In the last two articles of the series, I shared things that you need to do to prepare yourself for the freelance writing career. In this article, I will tell you what you should do once your résumé is in place, you have written a good cover letter, and you have built your portfolio.

How much do you deserve?

This is going to be tricky. You have two big giants to tackle: The pay rate in the niche you have chosen to write and the amount paid to new writers like you. For this, you will have to do some research. Ask as many people as you want to ask, and go through as many project postings as you can and see the bid people have made there. This will give you an idea about how much your niche pays.

Visit freelance forums and blogs

Freelance forums and blogs are the goldmines of resources. Hence, you should consider being regular on one or more freelance forums and blogs.

What are the best practices?

Not knowing the best practices of the industry and not applying it are two different things. You should research and find out not only the rates, but the prevailing best practices of the industry as well. You also need to know the payment terms used by the genuine employers.

Find Jobs

This is what you were preparing for all along. Visit different blogs, freelance exchange websites and get yourself registered, if asked to, and start applying for the jobs that interest you.

Fill in all the details in the form, when registering into freelance exchanges. I would recommend uploading your image as well, and not any avatar or any funny picture. You should look professional, in the photograph. I prefer it this way because a photograph tells the prospective clients about you, and on the Internet, everyone prefers doing business with an idiot whom they know then any undercover genius about whom the clients have no clue.

Research your clients

To safeguard your interest, you need to do some research on the clients before you accept the job proposal sent to you. Not every client is created equal. Some are crooks as well.

Read, Read and Read

It comes at the end of everything, isn’t it? That is why it is important. You will have to read as much as you can: read about freelancing tips, read some authors from your field, read how things are changing, etc.

This brings us to the end of the Freelance Writing Checklist series. I wrote three articles in this series, links to which are provided below:

Freelance Writing Checklist part -1

Freelance Writing Checklist part -2

Freelance Writing Checklist part -3

Hope you liked the series, your views and reviews are welcome. You can either use the comment box to share or view or you can mail me on bikramksingh [at] gmail [dot] com. waiting to hear from you.

Taking our discussion on freelance writing forward, I will give you some more items that you need to include in your Freelance Writing Checklist, before you jump on the bandwagon. Without wasting our precious time in stretching the introduction, let us begin with the checklist items.

Is your résumé ready?

Sounds familiar? Yeah…every job requires you to have a résumé, and freelancing is no different in this regard. You will need an up-to-date résumé throughout your freelance writing career, and particularly when you are starting out when you have no portfolio to show. Your résumé will tell your prospective client about your experience.

How good is your cover letter?

You cannot do without a cover letter ever in your freelancing write. You will need this every day and for every project you bid on. It is a thousand times more important than your résumé. You need to know that you are not alone when you apply for an online writing gig. You are competing with hundreds of freelancer who is vying for the gig. Hence, to get noticed, you need to have a very attractive cover letter properly outlining your skills and experiences.

The things written above were good enough for any freelancer, but what makes a cover letter more important to a freelance writer is the fact that through your cover letter your prospective client will get the first glimpse of your writing; hence, if it is very impressive then consider your job half-done.

Do you know how to apply?

Well, doing this is not very difficult. It is just time consuming. Before you apply for a gig, you need to find out how the employer or the freelance board through which you are applying wants your application to be.

Some boards just need one cover letter, which you post with your bid, while others may ask you to write a brief introduction while posting the bid, and the rest of the details in a private message.

There is one more difference. The difference is in the way your client will accept your samples: some will ask you to send them links to your sample, while others will be okay with your attachments, and you will also find a handful of clients who will ask you to paste a brief article in the body of a private message. It is also not uncommon to find a client who wants you to write a custom sample for him on the topic or on the subject chosen by the client himself.

Get these things ready, I will be back in the next installment with some more checklist items. Meanwhile, I will also request you to tell me what you feel about the items I have listed above.

If you write anything on the internet, for which you hope to garner attention, you absolutely need a good headline.  Studies have shown that 8-10 web surfers will notice your page based upon the headline of an article alone.  But that number drops to 2-10 after that headline is read, which means you need to always make sure that your headline is as interesting, as well as informative, as possible.  In order to beat that popular curve, and drive more traffic to your site, you need a headline that is going to pull in the readers.

That means using the right keywords.  If we’re talking about the videogame world, for example, you want to throw out the name of the platform you’re talking about immediately.  That means emphasizing “Xbox 360” or “Wii” as that’s where most of your searches are going to come from.  But after that, it’s how you use the keyword to your advantage.

You want a good short headline, that’s going to catch someone’s attention, while informing them of why they want to read your article.  For example, sticking to the videogame world, something like “How To Beat Your Friends On Xbox 360” isn’t really going to pull anybody in.  Sounds too generic, uninformed, and also doesn’t excite the audience for what your writing can do for them, not to mention it’s much too long.  “Dominate The Xbox 360” is a much more concise crowd grabber, more general, so as to lure in a broader interest.  Plus the shorter headline just makes you feel more pumped to read the article, and get what you can from the information.

Go for big keywords, short headlines, and use gripping vocabulary.  Words that really jump out and grab people, so that they have no choice but to read what you’ve written.  Remember, your headline is your first introduction to your piece, so try and make sure it’s something that people will want to read.

When applying for a job, or writing a resume, there are a ton of opportunities for error.  Any error can prove costly as well, as your resume is your first introduction to a job.  Essentially a pre-interview, interview, your resume says a lot about you, which is why you’ll want to be careful not to accidentally make a mistake.  You’d actually be surprised at the amount of people that make mistakes when writing their resumes, most of them simple changes that could have been avoided, had they been aware of the fact.  So here are eight of the most common mistakes, so that you can avoid them:

1. Not following submission directions.  This is a huge negative before you’ve even got your foot in the door.  Not following directions makes you look unable to follow directions, and not many people are interested in hiring a difficult employee to deal with.

2. The dreaded typo.  Spellchecker is your friend, but isn’t 100% accurate, so always, always proofread.  Read everything at least twice, and once backwards so that you can ensure all mistakes are completely eradicated.

3. Listing non-job related information.  The hiring manager that’s handling your resume doesn’t care about the info that doesn’t apply to that job, so don’t waste their time by adding unnecessary fluff.

4. Improper format.  All resumes basically follow the same exact format, and most corporations use this format to quickly scan through their masses of resumes.  If they find one that doesn’t follow the guidelines, usually they lose interest, as being different in the corporate world is never a good thing.

5. Don’t refer to yourself.  Whatever you do stay away from words like “I” or “me”, as referring to yourself on a resume is unprofessional, and makes you look bad.  It’s your resume, they already know that it’s about you.

6. Don’t make yourself look well-rounded.  Most people think that if they seem to have a broad skill set, there will be more availability for you at a particular corporation.  This isn’t true at all.  You want to describe a very specific skill set, as that’s what the job you’re applying to is looking for.

7. Writing too much.  Most people make their resumes much too long, loading the page with senseless facts, or worse, droning on for more than one page.  Your resume is supposed to be a short document to introduce a potential employer to your work experience, emphasis on the short.  A hiring manager’s time is valuable, they don’t want to read through pages of content, they want to get a feel for you as quickly as possible.

8. Inappropriate email address in your contact information.  There are a plethora of sources which offer you an email address for free, take advantage.  If you have something controversial, or possible offensive in your email address, don’t use it when you’re applying for a job.  You’re expected to be professional, an inappropriate email isn’t exactly that.

Why does we need home business ideas? After all what is the advantage of having a home business? Why are work at home jobs essential?

Most people opt for a home business after they become parents. The rising cost of day care and the increasing risks in trusting your child to a baby sitter are making more and more parents leave their jobs and work at home. No matter what, running a home business has certain advantages:

- You can look after your children and your home while you earn money – You don’t need to go to work at a fixed time; you can decide your own hours – You don’t need to spend money in buying a new wardrobe for your office; you can work in your pajamas. – You can tailor your home business to suit your abilities

Home business is quite a profitable way to earn money and requires no or minimum investment. Most business experts predict that sales and network marketing will continue to grow in the coming years. There are many kinds of home business ideas which can be utilized to earn money and can be chosen as per your skill and aptitude.

Here are some of the home business ideas which can help you to earn good money sitting at home:

1. Create a product or e-book and sell it on the net: Do you specialize in some subject? Do you know more about a subject than an ordinary layman? If you are a doctor, gardener or a chef, you can write a book about recipes, cures or plants and sell it online. Make sure that you make it interesting and enjoyable to read since there are scores of books available on every subject on the internet. Most of these are free so your book needs to be real good to attract people and make them buy it!

2. You can use affiliate marketing and earn commissions by selling products for others: Are you a good sales person? Can you write good product reviews? Are you good with words? If yes, then you can work at home by selling affiliate products where you get commissions for every sale. This means you need to promote the product through websites, articles and other tools so that your product gets more visibility and you get more commissions.

3. Online Auction: Do you believe “old is Gold”? If you do, then you can try conducting online auctions or start an online auction business where people can sell their old stuff by auction.

4. Internet Travel Business: Travel is an industry which the experts predict will continue to grow and increase about $7 trillion dollars in a span of 10 years. Your internet travel business can help people plan their vacation, trip and itinerary.

There are many other work at home ideas which can really help you to make more money than you have ever made! Setting up a great home business is a great way to enjoy your kids and work too!