A lot of people prove unemployed, retired, or in need of supplemental income. As such, these individuals can stand a great chance at getting some income from writing. Further, there exist another group of passionate writers who would out-and-out venture into full-time writing as a source of livelihood from a tender age. It stems from their love for and way with words.
However, most of these people lack ideas on how to launch their writing careers. So what can you do to start writing your technical or creative pieces?
Tips on Starting Your Freelance Writing
- Select a suitable niche. You have to pick a niche that tickles your fancy and one that you would love to write. It proves possible to write without the need to spend countless hours researching. Picking a suitable niche will also reflect your energy and allow your brilliance to shine.
- Establish a blog or website. You have to establish an excellent online presence to become successful in freelance writing. One perfect way to go about it entails establishing a blog, creating content, and sharing to cultivate a faithful following. Websites can come for free, especially on Wix or WordPress. Alternatively, you can also establish a website for blogging or the creation of a resume portfolio that you can share with potential customers.
- Write an excellent sample work. Work samples prove crucial for making progress in your new blog or when you decide to write as a guest blogger or to write for online magazines. You can share your write-ups with friends and family before receiving feedback and developing a faithful following.
- Pitch everywhere. After developing a portfolio, you can now start building your readership base on that subject. Once you attain a reasonable level, start pitching for extra work. Most print and online magazines, among other outlets, can provide guest opportunities, one-off paid projects, or continuous writing jobs. However, there exist diverse ways of building a readership base, especially for new freelancers.
So, how can you create a portfolio?
- Contact websites and companies that tickle your fancy to make your pitch. Here you can develop an effective but short “elevator pitch” to communicate what you want to do. You can also contact companies to offer your writing services for their websites and blogs, especially concerning their products and services.
- Try and join virtual and physical networking groups to develop connections with the freelance community of writers. Further, most common and available jobs get shared among individuals within these communities.
- You can also pitch your work online or in print magazines by contacting editors with your concepts for particular articles that you can potentially offer.
- Try and search for freelance marketplaces such as UpWork, Fiverr, and Freelancer.com. Such platforms have writing jobs, though they might not compensate well compared to others. Try and pick up jobs that prove appealing and subsequently use them as your foundation for better and bigger things.
- Blogging at times prove a hobby, and for such people who love blogging, it proves crucial to read and remark on separate blogs within your niche. Using such a platform can quickly allow you to know diverse writers, and you can also get opportunities for collaboration and sharing ideas.
- You also have to keep your social and professional social platforms such as LinkedIn updated and incorporate links when you publish your work for recruiters or bosses to see.
- Check job boards primarily dedicated to writing jobs. Such job boards prove perfect as a source for specialist jobs. However, if you have to look for well-paid and high-profile writing work. Additionally, writers within the community can share concepts and information regarding sites, blogs, and magazines that you can have an affinity to. Search the following resources and job boards to start with. It includes BloggingPro, IWriter, Writer Finder, etc.
- Gather testimonials. Try and collect client testimonials, and you can do this by asking for recommendations either by email or through the LinkedIn testimonial function.
Conclusion
You can review the above guidelines to start a successful freelance writing gig. Further, it proves crucial to understand that when you write quality content and on the right platform, you can earn a considerable amount of money.
