How to Make Money Selling Your Writing Online

Many people dream of developing a writing career, but they have no idea where to even begin. Some people believe that the only way to become a writer is to go to college and land a job with a publication company or to personally write a book.  While writing a book is a great way to get started in your career, there are other ways to get started and build your career online. You can start writing in the comfort of your own home and fine tune your writing skills for writing a book. However, some people find they prefer to simply write for others without the stress of trying to get published. Whatever you are looking for, there are ways you can get started today, without a degree and without any previous experience.

Start Your Writing Career by Using Freelance sites

There are many sites online that offer a service to match freelance writers up with buyers. These buyers are often looking for ghostwriters to write content and sell all the rights to the written work. The writing that is purchased is referred to as an article. You can find a wide variety of these sites online, some offer their services free to the providers and others charge a fee for you to sign up. Getting started requires very little effort. Refer to the following checklist of things you will need to do before searching for jobs:

The first step is to setup an account on the freelance site of your choice. You will want to consider the number of times you are allowed to bid on jobs on these sites. Some sites will allow a free account but you are limited on the number and type of projects you can bid on. Most people sign up for free to test the site and then upgrade to a paid account after testing the site.

In most cases, you will need to create a profile to tell buyers what experience you have and the type of writing you can do. You can also list how much you charge per hour or per article. Some people charge by the article and some charge by the word. It is simply a matter of preference.

You will also need to create sample articles so the buyers will have a good idea of your style and technique. You may want to create a few articles in different styles. You should consider a comedic style, sales style, informative style, and a persuasive style article for your portfolio.

Payment is another issue to consider. Some sites offer an escrow account that you can request money from. However, most people prefer to use Pay Pal and receive a debit card to access the money.

What Sites Are Available

There are many sites on the Internet. They are based in several different countries and each has different rules and regulations. Make sure you check each site out thoroughly before giving out any personal information. Consider the following sites in your search.

I Freelance – www.ifreelance.com – I Freelance allows you to sign up for less than five dollars a month and place as many bids as you like each month.

Get A Freelancer – www.getafreelancer.com – With Get A Freelancer, you can join for free and bid on a limited number of projects or upgrade to a paid account and receive many more bids. There are hundreds of new projects listed every day.

Constant Content – http://www.constant-content.com/ – Constant content allows you to upload your articles that are for sale and allow buyers to search through them. The site is in essence a showcase you can use to display your work. It doesn’t cost anything to upload your articles, but you are not guaranteed they will sell.

What Type of Articles Can You Write?

Writing Articles For Article Submission Sites – Many companies and website owners purchase content or articles from freelance writers. These articles are then submitted to article directories such as Ezines. The owner of the articles uses them to place links back to their website.

Writing Articles For Web Page Content – Website owners often have problems with developing well-written content. Some web owners also want o purchase content that is search engine optimized. This means that the content uses a certain percentage of keywords to boost search engine ranking.

Writing Blogs – Many blog owners use their blog to sell products or services. They use freelance writers to develop fresh content that attracts visitors to the page. These are usually very informal articles.

Sell Your Writing Independently

You also have the option as a freelance writer to sell your work directly to a buyer. You can offer your services to online or print publications or to article buyers similar to those on freelance sites. Some people hire freelance writers to write a book or manuscript. These people have a specific idea of what they want written, but often do not have the skills to put their idea into print. There are many ways that you can go about offering your services to a buyer directly.  Consider the following:

You can build your own website to offer your services to potential buyers. You can then advertise your site in online classifieds or local newspapers.

Apply with online publications. Many online magazine or news sites offer an application process to see if you qualify by their standards to write. If you qualify, these sites will offer topics that they need articles written on.

Many people who want to hire writers will list ads on classified sites like Craigslist. You may want to check these sites for any open jobs.

Avoiding Scams

As a freelance writer, you will have to keep an eye out for people who are looking to run a scam. These people will often seem like they are legitimate business people. However, they will want you to write a large amount of articles and send them as you finish them. Once you have completed the project, these people disappear along with your payment for the job. The best thing to do in this situation is complete the project in stages and require payment as you go along. If you are using a freelance site, you can require that the buyer place the money in escrow. This can protect you as the money must stay there until both people agree it goes back to the buyer or the buyer releases the payment.

Tips to Build Your Writing Career

While ghost writing can be a great way to make money and develop your skills, it does not allow you the opportunity to build your portfolio. You will not retain the rights to any of your work, and you cannot offer it as samples to receive other jobs.

However, if you want to build your portfolio, there are ways to put your work on the internet and take credit for it. Many sites like Wiki and Ezines allow you to publish your articles for free. You can offer a link with your articles so that a buyer can contact you if they are interested in purchasing more of your work.

With these sites, you will most likely get paid for your work, and you will receive exposure to help build you career. However, some sites do offer the opportunity to post your articles and if they are placed on the site, you get paid. If you have built a website to offer your services, many sites will allow you to place the url within your article to help draw traffic.

How to Self Publish Your Work

If you are considering writing a book, you might think about self-publishing. You can often save quite a bit of money on the publishing fees and retain more of the sales price for your book. You will also retain full rights to editing and making changes on your book. If you go through a publishing house, you will generally only receive a percentage of the sales price and the publishing house will be able to make whatever changes they feel are necessary. When you self publish, you can go through a printing service to have your books made. There are drawbacks to self-publishing as well. Consider the fact that when you go through a publishing company, you will be able to draw on their knowledge of what the company suggests you should do along the way. Unless you have self published a book, understanding the process can be confusing and frustrating.

You may also consider publishing your manuscript in e-book form. With this process, you save your book in pdf form and sell it online. You can develop your own site to sell the book or you can use the services of an online e-book seller. These sellers will charge a fee to sell your book, but it is often much less than the cost of publishing a book in print.

A Final Note

Writing is truly one of the best forms of self-expression.  For those that get paid to do it daily as a career, they are usually happy and content knowing they have found their niche in life.  Opportunities exist for writing and it can prove to be a very lucrative business.  The key to writing for money is complete quality works, with minimal errors.  This is especially important if you are writing for someone else.  No one wants to have to edit every sentence they read.  While it’s not required, a college level writing class is a good place to polish your writing skills before you attempt to write for profit.

Writing is not for everyone.  However, for those who enjoy it, it can fulfill a life long ambition, as well as help you put money in the bank.