Are you finding it difficult to become a well-paid freelance writer?

With all the information online about how to become a freelance writer it can be difficult deciding what to implement and what to ignore.

Fortunately, when I started my writing career I found a simple blueprint that I followed to the tee. That blueprint helped me earn my first $1,000 in only a few months. And now a year on I am earning well and have a thriving writing business, with my highest grossing month being $3,600.

If you’ve been following this blog for a while you can probably guess what the blueprint was and you know where to find it. If not, here’s the link to Bamidele’s Earn Your First $1,000 Writer Challenge.

Dare I say that’s all you need to succeed as a writer?

Seems stupid of us to share content that’s obviously in competition with us right? Well, that’s not our philosophy at WriteWorldwide.

Our philosophy is to share as much valuable information as possible to help you succeed as a writer. If it means sharing someone else’s work, advice, or content, then so be it.

Now, recently Bamidele reached out to myself and Richard Rowlands because he wanted to feature us in his new ebook: How They Started. The book details how four writers when from zero to four figures in monthly income.

One of the questions Bamidele asked in that book was: “What Would you do if you had to start again?”

Today I wanted to share my exact answers with you. Bamidele has kindly agreed that I can share this information with you.

My Proven BluePrint to Break Into Freelance Writing (And Earn Well)

Here’s what I would do:

1. Position myself – whether that’s by niche (e.g. technology writing) or service (blog posts, guest posts and magazine articles).

2. Decide on my rate to start – this would be between $0.10-$0.15/word.

3. Build a writer’s website with the following key pages: about, services, contact, and hire me page. I would build a simple one-page site to start. It doesn’t have to be perfect; the key is to get going. I can always change it with time.

4. Establish my online presence by updating my Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn pages to reflect that I’m a writer.

5. Build social proof to command higher rates.

  • Select and pitch a few major publications such as Huffington Post and Entrepreneur
  • Find the decision maker and their email addresses by using email finding apps such as Hunter
  • Pitch the decision maker of these publications – such as the editor – to stand out from the many submissions on their contact forms
  • Keep these pitches short because editors are busy people
  • Once I have one major publication, I will forget about this step and move on. One is enough to boost your credibility in the client’s eyes, even if you’re a beginner in yours

6. Build a prospect list of websites and publications I want to pitch.

It will be a list of 100 prospects. To speed up the time it takes to build a list and also to create a targeted list, I’ll target writers in my niche or niches and see who they write for.

  • Find the decision maker and their email address
  • Document this list in an excel sheet

7. Pitch those publications using a proven cold pitch.

  • Follow up with each of those prospects using the 3-7-7 formula. With this method, you follow up three days later if you hear nothing. You do the same seven days after that follow-up, and then another seven days after the last. If you still hear nothing, consider it a dead lead.
  • Document my progress in an excel sheet to make sure I’m on top of it all.

On paper these steps are simple. The reality though is that they’re only as effective as the effort you put in.

You need to put in the hard work.

I can’t promise you an easy ride. There all be lots of stuff that you need to figure out on your own. But, what I can promise you is that if you take one small step at a time, those little steps will add up and before you know it, you’ll have a lucrative writing business.

So, what are you waiting for?

Follow this template and share your progress with us, either below in the comments or via email at hello at writeworldwide.com

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