Here’s what I love about Sharon Hurley Hall — everything. Sharon is the brains behind Get Paid to Write Online, a terrific blog devoted to online writing advice. She’s also a warm, vibrant soul who shares openly her experiences and helps others improve what they’re doing. She shares good advice no matter who offers it,…
Writers Worth
Writers Worth: Ending the Waiting Game
About seven months ago, I had a conversation with a potential client. At the time, he and I were talking not just price but also project length, time frame, and duration. It’s a long-term, ongoing arrangement, so I was about to see my workload double, possibly triple. That takes some serious rearranging of the work…
Writers Worth: Content Mills, Desperation, and More Effective Freelance Marketing
On Content Mills, Desperation, and More Effective Freelance Marketing [Audio Post] by Jenn Mattern Content mills have been a pet peeve of mine for a long time. I went after them harder than most for years, and for good reason. They target both new and desperate writers and they have a tendency to twist the…
Writers Worth: Taking Tough Love
We’ve had a lot of encouraging posts so far this Writers Worth Month. How about we look at something you need just as badly? Tough love. I’ve never been a person who enjoys giving criticism. I look for it whenever I know it’s constructive and given with the right intention. Still, it’s really tough to…
Writers Worth: What’s the Actual Rate?
Once upon a time, I had a simple idea — Writers Worth Day. Soon, the interest was such that I stretched it to a week. Good, right? Not so, according to freelance writer and friend Paula Hendrickson. Paula suggested (and kept suggesting) that I expand the event to a month. Eventually, I caved. She’s very…
Writers Worth: A Work in Progress
There’s this quiet little success story happening right in front of us every day. Her name is Cathy Miller. Cathy is a former corporate communications wonk who did what every 9-to-5 slave dreams of doing — she chucked a lucrative, soul-sucking career mid-meeting and went into full-time freelancing. In 2008, right when the recession hit…
Writers Worth: My A-Ha Moment
What I love about Writers Worth Month is the various ways in which writers interpret worth and value. Ashley and Anne have taken the them and given us two very different twists. I think what stuck with me in both posts is these ladies had somewhat of an a-ha moment — that instance where they…
Writers Worth: Think You Don’t Do Enough?
One of the first people, if not the first, I met when I started freelancing was Anne Wayman. Back then, Anne was the freelance writing guru at About.com. Since that time, she’s morphed her business into a successful standalone blog and now a supportive forum I was proud to help establish — About Writing Squared….
Writers Worth: Where Your Value Lies
I was on a business trip recently when something kind of incredible happened. Well, let’s say incredible and incredulous — there was both going on. I was walking through the exhibit hall when I realized I was standing in front of the booth of a former client prospect. I say former because this was a…
Writers Worth: Finding Your Ideal Client
When she showed up on this blog and on others a number of years back, Ashley Festa showed great promise. Here was a bright, energetic writer who was asking the smart questions. She was new to everything — freelance writing, post-college life, careers and such. She was confused, but she asked questions that showed she’d…