Angela Booth's Writing Blog

Writing for the Web? Recognize your opportunities

The Web is revolutionary for writers. It's never before been possible for writers to write, and get published, within minutes.

Unfortunately, many writers, both new and established, are still trapped in a traditional mindset, and those writers who have made the shift to Web writing often flounder.

Why do they flounder? Because they're inexperienced, and can't see the opportunities available to them.

For example, just this week a writer approached me who took her Web site offline - it had been online for half a decade. She'd been selling an ebook on the site, and the book wasn't earning enough.

This writer had immense opportunities she couldn't recognize because of her inexperience.

Here are just some of the opportunities she had:

* She could sell ads on her old and valuable site (any domain which has been online for half a decade is highly valuable, no matter how small the site is). Even if she sold just two ads on the site, she'd have made $500 a year - just from those two ads. She could have sold dozens of ads... :-);

* She could add more content to the site and sell affiliate ebooks from ClickBank. A little effort, to be sure, but huge potential for making a weekly income;

* She could promote her ebook on the site, and sell several copies a week;

* She could sell the site and ebook - if she did that, she could have made five figures in less than a month, just for offering to sell. Established Web sites are worth good money.

The Web is DIFFERENT - it offers unique, unlimited opportunities for writers

I could see the opportunities the writer I just mentioned had. She couldn't, because she didn't have the experience. She had treasure in her backyard and didn't know it.

I wrote the Sell Your Writing Online NOW (SYWON) training course so that writers would get a glimpse of their opportunities. It teaches writers to make the most of their skills and opportunities on the Web

A common question has been: "Can I complete the training faster?"

The assumption is that you need to complete all 52 weeks to make money writing online. You don't need to complete all 52 weeks. You can make a full time income from any one module of the training - writing articles, writing ebooks, offering writing services... You can make a full time income just writing articles for example within a month or two - there's immense hunger online for good content from RELIABLE writers.

However, if you do complete the 52 weeks, you'll have a grounding in the myriad of ways you can make money writing on the Web.

There has never been a better time to be a writer. You have unlimited opportunities. But you must be able to recognize them.

Discover the world of Web writing - make a great income writing from home, or from anywhere

Sell Your Writing Online NOW

There's great money in Web writing. Some Web writers are making $20,000 a month by blogging for a stable of sites. Others are writing articles or ebooks.

Join the Web writing gold rush with Angela Booth's comprehensive training: "Sell Your Writing Online Now".

Get all the (great) writing jobs you want

Want to get GREAT writing jobs?

Fab Freelance Writing Ezine to the rescue. Here's an excerpt from this week's Editorial:

This week we're discussing the popular topic of writing gigs and how to get them. There's never been a better or easier time to be a writer. There are literally unlimited jobs available for you, even if you're a brand new writer.

Unfortunately, many writers (both new and established) shoot themselves in the foot because they don't understand the basics of getting the jobs they want. Our article "Writing Jobs - Get the (Unadvertised) Gigs You Want" will help you, as will my top three tips:

=> One: Decide What You're Good At Writing

It all starts with knowing what you want to write, and getting good at writing it. You may want to write Web articles, company catalogs, or ebooks. Whatever it is, start writing, and keep going until you're good at what you do.

Read the rest in the ezine.

The issue's out tomorrow - subscribe to Fab Freelance Writing Ezine now.

Web writing for technophobes - you can do it

I don't know why, but writing for the Web is scary for some writers.

If this is you, please realize that if you can use a word processor, you can write for the Web. In fact, writing for Web sites is easier than getting MS Word to behave itself.

Most articles, blog posts and other material you submit to Web sites (or post on those sites yourself) are in simple text format. You can write the material in any word processor you choose (even MS Word if you wish), and then save the material as a plain text file. Don't copy and paste - MS Word and other word processors leave artifacts when you copy and paste.

Or you can write the text in a text editor, such as TextEdit (free with your Mac) or my favorite text editor on the PC - NoteTab Lite, also free.

Once you've got a plain text file, you're golden. You simply copy and paste the text where you want it to go.

Above, you can see this text pasted into the TinyMCE Editor which is part of WordPress. If I wanted to post this article on Writing Hacker, this is exactly how I'd do it. Copy and paste... easy, right?

However, I want to use this article on my Typepad blog (right here), so this is what the article looks like pasted into the TypePad editor:

Copy and paste... as long as you remember that PLAIN text is for the Web, all you need to know is how to copy and paste.

And since you know how to do that already, you know how to "write for the Web.":-)

Welcome to the wonderful and easy, world of writing for the Web. As a writer, you just need the confidence to copy and paste. BTW, that applies to creating your own Web sites too, if you use the freely available tools which were created for technophobes. :-)

Discover the world of Web writing - make a great income writing from home, or from anywhere

Sell Your Writing Online NOW

There's great money in Web writing. Some Web writers are making $20,000 a month by blogging for a stable of sites. Others are writing articles or ebooks.

Join the Web writing gold rush with Angela Booth's comprehensive training: "Sell Your Writing Online Now".

Discover how to write articles fast

In this week's issue of Fab Freelance Writing Ezine our feature article is "Write Articles Fast - Plan and Write More".

Here's an excerpt:

Want to write articles fast? The secret is simple: it's planning. Let's discover how to plan your articles.

Your ability to write quickly is essential because content is king online - and offline too. As the Web becomes more competitive, site owners and businesses realize that the more content on their site, the better. Additional pages provide additional access points for site visitors.

Those additional pages are often in the form of articles, so if you can provide articles fast on demand, you're golden.

I separate the planning stage of writing from the drafting and straight writing stages, not only for speed, but also because each stage of the writing process demands a different mind state. Since it takes around ten to 15 minutes or switch from one mind state to another, separating planning from the other stages makes sense, speed-wise.

Read the rest in tomorrow's ezine.

Sell your writing on ContentBee - increase your visibility

Getting started as a Web writer can be confusing. Here's the most important thing you need to know: the more visible you are online, the more income you will make.

What's "visibility"? It's simply references to your name.

When I Google "Angela Booth" (with quotation marks as above) there are around 48,000 references in Google's results pages. It's reasonable visibility, and as a Web writer, this is what you should aim for too.

The benefits of visibility are:

* Clients come to you with writing jobs;

* You can charge more for your writing services because you bring more to the table - someone who is highly visible online has a knowledge of how the Web works. You're perceived as an expert in your field;

* You can sell your own writing products - ebooks, reports, courses and more. Anything and everything online.

Sell your writing on ContentBee - a new site for SYWON subscribers

ContentBee is a place for Sell Your Writing Online NOW (SYWON) subscribers to get visible, and also to sell their writing services. The site went live on May 17, 2008.

ContentBee was created for YOU

I've created ContentBee solely for subscribers.

I'll be promoting the site heavily in 2008 and 2009, and while you complete your SYWON training, and afterwards, ContentBee will help you to get your name visible, and will start sending you writing jobs.

As Web content writing jobs come in, I'll send them out to those SYWON subscribers who are part of ContentBee's writing team. You can pick and choose your jobs - apply for them all, or for none, it's completely up to you.

I intend to ensure that ContentBee is THE destination online for quality Web content. But primarily I created the site for subscribers - as another benefit to their Web writing training.

If you're a Sell Your Writing Online NOW subscriber, look for complete information on how to get listed on ContentBee in your Inbox.

Writer for Hire - Freelancing for Profit

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Want to make a great income as a freelance writer? You can. I'm fond of saying that anyone who can write an email message can write for pay, and that's accurate.

Unfortunately, many new writers get in their own way. They want to make the process of writing for money more complicated than it is. It's very simple: as a writer for hire, you sell your writing services to people and businesses who need those services.

Let's look at the process involved, and then we'll discuss how you can put the process into action, even if you've never been paid a cent for your writing.

1. Decide what you'll write

The first step is to decide what you'll write. Most new writers have had this experience: you read something, and suddenly you realize "I could write that!" or "I could write that BETTER!"

This inspiration is a signal that yes indeed, you could write that, and be paid for it too. You may be inspired by anything - an advertisement, an article, a book, a movie...

Now write something similar. Yes, you need to write, to sell what you write. So go ahead and write your own version of the ad, or the article or book, or whatever it is. Use the same structure and format as the material that's inspired you, but feel free to be as creative as you like, using your own ideas and words.

2. Decide who you'll write it for

Go back to the material which first inspired you. Where was it published? Study the publication to see whether they use freelance writers. Many magazines do, book publishers do of course, and so do many Web sites.

3. Get in touch with the people who can hire you

At this stage, you may want to contact other writers on Web forums, or get a mentor so you can find out how to approach these markets.

Or you can just approach the publication directly; they may ignore you because they're busy, but on the other hand, some kind person at the publication may tell you where their writers' guidelines are, or may even send them to you.

My preference is to approach markets directly, because you'll learn more when you do.

4. Writing for money is experiential - you learn by writing and by selling

Read through the three steps above again. You now know enough to launch your freelance writing career.

Every freelance writer follows those three steps - he (or she) decides what to write, decides who to write it for, and approaches markets. However the professional freelancer is different from amateur writers in only one way - he or she performs the above process every single day, because he knows that writing for money is experiential. You can only learn how to do this by doing it.

And the more often you do it, the more you write and the more you earn.

Initially you'll be awkward. This is understandable. Whenever you learn anything new, you're clumsy. As you keep writing and approaching markets however, you'll become more confident. Each sale you make will increase your confidence and your abilities.

If you want to become a writer for hire, you now have a complete process to follow. Write out the steps, and follow them. You'll learn something new each day, and before you know it, you'll be freelancing for profit as a full time career.

Want to develop a six-figure writing income?

The September 2007 issue of The Writer had a great story: “Secrets Of The Six-Figure Freelancers”. The story’s wonderful because it shows you the potential of a freelance writing career; with the development of the Web and its unlimited markets, if you can write, you can make a great income as a freelance writer.

I chuckled when I read the story because many writers think a “six figure income” is hype. Either that, or they think that a great income is reserved for copywriters, or genre novelists, or other specialist writers.

The fact is that YOU can develop a six-figure writing career: you just need to know that it’s possible to earn $250,000 a year and more as a freelance writer, and then make that your goal.

And of course, you need know-how. That's what my writing ebook manuals give you. In 30 years as a freelance writer, I've learned the tricks of the writing trade, and I'd love to share those tricks with you, so many of my ebooks offer free coaching. Whatever your level of experience as a freelance writer, you can develop a fantastic career, when you know how.

Develop your writing skills today.

Related articles

• What Freelancing Taught Me: Part 1 - Confidence [via Zemanta]
• Mental Exercises To Get Ahead With The Freelancing [via Zemanta]
• 5 Tips For Marketing Your Freelance Writing Business [via Zemanta]

Get a blog job - discover how this week

Our feature article in this week's Fab Freelance Writing Ezine is "Get Blog Jobs - Fun and Profitable if You Love Blogging".

Here's an excerpt:

Do you blog? I hope you do, because blogging can do a lot for your freelance writing career. For a writer, blogs are not only an instant-publishing tool, they're also an opportunity to find great writing jobs.

Blogs are a phenomenon. Although many "A-list" bloggers have been publishing for years and have built up strong audiences, it's only in the past couple of years that blogs have become mainstream.

Read the rest on Tuesday. The ezine is sent to your Inbox, completely free.

I cover three EASY ways to get blog jobs, and oddly enough, two of the easiest ways are rarely (if ever) used by writers.

So if you want to kick off a six figure writing career, discover how to find and get blog jobs this week.

Imagine... $1,000 A Week For Just Ten Hours

You can get paid to blog. The current rate for experienced bloggers is around $1,000 to $1500 a week for from two to five posts a day - VERY nice writing income.

Find out how to blog with the blogging best-seller "Blogging For Dollars: How to become a career blogger -- in your PJs, if you want". It's my complete new ebook package, with free coaching/ consultations as well.

Avoid Writing Income Disasters with These Five Tips - Part Two

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These days, writers can make an unlimited income. If you set your mind to it, you can make as much income as you choose. Many writers are earning six figures. You can too, as long as you avoid common writing income disasters.

In the first part of our article, we discussed three of the most common disasters:

1. Not asking for a retainer

If you don't ask for a retainer of at least 50 per cent, you have no way of knowing whether or not a client is genuine, or whether he's a scammer.

2. No writing services agreement

Without a writing services agreement, you're in a very bad place.

3. Procrastination

When it's time to write, write. The more you write, the more you earn.

You can read about the above three disasters in detail in Part One of this article.

Now let's focus on the other two most common disasters I see.

4. Writing for low pay

Assuming you have some writing credits (in other words, someone, somewhere, sometime has paid you for your writing), you can charge appropriately.

Writing for higher pay is actually easier than writing for low pay, and here's why: clients who pay you appropriately know their business and they know the value of writing. They're successful, so they want the best writers.

Many writers start their writing career on the out-sourcing sites. Now, while I have nothing against these sites, once you have a couple of writing credits it's time to get away from those sites, and FAST.

Why? Because of the "rush to the bottom" mentality that abounds on these sites. The writers on these sites use them inappropriately - they want to win projects by under-bidding each other. They've never learned any marketing skills.

Nobody wins when writers do this. Not the writers and definitely not the clients.

The writers don't win because they're forced into writing like battery hens are forced into laying eggs. They write so much the quality suffers. They have no time to get out of the writing ghetto and look for better writing jobs. They have no time for self-promotion, which would ensure that they get better writing jobs.

The clients don't win because sub-standard writing ensures that their projects are sub-standard.

Now let's look at the next writing disaster.

5. Forgetting to promote yourself

Writers need to learn self-promotion, and then they need to promote themselves.

Want to know the easiest way to spot a newbie writer? OK. Here it is: the newbie writer creates a name for their writing "business", like "The Write Standard", or "Writing Wonder Words" or "Just a Another Writer" or whatever... Please note that all these names are fictional, as far as I'm aware. I made them up; I certainly hope that no one's using them - if anyone is, I'm sorry, because I'm not referring to you specifically.

Big, big tip: a professional writer uses his or her own name ONLY. They realize that promoting anything is hard work, so they might as well turn their own name into a brand, rather than creating a ditzy name for their business.

Use your own name. It helps you to build your credits. Editors, publishers and clients will remember your name, so use it.

Please avoid all five writing disasters, now you know what they are. When you treat your writing with the respect it deserves, you will make an income beyond your dreams, and you'll richly deserve it too.

Recession-proof your freelance writing career

"Write More And Make More Money From Your Writing: Develop A Fast, Fun Productive Writing Process" gives you all the tools you need for a thriving writing career, no matter what the economic climate.

Three weeks after completing the class one student wrote:

"Thanks Angela, for all your help and advice in class. I'm quitting my job next week. I printed out my letter of resignation tonight after landing a contract writing job that will pay me more for three months part-time work than I earned in from my day job in the whole of 2007! You were right – the great gigs are out there, and now I've got the skills to land them. Your class opened my eyes. Bless you…"

"Write More And Make More Money From Your Writing: Develop A Fast, Fun Productive Writing Process" shows you how to thrive as a freelance writer. Would you like to write five times more than you're writing now, and sell to higher-paying markets? Take the class.

Avoid Writing Income Disasters with These Five Tips - Part One

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There's never been a better time to be a writer. You've got the potential of earning an unlimited income. Writing jobs abound, on the Web and off it.

However, some writers manage to cripple their income, both by not understanding all the opportunities which are available, and by not understanding that their writing skills deserve to be well-recompensed.

So let's look at five writing income disasters, and how you can avoid them.

1. Not asking for a retainer

Sadly this disaster is very, very common, especially for writers who are used to writing for magazines and newspapers.

If you don't have a regular gig writing for them, magazines and newspapers are lousy markets. After they cherry pick your proposals and you get a commission, they take their time paying you. They pay on acceptance or on publication, but they don't pay a retainer.

They train writers to wait for their money, and it cripples writers when they write for businesses or for the Web. They fail to understand that they must get a retainer.

A retainer is standard, it's vital, and if you don't ask for it you have no way of knowing whether you're dealing with a genuine client, or with someone who's out to scam you.

So get a retainer of at least 50 per cent of your fee. On long projects, your writing services agreement should include payment milestones - weekly, monthly, or as the project progresses.

You send an invoice for your retainer when you send your writing services agreement. Don't start writing, until you've got the retainer payment.

2. No writing services agreement

This is the second most common writing disaster I see.

You must have a writing services agreement, and you must state your payment and delivery services clearly in the agreement.

The project as you understand it forms the main part of the agreement. Please don't copy and paste into the agreement from the project brief. Rewrite the brief in bullet points and in your own words, as YOU understand it.

Rewriting the brief in your own words will not only clarify your thinking about the project, it also means that you will ask more questions of the client so that you understand completely what's required of you.

3. Procrastination

The more you write, the more income you make. Procrastination is a writing income disaster - and it's easily avoided.

Here's how. Make a commitment to write when you're at your computer. Write! Don't "research" (surf the Web), or dither. Decide that when you're sitting at your computer, you'll write. You can Web surf after all your writing for the day is done.

When you commit to a writing project, and have received your retainer, your speed of delivery is paramount. Your clients expect speed, but 90 per cent of the time their expectations are dashed.

Therefore when you fail to meet a deadline, not only do you guarantee that your current client won't send you further projects, you also poison the pool for other writers he may consider hiring.

So please, meet your deadlines. All it takes it commitment.

Watch for Part Two of this article, in which we'll cover other writing income disasters. If you avoid all five disasters, your writing income will soar.

Write more - the key to your writing success

Yes, you can write more - even if you're a world-class procrastinator.

Did you know that when you write more, your writing improves? Many of my writing students experience this. They find that when they write more, writing is easier for them - they're not dominated by their inner editor.

My new writing class, "Write More And Make More Money From Your Writing: Develop A Fast, Fun Productive Writing Process" is based on lessons I developed for my private coaching students to help them to write more, improve their writing, and make more money writing.

If you're struggling with your writing, the class will help. The techniques you'll learn in class with help you write fiction, nonfiction, and copy for business.

Discover how you can write more, improve your writing, and sell more of your writing to higher-paying markets.

Artful Blogging - new blogging magazine

If you've read this blog for any time at all, you know I love blogs, and have a great many of them.

I'm always telling writers that blogging is life changing, and once they try it, they find that yes it is. :-)

Artful Blogging is a sumptuous (new - to me) blogging print magazine.

If you're wondering whether and how you should blog, this magazine will provide great inspiration.

I'm sending away for my copy now...

"Go From Zero To Making $250 Per Hour For Web Writing - Kick Off Your Web Writing Career In 24 Hours!"

There's great money in Web writing. Some Web writers are making $20,000 a month by blogging for a stable of sites. Others are writing articles or ebooks.

Want to jump on this opportunity? No matter what your level of writing skill, you can make great money writing for the Web too.

Get a full year of weekly assignments; become a Web writing pro with Sell Your Writing Online NOW.

Write and sell self-help ebooks for a great home business

In this week's Fab Freelance Writing Ezine our feature article is "Self-help Ebooks - Inspiration and Motivation Mean Profits."

Here's an excerpt from the Editorial:

Ebooks are HOT: if you can write ebooks, not only will you find a ready supply of buyers and people who will commission you to write, but you can also create your own ebooks and sell them online.

In our feature article this week we discuss finding topics for self-help ebooks. Self-help is an incredibly popular field, and all writers can write self-help, because you can use your own experiences.

Sell Your Writing Online NOW (SYWON) subscribers are finding that focusing on self-help leads to easy sales of articles, reports and ebooks because the self-help industry is huge.

Subscribe and read the issue tomorrow.

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Want to make money writing online?

Want to make money writing online? Get my free report.

"Get Paid to Write: Make Money Online Today" is a 23-page PDF containing a series of articles to help you to make money online, just by writing.

Enjoy. :-)