If you use a bidding site or really any other method of finding an online writing job, sooner or later you are going to get a message from a potential client that says something to the effect “Congratulations, you have made it onto our short list!”.

This is kind of exciting, but you don’t have that job yet. What should you do in order to secure it? And more importantly, what shouldn’t you do? Here are some of my thoughts on some of the common proposals that a prospective client will sometimes make when it comes to negotiating the terms.

Writing a few samples

This is a very, very tricky situation, particularly for the new writer. If you look around at some other writing blogs and websites, you will probably see that the vast majority of writers discourage writing anything free of charge, particularly to land a job (Sharon Hurley Hall is particularly against this idea and has been ever since I started reading what she had to say about the business two years ago).

As usual, though, I find my practical ideas of business at odds with the ideal proposed by other writers.

While I haven’t written a sample article on spec in a long time, I am sure that doing so helped me land my first few online writing jobs. Again, I would go against the common advice in order to grow a business). Still, this won’t work for everyone, here are some quick points to consider before writing on spec:

• Don’t do it if they are asking for too many words. A spec article should only be around 350 words.
• Keep the article even if you don’t hear from the prospect ever again. Chances are you can use it as a sample and may even sell it on another project.
• Make sure that the spec article will count towards the total article number if you do land the job.

Negotiating Price

Another common theme for prospective clients who have you on a short list is the prices that you charge. I absolutely hate this, because I feel like for the most part all writers are underpaid anyway and no one should be asking them to work any cheaper.

Still, one of the problems of the business is stiff competition, and if a potential client sees your prices are higher than another bidder he or she will try and work you down a bit.

Again, your decision here will depend on where you are at with your career. If you have steady work lined up, there’s no need to dicker on your price and you can afford to be firm.

This doesn’t mean that you have to lose the job though; I have had several clients accept my price after I assure them of and proved, the quality of my work and my generally reliable timelines (unfortunately that has changed a bit since the third child, we are always sick or the computer is breaking or something).

The bottom line

As with so many decisions you will make in your attempt to find an online writing job, the decision about negotiating for that job will depend on where you are at as far as income and experience. New writers looking to break in often cannot afford the same lofty principles as those who have been doing it for a while, but taking some lumps in the beginning will mean that you can be more firm later on.

In various articles on this site, I’ve talked about ways in which you can find freelance jobs writing online. Most of the time I am talking about landing freelance work on bidding sites, where I make the bulk of my money.

In another article I outlined some specific client feedback I have received on those sites as to why they selected my bid over others; in this article I will use the same approach but in regards to some of the other ways I have landed online writing jobs.

The Cold Call

This is actually the freelance job finding technique that I hate the most. I don’t like to submit my name to anyone who has the chance to reject me and I really, really hate callbacks when I haven’t heard from someone. It feels pushy.

Still, according to at least two repeat clients, persistence paid off. Every time I come across a site on the web that has fairly obvious mistakes in spelling and grammar, or just suffers from poor writing in general, I look for the “Contact Us” button and explain in a letter what it is I do and how much experience I have.

If editing is the problem, I point out the errors I noticed. Most of the time I don’t hear back, but I do write down the sites and check back. If the fresh content still contains a lot of errors, I try again, and like I said, it has worked twice and that means two recurring clients (of course my success rate is still probably around 1% here but hey, work is work!).

The Application

Slightly better than the cold call approach is replying to jobs which advertise that they need someone for freelance jobs writing. There are lots of sites out there, particularly SEO exerts and web site developing companies, that are looking for writers to create content for their clients.

They can be found using services such as Craig’s List and other online classifieds, even through a search on one of the big engines.

Once you do find a site that is looking for writers to fill freelance jobs writing positions, the process becomes a lot like applying for a job fresh off the street.

Make up a good CV that includes your vital information and your years of experience, and remember to include your experience in the area. Be careful about who you include as references; the last thing you want as a freelancer is to be seen as competition or providing competition with material!

Once you send in your application, make sure to write the email address down, just like with a cold call. If you don’t hear back within five business days, contact the company again to see where the hiring process stands.

I think that both of these methods are a lot more work for a lot less in return than using bidding sites. Sometimes it can be a lot like hollering down a well, and it’s pretty lonely just hearing that echo.

Still, until you have a secure income every month with steady freelance jobs writing, you should take advantage of every opportunity possible.

The primary way in which I find online writing jobs has been until recently through bidding sites. These sites are a good way to start out, but they do have some significant shortcomings, not the least of which is the competition that you will find.

In this article we will take a look at Guru.com, a site I have used a couple of times. As always if you have had experience on this site, whether similar to my own or different, we would love to hear from you!

Usability

Guru is by far one of the most complicated bidding sites I have come across, although in most cases it is hard to see how the extra work helps one land more clients.

I mean, how many profiles does one person or company really need? And they should be a lot easier to start up as well; in one case the onsite help described clicking on a link to upload samples, and the link itself was dead. Contacting the Guru.com staff was no help, but that was par for the course as we will see in a bit.

Fees

The fees that Guru.com charges are a little bit ridiculous, probably because for the most part the resources of the site are concentrated on the tech jobs and not on the writing end of things (this is actually a big problem with Guru.com’s main competitor, Elance.com, as well).

While Guru.com does say that they provide bidding on some jobs for free, the reality is that these jobs are incredibly hard to find in fact, I have never seen one!

Client Potential and Competition

Guru.com also tends to attract online writing jobs that pay less than anywhere else. I don’t know if it is because their marketing campaign is done less enthusiastically than Elance’s, but the average price paid per article on Guru is about one third that of Elance.

In addition, many of the lower end buyers that are found on Elance will also post projects on Guru, and many of the same writing companies can be found on both sites to boot.

Feedback fairness and comprehension

As on Elance.com, Guru does not provide a very clear feedback process for buyers, and that means fairly subjective feedback for your business. What’s worse, Guru staff takes no interest in determining the fairness of feedback left for their paying providers, which means that one bad review can lead to a lot of lost business, most of the time very undeserved.

All in all, I would recommend avoiding Guru.com as a source of work. The site has all the failings of Elance, but without any kind of free service and higher prices to boot (now that Elance.com has reduced theirs).

In addition, the high paying jobs that you hope for as a beginner just aren’t there, and when they are landing them is much more difficult.

When I started looking for writing jobs online, I could not find any solid information about what to expect and how to go about it.

I have since had a lot of success using bidding sites to find writing jobs online. In under two years I have managed to grow a business to around $50,000 per year. Most sources I have seen state that as the high end of the average freelance writer’s pay scale. (Now I am happy with that, but you might think it seems like small change. There are freelancers who earn yearly wages in the six figure range, but hey, it hasn’t even been two years yet and I am still hopeful).

I wasn’t really optimistic about making even this amount back when I started. A lot of the writing jobs online were incredibly low paying, many through individuals who were unreliable. It was a lot of work for not much in exchange. That all changed the day I discovered www.Elance.com. Now I know that that line sounds like the start of a glowing testimonial trying to convince you to use the site, but it isn’t. I assure you I have many issues with Elance (which will be apparent shortly), but in the end it works for what I need to do, which is make money from home by writing for a living.

For organization’s sake, I have decided to break the reviews I write on different online bidding sites down into different categories. I am going to avoid assigning a “value” to sections on a site, simply because I think that the words should be able to determine what is good about a site and what you need to watch out for. So let’s get started!

What you can expect to pay

Elance is a site where you must pay in order to get a “Select” membership. Ostensibly the Select membership allows you to bid on jobs that are of higher value than the others, and I have found that in most cases this happens to be true.

I have paid for the Select Membership. My most lucrative contracts (and best clients too) have come in the Select category. You don’t have to be a Select member to bid on other jobs, though, so if the idea of paying rankles you, then you can go for the other jobs, although you won’t have a feedback section, which allows you to gain credence in your bids.

Aside from that monthly fee, Elance deducts a percentage of the fee paid to you on every project by a client. This part of the pay structure is pretty annoying, because you end up coughing up close to 8% of the money you make on every project. If it’s a smaller project, you can end up paying even more, because Elance demands at least $10 off of every single project.

What you can expect in return

We have already kind of touched on what you can expect in return for signing up on the Elance site: access to a lot of writing jobs online. There are plenty of buyers who use Elance, with dozens of writing projects being posted every day.

Where Elance really fails is in their service to the people who are paying their fees. The site is free for people posting projects, thus it is only bidders who are contributing to the site’s financial well being. Elance seems to think that the opportunity to make money is thanks enough, and are very neglectful or downright rude when a bidder needs help with a client. Their negotiation process is so convoluted as to be useless, and as we will see in the next part of this article the feedback program is a bit of a mess.

Feedback program

Elance states that feedback is the backbone of their system, and this could not be stating the truth more clearly. Writing jobs online, landing them and continuing to get more, depend on good feedback from past clients. Most of the time if you do a good job, there is no issue with this, but all the feedback is opinion, and although Elance provides guidelines as to what the feedback categories mean, buyers usually don’t take the time to read it.

A good example of this is in the “Project Cost” section. Clients rate a provider on a scale of 1-5 according to criteria set out by Elance. The Cost section states that this feedback is based on “the client’s ability to complete the project within the stated cost of the bid”. I have not once asked a client for more money than I bid for, even when the project turned out to be more time consuming than I had thought. Still, several clients seem to think that this section refers to cost, period. If they think I charged too much, they will deduct points. I have brought this up with Elance, but they say that it really doesn’t matter what the criteria states, feedback is the opinion of the buyer.

The upshot is, you can end up with a score that doesn’t always give an accurate reflection of the job. Elance will not remove feedback unless ordered to by a court, and my guess is that they are fully cognizant of the fact that not a lot of freelancers can afford to retain a lawyer and foot the bill even when they are justified in their complaints. It’s a big weakness in the Elance system, because everyone runs into a client at some point that just cannot be pleased within reason.

The quality of the clients

You will find a great range of projects and topics on the Elance site when it comes to freelance writing jobs online, from books to press releases to reviews, articles, and everything in between. Moreover, these are on virtually every topic under the sun, so if you like to learn and earn you’re in luck, and the more diverse your knowledge base, the better.

Of course, the range of buyers runs from those with ridiculously low expectations in the area of pay to the more reasonable. Whenever freelancers are competing for writing jobs online, it will be hard to really command the prices that the jobs are truly worth, and that is in evidence on Elance. Still if you like working in bulk, there is good money to be made.

The competition

We kind of touched on this above, but it bears repeating: when you have a bunch of writers, or writing companies, competing for work, you are going to find a situation where the pay may not be as good as it should be. Elance, like other bidding sites, will take money from anywhere, no matter how well that individual or company does as a writer.

In addition, there is international competition on the Elance site. Keep in mind that when it comes to outsourcing, you have to compete with people living in countries where the average cost of living is much lower than the UK, Canada, the US, Australia, and so on (a bottle of Coke in India costs 15 cents. Justify that one!). As a result, they can afford to bid a third or less of what you need to earn on a given job. We talk about how to deal with competition in the form of poor or international writes in another section; the point here is to demonstrate that you will encounter this on Elance.

The upshot of it all

If there were a lot of options out there, I think that Elance would end up sinking. They charge very high prices for services that are not all that great and when it comes to dealing with issues their bidders have, they might as well be non existent; they are more or less just a processing company.

That being said, I certainly have no complaints about the number of writing jobs online that can be found on the site. If you are discerning in your bidding, and in your choice of clients, then your problems with Elance should be few. Sooner or later, though, everyone runs into a client who just can’t be satisfied, and it’s in these situations that the flaws of Elance are made very apparent.

Ifreelance.com is another option where clients are posting freelance writing opportunities for bidding. This site which uses the same approach as bigger competitors such as Elance.com and Guru.com but is not quite as large as those two giants.

Price

Just like Elance and Guru, ifreeance.com has a structure wherein freelance writers can bid on freelance writing opportunities for free or within a certain pay structure. Unfortunately, just like Elance and Guru, the opportunities are a little bit thin on the ground in the free category in particular. You also have to suffer the lack of a feedback section or a good profile.

Fortunately, unlike the two big bullies on the block, ifreelance does not ask for nearly as much money from their providers. In fact the top membership cost is only $60 (US) a year, making it more than competitive in this aspect.

Clients and competition

Because ifreelance is not as big as some of the other bidding sites, it stands to reason that there are less jobs posted for individuals and writing companies. Moreover, there seems to be a lot of the same competition for jobs on this site as there is on other bidding sites.

You can also expect the average project on ifreelance.com to bid around $6 per 500 word article; definitely much lower than the average on Elance or Guru. Still, the fact that ifreelance charges less fees on a regular basis and takes no cut at all out of the fee of a project decreases the gap quite a bit.

Feedback and clarity

When it comes to setting up a profile, ifreeance.com really gets it right. You don’t have to go through a lot of steps, unlike Guru, for your profile to appear attractive and to get attention. Better still, everything is very user friendly and you won’t have to spend valuable writing time puzzling through the ins and outs of the site.

When it comes to feedback opportunities, ifreelance falls into the common trap of all three of the bidding sites I have reviewed here; there really is no balance and no appeal between the client feedback and the provider feedback.

Writers do get stiffed on this site (although it does not happen frequently) and when that happens not only is there no appeal process, but you are not allowed to warn your fellow writers via your feedback input on a client.

All in all, ifreeance.com is a pretty good site for writers who are looking to make a side income without a lot of hassle. The rates for membership are very reasonable, and it sure is nice not to have to write the first three articles in a project in order to pay additional site fees as you have to on Elance and Guru.

Editing jobs are one of a couple of areas that people don’t often consider when it comes to building a freelance writing career. After all, you are in this to create, not to fix what other people have created, right?

I subscribed to this type of thinking when I first started out, but since them I have definitely had a change of thought. In fact, I would happily make all my money editing rather than writing original articles, if I could find enough work to keep me busy in this area. There are a couple of reasons why.

• They are plentiful
• They mean the cash accumulates quickly
• They are very straightforward

In this article, we are going to expand on those points according to what I have found with my own business.

More than enough editing to go around!

The great thing about editing is that even the very best writers need to have some done for them, at some point. We all make mistakes when we write, whether it is a “brain fart” that means we put in the wrong form of “their” or “there”, or even just a common typo (“from” and “form” are commonly mistyped words that do not get caught).

This means that any time someone puts an article together, they need someone to look over it if they want it to be taken seriously. Now, I know a lot of people don’t think it matters too much how something is written, particularly on the Internet, as long as the idea is good.

I can say with certainty, however, that well written articles are becoming more important than ever even in cyber space; if sites want people to buy what they are selling, or take a certain course of action, they had better present it in a straightforward manner that demonstrates they know what they are talking about.

Low per unit pay adds up!

There was a time when this line of arguing convinced me to write articles for some site developer who didn’t realize slavery had been abolished. Although those days are thankfully far behind me, this is a line of reasoning that I do take when it comes to editing – provided it is the right kind of editing.

What do I mean by the “right kind” of editing jobs? Well, first let’s take a look at the three categories that can be found.

• Proofreading
• Line editing
• Copy editing

We’ve gone over proofreading jobs extensively in another article, so we’ll refer you there for an explanation and my thoughts (trust me, they are worth it!)

Line editing projects require the editor to do some proofreading and make sure that the punctuation and “flow” from paragraph to paragraph works. You can charge fairly low rates for line editing, as you can with proofreading jobs, because they tend to go fairly quickly – you don’t have to think up the whole article on your own.

Copy editing projects are those which require the editor (or writer doing the editing) to look over the piece in its entirety, to see if the whole thing flows together well.

The article/story should remain on topic, the characters should be well produced, and the piece should have a logical flow. It’s important not to project too low a cost for these projects, because they involved some in-depth reading that can take up some time! For fast cash, stick with the proofreading and line editing jobs.

Where can you find editing jobs?

Editors are needed in virtually every area where copy using the written word is produced, both online and off. One of the most lucrative editing jobs I ever received was at the local zoo, when I pointed out that a fund raising poster had numerous spelling errors in it (yes, it does pay to be annoying sometimes). Not only did I land that editing job, but I have been consulted on additional pieces the zoo has put out since.

Newspapers and trade magazines, publishers, and web sites that wish to put forward credible pieces for their readers are all interested in finding good editors.

It’s just a matter of getting your name out there. Don’t be a wall flower in this area either; anytime you see a site in serious need of a good editor, contact the developers and let them know what you do for a living. Make sure to give them solid information on what exactly you were looking at, so they can tell you know what you are talking about!

As always, remember that if you don’t succeed in landing those first few editing jobs, keep trying. I have probably written to hundreds of web sites, not to mention bugged various land based businesses, about their need for editing, but most of the time I get ignored (of course, the mistakes I point out are corrected).

Still, the times when you are able to pick up editing projects will prove to be quite rewarding!

Copywriting jobs are one way to add some serious money to your bottom line and some serious experience to your writing portfolio. If you are really quick on your feet, you might find that specializing in copywriting is the most lucrative form of writing that you can do; but at times I can guarantee that you will also find it the most frustrating.

In my experience writing for the Internet, I haven’t had too many copywriting opportunities, although I have completed a few jobs that I would file under the “Very Boring” section of copywriting; these were almost all product descriptions. Of course keep in mind that when it comes to a freelance writing career, “boring” and “lucrative” can be interchangeable – I think the descriptions I was turning out added up to around $60 per hour.

Still, there are a lot more exciting opportunities for copywriting out there, I just haven’t found them. What I have found, though, is an old friend who has been living off copywriting jobs, and who was willing to answer a few questions for me about what it is she does. First, though, let’s take a look at what copywriting is.

What is copywriting?

Copywriting is fairly straightforward; basically all you are doing is trying to come up with some phrases that essentially sell a product. (Come on, how many of you really, really knew that for sure? Most writers pretend they know what this is but really have never looked into it. Including me.) The copy you create may be used on television ads, in print, or on radio. It can also take the form of slogans, convincing copy, even ad “jingles”.

Sound pretty easy? Not really! Like other advertising endeavours, copywriting means that you have to be able to do a lot with a little. You want the copy you create to be powerful and also to stick in the head of a reader or listener, not to mention the client has to like it too.

A copywriter’s perspective

This is an exciting article for me, because I interviewed an old friend who I just found out has been hired as a copywriter for a radio/television company in Dawson Creek. Where is Dawson Creek? Well, unless you live almost at the Arctic Circle, Dawson Creek is north of your location, and that’s really all you need to know. Except of course that they have a kickass advertising campaign, and one of the people making that happen is Heidi Joachim.

I have known Heidi since high school, we were in Law class together back when we thought we could afford to be lawyers, and we also found ourselves working at the same restaurant where we decided we DEFINITELY did not want to be cooks. That experience (it was at Boston Pizza, and our former manager will be sentenced shortly for stealing – I am totally serious) drove us both to higher education as fast as we could scrape up the tuition, and she has parlayed that into a career as a writer.

Unlike me, Heidi actually focused her education on her writing career; upon completing broadcasting school she found herself hired at the radio station (she actually took some specific courses in copywriting!).

What does her job entail? Well, advertising of course, but the forms vary. She is called upon to write hard sell material, soft sell, dramatic material, informative ads, and even some with humour, both for radio and television.

When I asked her what the hardest part of her job was, Heidi didn’t have to wait very long; the hard part about successful copywriting is pretty much the same as any freelance job, and that is in satisfying the client.

She often turns in copy that she feels is great, but due to the subjective nature of the business she may find herself re-thinking the whole approach. It can be pretty frustrating spending a lot of time and effort on an ad and then having to go back to the creative drawing board again!

What about freelance copywriting jobs?

I asked Heidi if she had ever done any freelance work in the copywriting area, and though she has considered it she has never actually applied for any copywriting jobs.

The usual restrictions apply; she does not really know anyone else who has done it so is not sure where to turn for advice, and of course she has a solid paying job which states that freelancing might be out of the question.

However, Heidi did tell me about a website which does post freelance copywriting jobs from time to time at www.milkmanunlimited.com. It’s a Canadian media site and when I had a look there were a few writing jobs available, but they are a little thin on the ground. Still, it’s a good place to start looking!

If you are good at thinking on your feet and putting together strong copy fairly quickly, then you might want to give copywriting a shot. It is one way of letting your creative juices flow, even if the freelance business is your bread and butter!

Proofreading jobs are one way to really increase the bottom line of your freelance writing business every month. In fact, a few of the best jobs I have ever come across were proofreading projects. In this article I’d like to share a little bit about why these jobs are a virtual gold mine and how I went about getting them.

Why Proofreading Jobs are so Great

There are a couple of things that make proofreading preferable to almost every other job I have found on the Internet, and yes, that does include article writing! I will outline them briefly below and then expand on the bullets in the rest of the article.

• Proofreading jobs don’t take a lot of time to complete
• Proofreading jobs often pay at a competitive rate
• There are tons of proofreading opportunities

Taken together, these three factors mean that finding the right website to proofread for can mean a huge increase in your bottom line each month.

In and Out!

Proofreading is not like writing an article from scratch. There is no research, there is no need to turn a nice phrase with alliteration and some tongue in cheek humor. All you have to do is take a document that someone else has written and read it, correcting any spelling or grammar mistakes that you see.

It’s important to differentiate proofreading and editing, although sometimes the terms are interchangeable. Usually when you are talking proofreading, you’re talking line editing – just correcting spelling and grammar mistakes. Copy editing means looking at the whole piece and making it fit. In fact, I would go so far as to say that proofreading isn’t even really line editing, since all you are looking for is mistakes and not necessarily coherence within the paragraphs. So, if you can read, you can proofread!

Proofreading pay rates

The first time you come across a proofreading job, whether on a bid site or by having one offered to you, you might be inclined to scoff at the pay. I work for one company which pays me $1.50 for every piece I proofread. Not a lot, to be sure, particularly when compared to $20 to write an article.

Keep in mind, though, our in and out rule. While I do admit that I am looking for a little more than just mistakes in the pieces that the company sends me (there is some need to look for cohesion although it is pretty straightforward), it rarely takes more than a minute and a half to complete the proofreading of one of these articles; what that translates to is anywhere from $45 to $60 an hour – definitely one of my highest paying clients.

Lots of Opportunities!

A quick look around the Internet will show that proofreaders are, or should be, desperately wanted. It seems as though a good three quarters of the articles appearing on pages have significant errors (and believe me I know this site is not the exception).

There are a couple reasons for this. The first is that people just have tunnel vision when it comes to their own writing (I am firmly committed to this reasoning for any errors you see on this site!). The second is that most people just have no real clue how to spell, or hire people who can’t spell, and the result is poorly written pieces that really need cleaning up.

Getting in the Door

So how do you go about finding proofreading jobs? Well, I have secured some a couple of ways. The first, of course, is through bidding. I never bid too high for a proofreading job for the reasons I stated above; as long as I am just correcting spelling, it’s not going to take me too long.

Another method that has worked for me in the past is directly contacting a site when I find errors. I just fire off an email saying where I caught the mistake, the correction, and then explaining what it is I do for a living and how I think I can help their site to succeed. You have to be a bit careful, though, because sometimes people can take offence to this approach.

Of course, if you do succeed in landing proofreading jobs for a site, it can lead to even more opportunities. All of the sites I proofread for have also gone on to include article writing opportunities, most on a regular basis.

The site owners figure why spend money for the article in the first place, then spend more to fix it, when they can just pay a lump sum to have it done right in the first place? We’ll explore this a bit more in another article, but for now keep in mind that proofreading jobs can be a great way to get some fast cash in your freelance writing career!

It seems that a lot of advice encourages writers to pass up writing opportunities. Writers, and particularly those that like to give advice on building a freelance writing career, love to use the word “niche”.

To me, this word is blasphemy and I don’t think following the usual advice about it works very well. In this article I will talk about why I think that niches should be avoided like the plague, particularly for writers just starting out.

The Gospel of Niche

If you think I am exaggerating, pick up any book on freelance writing or go to an advice website; I will bet that one of the most repeated words in the print will be niche. The line is that in order to be successful, you need to find one area that you are really knowledgeable in or you really like writing about, and concentrate just on that.

This was the theory upon which I started out my freelance writing career, but I quickly realized that there was not a lot of opportunities out there for the niches I was interested in, or that the competition was just too crowded. And usually, it was crowded with seasoned freelancers who had starved themselves carving out their own niche.

The Heretic

I had a couple of options. I could indulge in artistic snobbery and decide only to focus on one area like everyone said to, and pad the monthly earnings with money earned at a mill or in a kitchen, or I could go against the niche gospel and take advantage of any writing opportunities I found. I went for door number two.

Instead of bidding on jobs that I felt I had a sound knowledge base about, I would bid on any and all jobs that I could find, as long as they weren’t too boring.

I was honest about my experience, but I found that as long as I bid a bit lower than the experts I could still get jobs. Moreover, I could parlay those jobs into experience, for as I wrote articles on a specific topic my portfolio started to carry a lot more weight, and I had a lot more samples to show to potential clients.

Weddings, real estate, fishing, and Internet marketing

I also found that when it comes to writing on the Internet, there seems to be a few cycles. All of a sudden web site developers will realize there is a dearth of information in an area and will all try to create a killer site on that area.

That’s another reason why you can’t be too narrow and have to take advantage of any writing opportunities that you can if you plan on making a career out of writing for the web; what’s big today won’t be in three months.

My first few jobs were all about weddings, something which was surprising given that I am a very inartistic male whose only wedding experience comes from the fact that I had my own wedding. And yes I did help with that.

Still, what I found was that as long as you can do good research, be it in the form of interviews or even just poking around on the web, great ideas for articles will come to you. I’ve ended up writing dozens of articles on weddings, and never once has a client been dissatisfied.

When wedding season is over and article are in less demand, other seasonal work has presented itself, on areas about as far removed from each other as you can imagine.

By far the most article I have written have been on real estate and Internet marketing, with fishing and other outdoor activities (in which I actually am something of an expert) coming in third; weddings are fourth and there are about 20 other topics I have some experience in.

The big picture: embrace all writing opportunities!

The point here is that if I had taken the advice of many others and only focused on my niche area, I would probably not be making a living freelance writing today. By taking advantage of every opportunity, I was not only able to make money writing, but I was also able to hone my skills and create a very diverse portfolio.

To be sure, there is something to be said for the theory “jack of all trades, master of none”. But we are living in a new age, one where the traditional ideas of the offline magazine and newspaper are going to be supplanted by the free for all that is the Internet.

It’s best that as writers, we also learn to adapt in order to make a living, and that means leaving the Gospel of Niche behind and taking advantage of any writing opportunities!