Jennifer Mattern This post is in response to Yaro Starak’s recent post: Is Outsourcing Exploitation? I started to comment, but the rambling was enough to warrant a post instead. Here are some of my thoughts as both a freelance service provider and someone who outsources work regularly. I’m all for outsourcing, both in one’s own country and elsewhere. I’ve worked with contractors in the US, UK, Canada,
This week’s Freelance Fitness post isn’t really about an exercise tip for freelancers, but it is about finding a way to burn more calories while you work. As freelance writers, we probably spend far too much time sitting on our arses in front of a computer, whether that be in our home office, in our favorite cafe, or even under a tree at the park.
You might have seen me mention this before, but I’m about to start on my first screenplay. If you’ve followed my blog(s) for a while, you might also remember that I let you follow along in my process to outline two novels (as a part of a process to compare different novel outlining / drafting methods). I’m planning to do the same with the screenplay
Before you can think about marketing your freelance writing business, you need to know where you currently stand among your competition. Are you dealing with over-saturation in your specialty area? Are you lacking skills other freelance writers have, that clients want? Do you have something going for you that justifies charging higher rates than others? A SWOT analysis can help you figure those things out, and
You know that here at All Freelance Writing we’re incredibly picky about what we will and won’t promote. For example, we won’t sell out to content mills that exploit writers, and we won’t send you to job leads at marketplaces we consider shady. Speaking of freelance marketplaces, there was actually only one we were willing to openly support — Elance. I’m sad to say that’s
Note: This post originally appeared at FreelanceTheater.com on February 9, 2010. The Freelance Theater audio play series is now a part of All Freelance Writing. One of the sometimes best / sometimes worst aspects of freelancing is how much time you’ll spend working alone. While it can be nice to avoid the politics and drama of a traditional office environment, there is also no 5pm
Today marks the start of our new Freelance Fitness series here on All Freelance Writing. This is where I’ll be sharing some of my own workout-related updates to show you that you’re not alone in trying to beat the bad health habits freelancing can sometimes lead to. Once per month we’ll talk about workouts tailored to freelance writers, and once per month we’ll share recipes
Note: This post originally appeared at FreelanceTheater.com on October 30, 2009. The Freelance Theater audio play series is now a part of All Freelance Writing. Have you ever had a “vampire client” — one who seems to suck the life out of you? Maybe they don’t pay enough so you push yourself to the edge of burning out regularly as you cram in countless projects.
If you want to create a business plan for your freelance writing business, publishing business, or blogs, you might feel overwhelmed by traditional long-form business plans. If that sounds like you, you might enjoy this free one page business plan template I created as a part of my former Web Writers’ Guide e-book. You can use this one page business plan template (in .pdf format)
For quite some time, I’ve planned to cut down my work schedule to a four-day work week. I never seem to get around to it though. Whenever I free up the time, either I have a new project to work on during those hours or a client wants to start on a big contract that I suddenly have some free hours for. So the schedule
I’ve mentioned before that middlemen clients — SEO firms, marketing firms, etc. — are some of my favorite types of clients to work for. They bring a group of their own clients to your door which saves on marketing time for you, and they tend to bring in bigger orders than most single clients. They also often go for regular monthly work rather than short-term
Many freelance writers have their own blogs. I’m always surprised by how many blogging writers I know don’t blog for clients! Why not? More importantly, why should they consider it? Today let’s talk about blogging for others and why it might be one of the best things to happen to a Web writer (or someone wanting to become one). Why Might Writers Prefer to Blog
Today I’d like to talk about blog comment etiquette — some dos and don’ts I guess you could say when it comes to commenting on others’ blogs. This issue comes to mind periodically regarding over-linking, but I never considered it worth its own post. Lately though, I’ve been seeing more commenters on various blogs of mine getting flagged as spam by default, so maybe it’s
If you blog, you’ll likely come across at least one content thief in the process. They’ll take your articles (usually in full) and they’ll publish them on their own sites so they can either monetize your work or use it to build their own false authority. As someone who makes a living from writing, I find content theft infuriating. I’m also the wrong person to
You might have already seen our free keyword density analyzer — the latest free online tool for freelance writers. Today I want to talk about some of the quirks and offer some tips on how to use it. Word Counts If you use the tool to track your word count, there are a few things you should know: You get to choose the number of
Diversify, diversify, diversify! If you haven’t gotten that message here over the years, it might never sink in, but I’m going to say it again anyway. DIVERSIFY! Normally we talk about diversifying your freelance writing business in a specific way, by creating your own residual revenue streams such as money-making blogs and e-books. We even give you tools to help you accomplish those goals like
Today marks the release of another free tool for freelance writers — a free keyword density analyzer. Before you groan about the evils of SEO content though, check out the press release below for more details. It was made with writers in mind to help you not only improve keyword density based on client requests, but also improve readability! As with any press release, feel
I’ve mentioned before that I don’t often take on new clients because my schedule is consistently full and I’m swamped with my own projects on top of that. A potential client (Robert Schierenberg of Superior Appeals — a company dealing with property tax appeals) changed my mind about that the other day. It was the first time I stopped, thought it over, and said I’d
In Yo’s last post, she mentioned the ups and downs freelancers face. Today I’m going to share a story that incorporates a bit of both. First, it’s an excellent case of query-free freelancing attracting more than commercial writing clients. On the other hand, it also shows how breaking one of my own rules ended up being a waste of time on a day when when
If you run a blog, chances are good that you’re going to get hit with blog comment spam. There are tools, like Akismet, to help combat this problem in blogging. But Akismet doesn’t catch everything. Blog comment spammers keep getting more clever. It seems like it’s more difficult every day to separate the spam from true comments. What’s sad though is that spammers take advantage
You know I’m a big advocate of query-free freelancing — helping clients find and come to you instead of the other way around. That’s especially important when it comes to finding freelance copywriting jobs. While it’s not uncommon to find regular copywriting work advertised, freelance copywriting is a different story. Yes, some of these jobs are advertised, but many are not. So how do you
Periodically I try to update you on the goings-on around All Freelance Writing. And with so much going on, now is a perfect time for an update! Here’s what you can expect during the rest of this month, in March, and through the next couple of months. February I’ll be recruiting the last of our new writers for now (we already announced that Dan Smith
One of the topics we cover here quite a bit is blogging. More specifically, I share tips on how to use blogging to get freelance writing jobs and how to make money blogging directly. Let’s talk more about the latter. Some writers want to make their blog a serious income stream, and others simply want to earn a little bit of money while their blog
If you decided to search for freelance writing jobs right now, you would probably find thousands of them advertised. Many of those writing jobs are crap (and that’s putting it nicely) to the bulk of writers here. After all, do you want to get paid $.001 per word (yes that’s 1/10 of one cent per word)? Do you want to work for $.05 per word?
Normally I don’t talk about my clients directly on my blogs, but today is an exception. One of my clients (the owner of DirJournal.com) made a special link building offer to writers and bloggers, and I’d like to share that with you today. But first, let’s talk about link building in general, why it’s important for freelance writers, and how you can build quality links
Every now and then I talk about the excuses freelance writers make for their lack of success when they’re not happy in their careers (and how they need to take personal responsibility if they want to change that). Let’s talk about the latter half — making changes. It’s not enough to knock off the excuses. You stopped blaming the economy for your lack of work.
Everyone makes mistakes. But when it comes to freelance writing, a lot of people make the same mistakes! New writers regularly set themselves up for failure. Even experienced writers get too comfortable in a routine and forget some of the essentials. The thing is, most freelance writing mistakes are easy to avoid. Today let’s look at some of the most common, and most foolish, mistakes
If you follow me on Twitter, you might have seen an all-out rant the other evening about a complete customer service nightmare related to Amazon.com and UPS. Here’s a run-down of what ultimately happened: I ordered a small chest from Amazon (directly, not a 3rd party seller). Being a somewhat large item shipping-wise, it took a while to get to me. I checked the tracking.
Now you see it, now you don’t. The blog post you read in your feed reader an hour ago was deleted by the blogger. But why? It always baffles me when I’m reading a blog and suddenly the content changes (as in it vanishes). There’s rarely a good excuse for it, although I’m sure there are some. Before you think twice about a post and
Market research is important. You should always know what your competition is doing, because it gives you insight into your market. But copying successful formats and strategies is not generally the way to succed for yourself. Imitation may occasionally be the sincerest form of flattery, but not in business. Jessie Fitzgerald asked me on Twitter today if I owned AllFreelanceBlogging.com. I don’t, but I joked