What Should You Write About?

I read an interesting article over at Write-From-Home by C. Hope Clark. She points out that a lot of writers have "day jobs" that they work in addition to building a freelance writing career. Ninety-nine percent of the time, these full-time jobs provide fodder for article ideas, so if you're currently in this type of situation, embrace the fact and use it to create a list of topic ideas you could research and write in the future. Hopefully, if you want to branch out into full-time writing, you'll be able to one day, but in the meantime take the opportunity to build up your portfolio. Here are some examples of what I'm talking about.

I've worked as a waitress, newspaper reporter, public relations consultant and assistant media planner. If I thought long and hard, I'm sure I could come up with a topic idea for each occupation. Such as:

Waitress - How wait staff and kitchen staff can peacefully co-exist.

Newspaper Reporter - How to conduct an insightful interview.

Public Relations Consultant - How to effectively pitch a great news story.

Assistant Media Planner (in an agency setting) - How to build good relationships with media reps.

And of course, being a mom. One of my first ideas that sold was an article about how to prepare your meals before bringing home a new baby. People may bring you loads of baby gifts and clothes after the birth, but they don't always remember that a home-cooked meal is always appreciated by the new parents. They are usually too tired and frazzled to properly shop for ingredients and cook dinner every night. This idea sold at least three times.

See? There's plenty of material out there, you just have to brainstorm it and put it together. Can you come up with your own list of topics based on the jobs you've worked before?

Call For Sources

I need some parents to interview for the following stories:

• How was your first postpartum doctor's visit? Did you have different types of deliveries with your children, and therefore have different follow-ups? Did you have any complications that sent you back to the OB/GYN sooner than the standard six weeks? This article is targeted at new moms' so they'll know what to expect after the delivery.
  
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• Shopping for Baby Monitors: What types of baby monitors do you recommend for new parents? How much should they expect to spend? Do you think the standard monitor is best, or should parents splurge on one of those fancy video monitors? No brand names necessary, just trying to provide readers with general guidelines. Any funny stories stemming from baby monitor use? (For example, I once heard all about the sexual exploits of a male, teenaged neighbor on mine. Hey, it was a Saturday night and I was bored! That's my excuse, anyway).
  

• Indoor Fun for Toddlers: The winter doldrums are almost here. How do you keep your toddler entertained when it's too cold outside? Do you take them to a music or play class, form playgroups, or do arts and crafts at home? Tell me all about it!
  

E-mail me at Renee(AT)FinishedPages.com with your anecdotes. These articles are for iParenting Media.

Should You Write on Spec?

For writers not familiar with this term, it basically means writing a piece for a publication without any guarantee of payment. Amy wrote an interesting post about this over at Write-From-Home, and I encourage you to take a look at it, particularly if you have ever been asked to write something in this manner.

I feel writers should ultimately be in control of the decision to write something on spec. I once queried a regional parenting publication about an article, and they responded that they liked the idea but weren't in position to pay freelancers yet. Most of the editorial was written by the editor and advertisers. She offered me the assignment if I wanted it but let me know up front that I wouldn't be paid for it. I was still trying to break into the business, so I offered to write it with the caveat that I would keep all rights to the piece, of course. She agreed.

I feel it was a wise move. I got a high-quality print clip, and sold the article at least two other times after that. Plus I felt I made a new contact in the industry. But to Amy's point, answering a blind ad that asks you to write articles that you'll be paid for, possibly, most likely won't help your career.

Use your judgment and instinct when writing something on spec. It's more important to maintain your integrity than spend a lot of time writing a piece that may or not get you a paycheck or even a usable clip.

Where To Start?

I told myself this weekend that I was going to start posting here at least once a day, but well, life and work kind of got in the way. It's Friday morning, and I should be diving into the stack of assignments on my desk, but I decided to add in a little more procrastination with my morning coffee.

I recently read a post over at Deb Ng's blog about how to break into freelancing. Wouldn't we all like to know? It's amazing how much the freelance writing industry has changed since I first jumped into it a little over two years ago. Or maybe I was just clueless and it's taken me this long to start putting the pieces together. Regardless, here are the first steps I think one needs to take before taking the plunge, so to speak:

1. Find your niche or specialty. Is there a particular topic or subject you want to write about? Does your educational or work background give you experience to help you land jobs? For me, I started out writing about parenting topics because my daughter was a toddler at the time. But I also had a background in newspaper journalism and that helped me land a position where I write about dining, traffic, profiles, and other news related events for the local newspaper. But it didn't all just fall into my lap. I had to turn in solid work, purchase a revised copy of The Associated Press Stylebook, and find good stories on my own at times. It helped me build up a reputation and it's required a consistent amount of dedication. Now I have have plenty of clips to back up my specialties whenever I apply for jobs.

2. A lot of writers are interested in blogging these days, including me. It's fun, for the most part, and it doesn't require a whole lot of time unless you're contributing to several different blogs. But before the jump into the arena, do your research. What kinds of blogs are out there? Are there any blogging jobs with that deal with your writing specialties? What are the pay ranges? But most of all, remember that the competition out there is tough and you can't expect to land the first blog gig you apply for. It might be worth a shot to create your own blog to help you build writing samples and help show you have expertise in that topic, so that you can include it in your resume and cover letters.

3.Don't get discouraged if you apply to three or four jobs or submit a few queries and don't get any bites. Like I said before, competition is fierce. I recently heard back from a few well-paying blogging jobs I applied for and found out I was number two or three on the final list. It was disheartening at first to realize I had come so close to being hired, but it's only given me more motivation to work harder. I only really started going after jobs about six months ago, and since then my workload has exploded. But I've put in the time, and other writers should expect to go through the same thing. Most of the time, writing success doesn't happen overnight.

That's all I have to say for now, but I have several new ideas for posts so I'll be back this weekend. If you have any recent success stories, I'd love to hear about them! I think it's so important to have a supportive community of writers to share successes, because there are too many snarky ones out there who can bring you down. Whatever you do, do not let one of these other writers discourage you. You could be talking virtually to a fifteen-year old teenager who knows nothing about writing and not even know it in this day and age of e-mail and instant messaging. So keep on, and persevere!

The Schizophrenic Writer

I'm wondering if this happens to other writers. Right now I've got several different assignments due and they are all on different subject matters and will run in completely different publications. I find myself having a hard time switching from one project to the next without getting a little confused.

For example, tonight I had to work on an article for Little Blue World, the Tori Amos fan magazine. They have their own style guidelines so I had to make sure the document was formatted correctly before I sent it off. Then I had to switch gears from writing about fans meeting Tori to a woman who gave birth to a baby at 21 weeks of gestation. That one's for a parenting website that has a different set of guidelines. After that, on to potty training success stories.

As I bounce between articles, sometimes I'm supposed to say ," says Smith and other times I'm supposed to write ," said Smith and I'm getting very, very tired and confused about what goes where.

The difference in word length and style guidelines for different publications really came back and bit me in the you-know-where this past month. I got an assignment for a local business publication and they require their profiles to be about 2,000 words long. I'm used to writing 1,200 words maximum for online publications and between 500 to 900 words for the Charlotte Observer. Needless to say, I fell a little short on the business profile and was scrambling around trying to come up with more words on the day it was due. Lesson learned there.

Anyone else ever have this problem? Blogging is a completely different animal too because typically posts don't have to be more than 300 words or so for a paid gig -- but, you do have to add in images most of the time. I don't know how people keep everything straight, because I know I'm struggling. And now, off to bed so I can get up and start the whole process over again tomorrow. 'Night!

What's Your "Heart" Project?

Recently, Jenna Glatzer wrote a post about what she would do with an extra hour a day to write on whatever she wanted to. She coined the term "heart project" and I thought that was very fitting.

I too have a "heart project," a fictional novel I would be typing away on if I didn't have paying assignments to complete first, a household to run and two children to care for. It's a story inspired by a tragedy that happened in my hometown when I was in high school. I have the main characters developed in my head, as well as the beginning, middle and end of the novel. I have Hollywood actors picked out to star in the movie adaptation of it. I even have a playlist on my iPod called "Renee's Novel," and I listen to it when I'm at the gym and envision scenes from the book played back in my head.

It's sad really, that it consumes so much of my life and yet I can't seem to make the time to write it. I guess I'm afraid once I get started it will completely take over my time and I won't be able to get anything else done. I'll get to it one day, I promise! It's a story that begs to be told, really.

So what's your "heart project?" What would you write if you had extra hours in the day to work on it and you didn't have deadlines to meet? I'd love to hear about them!

Inquiring Minds Want to Know: Have You Ever Used a Virtual Assistant?

So recently I blogged about virtual assistants over at Charlotte Parent. I first came across the concept while reading The Renegade Writer by Linda Formichelli and Diana Burrell. A lot of writers don't realize how time-consuming working for yourself can be, especially once your writing career takes off. I have a pile of expense receipts and pay stubs on my desk that I haven't filed. There are tons of markets I'd like to research for future queries and I just haven't had the time. I desperately need to build a good old Excel spreadsheet with a list of my sources and contact information, but I can't get to that either! Apparently there are legitimate people who will do this for you virtually for an hourly fee!

I'll admit I'm too scared to venture into this realm yet. Between my childcare expenses and coffee addiction, I'm trying my best to hold on to my earnings! I'm also afraid my stuff is so disorganized that it would take me days to sort it out enough to explain it all to an assistant! I'm interested to hear from other writers who have hired VA's. What was your experience? Would you recommend it? Was it worth the money?