Many people are under the impression that freelance writers work a lot for very little pay; sort of like struggling musicians. While this can be the case for some, there are just as many who are earning solid wages. One of the quickest ways to increase your freelance writing income is to break into the markets that pay the most money. Early in my career, one of my main goals was to find publications that paid $1/word or more. Writing for publications like this can quickly turn a meager income into a substantial income. After all, one feature length article could work out to a couple thousand dollars.
Now that you have seen the income potential, you are probably interested in learning how to break into these markets, right? Here are three tips to follow.
1. Before you can do anything else, you need gain some experience. Remember, you cannot start out earning $1/word. You must first gain experience with lesser known publications, and then work your way up. There is no easy way around this.Â
2. While you are working lower paying gigs, take the time to compile a list of publications that pay $1/word or more. This way, you can begin to align your career to match what these publications are looking for. For instance, if you want to break into high paying fashion magazines, write for lower paying publications in this industry. This will allow you to gain relative experience and work samples. To find these publications, buy a copy of Writer’s Market, or become a member of their online service.
3. Make as many connections as you can along the way. In several instances, I have had satisfied editors pass my name along to others in the industry. Additionally, you never know when a current connection will land a new job with a bigger publication. If this happens, you have a contact to call on from day one. Simply put, stay connected with as many editors and writers as possible.
It may take a while for you to break into these high paying markets. But when you do, your freelance writing career will become much more enjoyable. As you can imagine, becoming a regular writer for two or more of these publications will net you big time money.Â
A couple weeks ago I made a post on the predicted PageRank of ChrisBlogging. At the time, I used several tools to predict this number, and most of them were showing that I would obtain a PageRank of 4. While these tools were close, they were not accurate. This past Saturday I learned that I obtained a PageRank of 3. Am I disappointed with this? Absolutely not!
For a blog that is only five months old, I am quite happy with a PageRank of 3. In fact, this is even with many of the “big name†bloggers who are earning hundreds of dollars per month with their blog. And with that being said, some of the best pro bloggers out there only have a PageRank of 4.
As you have probably read, Google decreased the PageRank of many well known blogs. Some have speculated that the reason for this is selling links, whereas others feel that this has nothing to do with it. Your guess is as good as mine when it comes to this. As I mentioned before, I do not put much time or effort into thinking about my PageRank. It is nice that it increased and I am now on par with some bigger blogs, but even then, I am not sure that it will do much for me.
Now that ChrisBlogging has a PageRank of 3 instead of 0, I should be able to ask more of advertisers when I begin to offer advertising space upon releasing my new design. Also, some readers have emailed me and mentioned that search engine traffic is sure to increase with a higher PageRank. Hopefully, they are right to a certain degree.
So, how were your blogs affected by the latest PageRank update? Did you see an increase, or did Google slap you on the wrist?
In the world of freelance writing, dealing with language barriers is quite common. And of course, the way that you deal with this issue could be the difference between securing a contract and being turned down.
From my experience, writing web content brings a lot of opportunities to work with people from other countries. While many see this as a negative, it is actually quite interesting to me. Of course, it does pose a problem in many cases because I only speak English. For this reason, I always proceed with extreme caution if I am dealing with a client that does not speak English as a first language.
In the past, I have had some issues with project details and pricing in these situations. For example, I was recently contacted by a potential client who’s English was noticeably bad. Luckily for me, he was open about his struggle with the language, and apologized in advance. But even then, I had my hands full sifting through what he was interested in. It can often times be difficult to decipher what the client wants. In this particular case, it took about 10 emails back and forth to finally narrow down the scope of the project.
When working with clients who do not speak great English, never take anything for granted. Make sure that you always double check the details, and that everything is laid out on the table from day one. This way, you can always go back to prior conversations should something get out of whack during the project completion process.
To go along with the actual details of the project, pricing is also very important. Once again, somebody who is not fluent in English may not understand the American Dollar. It is very important that you also come to terms on the exact cost of the project before you start.
Overall, I am open to working with anybody and everybody, regardless of location. After all, one of the greatest benefits of the internet is that it brings together people from all over the world. Just make sure that you have all the details in line if you are going to be working with somebody who is less than proficient in the English language.Â
