Freelance Content Writer – What It Takes

The priority should always be the work. Not the relationship, not the website, but the work. Often the relationship with the purchaser is conducted online and will be subject to the vagaries of email. There are some good ways to go about positive handling of the content vendor-purchaser relationship.

Establish early on that your energies are driving toward results. The end of the project, the next milestone, the next action item. If you are waiting for a review of article A to start work on article B, say so. Remind your client of their part in the working relationship. If the ball stays in their court for too long, the project might collapse. Don’t allow this to happen. Keep communication flowing. Touch base with your content writing client to see what is happening with them.

But beware the overly chatty client, and avoid contacting clients with fluid chat or instant messaging capability. You are a freelance content writer, not an attention deficit disorder nurturer. Distracting texts and incoming message notifications are one more window open on a busy and (hopefully) productive desktop. Delivering the work is the priority, and all focus should contribute toward that end. Conduct your business peaceably, but socialize elsewhere.

Content production frenzy for multiple content articles requires time to deliver. Allow yourself the ability to get this done. Slicing focus to answer emails from the client is counter productive. If you require some bolstering, weigh the completion of many articles with extant experience. Many good word processing efforts can get cut short by distraction via instant messaging. Participate in social chat on breaks or intermittently throughout the day.

If you need feedback to verify your content caliber, wording tone and language are acceptable, send an email and get verification before incurring further costs and going on with the work. Nothing burns a freelance writer more than continuing with a project in good faith, then getting an email right before final submission that the client changed their mind. Keep project completion deadlines flexible enough to submit final files and edits without racing the clock to a fickle client’s finish line.

Time management is an important part of producing quality content in a time envelope. Clients online may be in different time zones all over the world. Without a fixed schedule of anticipated content production, chaos would reign. Planning content production, evaluating results, reviewing text and proofing before delivery are all part of the life of a freelance content writer doing business online. Organizing and assessing time spent researching, even while doing the research and doing outlines, is ingoing when freelance content writing is underway.

Content writing demands an informed and alert mind. A good work ethic is essential for freelance writing. Writing for online markets means not only doing a good job according to your understanding of the basic tenets and required elements, but contributing the work according to how others understand it to be useful and effective as well. Online content writing for internet clients is part of the Web commerce cycle. But without a community of peers or formal infrastructure it’s hard to see the content writing “industry” even while working as part of it.

The reality of writing content freelance online is that you are running your own business every hour on the clock. You must approximate return of serve for completed articles and text assignments under your own aegis. If there is a power outage, cable problem, or illness or problem typing or working your computer, you bear the brunt. The writing is due, and nobody but you knows the criteria the project but you. There are very few fingers to point when you run the show.

Writing content means understanding what makes people read an online article, and what makes them keep reading. If writing content for online publication was as simple as spinning text of out words, the multiple scripts and programs built to do just that would have effaced content writers before now.

Content Writing Ideas and Commitment

Exposure to a subject in depth and when looking at the most up to date news and information will inform any writers mind. The natural outflow of all this information will often be a “report” or position paper type project. While the content manager may not want this dry type of “white paper” style, it’s a good idea after a bevy of research to take a breather some thoughts and observations to the keypad.

A good writer knows when to get the gist of an idea down. The writer who gets in practice of spinning another original set of product content from the paid work of research on that topic now has a backlog item to market. This portfolio of unpublished work can become a part of a later project and supply a lot of time for further research.

Sometimes there is also the chore of editing down and overblown section of content or text file. Perhaps as an informed source you became overexcited about the topic and overwrote certain sections. It may be possible the voice and tone of the content has become markedly different from the other articles enough to be noticeable.

If there is a social component to your communication with the purchaser of content, be wary. The same time it would take the hiring content manager to write some of the work they just commissioned is being spent typing chat to you all day. How is this efficient?

Marketing the Freelance Article

As a website owner, webmaster, and domain name developer, I like to think I know a lot about how a domain name and a potential website will work. But when working with a client to support a new website launch or a web portal, make sure the communications reflect confirmations from the domain owner/project lead rather than inspired bursts from you as a writer. It must be absolutely clear what the hiring manager is committed to purchasing. Expectations related to performance are the client’s responsibility.

It must be clear regarding how long the text should be, what format it will be delivered in, how much leeway you have to alter the style or tone, what complexity or level the language should read at, and whether the content files should be keyworded or optimized for search engine optimization. Seeding keywords can degrade the quality of certain writing. The most readable text is often not the most easily sticky or enjoyable on the part of a browsing reader.

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