Special Events

Building Your Freelance Success One Publication at a Time

Making a living as a freelancer takes time, persistence and hard work agreed the panelists at the November 11 “Building Your Freelance Success One Publication at a Time” seminar, which was jointly sponsored by Johns Hopkins University and Washington Independent Writers.

In sessions such as “Moving Up the Magazine Totem Pole,” “Beyond Magazines and Newspapers,” and “Moving from Freelance Hobby to Freelance Business,” panelists shared their stories and offered tips for success they wish they’d known when starting out. Topics focused on the business side of writing, including how to make your research hours count, scope out new possibilities and make money doing what you love.

Presenters agreed newspapers and magazines simply don’t pay freelancers enough to make a decent living. Freelancers need to stay flexible, be open to new ideas, and look beyond the usual to find additional writing work.

Some of their examples: Pat McNees started writing histories for organizations and found one story so interesting that she developed it into a book. Mary Collins’ persistence in marketing her skills to publishing houses yielded a last-minute assignment to write a history book for young adults, which lead to projects with museums and more books. Ed Vilade, a freelancer for 40 years, writes speeches for CEOs and politicians. Lisa Daniel expanded her areas of expertise so her clients won’t overlap, and writes newsletters, white papers and marketing communications.

Kristen King hosted the event with panelists Cathy Alter, Beryl Lieff Benderly, Ann Cochran, Collins, Daniel, Christopher J. Gearon, Meg Guroff, McNees, John Pulley, Lester Reingold, Ellen Ryan, Holly Smith and Vilade. The breadth and variety of their experiences offered multiple takeaways—an editor’s laser focus on evaluating queries, advice on building lasting connections from freelancers who accidentally ruined some relationships, resources and references on marketing yourself and finding jobs, and creating dynamite Web sites to showcase your work.

Some of the tips panelists shared included:

• Make everything count. Recast a piece in several ways to make your research pay off and get the most mileage from an assignment.

• Remain a writer. Don’t let yourself get moved into editing if writing is what you love.

• Plan ahead before you leave your current job. Line up potential clients. Don’t overlook your current employer as a possible client.

• Little openings you think won’t take you anywhere often do!

• Generating new clients takes a lot of work. Make sure you retain your current clients.

• Network. Find someone who knows someone who knows someone else in the field or at the publication you wish to write for.

• Relationships really matter. Be easy and enjoyable to work with.

• Know when to move on.

• Spend money. Acknowledge people with small gifts, invest in nice business cards, join organizations and attend conferences to meet people and make connections.

• The more boring something is, the more you can charge (no one else wants to do the work!)

• Don’t forget the WIW Job Bank! Lots of business comes from those postings!