This is actually a field I’m looking to break into myself, so A) this is not a how to article, and B) I would love –LOVE!–to hear your experience in the field.  What this article will be, however, is a bit of a compendium of all my research here to date.

So first, I wanted to figure out where to find info for magazine submissions.  If theres a particular website you want to write for, often they’ll have a submissions page somewhere on their site.  If, however, you’re more like me and starting to look into the field in general, some really good resources I’ve come across have been magazines like the Writer, which not only has a Market Focus section that highlights a particular writing outlet, but also several pages of market classifieds that list magazines and other media currently looking for submissions.  Also, I found the WritersWeekly.com forum that lists magazines looking for submissions and seems pretty up to date–that so far has been my most useful link; I’ve found the most places I want to submit to on there. Additionally, the place that first turned me on to the idea of writing for magazines was Freelance Writing Jobs Monday Markets. Continue Reading

A few weeks ago I wrote about lawsuits against bloggers, and it’s something that admittedly terrifies me, so I want to discuss a few more lawsuits that have been brought against bloggers.

As a blogger, I know that I am only as good as my reputation.  Knowing this, I guard it well, and anything I don’t want associated for the rest of my life with my name–whether its controversial or just silly and embarassing–it goes under a pseudonym or the almighty Anonymous.  So I can understand the importance of anonymity and protecting your name. Continue Reading

Find More Work:

1.  Content Mills (Demand Studios, Bright Hubs)

2.  Magazines –most magazines work largely on freelance pitches, so if there’s a magazine you love, chances are you know what they’re looking for and can write effectively for them.

3.  Newspapers –OMG! YES, it’s true, magazines are folding, jobs aren’t secure, there’s less money, blah blah blah.  They still need writers.  Especially to flesh out online content which is where many are starting to focus resources.

4.  Classifieds  — Lots of writers magazines, like Writer’s Digest and The Writer often have pages full of classified ads which publish guidelines for all kinds of writing opportunities (that typically pay MUCH better than online work) that are currently seeking submission.  Hit your local B&N and cruise the magazine section.

Save More Money:

5.  Buy Refurbished — Do you need a new laptop?  Dell offers Continue Reading

Nacie wrote a great post on getting back to what you love.  My favorite part?  “Getting in touch with and being able to clearly identify what you really love can help you understand who you really are.”  Not only do I totally get what she’s saying (whenever I’m totally stuck writing I go back and read all my hundred-something notebooks from grade school on up because it reminds me of everything I desperately love about writing), but it also makes me think about the things I love DOING.

A few weeks ago I had a conversation with a friend of mine about how work should be 70% of your life, what you love should be 20% (passion projects, she said), and 10% should be free time.  I looked at her blankly, then told her that I didn’t know why your passions shouldn’t be EVERYTHING to you.  To me my fiction writing is super important, and I do the freelance writing to pay bills.  But I picked freelance writing because its flexible enough to give me the time to write. Continue Reading

As freelance writers with some experience, I think Karen, Nacie and I have all experienced the drying up of wells.  Whether its because a blog goes under, you run out of motivation to write articles for content mills, or your contract with a client ends, as a freelance writer, you’re subject to all kinds of fluctuations that alter your income that have nothing to do with “losing a job” or “being fired”.  That’s a threat unto itself, of course, but not what I’m talking about today.

The point is that everyone should consider their writing income and portfolio to be as diverse as possible, and this is important for a multitude of reasons.  First, as I’ve mentioned, the freelance writing world is wildly fluctuating and constantly changing, so you can’t always assume that your income will always be there.  Second, I mentioned “motivation”, something that’s close to “inspiration” in my mind.  Sometimes writing about the same subjects, particularly when we can inject little of ourselves into the writing, can be really draining to creative energy, and its important to realize that most likely, you won’t be able to sustain that kind of writing for a long time. To a writer, inspiration is everything.

The Basics. Continue Reading

As bloggers, we’re all pretty wary.  We’re wary of job ads, like Karen wrote about last week, we’re wary of spammers, hackers, and every virus and scam from Trojans to Nigerian Western Union emails.  But what about lawsuits?

The blogosphere seems to be, in many respects, a place where just about anyone can shoot their mouth off at any given time about any given subject.  It can range from entertaining (like Bethenny from RH blogging about the NJ Housewives) to informative (obviously we’re all interested in freelancing industry blogs) to pretty much anything in between or beyond.  With no more than a quick visit to WordPress and a few clicks of the mouse, anyone can have their very own forum for self promotion, self indulgence, and ranting, and no one can say otherwise.

For this online world, we find legitimacy in popularity; the most popular are given creedence and are considered reliable and trustworthy.  Reputation stands on the line, and that’s the only thing to keep anyone in check.  Until now, of course. Continue Reading

In all walks of life, it’s so unbelievably true; I’ve encountered it in many different forms, and I’m sure you have too.  You get started on something, and at first, it’s thrilling.  There’s a new relationship, a new goal, a new dream, and you’re taking those first shiny steps in a new direction.  Yet as you walk down the road, the novelty wears off, and the road, which seemed easy to travel with your boundless energy, now seems epically long.  All you can see is road ahead of you and road behind, and you don’t know whether you’re even still in the right place.

This is the unforgiving minute.  It’s that time when you look around you, and all you see is doubts, questions, and difficulties.  It’s that time when you look at your relationship and wonder where this is going; are they the one?  You look at your work and say, is this what I want to do with my life?  And you look at your life and say, I’ve done all this work, but will I ever have results that I’m proud of?

It’s that time when you look at all the space behind you, and the space left to go, and feel yourself thoroughly stuck in the middle. Continue Reading

As writers, we should all be constantly looking for ways to improve our skills, but during the summer, you’re more likely to be taking vacations, time off, and spending time with the kids and the family.  The freelancing life is best geared toward people with a lot going on in their lives (flexible hours, yay!) and the summer is the time when that takes the forefront. Continue Reading

Karen wrote a really interesting article this week about Time Management, outlining what’s important, urgent, both, or neither.  It got me thinking though, because a lot of the time, I feel like my personal time management gets so much more complicated than that.

For example, I’m terrible in the mornings, I don’t like other people (that I vaguely pay attention to, like family, friends, etc) to be around me, but I like background noise (so coffeeshops and libraries are good), and in the afternoons, I can power through for about three hours without raising my head, but at other times in the day it’s about 20 minutes before my attention span is up and I have to check Facebook, Twitter, or play me some Lexulous. Continue Reading

We work from home, coffeeshops, moving vehicles, or soccer practices.  We are masters at canceling out noise and distraction, feeding off the kinetic energy around us and channeling it into productivity.

But you know what, even we need a break!  We need to own it; even people that work 9-5 in offices aren’t working the ENTIRE time.  Our minds need a few minutes to take in some oxygen and recoup before diving into the fray again.  For those of us that don’t smoke or drink coffee (classic procrastination tools!), here’s a little list of distractions that I dearly love. Continue Reading