One Block at a Time

Every career depends on the building blocks gathered along the way. It isn’t any different for writers. Even the great pyramids rose one block of a stone at a time. So what kind of building blocks should you cultivate to make your writing career successful?

In this business, you’ve got to leverage whatever experience you have. Sure, one article or book may lead to another. A article, short story, or book may lead to a film. But those are the most obvious. What you need to look for are less obvious building blocks—those that you may even take for granted.

First of all, every experience you have may contribute to ideas for your work. Many writers, especially those writing fiction, use their own experiences as jumping off points. Some go as far as turning their personal experiences into stories or books. If you’ve gone through a traumatic time, readers want to read about it. Today, there seems an insatiable curiosity about what happens in other people’s lives.

But it’s a variety of experiences that lead to further successes. Take one writer who began writing reviews and taking photos of musical acts for a free arts tabloid handed out in record stores. This gig led to the publication of some of his photos in a large city newspaper. That gave him some clout to use when promoting his work to editors of some music and arts magazines.

That same writer loved to travel. But travel can be expensive, which limited him to local places. One day he received an invitation to a trade show from a friend in the travel business. That led to an invitation to travel to Guatemala on a press trip. He notified some editors of trade magazines that he was going on the trip, and one asked for whatever stories he could provide from the trip—on speculation, of course. He returned and wrote the stories, and the editor loved them. That was the beginning of a long-lasting gig with that trade publication.

Work from that publication led him to write for other trade publications. While writing for more than one trade publication in a particular field is normally frowned upon, he managed to end up writing for most of the major ones in the travel industry. Because he offered so many different angles, none of his pieces competed with each other.

And while trade writing brought in steady income, it didn’t pay all that much. So this writer set his sights on consumer travel magazines. His trade writing gave him ample credentials—he often wrote two or three articles a week for them. And writing for trade, no matter which trade, meant he was also writing for business.

That business article writing led to another long-standing gig with a regional business newspaper, for whom he wrote one or two articles a week. These provided another source of steady income.

Along the way, he was now developing several avenues of income which helped to steady his overall freelance outlook.

His travel trade writing led to offers to write travel guide books. Sometimes he was one of several contributors, while at other times he wrote books on his own. This added greatly to his credentials. The reading public, as well as magazine editors, look up to anyone who has written a book. The truth is that books don’t pay all that much. But the wealth they do give you is in the respect you get as a writer. If a book is successful—even if you don’t get paid a lot for writing it—it will be one of the biggest building blocks on your road to success.

If you’re work is good enough, you may even get awards. And these can go a long way to helping to promote your writing business. The writer above knew that and when he received several prestigious awards, he took full advantage of them as promotional tools. These helped him establish at least one specialty.

The bottom line is to always push your comfort zone. Seek work that stretches your skills—yes, even exaggerate here and there. Remember, your experiences plus networking plus your skills equals moving to the next level.

Tools of the Trade

Back in the good ole days—were they really as good as everyone thinks—writers used quill pens, then pens of other sorts and paper to put down their thoughts. Eventually, the typewriter appeared. This invention made work for writers like Mark Twain, one of the first to own one, much easier.

The standard typewriter dominated the writer’s tool kit until the mid-20th century. Soon the old hunt and peck model became electrified, enabling writers to work faster because its powered keys required a lighter touch.

Just when the electric typewriter—the IBM Selectric, with its rotating and interchangeable font ball, topped the list—the electronic typewriter, with its computer-like keyboard appeared. Writers wondered how life could get any better.

Well, it did. With the invention of the personal computer, writers’ productivity increased tenfold. Not only were the keyboard keys extremely light to the touch, but also this machine could store documents for future use and reworking. Editing, formerly a long and laborious process of marking up printed papers, soon achieved great speed through copy and paste techniques.

Over the past 25-30 years of my writing career, I’ve seen and tried them all. I entered my career with a big, old, black, clunky Remington typewriter, followed shortly thereafter by a sleek Corona portable. I hated typing. Each character required so much effort. For a while I rented an IBM Selectric and fell in love with it. After my first article sold to Popular Mechanics Magazine, I took the money and bought myself a Brother Electronic typewriter. This was even better than the IBM I had been using.

But in 1989, that all changed for me, for that’s when I entered the Computer Age. My first, a generic IBM compatible XT clone, seemed like something out of the far future. My productivity took a quantum leap. After that, I purchased a new desktop about every three years—my attic is literally a virtual museum of computing. I also purchased a Tandy portable wordprocessor that helped me to tackle notetaking on the go. I added several laptops to the mix, plus a computer just for my photographic work. And that’s only the hardware.

Along with all the various computers came a myriad of software—wordprocessors, spreadsheet programs, photo editing programs, you name it. I felt as if I was on a Tilt-a-Whirl at times. No sooner did I learn a program, then a new version came out, eventually making my work even more productive.

And that’s the key—productivity. As a writer, it’s imperative to keep up with the latest technology, the tools of your trade. While you don’t have to purchase the latest and greatest computers or software, you should have examples of each that make your work easier. If you’re still writing on a legal pad, then it’s time to make the leap.

To give you an idea of what you could be doing, let’s jump to the present. I no longer go to computer stores to buy equipment. Instead, I purchase lease-back, refurbished Dell desktops, complete with a later version of Windows, from Computer-Show.com. I’ve purchased four of these powerful systems from them for about $300 each and love each one. Since I began with computers that used floppy disks and newer computers today don’t have them, I make sure that my systems all have them. In addition, I also have CD and DVD players and writers that make my systems truly multimedia.

My laptops are all the same make and model IBMs. This allows me to use them and their accessories interchangeably. I do lectures and seminars as part of my work and these allow me lots of flexibility.

Software is a big part of my writers tool kit. Corel WordPerfect X-4, the latest version, is the cornerstone. It allows me to work and read files in both WordPerfect and that other nasty program, Microsoft Word. I also use Dragon Naturally Speaking, a speech-to-text program that helps me take notes from books and convert my handwritten notes to digitized text.  Using these programs, I was able to produce two books of over 100,000 words, each in 10 weeks. With my old systems and programs, that would have been impossible.

Other programs, like Iambic’s ExpenseDirector, incorporated into my Palm Pilot, allow me to keep records of all my expenses—a true boon at tax time. A program called Paperport allows me to use my computer and scanner as a copy machine. And either Corel WordPerfect or Adobe Acrobat allow me to convert my manuscripts to PDF files for producing e-books.

As a freelance writer, I’m both a writer and a business person. I’ve set my office and tools up with care so that my productive capacity is as high as it can be. And high productivity using the best tools you can afford equals higher profits.

Master the Possibilities

The now-famous phrase, “master the possibilities,” used by Mastercard in its promotional campaigns also applies to freelance writing. But with freelancing it’s less about whipping out your credit card than figuring out how to find markets for your work.

Before you go searching, however, you have to figure out exactly what type of writing you want to do. Are you planning to write articles for publication, either in print or online or both? Or are you more into business writing, preparing press releases, ghost-written articles for trade magazines, and such? While you can work in both directions, it’s better to chose one and stick with it. And while both require the same writing skills, each requires a different mind set.

It used to be that publication was more insular. As a freelancer, you’d send your pieces to publications that might print them and you’d get paid. Today, with the advance of technology, the publishing world has exploded with what seems an endless list of possibilities. Unfortunately, just as there are many more opportunities to get published, so are there many more, especially online,  that don’t pay anything. And you can’t live on those. With the ease of online publishing and self-publishing through e-books, many more would-be writers are finding it easier to get published, even if they have to do it themselves, thus by-passing the hurdles of the traditional route. So competition is fierce.

To begin with, you need to check one of the primary annual market guides—Writer’s Market or Literary Marketplace.

The first on the list, Writer’s Market, published by Writer’s Digest Books, has been around since 1921 and of the three is the least expensive with a list price of about $30. It features over 6,000 listings of newspaper and magazine markets, book publishers, including small presses, playwriting and screenwriting markets, and even those for greeting cards. Each listing gives you the information you need to see if your work will fit. And while there are many markets in which your work will be a good match, there are 10 times as many that it will not. And while the two-and-a-half-inch book has it’s good points, it offers a lot of markets that just don’t pay well or not at all.

Literary Marketplace claims it’s the “ultimate insider’s guide” to the publishing industry. For a whopping $339, it ought to be. It offers 54 sections in which it organizes publishers, agents, advertising agencies, associations, distributors, and events. It features twice the number of listings as Writer’s Market, but concentrates mostly on book publishing. Since its cost is prohibitive, you’ll have to use it at your local library.

Whether you use one or the other or both of these annuals will depend on how well you’re repeatedly tapping certain markets, how good you are at selling spin-off material, and where you wish to focus your publishing efforts each year.

As you progress in your freelancing career, you’ll find more markets that aren’t listed in the above annuals. Publishers of all kinds choose whether they want to be published in them. Many refuse because doing so opens them up to receiving tons of correspondence from too many wannabee writers who have neither the skill or talent to write well. They prefer to be more selective. Also, new technologies create new markets. In the last five years many opportunities have opened up for educational and recreational material for home and school computers.

Because editors play musical chairs and their requirements change regularly, it’s a good idea to use the latest version of each of the annuals. It’s important to know the exact name, spelling, title, etc., of a publication’s editor. If you’re going to impress editors, you must get their names right.

In the case of Writer’s Market, you can check out last year’s edition from the stacks at your library, find what publications look good, and make a list of them, then go back to the library and find those on your list in the latest edition in the reference section and note the changes. Because of the high cost of Literary Marketplace, you’ll have to do all your work on the reference edition at the library.

You can keep up with changes during the year by watching the market columns in Writer's Digest Magazine and The Writer, the only two magazines devoted exclusively to writing. You can also subscribe to the Writer’s Market online and catch up with changes there.

If you've decided on a specialty, you'll subscribe, I'm sure, to the best publications in your chosen field, or track them down regularly wherever you can. If you’re serious about book publishing and not just publishing a book, then reading Publishers Weekly regularly at your local library is a must.

Whether markets appear to be a broadening or a row of locked doors is entirely up to you, your energies, ambitions, and skills as a writer, promoter, and, most importantly, a salesperson.