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Building your Writing Business

© Sara Webb Quest

The U.S. Bureau of Labor foretells a 28% augmentation in writing jobs by the year 2010. Professional writers work online, in print (magazines, newspapers), for advertising agencies and publishers -- and these are just a few writing jobs now available. To write professionally, you should be able to market your work. A superb way of doing so is by writing a column you are sincerely passionate about. Your column should follow one or both of two rules:

• It should be read by a large audience Online databases like Suite101.com, About.com and iVillage.com that attract some two million visitors per month are the first choices selected and displayed by search engines. Evidence of this is Suite101.com's ranking: 3,000 of all websites. So, it is a wise writer that chooses a site like this to show off his/her column and article writing skills.
• It should pay well In the July 2003 issue of Writer's Digest Robert W. Bly, a high-income writer wrote an article on "10 Ways to a Six-Figure Income." I was amazed at how easy it was to pull in the bucks for doing what you love. Basically, he tells writers to decide how much money per hour our time is worth. (He decided on 35-50 dollars per hour) It is crucial to target high-paying markets like Fortune-500 companies, develop our productivity by using email and telephone instead of in-person meetings wherever possible, and take advantage of royalty-producing projects.

Yours truly came away from the article with a financial plan. After browsing the local grocery store lobby's free publications and taking home a parenting newspaper, I email-queried Rabideau Publications, who was in charge of the paper and three local magazines. The name of the newspaper is Cape Cod Parent and Child. As it turns out, I have just completed my third "Off the Shelf" book column for Cape Cod Parent and Child. While the column only pays fifty dollars a piece, I have this column for Suite101.com to publicize it.

So, your name is out there and you're making money ...

Now that you've shown your talent off, ask that local editor for more assignments. Because of the Rabideau affiliation, I now have an upcoming feature-article assignment that will earn 300 dollars for 1800 words, for their sister publication, Cape Cod Magazine. This translates to about 38 dollars per hour.

And, recently the free writing newsletter I receive - writersweekly.com -- offered an article on high-paying educational markets, complete with submission links, from which my humble tutoring experience for tutor.com (any writer can apply here) will gain me a job for.

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