your freelance writing career? If so, you will be able to greatly lessen your stress load.

So what do you think? Is a career in freelance writing right for you? These pros and cons may not be enough to help you make a decision, but they should definitely open your eyes. As mentioned above, these pros and cons still apply to me, even after a few years working as a writer.  

When I look back at the first few months of my freelance writing career, one detail still makes me wonder: why did I try to memorize the projects that I had to complete every day? Instead of writing my work down, I would simply try to remember what I had to do, and then use my email system as a bit of assistance. Simply put, I would never try this now. I have used another system for staying organized with my daily work, and it has been quite effective to say the least.

What does my system look like? In today’s day and age of technology, you are probably expecting me to use some sort of software to track my jobs and workload. But actually, the exact opposite is true. I use a simple post-it-note to keep track of the work that I need to complete.

My “freelance writing worksheet” consists of three columns; always in the same order working from left to right.

In the far left column, I include the jobs that I absolutely have to complete on a given day. I do not move onto any other projects until these jobs have a line through them.

The middle column consists of blog related work. This includes everything from writing new posts to changing ad placement and much more. If it has to do with any of my blogs, the task is put in the middle column.

On the far right I keep long term tasks. For instance, I have a reminder to renew some online subscriptions within the next few months. The reason that I keep this column is simple. Since they are all based on the long term, I know that if they are not on paper I could very well forget about them. And obviously, that would not be a good thing.

At the end of each day, I do two things. First off, I write my new worksheet for the following day. I base this off of the prior day’s notes, as well as any emails that I have in my “Jobs Due” folder. After that, I throw out the current day’s post-it-note that has been marked up.

Do yourself a favor and write down all of the work that you have to complete. This will help to ensure that you never miss a deadline. 

If you are interested in freelance writing, keep this in mind: you need to be good at something. What does this mean, exactly? Well, a lot of freelance writers spread themselves thin. In other words, instead of concentrating on a couple topics until they become well versed, they try to be the best at everything. But guess what? Before you can become good at everything, you need to become good at something.

Early on in my freelance writing career I got stuck in this rut; it can be hard to avoid, there is no denying that. I was so caught up on making money, that it did not matter what I was writing about. This included everything from travel related articles to adult website reviews. But over time, I realized that honing in on a few niche subjects was a better idea than being a do it all writer.

So what subjects did I decide on? Even though it has been a while, I can still remember the three topics that I catered towards in the early days. They were insurance, health, and real estate. Why did I choose these topics, you may ask? Simply put, when I was starting my freelance writing career, these were the subjects that most people requested articles on. The reason for this is that these niches were most profitable. And even after a few years, this still holds true.

This is not to say that I kept a narrow focus as my career moved forward. Today, I feel comfortable writing on a wide variety of subjects. In fact, there are not too many topics that I would not be able to write about. But as mentioned above, I only began to expand after I first became good at “something.”

To condense things, here are two tips to keep in mind.

1. From day one of your freelance writing career, decide on three topics that you would like to concentrate on. From there, take the time to become proficient in writing about them. When choosing, you can decide on topics that are of interest to you. Or you can do what I did, and choose the ones that seem to have the most opportunity attached to them.

2. Once you become good at writing on these first three topics, begin to expand into other areas. In no time at all you will be in my position; one in which you feel comfortable with the majority of topics.

Here is one last point to keep in mind: some freelance writers are faster than others at developing a good working knowledge of their first three areas of expertise. This may take you a couple months, or maybe longer. You may not believe it now, but as you begin to write more and more, you will get a feel for how well your skills are developing. And from there, your path to the future will become much clearer.