Mothering Forum banner

Writing From Home

Tags
wahm
1K views 12 replies 8 participants last post by  KodrutZ 
#1 ·
Does anyone still do that?

It's what I want to do :)

Anyone making a living at it?
 
#2 ·
lurk.gif


I do plenty of writing, but I'd like to make money at it.
love.gif
I used to do technical writing and that was primarily from home but I'm not sure I could go back to it (I've been out of it for many years). Will be interested to see if anyone has input!
 
#3 ·
I just bought a domain name!

I'll share it as soon as I have it up and running, but it's going to be so fun... lots of writing, mostly of the spiritual/personal growth nature. And there's going to be another exciting feature too... Not gonna share it quite yet, but it's going to help so many people I think :)
 
#4 ·
I used to make a very good living writing from home, some for upfront pay and most from residual income. I had hundreds of articles on eHow.com and a few other sites, as well as my own blogs and websites. I made a full-time income (working part-time) for several years.

Then eHow bought out all the freelance/ residual income articles (for a fair price, thankfully) and I had to start over to build back up my monthly income.

I am currently re-focusing on one niche. I am working on a blog re-design (I'll link once it's complete) for the site I've had for a couple years and am expanding to bring the business offline as well.

I will definitely share more as I progress. I do believe there is money to be made writing online, both for your own sites and for other companies, but the game has definitely changed a bit!
 
#6 ·
Yes, I'm a freelance writer working solely from home according to my own schedule. I work for commercial businesses that hire me to write articles, blog posts, ebooks, etc.

I used to write for a number of content mills, like wiseGEEK, Quality Gal, Need-An-Article and a few others, but have since worked to build up my own list of personal clients who pay a lot more than $5, $10 or even $20 per article. The work has its pros and cons. Though I enjoy working from home and being my own boss, I find it necessary to regularly market myself in order to keep work orders at a constant. It's not an issue of finding a few clients and then just sitting back and doing the work. Budgets get cut, businesses move in another direction, companies go under, etc. When your income depends on clients and their business which is beyond your control, you're better off marketing yourself on a daily basis. Not so bad once you get used to doing so, but it's oh so necessary and can be time-consuming when first starting out.

I also get tired of writing on dry topics that I have very little interest in. Even if I'm interested when first starting, after a year or so of writing on any topic, you can become severely burned out. And for many topics, it doesn't take nearly as long.

Then there's the issue of health insurance and other benefits which don't exist and can be expensive to pay for on your own. I don't have an issue with that, but lots of freelancers do, so I'm just warning you in case you're the head of household or need to be concerned about this.

Now, with all of that out of the way, the good stuff is that I can do what I want to do when I want to do it. Sure, I have deadlines, but nothing too strenuous and all of my clients right now are very easygoing. I also set the pace for my business and do not ever allow a client to confuse me with an employee. If I don't like something, I have a say in it and can also opt out of an assignment if I just don't want to do it.

The pay is also pretty good. Like I said earlier, I started out working for content mills, so I acquired a good deal of experience in SEO and writing for the web, in general. By the time I decided to branch off and do my own thing, I knew what "my own thing" was worth and I asked for it. Now, I make between $50 and $250 an article (depending on topic, frequency and a few other things). While my rate is comfy for me for the time being, I know a lot of freelancers who scoff at my fees as they make a lot more. On the flip side, there are also freelancers making a lot less.

My advice for you or anyone else starting out is to build a site introducing yourself as a freelancer. On that site, include a copy of your resume, your writing specialties and your contact information. Doesn't have to be anything special, but it should be neat, easy to read and professional in appearance. Also include a page for samples. Either link to samples you've previously published or write fresh ones if you don't have any professional writing experience. Be sure to proof your site well and ask a few other eagle-eyed folks to look it over and give you feedback too.

After you've established your site, hit the pavement and begin looking for clients. Employment boards (sites like Problogger and FreelanceWritingGigs are good), Craigslist, local classifieds-- look everywhere. Also tell everyone you meet what you do or what you're trying to do and put a little word-of-mouth power to work. In the past, I've also set Google alerts so that I know right away when someone posts a "writer wanted" or "come write for us" message in the blogosphere. Even without an alert set though, you can do a pretty easy search for sites that are looking for regular writers or that are looking for submissions.

If you can find some of my old posts, I think I may have offered sites that hire freelancers or that teach how to become one. Sorry, but their exact names slip my mind right now. I do recall one being the Work At Home Mom Center and also the WAHM forums under bloggers or freelance writers. I'm not sure how many content mills are still around, but I'm sure that the ladies at the WAHM forum know about them if they exist.

Speaking of the Work At Home Mom Center, a recent post said they were looking for bloggers. It may be a good place for you to start: http://www.workathomemomcenter.com/ever-considered-sponsored-blog-posts/

I've been busy and don't get to come here as often as I used go. But I hope my little bit of insight is useful and good luck!
 
#7 ·
Speaking of freelancers who make a lot less, Google's recent updates virtually killed me entirely, so now I'm a bit clueless on where to find some serious work for decent money to match my experience, with the entire Web being flooded with "native English writers" who charge 1$/100 words or even less. I worked full time at Softpedia for a few months a few years back (wrote Windows software reviews, then switched to Mac news and reviews), then I moved to Download3000 doing the same thing (Windows software reviews), in the meantime I wrote for a bunch of various blogs writing various articles (for example, I wrote the article that ranked 1st for a few years when searching "iPhone 3G problems" in Google), and so on.

Do you have any suggestions for me? I am too sick & tired of all the freelance sites around, especially since Freelancer.com became a huge scam and I lack the patience to dig for gold in the dirt on oDesk or elance, since they're also flooded with low-tier buyers and sellers. Thank you in advance!
 
#8 ·
Quote:
Originally Posted by KodrutZ View Post

Speaking of freelancers who make a lot less, Google's recent updates virtually killed me entirely, so now I'm a bit clueless on where to find some serious work for decent money to match my experience, with the entire Web being flooded with "native English writers" who charge 1$/100 words or even less. I worked full time at Softpedia for a few months a few years back (wrote Windows software reviews, then switched to Mac news and reviews), then I moved to Download3000 doing the same thing (Windows software reviews), in the meantime I wrote for a bunch of various blogs writing various articles (for example, I wrote the article that ranked 1st for a few years when searching "iPhone 3G problems" in Google), and so on.

Do you have any suggestions for me? I am too sick & tired of all the freelance sites around, especially since Freelancer.com became a huge scam and I lack the patience to dig for gold in the dirt on oDesk or elance, since they're also flooded with low-tier buyers and sellers. Thank you in advance!
Hi KodrutZ,

Sorry to hear about your Google woes, but that may turn out to be a blessing in disguise as you might now invest more into finding your own clients. I don't really do bidding sites either. Some freelancers do very well with them, but it's just not my thing.

For you, I'd say the same advice offered above applies. Sounds like you've got good experience and understand the ropes enough to get out there on your own. Can be frustrating at first, but once you get a few clients under your belt, you'll be just fine.

In addition to marketing yourself online, don't forget about local offline businesses. And if you've got any additional skills-- social media marketing, web design, etc., promote those to the fullest, too.

Lots of luck!
 
#9 ·
Thanks for suggestion, but the only way to go is online at this time, local offline economy is dead (Romania, joined the European Union as everyone's wh*re, our "crisis" will get worse and worse for at least another decade...). At this time, I'm doing almost nothing but I'm getting a lot of ideas written down, next step would be to find people who would invest in them...
 
#10 ·
Yes you can! It's really difficult but if you want to make it happen you can. My best advice is to compile and join companies that hire freelancers on a project basis. I have done work successfully with West Nile Book Reviews and some of the others mentioned in the previous post. A lot depends on the type of writing you'd like to do. There are separate resources for technical writing vs. creative writing. Don't be afraid to start your own little boutique service. Tell everyone about it. Contact relevant organizations. Offer a Groupon. You can have ads on a blog or create an eBook of your content. What kind of writing is your goal?
 
#12 ·
You could try Amazon Kindle where e-books, even novellas sell for £0.77 and download onto readers' devices within seconds. There is a huge potential market with Amazon Books/e-books. It's worth finding out more as it's yet another possible market.

Have you considered ghostwriting for authors? Here you either charge per chapter, or charge a day rate, but I don't know any more than that. I have considered writing, but think that will have to wait until Little Madam goes to school.
 
#13 ·
I did a few ghostwriting projects, mainly article or search/sort data/create a good looking copy, but I'd rather put my name on every word I write. Ghostwriting doesn't pay enough especially if you're not a 10,000+ words a day person. The ebooks market is attractive and I had one project in my mind for a while, I think I'll do my best to have it live by the end of the year. It may end up pretty short, but it would contain some concentrated ideas. I'd like to write a book "in the mirror" about so-called dictatorships that I and a buddy from Egypt lived in - I was in communism until 1989 (it was in fact more like socialism with personality cult a la North Korea style, but we weren't that poor and isolated as they are) and they've been in whatever it was until recently. That is the kind of book I always wanted to read and never encountered, especially about countries like Iraq, Iran or Liberia. Well... I'm not getting into this any deeper, but there's one thing that recently got into my head and keeps growing, probably it will be the headline of the book in a shape or another - a state can only be a totalitarian dictatorship only when even the most insignificant man who can decide on another's life is a dictator.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top