Misconception about Freelance writing beaware of it
In this article we will discuss many of the misconceptions about freelance writing that dominate the online writing industry thanks to self styled gurus who are making a buck off of you by giving you misleading advice –
Myth 1 — You can make a living right away as a freelance writer on the Internet.
Sometimes the only way you can get your first job if you are a beginner on Elance is to simply do one practically for next to nothing. It seems that once you get that first positive feedback it is much easier to clients after that. I would recommend bidding on a shorter project for cheap at first and try and do a really good job on it. This way you will establish a “positive feedback” rating very quick and that way your business will “take off” faster. After that you can gradually increase your rates as your feedback grows better and better.
If you are building your own site it can also take three weeks to six months for your site URL to be situated in the search engines so that people can find you. This is why it is not advisable to quit your day job the minute you decide to become a freelance writer online.
If you do happen to be hired by one of the many telecommuting type companies on the Internet keep in mind that many of them take sixty to ninety days to offer you a pay check and that most of these companies, such as workaholcis.com will not advance you the 50% that you should get for most jobs.
The reason you are paid so late if you work for an agency online is because they have already taken the 50% and invested it in their own company and believe the writer should be paid last. As a rule of thumb it is a bad idea to finance clients in this manner and you should avoid it at all costs as it is not cost effective for you to be financing a big conglomerate while you wait to be paid.
Self publishing companies that resell content are even worse – sometimes handing out royalty payments for your self-published books in quarterly or biannual payments. So if you want to make money fast, these sites are not necessarily a solution for you.
Myth 2 –You need to be a good writer to make money online.
The truth is that good writers make less money online than writers who do sacrifice a bit of quality for speed. Good writers have the luxury to spend more time on a piece and that is why it is better. If you do that as an online writer, you will probably lose the client who is pestering you for the product “yesterday.”
It is not talent that is appreciated on the Internet – it is expediency. Also the lower amount of money that you charge the more money you are likely to make as your customers come back to you again and again because you are cheap and efficient. The actual quality of the writing sometimes doesn’t matter and given the general illiteracy of Americans in general most of your customers wouldn’t know bad grammar if they tripped over it.
There are many writing gurus out there who recommend that you price yourself in the thousands for a single sales letter. Unfortunately those days are long over and if you are able to charge that it is doubtful you would be looking for work online. You would be so overpriced that nobody could afford you. Of course writers on elance charge people this kind of money all the time but they also get chosen as the winning bidder less than bidders who charge slightly less.
Myth 3 –You need a website to make money as a writer online.
Building a website is usually a waste of time unless you want a fancy cyber business card glimmering onscreen for you to see. The fact is that a URL is nice but it is not necessary. The reason you don’t really need a website to make money as a writer online is because most auction bidding sites for writers allow you to build a profile of yourself right within your site. The benefit of this is that your page ends up in the search engines faster than it would if you spent a lot of time submitting your own site.
If you have described yourself appropriately on sites like Elance and Guru then chances are you will have more than enough work to keep you busy.
Myth 4 – Being an online freelance writer will free up your time.
Being an online freelance writer will only free up your time if you are not willing to do much work. Then you will have all the free time on your hands that you can handle.
However if you want to make money, then you need to put in as many hours as possible into the actual bidding, pitching, self-promoting and writing part of your job. Remember that the more projects that you turn over, the richer you will be.
Also keep in mind that this is a lifestyle that is fraught with deadlines. It does not allow personal space for sleeping in, illness, hangovers or personal problems anymore than other jobs. In fact if you are habitually late with deadlines you will probably lose credibility as a writer.If you want to swing towards the affiliate marketing side of online writing than you literately can be lazy because you make money even while you sleep! Your affiliate links are always online and your affiliate advertisements will always be running on auto-pilot 24/7/365. However affiliate marketing takes more time starting off and the reward of wealth and laziness comes later down the road once your affiliate business becomes successful.
Myth 5 – Finding your niche will make you rich.
This might work for other business sectors in the Internet but the worst thing you could do as a freelance writer is specialize in just one type of writing. This is because a) the market is glutted with people already doing this and 2) you can’t make a living doing just one type of writing.
In order to make an income that is more than four figures your key is to diversify and be able to provide your clients with as many different types of writing as you can handle.Of course having a specialty can sometimes pay off for you. Just make sure your specialty is in demand. For instance last year it was ebooks. The year before it was Google Adwords (still kind of is). This year it is blogs and ebooks. Next year I predict it will be blogs that are written by fictional characters as well as ebooks.
Myth 6 – Giving 110% reaps you great rewards when it comes to online freelance writing.
Giving 110% is recommended in most situations in life but not when it comes to writing. Usually giving 110% gives you nothing more than bad eyes and a bad case of carpal tunnel syndrome.
Make sure you are paid for an honest day’s work and don’t take on more than you can handle to get a pat on the head from a client or a buyer. Unfortunately when it comes to writing for a living online, all “working your ass off” does is create a reputation about what a bargain you are and only bring you more clients that will expect you to do quite a bit for very little money. This is not the type of precedent that you want to set when the going rate for a page of writing is already ten bucks a page or less!
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