This exactly, Randy. If you show up always with your hand out, you will be ignored. If you share with your writing friends — and they are friends, not competition — you stand a better chance of someone remembering your background and sending something along to you in case it fits.

This is an ages-old problem. I’ve had people asking me endlessly for work as far back as 2003 when I first started freelancing. I’d love to say I see less of it these days, but you well know that the freelance beggar is alive and in our emails and social media feeds just as often now as then.

She did. And I can tell you from personal experience, it’s what I did, too. She kept digging for work. She didn’t reach out to three people and sit back and wait. She’s also not one to do this. She reached out to former clients, clients who were currently not handing her a project, and existing clients who might need one more thing.

You can also try reaching out and asking if they know anyone who needs some help. I managed to get a few clients that way over the years.

The biggest thing I can recommend is that you always market. Always. If you need help on how to do that, look on this blog for the Marketing tags.

Make sure you’re looking months out at what work is headed your way. If you don’t see anything, act now. The more you have on your desk, the better it will be when there is a lull in your workload.

Maybe we need to treat every potential contact as whether or not they’re worthy of the extra stamp, what do you think?

Oh, I’d never compete like that with work. Treat me like a pro, not like a contestant. You were so smart to suggest they shop that elsewhere. It’s the lack of follow through that’s killing these writers’ careers. It’s a shame because it’s an easier fix than they’re willing to take.

Not long ago I had a lengthy chat with a semi-established freelancer. Only one client, and they were having issues with the editor there encouraging different writers to cover the same things, then publishing whichever one came in first. I pointed out that’s not a very professional client. The writer had a solid idea, so I suggested sending a query one an editor I know would at least consider it, and even if the editor couldn’t use it they would encourage the writer to send more ideas. You guessed it. The writer never queried the editor.

It’s bad enough when beginners back out on contacting editors or clients they don’t know. But when someone offers an introduction and you still can’t be bothered to send in an idea, that’s just sad.