R: Rewrite Your Author Bio

Posted on April 20, 2012 | Leave a comment

R: Rewrite Your Author Bio

How long has it been since you looked at your author bio? When was that photo taken, really? Have you published something recently, started a new venture, added a new service line to your freelance writing business? Yep, I thought so.

I recommend reviewing your author bio every six months. Make a list of all the places where your bio is published: Facebook, Twitter, your blog, writing sites like Constant-Content and EzineArticles. If you’re a published author, contact your publisher or jump on Amazon to update your bio.

Quick tips on what to put in your author bio:

  • Tell what niche you write about/for.
  • Brag about how many years you’ve been writing. (I’ve been writing for 31 years, myself.)
  • Mention writers’ organization memberships.
  • Mention your writing degree, if you have one.
  • Mention the title of your free or paid ebook, if you have one.
  • Include your blog/website address, Twitter @, Facebook page.

But mostly your bio should mention your niche and your writing experience because you want people to hire you, right?

Author bios should be written with a purpose, just like all the other self-marketing materials you produce. What do you want readers to do after reading your bio? Why should they pay attention to you?

If you like, share your author bio in the comments section below. We’d love to learn more about you!

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Q: Quick!

Posted on April 19, 2012 | 1 Comment

Q: Quick!

Quick! Sign up for this! Buy that! Download this! Click here! OMG, you’re losing millions of dollars if you don’t get on my email list right now!!!

<Insert swear word here>, I hate that. The emergencies are emergencies, it seems. Online marketing can get completely out of control faster than a class of kindergartners encountering a herd of tarantulas.

If you do any type of sales writing, you’ve probably fallen victim to the all-red-all-caps-exclamation-point <insert swear word here>; it’s easy to do. But how do you deliver a call-to-action without annoying the <insert swear word here> out of readers?

By teaching. By slowing down. By listening to what readers want and need. By offering the best solution for their problems and then letting them absorb what you’re saying. Mostly, by slowing down.

Reach a friendly verbal hand out to your readers, draw them into your circle, and become a guide and mentor. Even if readers bounce away from your words at the end of the post, they’ll be left with the unconscious feeling that someone real just helped them cross the street.

Stop with the QUICK mentality and step into a welcoming, almost spiritual space. Ask how readers are feeling every once in a while and give your writing a rhythmic pace that soothes and calms. Yes, online content is meant to be digested super-fast, but you don’t want your readers to experience a sugar crash every time they read your words.

So, how are you feeling right now? Quick! Leave a comment below!!

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P: Punch Up Your Prose

Posted on April 18, 2012 | 1 Comment

P: Punch Up Your Prose

This post fits right in with my complimentary ebook “Pretty Darn Good Writers: Become Great” available by entering your email address in the opt-in box to the right. I despise spammers, so you can believe I won’t spam you just because you downloaded my ebook.

OK, punching up your prose.

I’ve noticed that a lot of online marketing content is a yawn. It’s grammatically fine, uses subheadings and keywords properly, talks about the subject in a linear way. But man, can it be boring! Lifeless verbs, limp metaphors, empty pronouns… Informative, but not captivating.

So how do freelance writers (especially ghostwriters) create captivating prose? Start by eradicating extraneous phrases. Just use the right words the first time, rather than tacking on more and more phrases that end up being breathy and confusing and that annoy a dedicated reader who is simply trying to solve a problem like how to write better prose.

See what I mean?

Next, get creative with your verbs. Punch. Eradicate. Tacking. Annoy. If you don’t have a thesaurus, use the online versions to find word substitutions that rock.

One more tip: Use clear but visually-stunning metaphors. Employ the six senses when writing so your readers can hear and see and taste and touch and smell and FEEL your writing. Yes, you can do this even in a shampoo review or an article about toe fungus remedies.

How do you punch up your prose? Creative writers, jump into the comments section and give us some solid examples!

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O: Overworked and Undervalued? You Must Be a Freelance Writer!

Posted on April 17, 2012 | Leave a comment

O: Overworked and Undervalued? You Must Be a Freelance Writer!

A couple of years ago, I ran a weekly email newsletter for a client. It contained four fresh articles per week, plus I did the background list maintenance and design. My client paid me what I asked, but she asked me to spend at least two extra hours a week tweaking headlines and rewriting content and adding links and taking links out. Plus, she insisted on face-to-face meetings that took two hours when we could have exchanged emails and spent five minutes getting everything right.

I fired this client in the nicest way possible: I told her I was doubling my rates. Being a fussy penny-pincher, she said she could do it herself. Six months later, her newsletter’s open rates were below 10 percent and her unsubscribe rate tripled.

She realized that she should have paid me my going rate and tried to rehire me. By then, I was already booked working for less fussy clients who paid even more, so I politely refused. She responded by sending me a word-of-mouth referral, so I guess she wasn’t too mad.

When you feel overworked and undervalued, what do you do? Do you have the guts to fire a bad client, double your rates, cut back on your schedule? Share your insights in the comments so your fellow freelance writers can take heart!

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N: Never Settle for Less Than What You’re Worth

Posted on April 16, 2012 | 3 Comments

N: Never Settle for Less Than What You’re Worth

We’ve all done it. As freelance writers, we’ve allowed clients to take advantage of our talents and time. We’ve accepted less money than we’re worth just to pay the bills, get something we want, build our professional portfolios.

As a once-in-a-while action, settling for less than you’re worth is OK. Most freelancers I know settle for less on a daily basis, though, and that’s a sure way to burn out and give up on working from home. If you’re not making enough income, you’re forced to go to town and get a job and that’s sad.

Do you know what you’re worth? What’s your real hourly wage? How much should you earn per word or per article? What’s your income goal for the next month and the next year?

If you haven’t put any thought into these questions, drop everything right now and figure it out. If you’re not satisfied with your progress, rethink what you’ve been doing so you can meet your goals. Please don’t put this off; every minute you waste by accepting less money than you’re worth is a minute lost out of your freelance writing business.

When the FOCUS Training exercises are completely polished, I’ll include a module titled “Setting Priorities for Work and Life.” These four exercises will help you get clear on what you’re worth both from a business perspective and a personal perspective. To get on the pre-launch list, just share your email address with me by downloading a copy of “Pretty Darn Good Writers: Become Great” in the upper right corner of this blog.

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