It’s now 2014. That means it is a new year and a new start for everyone wanting to get their freelance writing career speeding along. For the new freelance writer, getting started is more than half of the battle. Luckily, once you get started you can easily build on the initial foundation.
Probably the top issue that faces most new freelance writers is one of time. We live in a hectic world and I know that you have a lot of responsibilities. Most people starting out as a freelance writer either has a job or they have recently lost a job and are in desperate need of an income as quickly as possible. While this article is directed to those working full-time, anyone can benefit from the information.
Your day is probably divided into working, taking care of family and household chores. Because of this you probably fall into the huge category of people who want to write professionally but keep putting it off because there is a stack of dishes to wash and baskets of laundry to fold. What if I told you that you could get a freelance writing career started in as little as an hour a week?
This is really very simple and brings very fast rewards: Tap into online writing sites but do so on a limited basis. You will be able to get your writing career started without a huge time commitment.
I have reviewed a large number of companies that are great for the freelance writer that is just starting out. These sites allow you to work when you want and build up that ever important first group of samples. As with many careers, to be hired to write you have to have been published. Unfortunately you can’t become published until someone hires you. This is easily solved through the online writing sites. You get money, a byline and samples. It’s the perfect solution for the new writer.
I understand that you are very busy so here is how it works. You find a small block of time on a day off or maybe it’s after the kids have gone to bed or the hour before you leave for work. Just find a few minutes, no more than half an hour at a time and often no more than 5 minutes. Log into the site or sites of your choice and locate a single article to write. Write the article; submit it and you are done.
Of the companies I have reviewed, some work better at this than others. Here is the breakdown of how this trick will work on several of the best sites:
Scripted
Scripted is a great site for this technique. Take 5 minutes a day to log into the site, just to see what new jobs are available. If you see one that you like, write a quick pitch to it. That’s it, you are done. If the pitch is accepted you will have a week to write it. Don’t worry; you will be notified when the pitch is accepted. Additionally, you will be checking in on the site nightly so you will see it on your dashboard anyway. The only downside here is that you rarely get a byline. In exchange you get experience and higher pay.
Demand Media
This is probably one of the overall best sites for this technique because you get paid and you get a byline. Demand Media, though the website functions differently overall, you can use almost the same approach here that you used above if you want. The difference here is that the article titles are already set up and once you claim a title you can write it immediately or you have up to a week to get it written. Log into the site, find an article title that you want and then claim it. Claim as many as you like up to the maximum allowed in your queue. You can do this in just a couple of minutes and then write the article immediately or block out some time to write the article later.
Yahoo Voices
If you are looking for a place to write whatever you want in a relaxed manner, Yahoo Voices is a great place to start with. There is no need to log into the site and find a topic or anything like that. Just write the article of your choosing and submit it. That’s it and you are done. However I would suggest that you look at Facebook, Google or any other site that lists trending topics. This will tell you what is hot right now. This is important because most articles on Yahoo Voices generate their income based on page views. You can submit your Yahoo Voices articles for payment and this is often successful. Then you get both an upfront payment as well as residual payments. The time to write the article as well as logging into the system and uploading it is easily less than an hour a week for a great sample that is targeted to the topics of your choosing.
Examiner
Examiner is a great site for the freelance writer who wants to get started but has limited time. Once you have a topic area you only have to write a single article per month. Obviously it’s better to write more frequently and you can publish as often as you like. Because these articles can be as log or as short as you choose, you can easily write one per week. You are paid based on how many people read the article which doesn’t typically amount to much for someone with severe time constraints but the big bonus here is that it is a very popular site and a great way to begin building a brand under your byline.
Helium
Helium is one of my favorite sites for the beginning writer that is short on time. This site has a great variety of options so the first time you visit you might want to allocate all of your time on just looking the site over. After you do that, you can find a topic that interests you and write pretty much whatever you like. You can also visit the marketplace and apply to write higher value jobs. Either way you will have a byline and sample to use for other jobs.
HubPages
Hubpages is an easy to write for site that gets a lot of traffic, and allows you to write what you want, when you want. After you set up your hubs on here you can write on any topic you like. This makes for some samples as well as a tremendous amount of exposure. There is an additional bonus here in that this is a really fun place to write for so you might actually need to watch the clock because you might find yourself spending a lot more time here than you initially intended.
Those are some of the best sites for new freelance writers that are pressed for time. The primary goal here is for you to get into the habit of writing, collect some nice samples that show off your writing skills and to get you out of the rut you are in whenever you claim that you don’t have the time to write. With all of these you will have the best luck if you skew your writing to things that are trending through Google searches. This will cause your articles to rank high in Google searches and lead to the most exposure possible.
This list is in no way intended to suggest that these are the only sites where you can work when short on time. Online writing sites are often designed to allow writers to write occasionally. Because of this you can normally use this trick with any online writing site. Once you get used to using a site, you can normally find new jobs, submit pitches and otherwise keep updated in only 5-10 minutes every couple of days. The actual writing of articles will take longer and that is based largely on fast you can craft the article.
I shouldn’t have to say this but if you are very new and haven’t read many of the articles here you need to know this: create a writers website for yourself. Most of the sites listed above will have a place to link to your own website and it’s not unusual for clients to contact you if they like your work. This is an important part of life for a freelance writer, even one working on a part time basis.
Happy Writing!
