I was talking to an editor friend of mine today who was gnashing her teeth over a story that had been submitted to her. It was a Q&A piece and it just wasn't working. "The answers are just not quite right," she said to me. "No," I said to her. "The questions...
These five tips are gleaned from a conference panel I did with Valerie Khoo and Kerri Sackville called 'How to use your blog to get paid writing opportunities'. This is a summary of our five key points on how to find writing work beyond your blog. Hope you find it...
If there's one thing I've never really managed to master with the whole freelance writing gig, it's the waves. The work comes in waves. It's either drought or tsunami. Similarly, the income comes in waves - drought or tsunami (okay, perhaps more drought or trickle,...
I received an email from a friend yesterday. She had pitched a story to a magazine and received a 'thanks, but no thanks'. It had knocked the wind out of her sails but she was, she wrote, beginning to feel ready to try again. She wanted to know how to deal with...
Never underestimate the importance of contacts in freelance writing. I'm working on a feature at the moment, and nothing is going right. The experts that I have called are not calling me back. The time frame that's been allocated is simply not enough. I'm fast running...
One of the biggest questions that new freelance writers have is all about case studies. How to find them. What to ask them. (Yes, that's more than one question, but you get the idea.) So I've written a post to address the vexing question of case studies. I've spent...
There are two questions I'm asked most often when people find out I am a freelance writer: 1) Where do your ideas come from? and 2) Do you come up with the ideas or do they tell you what to write? Clever observers playing along at home will note that this is actually...
Part of my series of freelance writing tips. Last month, I sent a pitch for what I considered to be a fabulous and timely feature to the relevant editor at a major women's mag. One with whom I'd worked successfully before. One that I thought was just the right contact...
Part #5 of my freelance writing tips series. Despite my best intentions, I did nothing useful today. I made a few phone calls, collated a few notes, sent a few emails. Anything but face the freelance article that needed writing. It sat there, looming large, dark,...
