Happy reading!

From the Writing Forums

• How do You Set Your E-book Prices?
• Business Bank Accounts
• What Accounting Software do You Use?
• What Gets You Through Your Work Day?
• How do You Approach Website and Blog Design?

From the Blog

• Freelance Writers: Stand Up for Your Rates – by LaToya Irby
• Messy Subjects and Verbs – by Rebecca Garland

From the Web

• Fair Wages for Freelance Writing – Melanie Brooks at Freelance Switch
• 6 Freelance Writing Fears and How to Overcome Them – Anne Wayman at About Freelance Writing
• You Are a Better Writer Than You Think You Are – Laura Spencer at Writing Thoughts
• Plan a Marketing Strategy for Your Freelance Career – Jake Rocheleau at Freelance Folder
• How the 80-20 Rule Affects Freelance Writers – John Soares at Productive Writers
• 5 Steps to Freelance Awesomeness – Steph Auteri at WordCount
• Putting the Customer Back into Customer Service – Lori Widmer at Words on the Page
• 10 Ways to Ensure No One Will Read Your Blog Content – Ali Luke at Daily Blog Tips

From the Archives

• Free Business Resources for Freelance Writers
• How to Build a Writer Platform and Make Jobs Come to You
• 3 Types of Business Writing That Pay Big Money
• How to Insulate Yourself From Bad Freelance Clients
• Think Twice About Writing for Revenue Share

Writing Forum Daily Discussions

Every weekday I’ll kick off the day with a new question or discussion topic in the forums. For example, today I asked “How do you set your e-book prices?” in the new e-publishing section.

Some days I may start multiple discussions, but there will be at least one fresh one each day of the work week. And as always, you’re welcome to start as many discussions as you’d like. Just register on the site to be able to post. It’s free!

Weekly Roundups

I used to run a “Freelance Friday” series here where I’d highlight other posts from around the blogosphere. We’re going to go back to something similar.

From now on, each Friday I’ll do a weekly roundup post. That post will feature:

• Our daily discussions from the forum for the week;
• Blog posts you may have missed here during the week;
• Blog posts from others in the freelance writing world (or related areas).

My hope is that we’ll get AFW members chatting a bit more regularly while also encouraging people to check out other great posts from colleagues each week. What are you waiting for? Register today and head over to the forum to get involved.

I’m not sure yet how it happened. But I suspect it’s a result of a new plugin here which I’m using to clean up dead links throughout the site. I’m assuming it updated a URL and somehow altered that post date when the linked info was changed. I’ll look into it further and will hold off on using the plugin again until I can figure out what happened.

My apologies. If you see anything else that looks strange around here, don’t hesitate to let me know so I can fix it. I won’t necessarily see everything that you see, and things like this occasionally happen when plugins are involved.

New Forums Added

Registered members of All Freelance Writing have access to our writing forums. While we had freelance chat areas before, we’ve now added a section for book chat. There you’ll find a few new forums covering self publishing, e-publishing, and working with publishers.

Not a member yet? Register now. It’s free!

Branding Changes

There will be a minor branding change here at All Freelance Writing and most of my other websites. Rest assured we won’t have a name change here or any big design changes. But within the next week you may notice a reference to this site being a 3 Beat Media property. It is not being sold off. I’m simply in the middle of a business name change for my base business — from J.H. Mattern Communications to 3 Beat Media. The new company branding will be more heavily promoted on my sites and blogs.

You may have already noticed that there are shortlinks below each post here. They all starts with 3bm.co. That domain is tied to the new branding and all of our shortlinks will follow that format.

Other than that, it should be business as usual.

As a firm believer in freelancing the way you want, I try to stay away from stereotyping my peers. But I have noticed–and maybe you have, too–that freelancers tend to have a lot of invisible friends. And, by “invisible” I mean people they’ve never met. Whether through social media connections, blogging communities and freelancing forums, I know a lot of people pretty intimately that I might just pass by if we were ever on the same patch of sidewalk.

And it’s not just fellow freelancers, either. Many of the clients I work with, I’ve never met in-person. I remember attending a big meeting for one large DC based client because I just happened to be in town a couple of years ago. As I sat down to the table and pulled out my notes, I realized that I had a working relationship that lasted years with several of the people in this room. Sometimes I was emailing and calling these people several times a day. Yet, I had to ask each one her name before I could figure out who was who.

In-Person Connections

Last year, I spent a lot of time thinking about how I hide behind my computer. I’m one of those people who really enjoy my own company. Previous traditional jobs forced me to mingle with the general public so I always had a nice balance in my life. The moment I started working from home, I noticed that I spent more time in my head than anywhere else. I loved the fact that I could connect with others hundreds of miles away with just a few keystrokes. Still, I soon remembered that in-person connecting has its perks, too.

First of all, a face to face meeting creates a trust that you don’t always get when all of your contact is over the phone or Internet. This is great for client relationships. I used to have a client in Virginia whose office was near a shopping center I did a lot of errands in. If I happened to be around–um, and looking presentable–I’d walk in and say hi. I got a lot of work from her and I like to think that it’s because I made an effort to connect every couple of months. She could put a face to my work and that helped her trust me.

Another great benefit is that you don’t have to type as much. You get to give your computer or phone a break and just talk. If you’ve got email/Twitter/Facebook fatigue, this is the cure. You don’t have to “like” or retweet anything, either. It easier to decipher tone and meaning in person, too. No more carefully wording everything because you’re afraid the other person may take it the wrong way.

And finally, it gets you out of your home office and into the world. If you’re someone who spends a lot of time cooped up, this is perfect for you. Fresh air, sunshine and good company. What more could you ask for? And when you come back, you’re guaranteed to feel a little more inspired.

Making the Invisible Friends Real

So this year, I have a plan. I’m going to comb through my social media and email contacts for those who live in the greater New York City area. Then I’m setting up a meetup with each one. Lunch, dinner, cup of coffee or walk in the park, I’m going to meet as many people as possible this year. Not everyone will be into it, of course. But, the ones that are will get to see my smiling face in-person and we can both verify that each of us is actually real.

If you’re so inclined, there’s nothing stopping you from making your invisible friends real, too. I’m sure at least one or two of your Twitter contacts is local. Send them an email and ask them to coffee. Or participate in a TweetUp in your area. If you’ve got local clients, hand deliver that next holiday or thank you card you planned to send them. You could ask if you could stop by to pitch some new projects to them, or just offer to take them to lunch sometime.

For those of you living in less populated areas, don’t despair. Google Plus has nice hangout feature that lets you have group video chats that I’ve been using with great success. Skype has a similar feature. Invite two or three of your invisible friends and you’ll get the face to face connection without traveling a few hundred miles to get it.

And if any of you are in the NYC area, I’d love to put a face with your name. Email me and let’s take this thing to the next level.

About Princess Jones

Princess Jones is the evil genius behind Diary of a Mad Freelancer, where she shares her freelance life with anyone willing to stop by. She’s also the creator of Group Therapy, a monthly chat that gives other mad freelancers the chance to share their experiences.

It’s hard to believe it’s another new year already. I usually have my goals and resolutions set by late October or early November. But I’m a bit late to the game this year. In fact, I’ve been somewhat absent here for months. I had a crazy year in 2011. My guy and I started looking for a new place around May. That hunt, move, and settling in dominated the majority of my year and took a lot of time away from other things — mostly the time I could spend on my own sites and projects (hence the absence). I also got engaged. And then the holiday season hit with far too much travel and party hosting. I spent a great deal of my time last week sleeping out of the sheer exhaustion of it all.

Now it’s time to get back on track. And like I do every year, I’m going to share my business goals with you. Here are my 2012 New Year’s resolutions for my business.

1. Get back on schedule with my sites, books, and other projects.

I need to get myself back on a regular posting schedule on my blogs. That starts this week for this blog and a couple of others, and I’ll work my other blogs into that schedule over the next several weeks.

On the recommendation of Sharon Hurley Hall, I recently upgraded my version of Dragon, Naturally Speaking. I didn’t use it before because the accuracy was pretty terrible for me. But 11.5 seems to have fixed those issues. Even with just moderate training the accuracy is great. I’ve already used it to speed up some article writing for clients, and I’m hoping it will keep me more productive with my own blog posts as well.

My book manuscripts also took a back seat last year, which was incredibly frustrating. I’m looking forward to diving back into them shortly — editing the Query-Free Freelancer manuscript and finishing the first novel in my Murder Scripts murder mystery series.

2. See a Minimum 20% Increase in Gross Income

I screwed up in 2011. With all of the moving and other distractions, something had to give. Like I said, it was my own sites and projects. Income on that side of my business dropped dramatically last year, and it made 2011 my first year where my overall income dropped. Not much, but a decrease. Fortunately, my business expenses also dropped quite a bit, so my net income wasn’t affected very much. But it’s still disappointing.

As a result, I’m setting a goal of at least a 20% gross increase. That would get me back in line with past earnings increases. That said, I’ll certainly try for even more than that.

3. Finalize My Business Name Change

As announced last year, my base business is changing. The name will be changing from J.H. Mattern Communications to 3BeatMedia. My websites and freelance writing services will fall under the primary business name. A publishing-oriented division name of 3BeatBooks will be used for branding my books and e-books a little later this year.

This won’t take long to finish up, but I still need to put time into the new websites and then incorporating the new branding on all of my sites. Expansion to two other divisions is planned, but probably not in 2012.

4. Finish Setting Up My New Office Space

Even though we moved in mid-October, my new office space still isn’t completely set up and unpacked. It’s not a comfortable work environment, and getting this finished is a priority for me. In fact, I expect to reach this goal by this time next week at the latest. I have three work areas there — my desk, a standing desk setup, and a large chair with ottoman for longer writing sessions such as manuscript work. I can’t wait to finally be able to use them all on a regular basis.

5. Publish at Least 5 Short E-books

My longer projects this year will be the print book manuscripts. So for e-books I’m going to keep things short. I’m planning to release five shorter, lower-cost e-books (mostly released here through All Freelance Writing). Outlining will be finished this week, and the first should be out before the end of January.

6. Finish Editing the Query-Free Freelancer Manuscript

I mentioned this one previously, but it’s a big enough goal that I think it deserves to stand on its own.

7. Finish Drafting the First Murder Scripts Novel

This one is another big goal I mentioned before, but it also deserves its own spot here. This is the project I’m most excited to work on — the first under my Aria Klein pen name.

8. Release the First Murder Scripts Game

The Murder Scripts series has a natural tie-in to games. And I plan to release a few of them as ancillary products to this novel series. While I hope to release a few this year, it’s a completely new experience for me so I’m setting a goal of just releasing the first.

9. Get to $500 per Month Earnings on my Genealogy Site

Last year I started a genealogy site called Climb Your Family Tree. I originally intended to keep it quiet here and use it as an experiment to show earnings for a new site. But yet again, life distractions got in the way. That experiment is obviously off (for this site at least). But I fully intend to grow it and focus on increasing its earnings.

That will include a new design, new resources (some free and some for sale), building affiliate relationships for products I’ll review, and more. Genealogy is a huge passion of mine, and I’m excited to have it take a more prominent place in my work. I consider this to be one of the best parts of working for myself — being able to integrate passions and hobbies into my business.

10. Find Uses for at Least 3 of my Unused Domain Names

I have quite a few unused domain names — over a dozen at least. I have plans for several of them, but I haven’t had time to do the development work. But those domains aren’t earning me any money just sitting there. Even if it means setting up a few starter sites until I can pursue some of the larger projects, I’d like to get at least three of those domains in-use and earning money for the business. Ideally I’d like to have this done in the first quarter, but I’ll be happy just getting them set up this year.

What are your goals in the New Year? Are you hoping to reach new clients? Earn more money? Branch out beyond freelancing, perhaps by writing your first book? Share your goals with us in the comments below and see what your fellow freelancers are hoping to achieve.

In short, the beginning of the year is one of the best times to contact webmasters and small businesses. Many of these individuals and companies are looking to get organized for the year to come. By showing what you have to offer, you may find yourself at the top of the list when writing work is needed.

Have you thought about sending cards to past clients and current prospects, wishing them a happy New Years? Not only is this a great way to show that you care about them on a personal level, but it can also be used as a subtle marketing tool. Best yet, you don’t have to spend a lot of money on this.

With one working week remaining before 2011 is gone for good, it is time to focus on your marketing plan for the months to come. This is a great opportunity to service existing clients and gain new ones.

Marketing should always be on your mind. However, this is even more important during the first month of the year. Do your part now in making sure that 2012 is your best year yet. The time that you put into marketing your services will eventually payoff in the new year!

Over the years, I have found that connecting with other freelance writers, even if not in person, is very important. Here are three reasons why:

1. Referrals. Time and time again, friends of mine in the business send clients my way. This is one of the biggest perks of growing your network. The more people you know the better chance there is of receiving a referral. As you can imagine, this is much better than having to market your own services.

2. Ask questions, get answers. No matter how long you have been writing, you are sure to have questions pop into your mind. This happens to me all the time. When I can’t find the answer, I always call on one of my friends in the industry.

3. More than just career acquaintances. What starts out as a working relationship may eventually turn into a friendship. I have many friends who are clients of mine and other freelance writers. While we spend a lot of time discussing the industry, we also have talk about everything from sports to politics and much more.

As you can see, connecting with other freelance writers is a big part of making it in this business.

Our last post looked at reasons freelance writers should stop spending too much time trolling job boards looking for new gigs. It just isn’t an efficient use of your time when most of the best gigs are never publicly advertised. I also gave you several other marketing strategies you could pursue to land high paying freelance writing jobs. One of those suggestions was to build your writer platform so clients can find you instead of it always working the other way around.

Today I’d like to further explore writer platforms and why you should have one.

What is a Writer Platform?

Think of a writer platform as all of the things that give you visibility in your specialty area. It’s everything contributing to your built-in audience — the people who want what you’re selling.

For example, this website is a big part of my platform for The Query-Free Freelancer – a book I expect to release in the New Year. Even before the book is available, I have a significant audience with an interest in what that product has to offer.

You can do the same, building a writer platform around your services. Your platform would reach an audience of members of your target market.

For example, if you write search engine optimized (SEO) Web content your platform might be designed to help you reach an audience of SEO professionals (from freelance SEO pros to larger Internet marketing firms needing writers to serve their own clients’ needs).

Here’s another example: If you’re interested in public relations (PR) writing, like press releases, you would target people in need of those services — from PR firms to independent businesses looking for freelance help.

Benefits of Building Your Writer Platform

Why would you want to spend time building a writer platform? Here are a few good reasons:

• You aren’t at the mercy of what’s being advertised on any given day.
• You don’t thrust yourself into a large pool of writers (who often compete with a race to the bottom on pricing) applying for a single gig. In other words, there’s less competition for each freelance writing job.
• Clients come directly to you instead of you pitching them and waiting around on a response.
• Prospects who come to you as a result of your strong platform rarely bicker over professional rates.
• When you build a solid writer platform you can have regular offers coming in from prospects. Chances are good you’ll eventually have more inquiries than available time. That gives you the ultimate freedom of being able to pick and choose the best or most interesting projects and turn down the rest (or offer referrals to colleagues, which is good networking and can lead to more incoming referrals from them later).
• Many of the things you’ll do to build your writer platform will actually make money for you directly. That’s in addition to any freelance projects you land. In other words, you can essentially get paid to market your own services. That can help you grow your income in a general sense, but it can also help to fill in gaps between gigs until you build regular demand. I’ll give you some specific examples of this below.

If you’re the kind of writer who hates pitching, your writer platform is incredibly valuable. It does the heavy lifting for you — attracting prospects and convincing them to get in touch with you.

What Might a Writer Platform Include?

In my last post I gave you a few examples of what might be included when building your writer platform.

For example, you would have a professional website that helps you build search engine visibility. You could have a niche or industry blog that showcases your expert knowledge in your specialty area (for example, if you want to write music reviews for others, you might have your own music review blog as well). Your platform also includes community and social media profiles.

These things help people find you, they show them that you’re qualified for the work you want to do, and they give people a reason to want to approach you and hire you instead of the competition.

Your writer platform isn’t just about what you do online. Here are some other things your writer platform might include:

• A book you’ve published
• Seminars and speeches
• Courses you teach (or possibly a guest lecture)

If you want more examples of the smaller things you can do to build a solid writer platform, please check out this post from our archives:

30 Ways to Build Your Writer Platform

You don’t have to include all of these things. Trying to do so would take too much time. Focus on the things you’re comfortable with and good at (or willing to work hard to get better at). Some of these tactics are one-time efforts. Many require ongoing work if you want to maximize your visibility and audience reach, and therefore increase inquiries from prospects over time.

It might take extra effort on your part early on, especially if you can’t cut back on your billable hours to focus on marketing for something better. This is one of the rare situations where I’m going to tell you to suck it up and get it done, even if you have to work overtime. You need to lay a foundation you can build upon. If you can’t (or won’t) devote existing working hours to doing so, you need to set aside more time.

I know it sucks. I’m a bit fan of the work smarter, not harder philosophy. It’s why I make more working only four days per week, seven hours per day than I ever did when 60+ hour weeks were my norm. And if you want to get to that point, you can. But to speed up that process and make your platform work for you, you’re going to have to work your ass off to build your visibility and authority status early on.

While query-free freelancing is my preferred marketing strategy, you don’t have to focus on it exclusively. In the beginning while you build your writer platform, I highly suggest that you continue to directly pitch prospects you’d like to work with. Eventually your platform will attract new clients and you can move away from direct pitching if you prefer. But if you need gigs to tide you over in the meantime, never hesitate to come right out and ask for them. That’s especially true if you have confidence issues. Nothing will help you overcome those concerns better than having your first pitch accepted.

Are you ready to build a writer platform in  your specialty area? What tactics do you think will work best to reach your target market? If you already have a strong platform, you can share your experiences in the comments below, telling newer writers how long it took you to build regular incoming demand and whether or not you still use direct pitching in addition to the work your platform elements bring in for you.

Some of the most interesting advice I ever had was from a professor in my library program. There were a couple of us in the program who were trying to finish up our masters, who were teaching, had children at home and also pregnant. The professor kept telling us (ad nauseum) that we could do everything, but we couldn’t do it all at one time. I’m pleased to report I finished my master’s degree two days before my second son was born, but that little tidbit of annoying advice stuck with me.

Rock Star Mom

As a true rock star I can do everything all at one time. I mean come on – for two years I taught full-time, I wrote almost full-time and I finished a master’s degree all while pregnant and with a toddler at home. I did it. Hurray for me. I also was on the verge of collapse a lot of time – I fell asleep constantly putting my toddler to bed and I gained a huge amount of weight from stress eating and a lack of time to exercise and take care of myself. So maybe it wasn’t all as great as it sounds in my mind.

I’ve made peace with the weight that still’s sticking around because I know I’ll get to it later, and I’m no longer pregnant and I finally have older kids who are more self sufficient, but going through those tough years left an impression on me. My professor was annoyingly right – I can do it all, but I don’t have to do it all at once. Having that message ticking in the back of my head makes me want to take a step back from my rock star lifestyle. I’m going to simplify.

Rock Star Writer

I’ll admit that I’m intimidated quite a bit watching many of the other writers who are active on this blog and in the writing community I peek into from time to time. Jenn, for example, is writing books, planning programs, expanding her business in multiple directions and constantly creating new things to grow her presence in the market. Her goals are impressive and every time I see what she’s been up to I get anxious thinking I should be working just as hard to grow my own business, even if I’m writing part-time. Yet every time I come up with a new list of goals and brainstorm a new idea I know that it’s unlikely I’ll go very far with it.

It’s not just because I work part-time, which does contribute from a time perspective, but my lack of drive has more to do with my ultimate goal for being a writer. I didn’t start writing to build up a huge writing business and get a big name within the industry. I started writing because I enjoyed it and wanted to build a business doing something I enjoy. This is an excellent sentiment to build a business on, by the way, and I hope that all of the writers out there are doing this because they enjoy the writing – not just because they can make a few bucks doing it. That’s a sure recipe for burn out.

I also have a handy business degree to combine with more than six years of small business experience and I know that the bane of business is entropy, or the slow rot that undermines a stagnant business. You can’t sit still or you’ll be left behind and your business will ultimately fail. Knowing that, I’ve been working hard to be as much of a writing rock star as I can be. But I’m inconsistent in how I structure my plans and goals, and that’s due to the design and purpose of my writing conflicting with my actions and plans.

On one hand I like the idea of being a true rock star and building a huge writing business. I want ebooks, seminars, reputation management and business contacts in the local community. I want to wear suits and walk into office buildings with Barracuda playing as my soundtrack ala Lucy Liu in Charlie’s Angels. But then I also want to snuggle into a big wingback chair and write pithy statements on things I find amusing and engaging.

I want to write amusing novels in a drafty old farm house and wear large sweaters to symbolize my quiet success. I want to write educational pieces that will launch a seminar business. I want to write for a magazine, I want to start new blogs, I want to focus on new areas of my current business – I want to do it all. But I can’t. At least not any time soon.

Simplifying My Writing Life

So I’ve been simplifying things of late. Instead of spreading myself wider, I’m going to dig deeper into establishing a single brand and working within that brand. Every time one of my domains comes up for renewal, I’m letting it go. I had great plans for all sorts of projects, bought the domains, threw up temporary content and never got back to it. Knowing the starter sites were out there was draining  since they were waiting for my attention – just like everything else in my life. I don’t renew the domain and that removes the pressure of having to get back to that project later.

I’ve decided to not worry about the lack of SEO on my original site. This has been bothering me for years. I don’t have keywords in my url and I don’t have a singular phrase that’s easy to rank, but I have a beautifully aged domain I can play with later as I choose. However, after six years I’m embracing the fact that I don’t get much business through SEO.

I could, but I have other ways of marketing that work just fine. So I’ll get back to SEO later – I can’t tell you how many sites I plan and domains I buy trying to find one that would be easy to rank. But then I’d almost have to start over with branding to build a presence around that site and I just can’t get fired up about it and I do nothing but fret instead of moving ahead.

My new plan is one of many retired rock stars. I’m going for the simple life I can enjoy and embrace fully. I’m keeping two domains and I might let one of those go down the road to focus on the primary one. I’m not ruling out any additional revenue streams, but I’m not going to stress myself out planning crazy new projects.

I’m going to grow and improve in what I already do – writing for my various clients with an educational, small business slant, raising my rates a bit at a time and adding new skills and services within that umbrella. It’s going to be totally refreshing and I’ll be excited to report back in on my new narrow focus and its successes!