Links: Mardi Gras 2009 Edition

• The 100 Most Popular Twitter Applications
• 7 Fresh and Simple Ways to Test Cross-Browser Compatibility
• How strong are your passwords on sites like PayPal? These need to be impossible to remember because of the connection with your bank account. Check your password strength.
• 100+ Smart Ways to Use LinkedIn: Way beyond looking for jobs.
• 90-10 Rule for Successful Twitter Networking
• How to Promote on Twitter without Pissing People Off [Link: Amy Derby]

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• ZooBorn: Awww… Just like it sounds… zoo newborns.
• Adobe Cards: Amazing animation with decks of cards. After it loads, move the slider all the way to the right to play the entire show.
• Twittering with Ben Franklin, James Madison, Aaron Burr [Link: Brad Shorr].

Our life on Monday…

Links: Love Edition 2009

• Wordle: Create word clouds.
• 10 Harsh Truths about Corporate Web Sites [Link: Laura Carlson]
• Can’t Get Your Writing Project Started? Just Start Anyway!
• 7 Important Lessons Freelance Writers Can Learn from Working in Fast Food
• Salted Spring Fever and Hot Wax Zombies: Where Twitter and Old Posts Meet
• Get Your Money: Best Invoicing Practices for Freelancers: Only had two clients who were difficult about payment, but they were also unresponsive when the project team sent them work to review.
• Social Media Case Studies SUPERLIST- 20 Extensive Lists of Organizations Using Social Media
• The End of Marketing and PR?

And for fun and love because we’re allowed…

• Beautiful love story by Karen Swim, my friend.
• What I Learned from Love entries from Robert Hruzek’s Middle Musings.
• About Haiku Day on Twitter and the #LittleLove results.

Links: 2008-09-19

• Permission to Change Direction: Must read if you have a niche blog and strong reader relationship… you don’t mind if this blog turns into one about sewing, right? Just kidding.
• How a Credit Card Makes Freelancers Bawl… by me. I had fun with it… wish I could come up with more stuff like this.
• Why an Ugly Website Might Be More Profitable for You: Sage advice from Yuwanda. Wish I had an idea in the first place.
• How to Redesign Your Web Site.
• Someone Has It Together Over There at Craig’s List: Where can I come up with ideas like this???
• Getting Started Freelancing: FAQ for Beginning Writers
• I am thinking about Yolanda.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• Can you guess my accent?
• Top 10 Tools for Soccer Moms… and volleyball moms and baseball moms…
• 12 Promising New Web Sites and Services
• Say Cheese: 12 Photos That Should Never Have Been Posted Online
• Finally got around to watching Randy Pausch’s The Last Lecture. Also found Time Management, but it was not captioned as promised. It took further looking to find it. This Time Management video also has German subtitles.
• Top 10 Wild Kitchen Gadgets You’ll Only Use Once

Going to back specialist today. Pray he can figure out what’s going on with me. I can’t go without tennis for too long! I’ve had back problems for years, but this resembles nothing I’ve had before so it has me worried.

Links: 2008-08-15

• Is Updated Technology Important to Productive Work? Unless you’re a designer using resource demanding software, a software reviewer (then I recommend installing and using them on a secondary computer instead of your main one), or using a 10-year-old computer — then this sounds like another excuse from a procrastinator.
• DIY marketing is not always cheapest.
• Massive List of Killer Freelancing Tips.
• The Design Process Of Creating A $40,000 Creative Newspaper Advertisement: Love seeing Jacob’s thought process in action.
• Great explanation on Law of Attraction.

And for fun because we’re allowed…

• The Top 100 Undiscovered Web Sites: My client’s site, RadioTime, made the list.
• Thank you to Customized Engraving for the lovely keychain with my name on it.
• Kids, This Is What We Call “Scapegoating”: Hilarious. Moms and Dads — ya gotta see this one. Good or bad parenting… be danged… simply funny.
• Photoshop Disasters.

Life Lessons from the Olympics

I love the Olympics and look forward to them especially the summer Olympics. You can always count on the Olympics to bring out every feeling in the book. Sports also teach wonderful life lessons about endurance, perseverance, goodwill, respect, tragedy.

Tragedy: Sad to say, we’ve seen tragedy. A suicidal man stabbed and killed the father-in-law of U.S. volleyball coach whose wife was a former U.S. women’s Olympic volleyball player. Good news is the mother-in-law’s condition has been upgraded from critical to stable. The U.S. men’s volleyball team had a moment of silence before the match against Venezuela in which they won in five sets.

I had to deal with tragedy last year when my father had a stroke in April 2007 and passed away in December 2007. Freelancers can’t prepare for every situation, but they can adapt and accept. I let my clients know of my limited availability and they respected it.

Endurance: In the 400m relay, the U.S. swim team overcame a half-body deficit in the final leg against France’s strongest swimmer to win the race at impossible odds — or so people thought. The French swim team needs to work on sportsmanship. Apparently, they spat into the U.S. lane and trashed talked. The U.S. team stayed cool and let their swimming do the talking.

Freelancers may not deal with something that big, but they overcome illness and other unexpected events to make their deadlines and accomplish almost impossible tasks. For me, I lost two major clients during the dot com crash. At that point, it was either quit freelancing (it was a side career at the time) or forge ahead.

Perseverance: U.S. women’s gymnastics team started off unlucky. Samantha Peszek sprained her ankle in warm-ups leaving the team with four gymnasts for floor, vault, and balance beam. They couldn’t make mistakes. But they did. Two gymnasts fell on the uneven bars. Despite the disappointing start, the team still made the finals and players made it to individual event finals.

Lone freelancers must persevere often. They’re responsible for their own marketing, accounting, and other non-writing or non-freelancing tasks. If something comes up in their lives to interfere with their work, they push on to keep clients happy while taking care of personal business. My son’s medical program takes up much of my time forcing me to adjust my writing schedule. While stressful to deal with working and blogging less, I know this too shall pass and I’ll return to my groove.

What Olympic-like experiences have you encountered? Anything along the lines of respect, goodwill, or other adjectives?

The Freelancing Flexibility Advantage

A previous blog entry discusses Freelance vs. Full Time Writing. In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been discovering a big benefit of working as a freelancer. My mom role collided with my freelancer role when my son’s medical challenges erupted.

Not to worry — he’s fine. I don’t mind talking about it, but it doesn’t belong in a public forum living in cyberspace for all eternity. Feel free to contact me privately if you’d like to know details.

My spouse and I had been struggling since spring trying to figure out how to help him and what would be best for him this summer. We thought we had it figured out only to find the program had no room for him. We put him in two programs and they worked OK. But I had to take time out of the day to deal with some incidences.

Two more opportunities came up and I had to investigate them … during the day. Yesterday, he started a three week program that made oil companies happy as we drove through lots of traffic to get there. The program could make a big difference for him and it requires parents to attend meetings every morning and afternoon — so count the commute and meetings and you have a formula for eating up lots of working time.

My spouse works for a corporation, so I’ve felt bad about him having to attend these meetings and miss a lot of work. Imagine if I had still worked for a corporation and having to make up all the missed time or take vacation days for something that is no vacation.

So I go to most of the meetings and my spouse goes to a couple of them. We appreciate having my flexibility, but it doesn’t ease our feeling guilty for our jobs. I emailed my regular clients to let them know what’s going on and that I would prioritize work as needed.

Needless to say, I’m running around with my virtual head cut off and doing only what I need to do for the next couple of weeks. That means sacrificing my social networking including blogs, Twitter, and elsewhere. I won’t blog as often. I’m all about getting the kids where they need to be and keeping the work going.

How do you handle unexpected job interruptions?

The $75,000 Writer: Follow the Dollars to Freelance Commercial Writing

Winners of Are You Ready to Hire a Virtual Assistant? entry prizes: April wins Five ebooks on writing from Anne Wayman and Tracy Fitzpatrick wins one full copy of Astraware Classic Collection, which includes Astraware Sudoku, Astraware Solitaire, and Astraware Board games. Congratulations!

This entry’s prizes: One copy of Business Daffynitions: Humor from the Workplace from Joe Heuer, the Rock and Roll Guru, one full copy of Orchidia PC game from Joyboost, (See Meryl’s Orchidia review.) and one copy of Andy King’s Website Optimization. As usual, just post a valuable 30+ word comment by July 6.

Either Peter Bowerman’s name or books came up in the newsletters on writing that I regularly read. Eventually, we exchanged a few emails and I enjoy his knowledge, honesty, and writing. He produces a valuable newsletter and of course, his books are worth every dollar. I’m honored to have him as a guest blogger.

The $75,000 Writer: Follow the Dollars to Freelance Commercial Writing

Imagine This: The editor of a magazine you’ve written several pieces for says yes to a recent query. You outline the parameters of the piece and the conversation turns to money. He says, “Let’s try something a little different this time. Figure out how many hours you think it’ll take to do the piece. Factor in time for research, background reading, travel to and from appointments, brainstorming, interviewing, writing, and editing. Then multiply the hours by $75 and give me a figure.” You return with a number, he says “fine” and you get to work.

Has he lost his mind? Is this a freelancer’s wistful fantasy? In some writing arenas, maybe. But in freelance commercial (corporate) writing, the above-described scenario is pretty much right on the money. And speaking of money, instead of flat fees with potentially vast and open-ended investments of time, here’s a field where fees are based on hourly rates of $50-125 or more, and all time counts.

A Lucrative and Growing Opportunity
In the few decades, prolific downsizing in Corporate America has resulted in the outsourcing of an enormous amount of writing projects to well-paid freelancers. How can you get your share? Who do you contact? Well, for starters, there are two main groups of prospects: End Users (EU) and Middlemen (MM).

End Users (EUs)
EUs are the corporations, large and small (as well as non-profits, universities, and more), that will be the end-users of the writing. With large companies, approach Corporate Communications, also known as “MarCom” (marketing communications). With smaller ones, try marketing, sales, or finally, HR.

A manager with a huge telecommunications firm in Atlanta noted, “Most people would assume that a company of our size would do the bulk of our writing in-house, and they’d be wrong. It’s amazing how much writing we outsource. My writing needs these days are pretty steady, and I pay anywhere from $65-85/hour, depending on the writer’s experience.”

Middlemen (MMs)
MMs – companies often hired by EUs to execute these projects – include advertising agencies, graphic design firms, marketing companies, PR firms, and event production companies – to name the key ones. Few of these entities staff writing talent, preferring instead to hire the right talent for a specific job, and only when needed.

• Ad Agencies/PR Firms: These entities, which can be huge, do staff copywriters for high-profile ad campaigns but will often bring in freelancers to handle “collateral” (marketing brochures, newsletters, sales sheets, etc.). Small agencies offer better opportunities for freelancers.
• Graphic Design Firms: This group tends toward the smaller end and rarely have on-staff writers. They include many “lone rangers” (one-person shops), several of whom have put many thousands of dollars in my pocket over time. Cultivate relationships with the most talented designers at the larger firms. The good ones all eventually go freelance and if they like you and your work, you’ll be on their “A-list.”
• Event Production Companies: These firms handle all aspects of huge corporate conventions, conferences, product launches, etc. That may include show literature, videos, speeches, web content, signage, and more. Contact major convention facilities to get the names of the big players.

Who to Contact?
For all the above MM clients, contact CDs (Creative Directors: often hard to reach), ACDs (Assistant CDs: easier), AEs (Account Executives), PMs (Project Managers). Find them through the actual category listing in the Yellow Pages or through an annual business listing publication.

Beyond the Yellow Pages…
Where else can you find your prospects? Most good-sized metropolitan areas have a weekly business publication ending in “… Business Journal (i.e. Los Angeles Business Journal, Philadelphia Business Journal, etc.) Check www.amcity.com for the full nationwide listing. Get their Book of Lists, an invaluable annual resource listing of the top businesses in dozens of categories.

Whatever your goals or circumstances, the commercial writing field offers a lucrative and growing opportunity for those with good writing skills. Isn’t it time for a raise?

About the author: Peter Bowerman, a freelance copywriter, speaker and business coach, is the author of the award winning Well-Fed Writer titles – how-to “standards” on lucrative freelancing for businesses (www.wellfedwriter.com). In 2007, leveraging the successful self-publishing of his first two books (52,000 copies in print, and a full-time living for five-plus years), he released The Well-Fed Self-Publisher: How to Turn One Book into a Full-Time Living. (www.wellfedsp.com).

Telling the Hard Truths of the Writing Life

The winner of one full copy of Spinword PC game from Joyboost from the How to Become a Freelance Writer entry is Karen Swim! Congratulations again, Karen. It’s possible to win more than once in the blog entry prizes.

This entry’s prizes are a book by Tara Calishain and AWAI’s Accelerated Six Figure Copywriting program (excellent — I have it… but never had time to finish it). Just leave a 30-word comment on this post by June 21 to get an entry for a drawing.

I was going to call this “Telling the Violent Truths of the Writing Life,” but Freelance Folder already has dibs on “violent.” Just joking — that’s the name of guest blogger Bob Younce’s excellent series over there.

I met Bob through Poewar. Obviously, John Hewitt of Poewar connected me with a lot of new writer friends. Thank you, John. It only took me a second to consider him a friend. His articles on writing and freelancing — whether on his site or elsewhere — provide a lot of value.

Telling the Hard Truths of the Writing Life

It’s easy, if you listen to one element of the Internet writing community, to think that freelance writing consists entirely of days on the beach sipping margaritas and writing for half an hour on your laptop. For anyone who’s been writing for more than a few weeks, though, you know it just isn’t true. Anyone who tells you that it’s possible to make a living in minutes a day is selling something.

Not that selling is bad, mind you; in fact, writers have to do it in order to be successful. But these folks are selling a false idea. In this life, you reap what you sow, plain and simple.

These folks prey on unsuspecting new moms, for example, that want to work from home. They prey on guys tired of their cubicle careers who are looking for a way out. They look for a felt need and offer a fake solution.

At the same time, there are folks on the opposite end of the spectrum. There’s me, for example. If you’ve read much of my writing at all, you know I constantly promote the idea of hard work and, sometimes, long hours. I have probably turned more people away from a writing career than I have recruited, in my time.

I like to think that the realist approach is a good thing, and that it helps folks considering the writing life to count the cost before they get into something they’re not willing to follow through on.

Maybe I’m just trying to keep away the competition. I don’t think that’s it, though.

Here’s the danger that I constantly find myself in, though. I want to be able to encourage writers. I want to cheer them on. I want them to see the same kind of success I’ve had, and the same kind of success Meryl has had right here.

So, those of us honest folk in the Internet writing community wind up saying something like this:

“Freelance writing is hard work. You can make an honest living doing it, and there’s no better life. But you’ve got to work hard and you’ve got to have your wits about you.”

On occasion, I think it’s worth talking about all of the good things in the writing life. I think it’s worth celebrating a success or two, both our own and others’ successes.

Like Meryl, here. She’s been plugging away at this site for the better part of a decade. My goofy little blog has been on the map since February; Meryl’s been here for 8 Februarys.

That says something, folks. It says something about character. It says something about tenacity. It says something about dedication. It’s these characteristics that you’ve got to have to make it as a writer.

So, I celebrate with Meryl. I thank her for her inspiring example. I take a moment away from telling the hard truths of the writing life to tell a pleasant one:

Writing success is possible. Look at Meryl, and at others who have done it. Dream your dream, and dream it big. You can get there, no matter what challenges you face. Stick with it. Be dedicated. And remember: you’re standing on the shoulders of giants.

Thanks, Meryl. Enjoy your vacation, and come back soon.

About the author: Bob Younce is a full-time Internet writer and writing mentor living in Linwood, Michigan. He is dedicated to helping Internet writers to achieve their dreams. Visit Bob at The Writing Journey or follow him on Twitter.

How to Become a Freelance Writer

The winners of two full copies of Big Kahuna Reef 2: one for Macs (!) and one for PCs from the Do You Own Your Web Site post as selected by Random.org are…

{eDrum roll}

Travis Vocino for the Mac copy

Paige Eissinger for the Win copy

Congratulations! On with the celebration!

This entry’s prize is one full copy of Spinword PC game from Joyboost. Just leave a 30-word comment on this post by June 16 to get an entry for a drawing

I’ve been reading Anne Wayman’s stuff for a long time beginning with her About.com page for writers. Then, I followed her to The Golden Pencil and About Freelance Writing. I don’t know how she finds energy to manage two sites, do her regular writing work, post at least 40 writing gigs every couple of days, and provide sage advice about writing. Whatever she does, I thank her for helping writers.

How to Become a Freelance Writer

People seem fascinated that I earn my living as a freelance writer. They are surprised I don’t write fiction, and often confused when I tell them most of my income comes from ghostwriting. I suspect the picture most people have of freelance writers is someone huddled in a garret (do we have garrets any more?) struggling all night to get some deep fiction down on paper in hopes of a great (name your country) novel.

It’s a lovely fantasy, and so far from my own reality it’s almost laughable. Maybe my story will give you some hints about how to carve out a freelance writing career for yourself.

The family story is I started talking about writing way back in the 6th grade. I don’t remember that, but I do remember the 7th grade typing (yes, typewriters, manual typewriters) class that allowed me to write for the high school newspaper. It was also in high school that I started sneaking off to buy the magazine, Writer’s Market.

It wasn’t until my early thirties that I dared submit something – two articles, one each to Family Circle and Woman’s Day. Both were rejected, as they should have been, but I learned that I could survive rejection. In fact, I posted those two slips to my bedroom wall with pride.

I’d also discovered that while I’m a darn good worker, I’m a lousy employee. I hate the structure and the interruptions and all the office politics. I want to get my work done and go home. So I kept writing and submitting and trying different jobs. I finally landed a freelance job as a tech writer. I hadn’t done any tech writing, but by this time I did have a computer (an Apple II+ with a CP/M card, WordStar, and two single-sided drives!) and convinced someone I could explain how to hook up and use a computer. I did, and parlayed that into a staff tech writing job.

During the tech writing gig, I gathered together three others and we began to write third party software manuals. I also submitted my first piece to Hazelden, the drug and alcohol recovery publisher, and it was accepted! I can remember sitting at my desk hardly breathing.

I’d love to tell you my freelancing was profitable from then on. It wasn’t. A lot of that had to do with personal issues of self-worth, which is why I’m always telling my readers to consider charging more. But even though my view of myself was shaky at best, I kept writing and I kept telling people I was a writer. I stumbled into my first ghostwriting job — I said “yes,” rather than the truth which might have been something like, “I don’t know how, but let’s try it,” and it worked. I was referred to my second ghostwriting job.

I began to write for what’s now About.com and eventually figured out how much to charge for ghostwriting. (A lot!) I blog because it helps me find clients. I qualify my clients carefully and generally now make a pretty fine living.

There are three secrets to a successful writing career:

1. Write
2. Rewrite
3. Market

It really is that simple – not easy, but simple. Go for it if it’s something you want. I give away a free booklet that goes into a few more details at www.aboutfreelancewriting.com and talk about freelance writing almost every day at www.thegoldenpencil.com.

About the author: Anne Wayman is a freelance writer, grandmother, cat lover and gardener. Her websites and blogs are at: www.thegoldenpencil.com, www.writingwithvision.com, www.aboutfreelancewriting.com, and www.powerfullyrecovered.com.

8-year-old Blog Birthday Celebration

Hey, guys. I’m gonna be eight on June 1! Seriously. I’m too embarrassed to show you what Meryl posted in her first entry on June 1, 2000. But she and I have grown a lot since the early days of blogging.

So I tell Meryl that she oughta take a vacation from blogging as a way to celebrate. But she says she can’t do that — the blog needs to stay regularly updated as she won’t take me for granted.

Then an idea comes to me. A contest! Prizes! Well, maybe I cheated a little as her friend John over a PoeWar is doing this. Here’s the deal:

• Prize donations: In exchange, you’ll get a link with a short write up of the link. Also, readers will be encouraged to link to sponsors in exchange for entries.
• Guest bloggers: Anyone who writes a guest blog entry will be entered into a contest for guest bloggers only.

Once we get these figured out, we’ll flesh out the details. In summary, the contest has two parts: Readers, prize sponsors, and authors.

1. Readers get entries for a chance to win prizes by simply leaving valuable comments and linking to this blog and its sponsors from their own blog.
2. Prize sponsors: Automatically get 10 entries for donating a prize and links to their sites. Readers gain entries for linking to sponsors, which means more linkage!
3. Authors get entries into author-only prizes for their contributions. Articles can cover any of the following:
   1. Writing
   2. Freelancing
   3. Marketing
   4. Web site design, usability, etc.
   5. Technology

Do two or three to increase your chances of winning. Sound cool? Spread the word so you get a chance to win cool prizes.