In this issue:

• Freelance Bidding: The SMART Approach
• Setting Goals For Blogging Success
• Understanding the Target Audience for Writing Work
• Essential Writing Tools For The 21st Century Freelance Writer
• Avoiding Scams
• Diary Of A Working Writer March 2008

Freelance Bidding: The SMART Approach

by Sharon Hurley Hall

I write occasional guest posts for the Writing White Papers blog. After writing a post on bidding on my own blog, I began to think about how freelance writers could get smart about their bidding process. This post was the result. Here's an excerpt:

Specific

Clients aren’t always as focused when providing a brief as freelance writers would like them to be. However, that doesn’t excuse us from stating clearly what we can provide. Whether you are sending a query, making a bid or writing a proposal, be specific about what you will do for the client and how you plan to achieve it. This makes it easy to see whether you are on the same page, and will help the client to clarify the brief.

Measurable

The next question is how you and your client are going to measure success on your freelance writing project. This might involve setting milestones for completing sections of the project. If it’s a ghostwriting book project, these milestones may also correspond to payment points, so it’s in your interest to get them right. With article projects, milestones often consist of a number of articles to be delivered in a given period. For a recent 50 article project I worked on, the client wanted at least five articles every business day.

Read the rest of Freelance Bidding: The SMART Approach

Setting Goals For Blogging Success

By Sharon Hurley Hall

One thing leads to another, and I began to think about how to apply that same formula to blogging. I've written about successful blogging before, but the SMART formula made me think of some new approaches:

Setting a specific goal makes it easy to have something to shoot for, and you can still exceed it. Being specific also helps you with the second part of goal setting, which is making your goals measurable. If you can’t measure them, how will you know when you have achieved success? For example, you might want to attract a certain number of visitors to your blog, and you can use a stats program to measure when you have met that goal.

Next, your blogging goals need to be achievable and realistic. I always start my goal setting process by thinking big about what my perfect blog would look like. That’s the dreaming phase, where I think about what my ideal blog would look like. I write down my aims, and get rid of the ones that are unrealistic. Then I divide them up into short, medium and long term goals. That gives me targets to meet and realistic time frames in which to meet them. I also need to think about my own time. If I need to do something time consuming, like submitting my blog to 100 directories, I need to set that goal for a time when I can actually doing it - otherwise it isn’t achievable.

Read the rest of Setting Goals For Blogging Success

Understanding The Target Audience For Writing Work

By Dana Prince

Dana's blog is on my must-read list, because it's full of sensible advice for freelance writers. This article is just one of many examples, and if you haven't subscribed already, then maybe you should. Here's an excerpt:

When clients want an SEO article you should be writing with the intention of writing an intriguing article that will pique both the human readers as well as the search engine spider's interest so that the article will get clicks and indexed. When clients want a sales letter there's going to be a clear call to action as well as examples of why it's a great buy, ways of overcoming objections and a lot of answering questions that the reader might have. When you write copy for a website you are selling not only a product but a brand. When you write a press release you have to follow a specific formula. As you can see, not all writing assignments require the same approach.

Knowing where the projects you write will go and who the client wants to have read them will help you be a better writer. You need to know if you're writing for a "made for adsense" site versus a wiki site. You should have a clear idea of who you're writing for and what the desired result for the piece is before you get started on your first draft.

Read the rest of Understanding The Target Audience For Writing Work

Essential Writing Tools For The 21st Century Freelancer

By Sharon Hurley Hall

This is an excerpt of an article I wrote for my Garden and Hearth freelance writing site. What are the tools you can't live without?

Here are some of the tools I find most useful as a freelance writer.

Laptop
Desktop PCs were a great invention, making computer power available to everyone. But since writers often have to go out to work, having a portable model is even easier. I couldn't do without my laptop, as I can work anywhere. Most freelance writers take their laptop on holiday so that they can check their email and respond to any urgent requests.

WiFi
Where would we be without it? Whether you can find a free access point or have to pay for connection, having WiFi on your laptop or PDA means that you can connect anytime and anywhere. There are more and more access points all the time, in locations all over the world. That means that your location is no longer a barrier to making a living as a writer.

VOIP Phone
Voice over IP (VOIP) means that you can make phone calls over the internet. The calls are much cheaper and, since the advent of truly fast internet, clear and comprehensible. For the writer on the go, there's no better way to be sure of not missing a call or being able to make one. A VOIP phone and a Skype account puts you in control of communication with clients.

Read the rest of Essential Writing Tools

Avoiding Scams

By Sharon Hurley Hall

Freelance writers are always concerned about getting scammed by clients. Here's some info on some of the major scams:

1. The Free Samples Scam

The free sample scam is one of the most common. If you apply for work through a bidding site or Craigslist, then this is the one that might affect you most. I often see job postings that say that applications without a sample won’t be considered. If someone asks you to provide a sample, you might feel like you have no choice, especially if you’re new to the game.

Some ‘clients’ ask several writers for one free sample each. This is a way for them to get all the articles they want free of charge. Frankly, it stinks! If you want quality writing, then you should be prepared to pay for it.

2. The Urgent Work Scam

I’ve fallen victim to the second scam before. My bad. The client approached me via my website, gave a payscale that wasn’t great but was acceptable, and gave a time within which I would be paid. So I wrote the article. (Note to self: you KNOW better. ALWAYS ask for a deposit.) I don’t know why I broke my own rule, but I didn’t get paid for that one.

3. The Wait For Rates Scam

The third one is where clients try to persuade you to write 100 articles for $100 (or less!) with the promise that there will be more, better paid work later. Don’t hold your breath. They will move on to find someone equally gullible for the next batch of articles.

Read the rest of this article to find out how to avoid these scams.

Diary Of A Working Writer - March 2008

Nothing ever goes quite as planned, and February was no exception. I spent much of the month struggling with various ailments and trying to fit work around them. It wasn't always easy.

However, I found time to write about the joy of writing, and to add to my list of answers to freelancers' questions with posts on bidding and creating a writing business, among others.  Three of my posts on Daily Writing Tips made the most popular list for last month. One was a post on palindromes, another on the ills of MS Word and a third on writing humour.

When I was able to work, I did some projects for new clients, and I hope that they will become regulars. I'm continuing to work on courses, as well as an ebook that I plan to release in a couple of months.  Feel free to drop me a line and let me know what's been happening with you this month.