5 Mistakes that are Killing Your Freelance Writing Biz

When it’s July, my calendar is pretty light. I get to concentrate on marketing, networking, and improving my business.

I get to see a lot when I’m out there on social media. Plenty of it is good.

Plenty of it sucks, too.

I’m not necessarily a judgmental person. I screw up just as much as anyone else. But when I see things that are speaking volumes about how bad someone is at marketing, networking and yes, even writing, I can’t help myself.

[bctt tweet=”If you put your #freelancewriting shingle up, you’d better know how to write.” username=”LoriWidmer”]

Let’s just say that’s mistake #1. And honey, it’s a big one.

A fellow writer called me yesterday about that very thing — she’d seen a LinkedIn profile that had me more than a little concerned. In fact, my concern wasn’t for the person’s writing ability, but for their mental health. I’m serious. The writing was poor, which is a problem in itself if you’re billing yourself as a writer. But the claims went from “huh?” to outright lies. There’s no way I’m buying that this person, who clearly is not able to write coherent sentences, was the publicist and scriptwriter for two household-name stars and scores of music.

That brings me to mistake #2:

[bctt tweet=”Lying about your #freelancewriting background will backfire. Always.” username=”LoriWidmer”]

As we talked, my friend went over a recent incident where she was asked to help someone “boilerplate” his resume — so that he could drop in experience he didn’t have. She told him, repeatedly, that he didn’t have the experience, so he couldn’t say he did. He got upset and quit working with her.

And if she’d written that resume, complete with falsified info, whom do we think would get blamed for it when he got fired for lying? And you know he’d get fired because companies don’t get all warm and fuzzy over working with liars. And her friend was getting advice from a hiring manager on what they were looking for, so he was certainly getting the attention of the right people.

And that’s where mistake #3 comes in:

[bctt tweet=”If you’re marketing to the wrong people, your #freelancewriting business will suffer.” username=”LoriWidmer”]

I see it on Twitter — using the wrong hashtags to ask for work. Two things wrong with that, the smaller of which is you’re on Twitter asking for work constantly. But too many writers are using the #freelancewriting and #freelancer hashtags to ask for the job. So tell me, who sees that? You, me, other writers. Typically, prospective clients are paying attention to hashtags in their own area of focus. That’s what writers should be doing, too — using hashtags to reach the people in a position to hire them.

But even marketing to prospects on social media requires more than just saying how great you are.

And that’s mistake #4:

[bctt tweet=”If you’re referencing your own #freelancewriting blog, you’re not helping anyone but yourself.” username=”LoriWidmer”]

I’ve seen this done by just a few people, thankfully. One guy I had to block eventually because he was incessant in his “look at what I just wrote!” BS. Feign you give a shit, slap your link in front of everyone, and think no one notices the blatant self-promotion isn’t marketing — and everyone notices the blatant self-promotion part. I’ve seen a few writers go out of their way to make it sound like they’re about to give you the most incredible secret to freelance writing success… and it’s one “Duh” statement that they take five paragraphs to build up to. All for traffic, all for Google juice. No, thank you. Please go away.

And it speaks to a larger issue, which is mistake #5:

[bctt tweet=”Your #freelancewriting audience knows when you’re being authentic and when you’re faking it.” username=”LoriWidmer”]

I had a wonderful compliment the other day. A fellow writer told me my blog voice was distinct and not like other writer blogs that “all sound the same” and talk about the same warmed-over topics. Yea, there’s only so much you can say about freelancing, and we do tend to repeat topics, but when you’re rotating things out with different titles and reworking articles to make them sound new, maybe it’s best not to write something that day, you know? I’ve been known to cover the same topic here (hence the tags on the right there), but damn, people. Make it fresh, would you? And quit trying to be everyone’s best friend. Particularly people who make money from their customers, you need to be extra-careful. No one needs the impression that you care until the check clears.

Writers, what mistakes have you seen that could sink a freelance career before it starts? Share your worst.