For a freelance writer to succeed, repeat work is a must. When it comes down to it, “one and done jobs†are not going to get you very far. Sure, you can make some money this way, but you need to keep clients coming back time and time again. This is how I have grown my freelance writer career from $0 to $5k to $10k per month, and something that you will definitely want to keep fresh on your mind.
I found one of my biggest repeat clients at GetAFreelancer, even though I did not see this coming initially. Up front, they asked for 100 articles at $10/each. Since they were only short pieces of about 200 words, I decided to go for it. Over the past year, they have paid me more than $7k for similar work. The moral of this story: when you start working for a client, you never know if it will turn into repeat jobs in the future.
The best way to secure repeat work is to offer your best the first time around. Simply put, if the client does not like your writing on the first project, why would they offer you more in the future? This alone is reason enough for you to put your best skills forward on each and every project.
Obviously, if a client tells you that repeat jobs are going to be available, you should fall over yourself trying to win the project.
The best type of client is the one that comes back for more, time and time again. Some clients will send one job right after the next, whereas others will wait for weeks or maybe even months. It comes down to what they need, and of course, how much money they can afford to spend.
Although repeat work is huge in the freelance writing industry, this holds true among other jobs as well. Everybody from web designers to car manufacturers know that repeat customers can help them to grow their business, while increasing profits.
I have been talking for a couple of weeks about offering a contest to all my readers. Well, the time has finally come. Even though I am starting out small, I am sure that you will find this contest to be well worth your time.
This is the second book that I have written, and to this point, my most popular. Although it is based largely around the game of basketball, it also teaches life lessons at the same time. To give some details, Open your Heart with Basketball touches largely on how my life and basketball career were affected when I was diagnosed with cancer. As you can imagine, the lessons taught in the book can help you succeed in life, sports, and of course, business.
To give you an idea of the publicity that the book has received, cover quotes were provided by: Regis Philbin – television personality, Dick Vitale – basketball announcer, Jack Wagner – Pennsylvania Auditor General, and a foreword by Lute Olson – Head Coach of the University of Arizona men’s basketball team.Â
Entering the contest is quite easy:
1. Make a post on your blog announcing this contest, and linking to my site. You can use whatever anchor text you please.
2. If you have pingbacks disabled on your blog, send me an email or leave a comment with a link to your post. You may want to do this anyway just to make sure!
3. There is no limit on the number of times you can enter. If you have more than one blog, feel free to link from each one; it will better your chances of winning!
4. One week from today, August 14, I will draw a random winner. I will contact the winner right away, and upon receiving a mailing address the book will be sent out!
Although the retail value of this book is only $12.95, it is definitely a valuable tool for bettering every aspect of your life.
I am looking forward to a good response and many more contests in the future!
Trying to increase traffic to your blog is not an easy task. All in all, this is one of the main reasons that a lot of people give up on blogging after only a couple of weeks. Although I felt good about this blog’s progress at the end of July, I am even more optimistic about the future after the way things went this last week.
On Tuesday August 1, I posted my freelance writing income for July 2007. While I thought that this would get people talking, I was not expecting the results that followed. Within a couple of days this post made its way around the blogosphere, and really hit it big when John Chow featured it on his blog.
You are probably wondering what this did for my blog, right? First off, it has helped to increase comments. To me, this may very well be the biggest benefit; I feel that comments are a great way to make the most of the blogging experience. At this time, my freelance writing post has 33 comments; my personal best for this blog.
Additionally, my daily traffic has doubled. I thought that this may only be temporary, but it appears that the numbers are holding steady for the most part. The reason that I am optimistic is that my RSS readership has also doubled. Obviously, this will have a positive effect as time goes on.
Although a lot of this success has to do with top ranking blogs linking to me, I feel that the quality of my original post is where everything started. Think about it this way: if my original post would have been poorly constructed, nobody would have ever taken notice. This is why you need to make sure that you put your all into every post that you write. You never know when a John Chow or other big time blogger is reading!
Despite the fact that I got a huge boost over the past seven days, I am not going to stop working hard this month. The way I see it, the more great posts I make, the more publicity this blog will receive. Sounds easy enough, right?
