• Moving Your Article From Mag To Web
• Proofreading Tips for Writers
• An Introduction to Ghostwriting

Hope you enjoy them! Bookmark my profile page to keep up to date as new ones appear.

That’s when it hit me. We each bring our own unique skill-sets to these pages. We’ve all got talents in various aspects that are individual. When a client offers to hire us, it’s US they’re hiring because of something special they discovered through our query letter, application, or word-of-mouth.

What do you have on your skill-set that can sell you as the ideal freelancer for the articles you write or the jobs for which you apply?

Build Your Skills

Initially, it’s important to start with what you have. Build on your skills. Reading this blog is one fantastic way to build on your existing skills and begin to discover new ones. In fact, the web is filled with talented writers who are eager to share their experience. There are books to fill shelves (I know because I have shelf-fulls) about the practice of writing, the business of writing, the art of writing.

These resources are the beginning of your path, but the truest beginning is to dive into the deep end. Give up Procrastination and get writing every single day, then Just Hit Send! If you’re writing for the magazine market then you need to get those queries out there, submit articles to article directories, perhaps even begin a blog of your own on your favorite topic. If you’re looking to make a dime or two from fiction writing you’ve got to get your stories out there, finish your novel and hook an agent.

Grow Your Skills

Starting with what you have is a great way to begin. From there, however, it’s important to grow, constantly. Yes, you can write, and with practice you’ll write well. What else can you do? In the online world you could build skills with web languages, and graphics. Your skills might be in book keeping, photography, administration, or languages.

Can you offer transcribing services? Do you have a firm grasp of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) techniques? Are you a closet poet? Would you offer editing services?

Each of these additional skills, small and large, make you a more valuable freelancer. It doesn’t matter where you gained the skills, if you got a degree from college or are a jack of all trades. Potential editors, employers and clients are more interested in what you can do for them, then why you can do it.

Examine Your Skills

Take some time this week to reflect with honesty where your skills are strongest. Acknowledge your weaknesses. Embrace your interests. With this information in hand you can polish your skills, and expand on your existing skills. As you increase your skills acknowledge your worth. Additional skills means your time is more valuable. Expand into higher pay brackets as your skills increase.

You are your greatest asset!

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Rebecca Laffar-Smith is a freelance writer, editor, and web tech. Her skills range from web copy writing with SEO flair, through poetry critique, and web programming. Need a custom Wordpress theme? She’s your gal. Need to figure out your email program? She can help you. Want to grow as a poet? Her advice has already mentored poets with great success. For more, check out her blog, Writer’s Round-About.

(Photo: Alvimann)

The theme: getting our blogging start. I don’t know about you, but I’m always fascinated to hear how others got started in blogging, so I’m looking forward to reading all the entries.

The rules are simple: write a post with this theme on your blog, include a link to this post and leave the link to your post in the comments section. Check back regularly and visit everyone’s posts to share some comment love.

At the end of the writing project, I’ll do a round up post with all the links.  There’s even a cool button for you to use if you want to.  Spread the word about the project and invite everyone you know to join. It will be fun. Arbitrary closing date: August 17th.

1. Men with Pens

2. Writing the Cyber Highway

3. Freelance Writing Jobs

3. Get Paid To Write Online

Honorable Mention

Anything by Thursday Bram

Write From Home

Writing Forward

Writer’s Roundabout

Write To Done

Freelance Folder

The Writing Life

Contributors:

HopeWilbanks

LaShae

MicheleT

Becca L-Smith

otherdeb

Sociologist

Cindy Thomas

talespinner

Another hot issue was telephone use. James Chartrand asked Should You Turn Off Your Telephone? while Jennifer stated: My Phone Number is Unlisted. Definitely food for thought there, and I was in sympathy with the idea of turning off the phone in favour of more effective communication.

Thinking about freelancing skills, I started with Seven Must-Read Articles for Freelancers but was particularly struck by DoshDosh’s statement that You’re Not Just a Writer, You’re the Editor-in-Chief - a timely reminder for all blogging writers. FreelanceSwitch offers advice on Why Freelancers Need Multiple Skills: Handling the Feast or Famine Phenomenon while Freelance Writing Gigs says I’m a Professional…So Pay Me Already!, a position with which I have a lot of sympathy.

On the same blog, the FWJ Idol candidates gave Four Reasons Why Freelance Writing is Like Dating, Ten Ways to Get a Paid Blogging Gig, Ten Great Resources for Writers and Top 10 Phrases No Freelancer Wants to Hear (and How to Fix Them). Tips and tools which appealed to me included Performancing’s Online Office Suite Roundup, Freelance Folder’s 5 Online Archives To Aid Your Research and Idea Seeds For Successful Articles and Posts.

In the ‘made me think’ category were The Violent Truth Of Freelance Sales, The Five Most Common Mistakes of Female Freelancers (how many of these have ever affected you?) and 7 Questions That Can Attract The Right Clients. Daily Writing Tips offers 25+ Pieces of Writing Software You Should Know About while FreelanceSwitch suggests 8 Things You Should Include In Your Terms of Service Agreement.

The final word goes to Courtney of WebWritingInfo: Some Buyers Just Don’t Get It!

Happy reading.

When you yell ‘writer, writer’ there’s sure to be someone around to provide some writer’s notes which will help you to write from home. When you’re ready to take a writing journey, don’t forget to pack your inkwell. Editorial tips are also available from freelance write.

Meanwhile Hope writes to Rachel Kaufman, Lillie Ammann and Shelly Bryant, telling them how to grow your writing business, develop a freelance writing career and raise an arctic llama. Final words: functional shmunctional.

The bloggers listed in this post are the top commentators on Get Paid To Write Online in the last six months. Thanks for being a part of the community.

If you’re looking for tips for maximising your blogging income, there are plenty of those around. Courtney Tuttle provides valuable advice on selling advertising, while I talk about website marketing with Twitter over on Mixed Market Arts. There’s more advice on using Twitter effectively on the Home Office Warrior blog. This Laptop For Hire tells you how to boost your RSS subscribers, while Marie Baca gives a crash course in digital promotion over on Freelance Writing Gigs.

I was also interested by a guide to podcasting for newbies, as I know it’s something I’ll have to do eventually. Performancing’s guide is clear and comprehensive, so it’s a good place to start. You can also find out how to promote your freelance services with a podcast over on Freelance Folder.

Turning to freelance writing career management, I looked at 26 things that could be holding you back from freelance writing success, saving for the freelance future and negotiating with clients. Bob Younce started a compelling series on violent truths about freelancing which is definitely worth a look. It’s also worth looking into the secret habits for success and how to get more from your content.

Thought provoking posts this month include why freelance writers should apply to full time jobs and the question of whether bidding sites are worth it or whether you should simply give up on them. I love lists so I was intrigued to see who else was included in the top 60 blogs for writers (according to ProFreelancing, as well as to discover 50 open source resources for writers and 20 types of freelancing work.

Finally, I want to end with a few posts that made me consider different approaches to blogging, writing and freelancing:

• Are Bloggers Journalistic?
• Allowing Yourself To Take The Risk Of Writing
• Stop The Madness And Start Hand Picking Your Clients
• 10 Ways To Let Your Competition Be Your Guide
• Food, Sleep and Exercise Are Not Time Wasters
• Running With The Wolves As Nature Intended

Enjoy!

• They read, so they are always up to date with changing nuances in language. This makes it easy for them to produce writing for different audiences.
• They write, sometimes for years, so that the written word becomes a finely tuned instrument. (Article rewriting software, on the other hand, is a blunt instrument and is none too clever.)
• They talk to other writers, so that they know what’s going on in their sector and others. (When is the last time a piece of software visited a blog other than to drop spammy links?)
• They adapt to changing client requirements, and if they don’t know something, they can do research. (If article rewriting software has to go beyond the included vocabulary, then you’re likely to come out with nonsense.)

Many of these pieces of software work from a database of synonyms. I remember when I was at school having to learn synonyms for various words (abandon: desert, forsake, leave). But those words are not interchangeable - they have nuances which a piece of software just can’t pick up.

When a real writer writes, you are likely to be affected by the writing, whether you are touched, moved, pleased, angry or feel some other strong emotion. When a piece of software spins the article, you are likely to feel puzzled, as if something is not quite right.

Of course, when people use these tools, they may not care about this. They are looking for something that will game the search engines, rather than appeal to real readers. If that’s what they want, fine, but let’s not confuse it with real writing.

ProFreelancing often makes me think. If you are wondering if you are doing the right job, consider 13 Reasons Why You Should Not Be A Freelance Writer. Have you ever wondered what to do if a potential job just didn’t feel right? Maybe you should think about rejecting work based on ethics. It might help with career improvement.

I always want to know how to be more effective as a writer and a blogger, so I was interested in three steps for beating the boring content blues and five steps for writing effective articles in less time. (That makes eight steps so far, but who’s counting?) Actually, the fact that I mentioned that shows that my inner boss is alive and well.

Problogger weighed in with advice on adding depth to your blog. I had to wonder if using any of the eight ways to make money with my blog would end up increasing my blogging workload, but then I thought that if I used my daily life as inspiration I might be able to make better use of these valuable post types and use them correctly. I might have more time if I cut these five words from my vocabulary.

I was glad to read a post that cut to the chase, and told me exactly how to get piles of subscribers. links and comments on my blog. There is a danger, though, that this might turn me into even more of a blogging addict.

Finally, I want to end with a few favourites from the Pen Men, who ask whether it’s ok to charge more, whether low rates are holding you back, and if you’re a good web worker. But for me, the most interesting question I was asked this month was what writing means to me.

Happy reading.

Run by several journalists (though I expect their IDs are pseudonyms), the site aims to bring examples of bad journalism into the public eye.  Read the Archoles post to see how the team exposed some sloppy practices at the UK’s Telegraph.  I think this is one to watch.

Most of the time, I find it useful. I signed up for a premium account so I could check blocks of text rather than just URLs. (Five cents a time is a small charge to protect my good name.) The fact is, sometimes you have to use it, but what do you do if it isn’t working? This recently happened to me. I needed to check some work quickly and Copyscape was throwing up error messages. Thanks to the wonders of Google, I quickly found a few alternatives, which I’m putting here in case you can use them.

Article Checker

Article Checker was the most useful of the alternatives I found. You can paste in a block of text and check it against the sites indexed on Google and Yahoo. It’s lightning quick and appears to be accurate. I don’t know how long a text has to be before it flags. I was checking 400 word articles and it seemed ok. I’ve used this tool a couple of times and it’s never found any plagiarism but that doesn’t mean it won’t. Many other writers I know use this tool because it is free. A good feature is that you can upload files for checking, which could be good if you are doing rewrites.

Plagiarism Checker

The Plagiarism Checker was originally designed as a student project at the University of Maryland. Like the other tools, it works by pasting some text into a box and hitting enter. Then you get a list of results for phrases. Interestingly, this check said the article I checked with Article Checker was almost certainly plagiarised. It brought up a list of suspicious phrases and then you could click on a link for more information. That took me to a Google search page which found … drumroll, please … no plagiarism. So I wouldn’t rely on that tool.

DupeCop

DupeCop allows you to compare two pieces of text through its free online duplicate content checker, or to compare up to four versions of spun articles through its spun article checker. I haven’t tested these yet, but this looks like a good service. There are desktop versions of both checkers too.

Other Tools

If you just want to compare web pages, then try DuplicateContent, which has an online URL comparison engine. There are also a few other tools, which I haven’t tested, but am listing in case you want to. DocCop has both free and paid services, but you will need to register to use either service. DupeFree Pro is a piece of free software (I’m still waiting for my registration details to arrive). Finally I-thenticate is a web based product used in business and education. It’s not free. In fact, you have to register just to find out the price, which is why I didn’t.

As web content writers, we have other skills too. We can’t take years to germinate the perfect masterpiece. We have to produce it in hours, or sometimes even minutes. We know where to find information on almost anything, and find it quickly. We are good at speed reading research sources, extracting their essence, and making something better and more readable with our own personal flair. Our minds are buzzing with words and phrases that make any subject come to life. We know how to add the personal touch, addressing our readers directly and making them feel that they are the sole focus of our writing attention.

So the next time someone asks you what you do, or suggests that you can’t possibly have a real job working from home, or disparages your job because they haven’t heard of the places that you write for, tell them this: I am a talented writer with the same skill and creativity as other writers, and a wide range of subject knowledge. Or just say: I AM a real writer, and this IS a real job.

When you start writing, you often don’t think past getting those first few jobs. If you do, perhaps you think about getting to the point where you’ve got a fairly reliable income coming in across the year, even if there are peaks and troughs. But what about getting beyond that time?

Making Dreams Into Reality

Let’s face it, we’re all going to get older. When our office bound peers are thinking about retiring to Florida, do we still want to be chasing every writing commission? I think not. That’s why it’s important to have some sort of long term plan for your writing career. What this might look like will depend on the individual, but here’s mine. It may have an element of fantasy about it, but there’s no reason why I can’t make it reality.

Spreading My Wings

My long term plan involves diversifying so that I am less dependent on the income I produce with my own flying fingers. I’m sure I’ll want to slow down at some time, and I’ve already had a couple of wake up calls about how illness can throw your writing career into disarray. My first step in diversification came last year, when I started working with a small team of writers. Not only do I get the satisfaction of helping other writers with career development, but I also have a group of reliable writers who can help me out in a pinch. One person I know who did this now does very little writing herself, concentrating on editing others’ writing. While this won’t suit every writer, as a former editor, I might not mind making this part of my daily routine.

Writing For Myself

The second option is to write not just for clients, but for myself. I’ve already started doing this, and if I can get my act together, I’ll soon have a couple of new ebooks to add to my list. Writing something that might also transfer to print increases the options for this strategy. Creating information products that can sell means a reduction in the daily grind. (It’s not really a grind yet, but will I feel the same in ten years’ time?) I will have to update them from time to time, but that’s a manageable task.

Passive Income

Passive income is the third plank in my strategy. You hear a lot about making money online, and at least some people must actually be doing it. I am already making money online, but it’s not enough to retire on. However, if I add some new sites, or increase the options on my existing ones, and promote some products that I believe in, maybe I can get a share of that ‘untold wealth’ that seems to be knocking around. I’m not looking to be a millionaire, but to have enough for my needs and savings to handle any emergencies.

As time goes on, I’m sure I’ll think of different things that I can do to secure my future. Maybe I’ll get around to finishing one of my novels and will become a runaway success. Maybe not. In the meantime, I am starting my career planning with the things that I can do now, knowing that the plan is likely to evolve. How have you planned for your career as a writer?

• Will Content Kill the Web?

‘PLR content drives down the market value of web content. Why buy pricier work when nearly-free (and sometimes free) is right there for the taking?’

• Handling Your Perfectionism

‘One of the biggest problems perfectionists have is setting realistic goals. I never realized I set the bar too high for myself. Halfway through whatever I was working on achieving, when nothing went according to my vision, I would give up in frustration.’

• What a Camera Can Teach You About Customer Service

Sorry, you’ll just have to read this one. No excerpt would do it justice.

There is so much good stuff in there it’s hard to give you a flavour of it. The blog focuses on blogging, business, design and writing, and currently has a great series on fiction writing. Just to round out the list, here are some posts with great titles that made me stop and look:

• Bloggers That Fake It
• Don’t Be Efficient if You Want a Successful Business
• Knitters Never Comment!

Over the past year, posts from this blog, and its predecessor, have turned up regularly in my links roundups, which shows how consistently readable it is. If you haven’t done so, check it out.

Technorati Tags: writing,blogging,reviews

How much time do you spend on writing each week? When you sit at your desk to write, is that all you do, or do you get distracted by other things. I’ll come clean and say that I am prone to distraction. In addition to writing/blogging, I also spend my time reading blogs, maintaining my sites, checking out new advertisers, researching and promoting my sites or blog posts. All of these are essential tasks for a writing business. But …

Rescuing My Writing Time

If you’d asked me a couple of weeks ago - or if you’d asked anyone in my family - you’d hear that I spend all day at my computer. I start at 8am, work till 2pm or 3pm depending on school pickup, and do some more in the evening. But I decided to find out for sure, with the aid of an application called RescueTime.

RescueTime is a time tracker. There’s a lightweight desktop application which sends info to a website to produce charts about how you spend your time. Of course, you have to do some work too.

Tagging And Tracking

The desktop app tracks the applications that you open and how long you spend using them (measuring the application that’s in focus at the time). It also tracks which sites you visit. Your job is to tag those sites with handy labels. If you are a serial surfer, then this might prove too much for you. I discovered that I visit a lot more sites than I thought.

I’ve been using it for the last week and I’ve made a few more discoveries. This was an unusual week for me. I was off site for a couple of days, and busy in the evenings, so I did much less writing than usual - just 11 hours. That included both writing articles and writing blogs. I spent 4 hours on email, 2 hours on site maintenance, and nearly an hour each on advertising and promotion.

What I Learned About Writing Time

Clicking on my most productive day revealed that I spent almost 45% of my time writing, with the rest spent on other tasks, including looking at other blogs. That means that 55% of my time was spent doing other stuff. A lot of this was research for my writing, searching for new gigs, and emailing writers and clients, so this was all related stuff.

And I learned something else. Although I did less writing than I thought, my writing time was extremely productive. In the hours that I worked, I wrote quickly and maintained a high hourly rate. The lesson is that I don’t have to be glued to my computer all day to make writing pay. I just have to use my writing time effectively.

Have you ever tried tracking how you spend your time? What tools did you use and what did you find out?

Technorati Tags: writing,writing business,freelance writing,writing career,time management,rescuetime

We’re all human, and freelance writers can have bad days too. Those are the days when you wonder if you can bear to write another article with impossible keywords; the days when you wonder if this was why you became a writer. Some people I know give up at this point, realizing that for them the dream of writing does not match the reality.

The reality of writing is that although it is creative and can be fulfilling, it is also hard work. If you freelance, you may be fitting your writing around responsibilities in the home, so you may work even longer hours than you would as an employee. In addition, you have to manage the business of writing as well as the pleasure, looking after invoicing, paying taxes and taking care of health insurance. I’m willing to bet that those tasks weren’t top of the list when you became a writer. They certainly weren’t for me.

Despite the negatives, those of us who love writing keep at it. For some it’s because they can’t imagine doing anything else. Writing is as essential to life as breathing. They are full of ideas, and the only problem is finding the time to write them all down and develop them.

For others, it’s the sheer joy of being able to string words and sentences together in a way that moves people or makes them think. It’s not really a power trip, but a feeling of power.

There are also those who start out by looking for a way to make money at home, write a couple of articles, and discover that they have a talent that they had never explored. Writing for them is about continuing the journey of self exploration.

For me, the first and second explanations are closest to the truth. What keeps you writing?