Article Writing Tips

Thanks to MJ Logan for allowing me to use this.

Here’s some tips, I use these every day.

1 – Copy and paste the Marketplace Guidelines into your word processor.

2 – Go through the guidelines and single out specific requirements. For example, in recent marketplace titles for travel, the publisher wanted 10 subheadings. Start your article by making a section for each of those subheadings.

3 – If they give a URL to look at, copy-paste that into your word processor as well. Go visit the page. Look at examples of what is there. Read them because this is the style you want to use.

4 – Do a keyword specific search on the topic. Exclude any Wikipedia results. From your results, choose two or three informative pages and read them. Make *notes* in notepad as you go. By notes, I mean short brief notes, do not copy-paste anything. You can keep notepad on top of a web page as you read and make notes in it. If you are required to cite references, make notes on those as well. Copy any URLs you use into the notes, and later into the top section of your article in the WP.

5 – By now, you should have spent 10-30 minutes on research. It’s time to write. Look over your notes in notepad. Copy them into the top of your article in your word processor for easy reference, just under the guidelines.

6 – With it all fresh in your memory, start writing. Usually you want AP style. No first person, no jazzy words, no slang. Be rather generic in your writing. For good examples, go to the AP website (http://www.ap.org/) and read some news articles. This will give you an idea.
Set your word processor to formal writing and turn on the feature for writing and readability statistics. 8th grade is usually best. If your writing shows up as a grade level 12, you have to pare down your sentence length and complexity.

7 – Start by writing without checking your word count. After a while you get a feel for it. Make sure you use whitespace generously. 4-8 (max 12) sentence paragraphs. More sentences and you’re losing readers.

8 – When you get to the end, save it. Take a couple minutes without looking at it. I use this time to make an outline for the next assignment on my list. This clears your head a little.

9 – By now, if you type at a speed of 20 wpm, you’ve still spent less than an hour on a 400 word article. Open the article again and do a word count. If you’re over and I hope you are, it’s time to chop and be ruthless. Look for words you don’t need. Slang. Whole sentences are open to chopping if you don’t truly need them. If the word count is still over budget, chop more. Sometimes you need to rearrange sentences to get the count down. Do it. You do not want to be over or right on. Always 5 under for an assignment of 600 words or less. Ten under for more than that.

10 – Save and set it aside for a few hours or a day (usually a few hours on my schedule). Go back and re-read s l o w l y and carefully. Look for missing words. Fragments (happens if you chop a lot). Words the spell check missed because they are the wrong word, not spelled wrong (Their instead of There) stuff like that.

Save. Submit. (leave out the extra stuff like guidelines and notes you put at the top. Be sure to include citations at the bottom if required.)
Over time, you will develop a style and method that works for you. Things that help are fast, accurate typing, silence or noise (depends on you, I turn the music off when I write), choosing topics that you already know something about, using research you already did and wrote about (always rewrite, never copy, even your own work).
Give yourself deadlines and work to them. Make lists of what you are going to write. Slash items off when you finish and submit.

Freelancing Articles

Over the last month and a half I’ve put a number of freelancing articles up on Helium.  Some of them I’ve used excerpts of here, but I thought that someone might find some of these useful.

So, here’s the list.  Enjoy!

General Freelancing Articles

How to succeed on any freelance site

Tips for finding online freelance writing jobs

Online business: Build a reputation

Finding legitimate work from home jobs

Finding paid work from home

How to spot fake work-from-home jobs

The pros and cons of working as an independent contractor

Managing your Time

Break time: Ways to take a break when working from home
Is telecommuting right for you?

Freelancing Tools

Free software for business functions

How to save money running a startup

Articles about Web Writing

How to write effective SEO copy

Why editing is essential for web copy

How to write effective web copy

Miscellaneous Articles that may be of interest

Dangers of business ads for at-home work

How to create wealth working from home

Niche writer versus Jack of all trades

Spread your wings!

If you’re a freelance writer and you are looking for (a) additional experience; (b) additional income; (c) an opportunity to build your portfolio, there are some websites that are available to you to help you do this!

Here are some examples:

Helium – if you’re interested in writing about a wide variety of topics and you want the opportunity to practice your writing, Helium offers you a wide range of topics that include poetry, creative writing, business, legal, family issues and the list goes on and on.

One of the nice things about Helium is that you will earn residual income off hits to your articles.  Now you’re not going to get rich off these but they do add up.  If you’re looking for additional income opportunities take a look at their Marketplace as well.

Associated Content is another site that basically allows you to submit articles.  One of the advantages over Helium is that you basically don’t have to write on existing titles, instead you have the opportunity to write about anything that falls in their categories.

Again you’re not going to make a lot of money on these articles, but they go a long way in helping you create a portfolio for your freelance writing business.

Both of these sites will give you an opportunity to flex your writing muscles and create a portfolio. Remember, various categories invite more views so read up on the rules.

Both sites offer you the opportunity to cross-post articles as well so feel free to post them on both sites (read all the rules that apply to the content first!).

Happy freelancing!

Non Specialized Freelance Writing

If you’re just getting started freelancing you might be wondering if you should be focusing on just one field of freelance writing or if you should be expanding your horizons.

There is something to be said for both options, let’s take a look at the advantages and disadvantages of both types of freelance writing:

Specialized Writing

It’s been said by many that freelance writers who specialize in one field (finance for example) often garner higher wages for their services. While this may be true, not all freelance writers have a single base of knowledge that is marketable.

Advantages of Specialized Freelance Writing

1. Higher per article wages – if you can specialize in one field of writing you probably will make a better wage than those who write about multiple topics;

2. Client base – there’s a pretty good chance if you are specializing in one field that your client base is easier to find;

3.  Consistency – typically the more your freelance writing sticks to one topic the better you’ll be discussing that topic in a variety of ‘voices’

Disadvantages to Specialized Freelance Writing

1. Higher per article wages -yes, it can be a disadvantage as well! The reason that a specialized freelance writer is at a disadvantage with higher per article wages is that it often cuts off a portion of clients who might otherwise be attracted;

2. Client base – your client base is limited to the one field that your freelance writing skills are based on.  This allows for a ceiling on growth;

3.  Consistency – read boredom.  As a freelance writer you can grow quickly bored with writing about the same thing all the time!

Non Specialized Freelance Writing

If you overlook the individual topics that non specialized freelance writers can deal with (if they chose to) there are some other freelance writing opportunities that you might not otherwise have as a specialized freelance writer including:

1.  Variety of challenges – if you’re a single topic writer chances are probably good that you’re not as versatile as you could be. This might mean that you focus on only one potential avenue of income such as article submission;

2.  Variety of Subjects - as a freelance writer who is ‘non-specialized’ you could write about a wide range of topics in one day from the alphabet to zoos ensuring you’ll never get bored with your writing;

3.  Referral business – if you find a client who is happy with your work you’re even more likely to get referral business if your freelance writing isn’t locked into single subjects.

As a freelance writer, it’s helpful if you can expand your horizons. If you’re not sure that you have the skills that you need to do that you can sign up for a free “Helium” account and practice there!  Helium offers a variety of subject matter that can help you practice your writing skills in a non-threatening manner.

Making yourself Marketable

It’s one thing to decide that you want to venture into freelancing, and it’s another thing entirely to make yourself marketable.

One of the first things that you’ll quickly come to the realization of is that no matter how good you think you are at your given talent, there are another 50 (or more) people out there that believe themselves to be better than you are – and they can offer their service less expensively than you can.

If you’re leaving the brick and mortar job market for a virtual job the f irst thing you need to do is make sure you understand the reality of the virtual job market.  There are buyers who simply are not going to pay more than $5 an hour regardless of what skills they’re looking for. The more competitive the field, the more likely this is to happen (consider data entry for a great example of this).

You need to make yourself stand out from the crowd.   Now that might sound like a generality (and it is) but frankly, you have to figure out what your ‘niche’ is and you have to create an environment that highlights that niche.

If you’re a graphic artist for example – you will most likely highlight your graphics work in your portfolio – and this is a great idea.  However, you might have additional items that you want to share with potential buyers. Find a blog where you can upload files and highlight specific work broken out perhaps by categories.

You will definitely need to be creative, the more diverse the talent pool the more likely it is that you’ll have tough competition.  You are the only one who can market yourself – no one else is going to do it for you.

Happy Freelancing!

What’s Your Niche?

You might think that because you’re a freelancer that it’s ok to offer a variety of  skills and technically speaking you’d be correct. However, there are some things that you need to be aware of:

If I’m looking for a programmer (i.e. C Programming or other types) and your profile highlights what a great article writer you are, I’m not likely to even interview you.

If your skills are complimentary skills: I.E. a writer who’s really good at proofreading for example, I want to know that in your cover letter.  The same thing would go for SEO marketing – if you’re a writer with extensive SEO experience then perhaps that’s going to help me make a DECISION to hire you over the next person.

Don’t mix your fields - if you’re signed up as a ‘professional’ data entry person then don’t apply for writing jobs, you immediately lose credibility.  If you are ‘experimenting’ with a field, then make sure that you change your profile accordingly: If you’re an article writer/provider and I go to your portfolio and all I see are graphics that you designed – I’m out of here!

If you’re a ‘typical’ programmer but you’re trying to break into writing then the easy way to do that is to write a few articles for your portfolio or create a blog and point me there – if you don’t want to change your profile you can tell me in your cover letter ‘I normally focus on programming but I am working hard to develop my reputation as a writer – you can find some strong examples of my writing skills here’.  You get the picture…

Whatever field you chose, be an expert. Don’t bounce around from field to field and be honest with yourself. If you’re a lousy writer but a good programmer – stick to programming.  If you’re lousy programmer but you’re a  decent writer then stick to writing. You get the drift!!

Writing does offer additional opportunities such as proofreading. In fact, proofreaders are hard to come by because not everyone can easily identify mistakes in a document (or on a website) so if you have an eye for it then highlight that skill!

Happy Freelancing!

Virtual Reality 2

We talked in our last post about giving yourself a break – but there’s a downside too. Too often when folks work at home they think they have far more time than they really do!

What can happen?

The biggest problem for many people is working at home can lead to a lot of wasted time. If you’ve made the decision to work at home you have to be totally committed to working a set number of hours every day – and once you do that you need to stick to it. Whether it’s 3 hours every morning and 3 more every afternoon or 6 hours without a break, you need to decide that for yourself.

Keeping on track
There are tools you can use to make sure you stay on track and focused (or to see how well you’re doing). I like ‘WR Time Tracker’. Here’s what I can do with it – I can track all of my days ‘activities’ and mark them as billable or non-billable (by the way I don’t use this anymore since I joined oDesk) …. but what it allows you to do is to establish your own ‘pattern’.

The Difference Between Multilevel Marketing and Multi tiered Affiliate Programs

A Comparison

Multi-level marketing (MLM) is a business model that combines direct marketing with franchising. Multi-level marketing businesses function by recruiting salespeople (also called Distributors, Independent Business Owners, IBOs, Franchise Owners, Sales Consultants, Beauty Consultants, Consultants, etc.) to sell a product and offer additional sales commissions based on the sales of people recruited into their downline, an organization of people that includes direct recruits, recruits’ recruits, etc.

Affiliate marketing overlaps with other internet marketing methods to some degree, because affiliates are using the same methods as most of the merchants themselves do. Those methods include organic search engine optimization, paid search engine marketing, email marketing and to some degree display advertising. Affiliate marketing – using one site to drive traffic to another – is the stepchild of online marketing.

About this Blog

I encourage you to share links to other websites that offer freelance jobs. However, there are some items that will be immediately removed:

A)  Foreclosure assistance - Foreclosure assistance businesses are sketchy at best.  Companies that offer help and charge large up front fees are typically not companies that I would encourage anyone to get involved in.  While I’m sure there are some out there that do their businesses legitimately, I prefer to have folks who are involved with government programs such as HOPENow and FNMA work to handle these.

B)  Multi Level Marketing – MLM’s are hard to do and often require extensive up front money. While many exist that have great reputations, the purpose of this blog is to encourage folks to take up freelance pursuits making money on things such as writing, blogging, building websites, programming and more.  There are hundreds of sites that offer MLM opportunities. This is not one of them.

C)  Anything else we feel is not ‘kosher’. If you post a link you can rest assured that before your comment is approved we’ll go over your website with a fine tooth comb.  Anything that looks like it falls into the categories above will be immediately deleted.