Are you looking for a way to make money from home? You could do so by taking up freelance writing for a site like Upwork, which specializes in online freelance work. But aside from the fact that this can be a relatively low-paying option, there’s another problem: A potential client could decide that you’re not worth their time after all and simply discard your work. To combat this, it’s essential to build a good profile with a winning attitude, excellent communication skills, and above all, solid research skills. To help you achieve this, we’re going to discuss some of the best ways to get paid to write stories.
Decide What You Want To Write About
As we discussed in the last article, affiliate marketing is about making money online without doing any of the work yourself. The concept is quite simple: You promote a product or service via online marketing, and when someone clicks a link or buys a product that’s promoted on your site, you get paid a commission. For example, let’s say you’re a freelance writer and you manage a blog that earns $5,000 per month. You also have a social media account where you’ve amassed 500 followers. If anyone clicks on an affiliate link promoting a product that costs $25, you’ll earn $500. Not a bad deal, huh?
To generate more income, you could write and edit articles for other sites in addition to your own. The important thing to keep in mind is that all these other sites are generally businesses that want to sell a product or service, and they’re hoping you’ll write about it favorably. In other words, you’re getting paid to give an unbiased opinion on products and services that you’ve been given free access to. In return, you simply need to follow a few guidelines to ensure you get paid correctly.
Build Strong Platforms
If you’re new to marketing, building a platform is a good idea. This is essentially a portfolio of all your work that you can use to showcase your ability to write. You can do this either through freelance writing, social media, or a combination of both. Whatever you do, make sure that you are consistently delivering high-quality content that makes other people want to read your work. The better your platform, the higher your price tag since more and more businesses are looking to pay writers to write content for them.
Look For Clients
As we’re about to discuss in the next section, cold-calling potential clients can be a very time-consuming process. This is why many freelancers and other independent contractors turn to Upwork, freelancing platforms like Fiverr, or dedicated writing communities like Creative Commons to find clients. In the next subsection, we’ll discuss how to get paid to write stories the right way.
Only Take On Work That You Can Complete
This is probably the most important guideline to keep in mind if you want to become a freelance writer. Far too often, people get into the habit of taking on work that they can’t complete. If you can, avoid this at all costs; focus on delivering quality content when you can and only take on work that you can complete.
Follow Up
Even after you’ve delivered a high-quality piece of content, followed up with the client to make sure they were satisfied with your work, and gotten paid, it’s still essential to follow up. After all, not everyone will agree with your opinion, and you don’t want to be left in the lurch when a potential client decides they don’t want to work with you because of your unfavorable opinion. It’s important to keep in mind that these are not one-off situations, but something you’ll need to continually work at. You should continue to follow up even after you’ve completed a project for a client because they may still have use for your services. It never hurts to stay in touch even if the work is done; staying in touch even after the work is done demonstrates that you’re a professional and that you take your job seriously. Most importantly, following up keeps you in the good books of your clients; it shows that you’re a reliable and trustworthy person who cares enough to make sure they’re satisfied with the work you do.
Get Paid Early
This advice may seem like common sense to seasoned freelance writers, but a surprising number of people get paid later than they’re supposed to. If you’re not paid on time, you’ll start missing rent and other payments which in turn makes it very difficult to keep afloat. To avoid this, make sure that your clients are aware that you’ll be sending them an initial check within 24 hours of completing the project. This ensures that you’ll get paid on time and won’t have any trouble making your next rent payment. You should always get paid as soon as you complete a project; not doing so can lead to serious problems (i.e., credit card debt, rent arrears, etc.). This is why it’s essential to build a good relationship with your clients from the outset and establish a pattern of speed and reliability in your work. If they know that you always comply with deadlines and do what you say you’re going to do, then they’ll have no reason to suspicion that you’ve misrepresented your skills or the quality of your work. This in turn can lead to a healthy working relationship and continual engagement in the future.
Quality Control
This is probably the most important thing to keep in mind if you want to be taken seriously as a professional writer. Make sure that your work is of high quality and follows the standards set by the industry. If you’re worried about this, you might want to consider getting some help from a professional editor or a copy writer. They will be able to give you an objective look at your work, point out any glaring errors, and suggest ways in which you can make it better. Sometimes the most obvious changes are the ones that create the most effective results. Having an objective third party look at your work before you release it ensures that you’re not being fooled into thinking it’s perfect when it’s actually not. As we’ve established, quality control is essential if you want to succeed as a freelance writer; it demonstrates that you care enough about your work to ensure that it meets the standards set by the industry.
Research
If you want to get paid to write stories, you’ll almost certainly need to do some research beforehand. This could entail contacting the company that the product or service is sold by, getting in touch with previous customers, and checking out reviews online from previous clients. There are a number of ways to do research, and once you’ve accumulated enough information, you can sit back and draft a well-researched article that’ll sell a product or service far better than anything a busy writer would churn out.
At this point, you might be wondering how you can actually get paid to write stories. The answer is fairly straightforward: You can take up affiliate marketing, which we discussed in the last article. For those interested in getting paid to write, there are various ways to make the process a bit easier. You could try getting paid to write for sites like Upwork, Fiverr, or similar marketplaces where you can find clients. Or, if you’re a fan of traditional publishing, you can look into getting paid to write for small businesses that want to increase their profile among potential customers. With enough determination and hard work, you could make a pretty decent living from home as a freelance writer.