How Good of a Salesperson Are You?

No, you aren’t applying for a job in a retail store. But to be a successful freelance writer, you do have to be a good salesperson—as good as anyone who sells in a high pressure environment. You need to develop selling skills on a par with the best traveling salesmen.

Many beginning freelance writers are so consumed with the act of writing that they forget about selling their work after they’ve finished writing it. But writing and selling should go hand-in-hand. You need to do both jobs equally to be a success. So before you even begin to work on a project, have an idea of where you’ll potentially sell it.

The best salespeople begin their sales campaigns by developing a list of prospects. They glean names from whatever source they can, building a list of people to contact. Though over time you’ll amass a list of people you can count on to help with research, you also need to begin a list of potential markets—and not just markets but personal contacts in those markets. You can achieve this by sending out queries for projects or sending material out on speculation that some editors will begin to buy. Once you have your foot in the door, insert a doorstop and keep that door open.

After a top salesperson has a short list of contacts, they’ll sort through it to find the best-sounding prospects so they'll save time and money by avoiding blind alleys. They make their initial contacts, then review what happened, noting all reactions. Then they use these notes for follow-ups. They’re constantly looking to expand their markets. And you should, too.

While you may tackle the first step—creating a partial list—you probably don’t follow up on the remaining ones because, let’s face it, most freelance writers are lousy salespeople. While creative burnout and procrastination often plaque their writing, the same thing happens when they're trying to sell their work. In order to expand your freelance writing business, you have to avoid this. Remind yourself that at times freelancing may be 50 percent writing and 50 percent selling. And while large businesses have sales departments to handle selling their products, you don’t.

Be realistic about your markets. Remember, there’s loads of competition—a recent statistic puts the number of freelance writers in the U.S. at nearly 70,000. To get anywhere, you have to stand out from the crowd. Your material and your presentation of it have to offer editors the best and more of it than others can provide.

The first step is developing your prospect list. You’ll need to study the market and learn the possibilities so well that the market seems to evolve by itself. And don’t start at the top. You’re sure to fail. Begin at the bottom and work your way up. Start with the easiest markets, which most likely will also not be the highest paying. But the easier ones have less strict requirements and demand less work overall than the highest paying ones. Plus, you’ll have a much better opportunity to get published in them. But remember that you’ll only be working with them for a while to build up your credibility as a writer.

If you’ve already begin to publish your work, review your original markets. If you're working well with them, negotiate with the editors for higher pay or perhaps ask if can become a contributing editor. As such, you won’t get any more pay, and you won’t be doing any editing. But you will have your name on the magazine’s masthead, which will impress other editors higher up the pay chain.

When the same bland renewal notice for a magazine subscription arrives in the mail, you usually toss it in the trash. If you intend to renew, you most likely don’t do so on the first notice, but two or three later. The same goes for the reaction by an editor to the same presentation. If you want to renew an editor's interest in your material or build up assignments on a higher level than in the past, think about upgrading your presentation. How well does it sell your ideas? Is your timing and the sequence of your ideas logical? Is the market holding you back or are you holding yourself back through lack of expertise, timidity, or just plain fear?

Today, freelance writers have all sorts of sales tools at their disposal—Email marketing, Web sites, social networking, etc. But just like regular advertising, you also have mass mailing. Have you ever thought about designing a brochure showcasing your work and sending it along with your queries? Can you do the same digitally and send it along with Email queries? Have you given any thought to developing your own Web site. Not a personal one, but a professional business site that’s aimed at editors?

Remember, some of the nation’s top freelancers spend as much as three or four hours a day on the phone and the Internet keeping in touch with publishers and editors. Start making the time to do the same if you want to become a success in this business.

While Facebook is probably the most widely known social network on the Web, it’s not the only one of use to writers. Facebook takes in everybody, not just one group. Sure you can create a professional page, but it’s main purpose is to connect people. As a writer, you may want to socialize on a more professional level, targeting those who can help advance your career. For this, you need to join LinkedIn, a social network of business professionals.

LinkedIn
Unlike Facebook, the people that use this network come from all sorts of professional careers. You’re more likely to find editors, publishers, and public relations consultants here. But it takes time to build a useful network of contacts, so be patient.

Look at LinkedIn as a tool in your marketing arsenal, not as a fast way to get to an editor or agent.

As with other social networking sites, you have a profile page and a network of connections. You can also join groups, pose questions to your network/groups, post events and add widgets, such as your blog feed, to your profile.

LinkedIn creates visibility for what you do and offer. Your profile will appear in search engines and can be accessed by the public if you allow it to. The site also allows people to publicly recommend your professional work. Used wisely, it’s an effective and dynamic way to network and spur new ideas for promoting your writing.

As with Facebook, you’ll be able to create a profile on LinkedIn. But instead of posting your resume, show what you’ve achieved—examples of your work and excerpts from your books.

LinkedIn has a feature that other social networks don’t have. It allows its members to recommend other members to confirm the type and quality of their work. In getting work as a freelance writer, recommendations from editors, publishers, and publicists are important.

Like Facebook, you can post helpful articles, tips, and share links to sites that you think your followers may be interested in. And don’t forget to periodically link to your own Web sites and blogs and other places online where your work can be found.

TWITTER
Twitter is a mini-blogging network that is probably the least useful for you as a writer. First, you’re limited to 140 characters, plus a photo, which doesn’t give you much space to leave a detailed message like Facebook or LinkedIn. v

If you choose to use Twitter, follow people or companies that can offer you entertainment, information, promotion advice, inspiration, or news. Agents, editors, publishers, other authors, publicists are tweeting.

When you follow someone on Twitter, they generally respond in kind. This is true whether you’re following your cousin or the Washington Post. In order to send a message to a fellow tweeter, you must be following him or her.

With Twitter, it’s important for you to know why you’re tweeting. Are you doing it for fun,  to engage potential readership, to drive people to your website, or to spread the word about a giveaway or an upcoming book?

Use Tinyurl.com to add links to your tweets. This site turns unwieldy URLs into more manageable ones, helping you fit links into Twitter’s 140-character limit.

Above all, figure out how posting to Twitter will fit into your overall promotional strategy. You’ll find you won’t have the time to post to a group of social media sites, so choose which ones you use wisely.

Making the Most of Social Media Part 1

Are you taking advantage of today’s social media networks? If you’ve only been tuning in to popular networks like Facebook and LinkedIn, then you’re missing a golden opportunity to promote yourself and your work.

Today, it pays to be a joiner. Normally you’d want to stand out from the crowd, but in today’s social media world, it’s just the opposite. “Who you know” has always been as important in the writing business as “what you know.” But unless you traveled a lot and met key people face to face, it was difficult to network contacts.

There have never been more people participating in social networks. While there’s a personal dimension to nearly all such networks. But just joining isn’t enough. You must also use them.

Social networking demands a consistent investment of time. If you approach these sites simply as places to sell your book or service and never give back to the communities, you’ll find yourself losing “friends” faster than you add them. As with all types of marketing, what you do on social networks depends on what your audience will respond to and what your goals are. One of the leading social networks is Facebook.

Facebook
Facebook can be as simple or complex as you like. You can simply tell your friends what you’re up to using text and photos or you can develop a following that will greatly enhance your marketing efforts.

Above all, Facebook is a network that can help you find other people interested in the same subjects as you. You can join groups of users specializing in different types of writing or in different subjects that you write about.  You can also create your own group around your blog. Once you establish a group, you can send messages to its members. With such a targeted audience, you can post content with real value.

Facebook also allows you to announce events, such as book releases and readings, bookstore appearances and such, and invite people to it.

The key to keeping your Facebook page active is keeping your profile current. Even if you don’t reveal too much about your personal life, your friends on Facebook will feel they know you better.  Status updates are just that—posts that keep your Facebook followers informed as to what’s happening in your life or your work.

As part of your profile, you’ll also be able to post an image. As a professional writer, you need to use good photos of yourself. Try to make these more than a snapshot. Don’t use bizarre images in place of your personal one. Remember, your Facebook followers will judge you by that image as well as your profile.

Unlike other social networks, Facebook offers you three ways to promote yourself. The first is the personal page. Through this page, you’ll assemble a group of “friends.” Some may actually be friends of yours, but most will be strangers who come to your page because of the posts you make.

The second sort of page you can create on Facebook is the professional page. This page is focuses on your business, putting you in the same category as the Coca-Cola Corporation. Instead of assembling “friends,” you must get people to “like’ your page. This becomes a select group of Facebook followers, known as “fans,” to whom you can send targeted information about your work.

The third kind of page you can create on Facebook is the author page, which you assemble for a particular book or series of books you have written. This is also a “fan” page, but differs from the professional page in that its posts go only to fans of your books—in essence, your readers.

Facebook most likely offers the most flexibility of all the social networks, but there are others that can be of help in different ways.

NEXT WEEK: Part 2 of Making the Most of Social Media