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Freelance writers don’t plan to fail.

May 27, 2019 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

Planning to become a blogger or freelance writer? Plan well.

While some people do strike gold quickly and make a ton of money, it’s best to assume that these folks are outliers. Entrepreneurship is chancy at best and sometimes downright frustrating.

For part of my own freelancing career, two words too often applied: feast, famine.

Too much work, not enough work. A fair amount of work but knowing that in a week’s time I’d be finishing up my final assignments – and no editors seemed interested in my current pitches. More rarely (and usually at the beginning of this journey) I’d have no work at all for weeks at a time, and be mighty glad that I had some side hustles.

Then again, I started freelancing full-time way back in 2002, when blogging wasn’t a big thing and when companies didn’t have to have major online presence. I’d get some magazine or newspaper gigs, and then a whole bunch of rejection slips. Again, thank goodness for alternate income streams (and a super-frugal nature).

“To break in you need to be willing to be broke,” notes Lamine Zarrad in the Freelancers Union blog.

Zarrad suggests that would-be entrepreneurs (including freelance writers) become “scrappy and creative.” He also offers some pretty useful tips for doing so. I’m listing some of them here, along with a few of my own.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, freelancing, self-care, writing for pay, writing ups and downs

The Skilsaw of Skilful Editing™

December 24, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

Editing is an art form. One of the best editors I ever had really knew how to set limits. When he asked for 25 inches on a given topic, that’s what we were expected to deliver.

Those limits made us focus intensely, winnowing out extraneous details. Instead of meandering, indistinct articles, we turned in pieces that told readers what they needed to know.

This being the features section, we were allowed to do it with a bit of panache. “Voice” was a thing* in our department. Unfortunately, we were sometimes a little too in love with the sounds of our voices.

Invariably, the editor called us out when we turned in 30 inches, or 35. Boy, we hated that.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, freelancing, self-editing, writing

‘Self-care is part of your work.’

November 19, 2018 by Donna Freedman 2 Comments

Paula Pant, who writes the Afford Anything blog, has been a freelance writer since 2010. Recently she posted some excellent advice on Instagram:

The time that you spend going to the gym, practicing yoga, writing in your journal or connecting with a close friend on the phone is not time that you are spending away from work.

Self-care is part of your work.

Even laptops need to recharge.

Paula is a very wise woman. Freelancers would do well to listen to her advice about self-care – especially at this time of year.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, freelancing, self-care

Attend FinCon18 without leaving home.

October 13, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

Every year I attend (and speak at) the Financial Blogger Conference (aka FinCon). It isn’t just for personal finance writers and devotees, though, because it touches on topics important to bloggers, vloggers and freelance writers of all stripes.

Topics such as good writing, effective interviewing (the topic of the panel I chaired), writing and publishing books, creating a niche brand, how to check a source’s credentials, social media, creating top-drawer YouTube videos, affiliate marketing and financial independence.

The conference took place in late September in Orlando, Florida. If you wanted to go but couldn’t, here’s another shot: The FinCon18 Virtual Pass.

You won’t get the in-person networking, the Freelancer Marketplace (which was great – kind of like speed dating for self-employed writers) or the chance to sit in the 16-foot inflatable flamingo. But here’s what you will get:

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, blogging, conferences, Financial Blogger Conference, freelancing

Give your audience what it needs.

September 30, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

This year’s Financial Blogger Conference was the biggest yet: 2,000 attendees, including vendors. (Speaking of which: The FinCon18 box of swag giveaway is up on my personal website until Oct. 15. Some really fun stuff in there.)

Someone on the FinCon Facebook page asked other members to name their favorite takeaway(s) from the conference. Here’s the one that got my attention:

 

“Stop trying to be clever and serve your audience’s needs.”

 

That is one solid-gold reminder.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, blogging, Financial Blogger Conference, freelancing, writing

You’ve been given a gift.

August 23, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

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(Happy Throwback Thursday! This article was originally published on May 3, 2016, but its sentiments remain fresh.)

Ever question why you need to write? Not want, need. According to Gary Garrison, it’s because you have “The Gift.”

That’s the name of a short essay that Garrison sent out to fellow members of the Dramatists Guild of America. A friend sent it to me because she found it inspiring and, well, true.

Although Garrison was referring to playwriting, his words apply to bloggers, short-story writers, novelists and others of that ilk. All of them “have the ability to create whole, intricate, dimensional worlds and to people them with infinitely interesting, complex beings.”

Wait…Bloggers create worlds?

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, inspiration, writing, writing ups and downs

Freelancers: Jury duty can cost you

July 21, 2018 by Donna Freedman 2 Comments

Earlier this week I spent six hours at the courthouse, listening to multiple potential jurors be dismissed and anticipating every moment that the next name called would be my own. Jury duty seemed inevitable.

Fortunately, it wasn’t – and as a freelancer, I was mightily relieved.

To be clear: I know how important jury duty is in a democracy and I do take it seriously. It would never occur to me to try and weasel out, e.g., to make up a story about how I didn’t trust lawyers and could therefore never be impartial. I’ve been called for jury duty several times and actually served once, in a robbery trial.

But the very words “jury duty” make even conventionally employed people flinch. They grouse about the hassle of parking, the boredom of waiting, the bad coffee in the jury pool room. (That is, if there even is coffee.) A much bigger potential problem, though, is the potential loss of income.

If you’re lucky, your employer will keep paying you even if you spend a day or two (or a week or two) serving on a jury. I got called in the late 1980s, when I worked at a newspaper, and my pay was not docked.

Freelancers don’t have that option. Back in 2010, when I got called to a Seattle jury pool, I sent a letter explaining my situation: How could I do interviews and research if I were in a downtown courtroom all day?

They ordered me to report anyway. And when I got there, I found people who were a lot worse off than me.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, freelancing, writing for pay, writing ups and downs, Your Playbook For Tough Times

Major proofreading fail.

May 14, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

A while back I offered to proofread a book by a former co-worker. It was for a regional publisher that has its own in-house copyeditor for proofreading, but my friend wanted to go the extra mile.

In fact, he hired yet another former co-worker – who’d spent many years on a newspaper’s copy desk – for a third set of eyes.

A total of five pairs of peepers (including those of the author and the publisher) pored over that manuscript. After finding a handful of typos and misspells, we congratulated ourselves on making the book as clean as it could be.

You can guess what happened in the finished product.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, humor, self-editing, writing tips

A free peek at “The Complete Writer.”

April 16, 2018 by Donna Freedman 1 Comment

If you’re a freelance writer, a homeschooling parent or even just a word nerd, listen up: Week by week, Dr. Victoria Hay has been making chapters of her upcoming book available for free.

“The Complete Writer: The Ultimate Guide to Writing, Publishing and Living the Writer’s Life” is based on Hay’s considerable knowledge of the written word. For decades she has been making a living as a writer and editor, and also taught writing at Arizona State University.

Every Friday she posts a new work-in-progress chapter on her writing blog, Plain & Simple Press (“Independent fiction and nonfiction”). Currently she’s up to Chapter 9.

Here’s some of what you’ll be getting:

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, books, freelancing, self-editing, writing

The flexibility of the freelance life.

February 17, 2018 by Donna Freedman Leave a Comment

Sometimes the freelance life is frustrating: isolation, long hours, dry spells between assignments, no paid time off.

Sometimes, though, the freedom to order your own days makes it all worthwhile.

A few days ago I was just about to tackle a current deadline when my teen-aged nephew, M, called from the school counselor’s office. He’d just learned that a friend had committed suicide, and was too shaken to finish out the day.

His mom had okayed his leaving but could not break away from work (she’s a teacher) to come get him. Was there any way that I could?

You bet there was.

 

[Read more…]

Filed Under: General Tagged With: best practices, freelancing, self-care, writing for pay, writing ups and downs

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