Jumping into the freelance writing world can be scary. But if you think about it, this holds true no matter what career path you choose. The only difference is that when you are a freelancer you do not have any set income. And that leads me to the number one fear that all freelance writers share: not making enough money.
Starting out as a freelance writer can be scary as far as earning enough money to survive is concerned. After all, you more than likely have financial responsibilities, and quite possibly a family to support. To get past this fear, make sure you have enough money in the bank to help you along early on. If you have at least three months of living expenses saved, you will have plenty of time to jump start your freelance writing career. Even though this is not required, it will definitely help to make the leap less stressful.
Fear number two: not being able to find clients. This goes along with fear number one, because if you cannot find clients you cannot make money. Luckily, there are three options to consider when searching for work. 1. Use bidding sites such as GetAFreelancer. 2. Market yourself to people who may need your service. You can do this through cold calling, email, and by setting up your own website. 3. Search freelance writing job boards everyday. If you rely on all three of these options you should be able to find some work early on in your career. And all you need is a few little jobs to put the wheels in motion.
Fear number three: not making it. A lot of people are afraid to try a career in freelance writing because they think that failing is a bad thing. Of course, nobody wants to fail, but you have to chase your dream career if you are ever going to realize your potential. The bottom line is that until you take the risk, you will never know if you have what it takes to make it as a freelance writer. Forget fear, and go for the gusto!
If you can learn to get past these three fears, you will find that the early days of your freelance writing career are less stressful and hopefully more successful.Â
For many freelance writers, keyword article writing is where they start. Generally speaking, these articles are pretty easy to understand. They are articles based around a “keyword†as to help with search engine rankings. Since more and more people are hoping to make money online, more and more keyword articles are going to be needed.
The question is: does writing these articles make you a freelance writer? To me, the answer is a resounding YES. Some will tell you that you are doing nothing more than wasting your time with keyword articles; the reason being that you will not get paid a lot of money. But in my opinion, just because you are not earning $1/word from a national publication does not make the writing any less important.
What type of money can keyword article writing bring in? From my experience, this can differ greatly. Early in my career, I was writing these short pieces for as little as $3 an article. While this would be a time waster for me right now, back then I was happy to be generating income; no matter what it was from. I still write keyword articles from time to time, and I usually earn anywhere from $15 to $20 for 400 words or so. Again, this may not seem like a lot, but look at it this way. If a client orders a batch of 20 articles at $20 each, that is a $400 project. Five of these projects a month and you are earning $2,000. Not bad, right?
All in all, keyword article writing is far from copywriting. But with that being said, it is a viable way to make money. There are tens of thousands of webmasters who are willing to pay writers a decent rate to produce a high quantity of keyword articles. Don’t overlook this income stream if you are interested in becoming a freelance writer.
As a blogger, one of your goals should be to provide a quality experience to your readers. Of course, the word “quality†means something different to every blogger. But with that being said, there are a few ways that you can increase the quality of your blog. Here are three factors to consider:
1. Since I am a freelance writer by profession, in my opinion, the number one way to increase the quality of your blog is to increase the quality of your posts. Make sure that you are supplying useful, interesting, and near-error free content. Remember, content is what powers your blog. If it were not for your words, you would have no traffic and no revenue.
2. Use a theme that portrays the content of your blog, while also offering a great user experience. This can be done with a free theme, but if you are serious about taking your blog to the next level, buying a custom design may be the way to go. As I have mentioned, this is my next step.
3. When readers comment, make sure that you comment back. While you do not have to do this every time, it is definitely something that will increase the quality of your blog. At the same time, getting involved with your readers will keep them coming back day in and day out.
These are three of the best ways to increase the quality of your blog. If you are lacking in any of these areas, try to pick up the slack as soon as possible. By doing so you may notice an increase in your blog’s productivity.
I have made several posts in the past regarding GetAFreelancer, how to win jobs, and other miscellaneous details concerning this service. But even then, some freelance writers feel that this site is not worth their time. In other words, they think that all the jobs are low paying, or that they will be outbid by others. While this is true to some extent, it is not the case across the board.
A few months back I won a project on GetAFreelancer to complete a batch of 10 articles. Even though the pay was only $150 or so, the entire job only took a few hours to complete so everything worked out in the end. But instead of looking at this as a one shot job, I continued to follow up with the client every other week or so. The result: two weeks ago they asked me to write 20 press releases for them. Better yet, they did not want them to be any more than 150 to 200 words, so they were actually quite simple.
For the entire job we agreed on a price of $1,000 or $50 per press release. This may not sound like a lot, but the project only took 10 days to complete. I wrote two press releases a day for ten days. In most cases, each one only took about 30 minutes to write thanks to a lot of good direction and information from the client. As you can see, that works out to $100/hour.
Every job on GetAFreelancer is not going to suit your needs. But in the case outlined above, one small job led to a quick $1,000 a few months later. Keep in mind that bidding on and winning one job may turn out to be way more than that.Â
Wouldn’t it be nice to make it through the workday without having an unsuspecting problem arise? Even though I do not work in an office, as a freelance writer there are common glitches that I deal with time and time again. And of course, it always seems as if these problems come about when I am bogged down with tons of work.
Here are three common glitches that have gotten in my way more than once during my freelance writing career.
1. The ever popular internet access glitch. When it comes down to it, if I do not have access to the internet I cannot get a lot of work done. Even though my internet service provider is very good as far as uptime is concerned, there are times when I cannot gain access. When this happens, my entire day gets set back until the internet “comes back on.†Even though I use the best connection available, this is still bound to happen at least a couple times a year. And guess what? Every time I lose access I get just as frustrated as the time before.
2. Working at home as a freelance writer has its benefits. But at the same time, when you are always at home you have to deal with problems as they come up. For me, this includes everything from dealing with the cable man to dogsitting from time to time. As you can imagine, these unexpected occurrences can throw a wrench into your routine.
3. As every freelance writer knows, writer’s block can happen from time to time. I am lucky enough to avoid this for the most part, but some freelance writers have no such luck. All in all, this can be the biggest freelance writing glitch of them all. When you have nothing to say as a writer, you are pretty much useless for the time being.
There you have it! These are definitely three scenarios that I could do without in the future.
Since starting this blog about five months ago, I have learned quite a bit. Not only have I done this through my own experiences, but my readers have also taught me quite a bit as well. Hopefully, as the next few months go by I will learn even more. After all, the more knowledge you have the more comfortable you will feel with your blog.
Here are three blogging lessons that stick with me day in and day out.
1. Take an original angle on every post that you write. There are not a lot of topics that have yet to be discussed. But with that being said, you can add your own angle to give the material a unique perspective. Remember, your readers like your blog for a reason. They enjoy your content, and your writing style. Give them what they want with each post.
2. Do whatever it takes to help your readers out. For me, I have always made it known that I am more than happy to talk with readers via blog comments, email, or even phone. By showing your readers that you care, they will be more likely to visit your blog time and time again. Plus, by staying in touch with your readers you can help them to reach their goals; whatever they may be.
3. Have an idea on what direction you want to take your blog. Even though starting a blog is a quick and simple process, you need to know what you want to accomplish in the future. Do you want to make money with your blog? Are you writing for fun? Do you want to turn your blog into a bigger business? No matter what, have an idea of how you want to expand.
These three lessons will help you to become a better blogger now, and as your blog grows in the future.
One of the main goals of this blog is to help aspiring freelance writers learn from my mistakes. Well, listen up! I recently made a huge error when accepting a job from a client that I have been working with for several months.
Most of the jobs that the company offers me are within my realm of knowledge. The topics that they ask me to write about are usually main stream, while not touching too much on the complex. But this time around things were a bit different.
So where does my mistake come into play? Instead of considering all of the details of the job, I simply said “yes†after reading their initial email. As I mentioned, this is usually not a problem. Sure, I took a quick glance at their requirements, but I was far from diligent when reading them over.
The result: a project that was technical in nature, and full of keywords that I was not familiar with. Of course, I got the job done on time and with high quality, but it was far from ideal from where I was sitting. Even though I have a long term relationship with the client, I probably would have turned this job down; even though they were offering a high per article rate.
The moral of this scenario is that you should always check every last detail of a freelance writing project before taking on the job. This way you will not find yourself in a situation where you are working way too long to complete a small job.
After finishing this job today it felt like a huge weight was lifted off my shoulders. It is safe to say that I will never make this mistake again.Â
As you may or may not know, the design of this blog is not unique. In fact, I have come across several other bloggers who use a similar design, if not identical. While I did not have a problem with this at first, as the blog has grown so has my desire to see how far it can go. And the only way to take things to the next level is to get a custom design.
Of course, like always, I am going to have to do some heavy research before deciding on what the new blog should look like, as well as the designer I should hire. With that being said, I have some solid ideas on where to start.
I have a couple of goals that I am hoping the redesign can accomplish. First off, I want ChrisBlogging to look different than everything else that is out there. Not in a hard to navigate, complicated way, but in a unique way that readers will remember. In other words, I want the design to fit in with the future branding of this blog.
Additionally, I want to add more space for links, featured sites, and sponsors. But at the same time, I do not want to clutter the site and take away from the content.
Do any of you guys or gals have experience designing WordPress blogs? If so, please send me an email with your ideas for a redesign. Since I love to help out my readers, hiring one of you to do the work would be ideal!
Do you want to know the number one reason that aspiring freelance writers do not succeed? Simply enough, they never get started. If you are going to get involved with freelance writing you need to have the guts to take the plunge. No matter if you start off full-time or part-time, you need to make the move sooner rather than later. If not, you will join the thousands of others who want to write for a living, but instead stay stuck in their monotonous day job.
Here are three simple tips for starting a freelance writing career. They are not earth shattering, but instead simple and to the point. And when attempting to start a freelance writing career, simple is a good thing.
1. Determine what is holding you back, and then decide how you are going to get past this. For instance, many aspiring freelance writers feel that they are being held back by their lack of experience. But guess what? Everybody starts somewhere. If you do not have any samples, write some on topics that are of interest to you. All in all, no matter what is holding you back, you need to come up with a plan to overcome it.
2. Learn from freelance writers who are already having success. If you are reading this blog, you are probably interested in freelance writing in one way, shape, or form. By learning from me, you can avoid mistakes that I have made in the past, so that you can earn a solid income in the future.Â
3. Practice patience. You are not going to make thousands of dollars your first month as a freelance writer. But over time, you can reach your goals if you stick with moving your career in the right direction. Some climb to the top of the ladder faster than others, but as long as you are patient you will get there sooner or later.Â
Now that you know what it takes to start a freelance writing career, go ahead and get started. There is no reason to wait any longer!
I am not one to keep an extremely close eye on who is linking to this blog, but I found it interesting that about.com recently mentioned ChrisBlogging. More specifically, the freelance writing section of about.com was where the link appeared.
Why would the freelance writing author for about.com write about this blog? From what I can see, it has a lot to do with me releasing my income data. The story where ChrisBlogging was mentioned was titled, “Can I Really Make Money Freelancing?â€
Hopefully, this link will do a couple of things for me. First off, I am hoping it will bring more traffic. I have already noticed this happening, so I am confident that it will continue for the time being. Additionally, since this page on about.com has a PR of 6, it may help me out as far as search engine traffic, as well as my own PR is concerned. This link is by far my best to date; and I didn’t even have to ask for it!
For now, I am going to contact Allena Tapia, the freelance writing author at about.com. Simply put, I want to thank her for including my blog in her recent story, and of course, offer my help whenever possible.
