Starting a freelance writing career can be challenging. Creative careers often attract individuals fueled by passion, without the business acumen to sustain their efforts. Learning how to attract and retain clients, while remaining fulfilled by your work, is a delicate balance that can be achieved by avoiding these common beginner mistakes…
A few weeks ago a writer friend suggested that I check out one of her favorite publications. On the surface it looked promising. The journal presented itself as a socially conscious, humanitarian outfit. However, the writers’ guidelines told a different story…
As I look back, I am stunned that the ignorant inquiries I made to my traditional publisher and literary agent did not create waves of guffaws and rollicking cackles. Upon the release of my first book by a traditional publisher, during a conference call, I queried the publisher and her henchmen about their promotional plans. Would there be some sort of tour maybe? A round of book signings in a few large cities perhaps? A few flights and hotel stays, at the publisher’s expense, of course, in the pursuit of boosting book sales? Silly me. The nerve! A publisher spending money promoting a new author’s book? Ha…
Your byline is important, not just in its frequency of appearance, but also in how it affects your income. Some writers operating writing businesses use a name other than their own if they pen web copy or advertising, for example. But for some types of writing, such as periodicals and books, your name is your brand identity…
I learned the concept of the Rule of 5 at a seminar, “The Rule of 5 for Leadership,” by John Maxwell. Since then, I’ve heard the Rule of 5 for just about everything. The Rule of 5 is a list of the five key things that you must do every day in your business, in your writing, or whatever goal you may be pursuing…
One way to increase income is to write and sell more. But, how do you overcome inertia? Consider what excites you…
Story opportunities are as densely packed as the crab traps that blanket Florida Bay. For the nautically minded writer, opportunities abound wherever mariners are enjoying their boats – or not enjoying their boats, i.e.: treating stinky waste-holding tanks, fixing balky engines or extricating the entangled lines of those pesky crab traps from propellers…
A friend had recommended me to a curriculum publisher. Could I revise workbooks for fifth-grade science? I said that I would give it a try, and soon a big box appeared on my porch.
I eagerly delved into the materials: course samples, manuals on how to design curriculum, workbooks to revise, and the fifth-grade science textbook. The cover art featured a wise-looking owl. Was I wise enough to rewrite ten science workbooks?
Each year about this time, a new set of graduates with fresh, new academic degrees embarks on post-academic life. Especially among those who majored in a humanities field, or who earned advanced degrees in creative writing or literature, the road to graduation was likely paved with plenty of course papers and presentations. I’m not sure how many new graduates (or, for that matter, those with degrees earned in years past) realize that this work needn’t simply gather dust – literal or virtual. Sometimes, it can be transformed for publication and payment.
Sometimes we writers get hitched to the wagon and steed on a blazing trail headed to nowhere fast. That blazing trail for our purposes may be the pipe dream magazine of a bitter editor. It might be a newspaper making due at just the middle ground with no path to better real estate. It may be the dead end online portal for pulp entertainment and sports write ups that don’t really get you the Pulitzer you dream of. Whatever it is, eventually you have to have a heart to heart with yourself about your ambitions as a writer. When is it time to move on to greater adventures? That, my friends, is the million dollar question…
