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It took me many years to give in to the idea that I was a writer, and a few more to discover the secret to my success. The first happened for me on an auspicious occasion: passing the hours beside my husband’s hospital bed. He was on a respirator after a massive heart attack, and at the time the extent of his recovery was unknown. As I listened to the beeping and whirring of the machines keeping him alive, a lightbulb clicked on in my brain. If I wasn’t going to write now, then when? During his recovery, (his disabilities don’t limit his quality of life, thank goodness) I tried writing at home and found the environment full of distractions. Therefore, my first nine books were written via coffee shop hopping. This shop on Monday, that shop on Tuesday, etc. My virtual calendar worked like a well-oiled machine of lattes and iced teas. That is, until the pandemic hit. Suddenly, there were no coffee shops or public spaces to write. Without a home office or any private rooms, I was left trying to further my newly-chosen career between conversations about toilet paper and loads of laundry. My goals went from More

A website shows who you are, where you’ve been, and what you offer to make someone’s life sweeter. Many writers think that having published someplace validates them. Some think that promising the moon will entice someone to hire them. You’ve got to give them something to study about you, and without a website or a very solid social media presence, your promises to do a good job appear rather diluted. You need a website: To show that you take your writing seriously. To demonstrate what you’ve achieved. To show your efforts moving forward. To post examples of your work. A lot of writers think publishing an article is a one-way street, or that writing material for a client is just about the job. They believe that submitting something that ticks the boxes ought to work and merit payment. They hope that including a link or two where they’ve published before will work. You have to show your success. Why? The publication or client that hires you also wants to piggy back on your platform and your reach and your success. It is a two-way street. What if you’ve never published anywhere before? You can still have a website that shows More

Starting my freelance career writing for content mills instilled the mindset that I had to say yes to every job and put up with anything my clients threw at me. Now after three years, I see the benefits of saying no and the opportunities this can lead to. It was frightening at first, but here are the signs I’ve become familiar with, telling me when to ditch a client. The workload keeps expanding Being approached on LinkedIn by a client asking if I wanted to write dating articles was an ego boost. However, the workload went from writing articles with light research and inserting keywords, to extensive research, quotes and sources, and a complex system that even my client couldn’t explain. Despite the increased workload, the pay stayed the same. Each time they took longer to pay, and I gave them several chances, knowing delays can happen sometimes. However, I eventually ditched the client since they issued more work without addressing any of my concerns. I now had more time to send pitches and respond to opportunities, and I achieved my first by-lined articles and regular freelance work from a client who offered a rate I was happy with, as More

Magazines use regular “contributing” writers for many reasons. They love having writers already on board who understand the needs of the readership and the publication.. To ask a publisher to give you a chance is to say you don’t feel you are valuable enough to earn markets on your prowess. . . and it says you need a hand-up versus being a writer hired on skill. Instead, you need to polish your material and make it glisten, all in the vein of what that publication needs. And you learn how to do that by studying the publication. If they turn you down, it’s because of a zillion reasons, some of which include: 1. They have a stable of writers who don’t have to be groomed and who can speak the language. 2. They don’t have the energy to break in a new writer, or go back and forth teaching someone how to fit in. 3. They really don’t need writers at the time. 4. Your voice might be good but not quite what fits this particular readership. 5. The piece sounds too common, not unique enough. 6. You deviate from the guidelines in some fashion. 7. It is clear you More

When you write and publish, whether an article or a book, the reader wants to walk away from the reading with the knowledge they were educated or entertained thoroughly. The experience should be memorable. A lot of writers make the mistake of thinking that writing in quantity or just getting the grammar correct or just relaying the topic, are the goals. FFW receives so many mediocre articles from people who think that a list of suggestions on how to write, how to win a contest, how to publish . . . lists like they’ve read on the web a thousand times, is writing. No voice. No originality. Just ticking off boxes on guidelines. Readers value their time, and once they’ve decided to invest their time into reading something you wrote, they want to feel like the time was well spent. That’s why I’m against the oft recommended advice of reading bad and good works. Sorry, I only want to be immersed in the good, thank you. My time is limited. The reader should feel like they made a good choice, a valuable selection. Your job is to provide top quality material so that enough readers are thankful for what they More

Years ago, I was a freelance writer who had run the gamut regarding content mills. I was overworked, underpaid, and something in me kept saying that I deserved better. Working for $0.03 per word didn’t pay the bills. After hundreds of Google searches, I found the method to the madness was pretty easy. I had to scour three job boards; Pro Blogger, Blogging Pro, and Freelance Writing Jobs, and pitch for better-paying jobs. This is where other freelancers said they made it, and I was ready to try just about anything to get ahead. New Challenges As I made the resolve to succeed, I spent my days and nights weeding through these job boards. For the first time, I came across decently paying writing jobs by top-tier companies, quite a nice change of scenery. While I had the experience, one requirement proved consistent; the need for a virtual interview through Skype or Zoom to finalize the process. For instance, this is a message I received from Quoko Studios after my application went through: “Our hiring team has reviewed your application, the next step is a skills assessment. If you pass, we’ll invite you for a short zoom interview and make More

As writers we make promises. We forget that sometimes. -We promise to write a great article that fits the readership, giving it our absolute best, delivering it on time. -We promise to write a solid book, published professionally. -We promise to spin a tale that entertains while tickling the intellect. -We promise to provide a regular article/blog post/periodical/column that maintains a standard. But the promise we are making, the unsaid promise but the very expected promise, is that we will continue to fulfill these promises in each and every piece of writing we do afterwards. We will not backslide. We will not rest on our laurels. We will continue presenting our best work, in the best way possible. Quality is character. Maintaining a standard can represent a dozen or more different aspects of you and your writing. -Quality of word choice. -Quality of grammar. -Quality of topic. -Quality of delivery per contract. -Quality of cover. -Quality of speaking ability. -Quality of website. -Quality of voice on social media. -Quality of reachability. -Quality of storytelling. -Quality of voice. -Quality of concern for the reader. -Etc. For instance, because you won an award does not mean you’ve arrived. Your next work should More

A variety of skills are needed to earn a consistent income as a writer. Next to writing aptitude and business proficiency, relationship building rounds out the top three. In more than 30 years as freelance writer, I’ve grown to appreciate the power of personal. Building authentic, mutually-beneficial relationships with editors, business clients, and fellow writers has had a positive impact on my income, as well as my overall state-of-mind. Despite the convenience and widespread use of email, text, social media, and video meetings, a significant percentage of people still feel lonely and disconnected. “Loneliness is a growing health epidemic,” wrote former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy in an article for Harvard Business Review. “We live in the most technologically connected age in the history of civilization, yet rates of loneliness have doubled since the 1980s. Over 40 percent of adults in America report feeling lonely, and research suggests that the real number may well be higher. In the workplace, many employees – and half of CEOs – report feeling lonely in their roles.” Sometimes an email or social media shoutout just doesn’t cut it. Call your editor or send a card to congratulate him on a recent award or other professional recognition. More

I have yet to attend a writer’s group of any kind without someone fussing about submitting and only hearing crickets in return. They’d prefer an acceptance, but if that’s not in their cards, they want a rejection, and on top of that, they want to know why they were rejected. My questions then become: – Are you willing to pay for that critique of your work, which is what it takes for someone to give you the reasons why? – Or, on a lesser scale, are you willing to pay a fee when you submit, in order to assure yourself of a response, whether acceptance or rejection? Nobody does. However, on the other hand, you are expecting a publication/editor/agent to take time away from time they could be spending earning an income, just to tell you they cannot use you, or you did not win, or you don’t fit their needs at the moment. You are expecting them to pay an employee to reject you with no gain out of it whatsoever. With some publishers/freelance markets/agents, considering the number of submissions they receive, that would take a fulltime employee. Let’s assume this is a minimum wage employee just sending out More

Writers make a living in different ways. I am lucky enough (and struggled hard enough) to have a job that includes writing: an anthropologist who works in academic research. And yet I found myself wanting to write more and differently, to be creative, to produce fiction and creative nonfiction in addition to peer-reviewed manuscripts describing research results or grant proposals to fund further research. The difficulty for me has been ensuring that I have both time and mental energy left over from the paid work to give to my creative endeavors. I think of it as establishing—and maintaining—a ‘work-write’ balance. Academia can be all-consuming, but whatever the day job, many of us are guilty of overworking. When it comes time to clock off, but the project deadline is at the end of the week, walking away may simply not be a responsible option. But what if you face a writing deadline as well as a work one, perhaps for a contest entry or a journal’s reading period? Maybe you made a commitment to yourself to finish a first draft of a chapter or a short story by midnight tonight. How, as writers-with-jobs, can we ensure that writing keeps its rightful More