What To Include In Your Freelance Writer Resume

Contributed by Amy Huges

If you’re a freelancer, you really should have an updated freelance writer resume with you at all times. But more than that, you really should be armed with a quality freelance writer resume at all times.

After all, it’s this resume that’s pretty much your lifeblood as a freelancer; it’s your workhorse, your foot through the next door. As you search for new gigs each week, the best way of getting one is via quality resume distribution.

So if you’re experiencing a bit of a lull in your freelance career, and if the jobs have dried up and no one wants to touch you, it could well be that it’s your freelance writer resume that’s letting you down. Take a look at it. Go on. You don’t need to be embarrassed, it’s just us.

Is it jumping out at your with its mediocrity? Is it making you want to cut it up into a million different pieces before throwing it out of window like a load of mediocre confetti onto some stranger?

You could solve your problem by paying an online service to write you up a resume. You could. OR you could take a look at our hints and tips on what to include in a freelance writer resume.

Include Your Work Experience

As a freelancer, you’ve probably got a lot of work experience under your belt. For this reason, you don’t have to include every job you’ve ever done. Just include the best ones, the ones where you excelled at, and the ones which are related to the work you’re now applying for.

Include Your Online Presence

Nowadays, more than ever, potential clients want to see some juicy online presence. They want to see that you’ve given the online world a shot - and you’re doing really well at it.

For this reason, we recommend including your website in your resume distribution, as well as any social media accounts. A tip though; don’t include social media accounts that will do no harm than good. You know, if you’ve got a twitter account where you interact with ‘the lads’ over football, cars and beer. This is a big no-no. If you have a professional twitter account, stick it on your freelance writer resume. If not, leave it out.

A website is huge eye-catcher because it says a lot about you as a freelancer. It says that you’ve taken the time to get yourself organized, and that you present yourself really well.

Include Samples!

A graphic designer can’t include samples in their resume because a resume is text only. Neither can an artist or a web designer include their samples. For them, life sucks.

For you, though, it’s great! Because a resume is text-based anyway, you can nicely fit in one or two short samples of your writing - no more than two - to give clients an idea of your style.

Include Any Side Specialties

Freelancers are often multi-talented individuals who have a few strings to their bow. If, for example, you’re a writer who is also pretty darn good at taking photographs, include it. I myself am a filmmaking graduate who now works as a writer, and I include this on my resume. You really do never know the opportunities that can arise! You’ve just got to sell yourself.

Include Your Education

People tend not to care all that much about education when it comes to working with freelances. They don’t really care about what grade you got in math and science back in 1999 when all that matters is whether you can write killer content for them.

But it’s still good etiquette to include your education and qualifications. In a freelance writer resume, you can include this stuff near the bottom. If you haven’t graduated from University, education on a freelance writer resume is honestly the least of your worries. But be savvy and include it anyway. (Just keep it brief).

Include References

Some people looking for jobs struggle to come up with referees. But you as a freelancer should be able to call upon lots of satisfied clients who can act as your references.

With this in mind, you can select two - maybe three - of your most regular and satisfied clients and stick them in your resume. Freelancers always include referees, so make sure you do too. If you don’t, it looks like you’ve not done any work for anyone.

Or you have, but you were rubbish.

About Author:

Amy Huges has been a professional ghost writer and content manager at http://www.resumewritingservice.biz/ for 5 years. She provides writing, editing and coaching services independently on various freelance platforms. Among her favorite activities there are browsing the web, social promotion of friend's and colleague's profiles and reading.





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Freelance Writers: How to Stay Focused on Developing Your Writing Career

by Suzanne Lieurance, the Working Writer's Coach

One question I hear over and over again from the writers I coach is, "How do I get focused and stay that way?"

That's a good question. Even seasoned professional freelancers have trouble staying focused from time to time. And they usually find their writing careers start to suffer when that happens.



Here are some tips for getting focused on developing your freelance writing career and staying that way:

1. Brainstorm for a few minutes and make a list of all the things you like to write about. Once you've got several things on your list, narrow the list down to just your top two areas of interest. Stick with these two areas or topics for awhile. Any writing or research activities that don't come within these two areas of focus should be set aside - for now.

2. Every Sunday evening, or Monday morning, sketch out your marketing plan for the week. And remember, keep your two areas of interest in mind when you do this. Only put things on your marketing plan for the week that relate to your two areas of interest. If you've decided you love to write about parenting, for example, but you'd like to finish that novel you started years ago, don't even think about the novel right now. Instead, focus on the kinds of parenting articles you want to write. Start studying the different parenting publications you find at your local bookstore or library to get a feel for the kinds of articles they publish. Then, get busy and write some queries to a few of these markets.

3. Start small. Make just a few simple changes in your life that give your writing priority. For example, if you're trying to develop a freelance career while still holding down a full time job, don't over work yourself. You'll only end up frustrated and disappointed. However, do plan on structuring your days to give yourself at least 15 to 30 minutes EACH day to write queries or articles, research markets, or study books about writing techniques. Too many people think they have to allocate huge amounts of time in order to get a writing career started. And, since they don't have huge amounts of time available for writing, they don't write at all, so they never develop the freelance writing career of their dreams.

On the other hand, if you decide you absolutely MUST write for at least 15 minutes, every single day, and you stick to that, soon you'll see some big improvements in your writing and you'll also begin to feel more in control of your life. It doesn't matter when you schedule the 15 to 30 minutes. It could be in the mornings, in the evenings, or on your lunch hour at work. The important thing is, just do it.

4. Part of your weekly marketing plan should include how you will network with other businesses and other writers each week. Don't neglect this part of the marketing plan. Even if the only way you network with other writers is through a listserv or private email with another writer, make sure you do this each and every week. Contact with other writers will keep your passion for writing alive, even when the pressures of work and family threaten to make you lose focus. And networking with other business people just might result in a few writing assignments.

5. Have fun with your writing. Don't turn it into just another chore. If you do, chances are you'll give up on the idea of freelance writing very quickly. And, if that happens, you'll just feel disappointed in yourself again for failing to follow through on your dream.

Try all of the above tips for awhile. Then – if you find you can't manage to stay focused, or develop a marketing plan each and every week, or actually write queries or articles to submit to publishers – hire a writing coach. A good coach can keep you focused, will help you improve your writing skills, and will teach you insider tricks to marketing your work.

Suzanne Lieurance is an author, freelance writer, certified professional life coach and writing coach, speaker and workshop presenter. She has written over two dozen published books and hundreds of articles for newspapers, magazines, and other publications. She lives and writes by the sea in Jensen Beach, Florida.

Visit her blog at www.writebythesea.com and for daily tips to help you stay focused on your writing career, get your free subscription to The Morning Nudge at www.morningnudge.com.

Freelance Writing - An Education for the Uninitiated

An education in freelance writing for the uninitiated

Guest Post By Nadia Jones
Freelancing is tough work for any trade, but freelance writers looking for work on the web have it particularly rough. I say that to anyone who expresses interest in freelancing just so they know what they're getting into. Freelancing can be a rewarding and empowering gig, but it takes serious effort and talent to make it big.

Why is freelance writing so difficult? In this (freelance) writer's opinion, it largely has to do with the sheer number of writers on the blogosphere competing for coverage and attention. Some are professional journalists and writers looking to make a living off their web writing, others are simply entrepreneurial bloggers who lack real writing experience but possess social media savvy that can pave the way for success.

Long story short: there's a ton of competition out there. So how is a person interested in freelancing expected to make a splash in an already saturated market? Consider my tips on the subject.

I wholeheartedly encourage writers to try out freelancing for themselves to see if they like it. But what I don't advocate is for those same writers to quite their day jobs and take up freelancing as their sole source of income.

It's possible to be self-sufficient on paid gigs through freelancing, but it takes time to build up that kind of loyal client base. A newcomer to freelancing would be better off keeping their job and freelancing on the side until they start making considerable profits from their efforts. Doing it any other way is simply foolhardy.

Search for potential clients and viable projects whenever you're on the web
Writers interested in freelancing should look for opportunities whenever they're on the web. A seemingly infinite number of writing opportunities await freelancers; they just have to know where to look for them. Many blogs accept guest post submissions from qualified and insightful writers, for instance.

You never know where an opportunity might pop up—maybe someone on your Twitter feed is asking for some help writing content for their site, or perhaps your favorite blog offered guest posting and you never even realized it. The point is that you keep your eyes peeled for these opportunities whenever you're online.

Don't be picky about assignments
In the same vein as the previous point, I have to emphasize that freelance writers refrain from being choosy about their assignments. For example, say a writer comes across some drab medical blog looking for writing help that doesn’t remotely pertain to their personal writing interests. While it's tempting to pass up that opportunity in hopes that something "better" will come your way, the writer would be much better off if they took the gig.

Why do I say that? Because you never know when you'll encounter work, and keeping busy on work that doesn’t exactly excite you is much better than sitting idle and wishing you had something to write about! Writing is rarely as glamorous as its made to be in popular culture, and aspiring freelancers should learn that truth sooner than later if they want to become a seasoned writer.

Nadia Jones works as a freelance blogger a number of websites, including sites focused higher education and online colleges. When she’s not writing about the overlap of technology and higher education, Nadia writes on topics as wide ranging as the food industry, small business, and the latest in mobile tech. Feel free to leave Nadia some comments!

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More on Freelance Writing

Writing for Money – Breaking Into Freelance Writing
Freelance Writing Work: The Possibilities
A Ghost Writer: 5 Features That Can Help Your Business Part 1

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Karen Cioffi
Multi-award Winning Author, Freelance/Ghostwriter, Editor, Marketer
Writer’s Digest Website of the Week, June 25, 2012