Writing When You Know Nothing About the Subject Part 1

I hear a lot of writers talk about how they won’t apply for certain jobs or worry about accepting assignments because they know nothing about what they’d be required to write about and I hope to set you free today by letting you know you don’t have be an expert on a subject to write about it.

*Sigh* Felt good didn’t it? Letting out that breath of fear and hesitation is the first step to taking your writing career to the next level. Now, back to business. How do you write about something of which you have no knowledge? Research, research, research.

Do you need to become a leading expert in the subject before you can write your lede? No, but you need to become literate in the subject before you can begin searching for and interviewing subjects. Read up on the bones of the subject and then look at your audience. Are they other experts, hobbyists or the casual reader? Knowing your audience helps you determine how in-depth your knowledge of the subject needs to be.

Read up on the subject and then contact an expert. Ask the basic questions and also ask for research and source recommendations. Ask about angles on the subject that are not often covered. Remember, even for the casual reader you want to offer something more – something that will catch a reader’s eye and draw them into the article. Every parent has read an article on infants losing their belly buttons, but an article targeting less circulated newborn belly button issues like hernias is a great and different angle.

On Thursday: Part 2 – Research Sources.

Writing Tip of the Day: Follow the Freelancers

Where do the freelancers in your town gather? Networking functions? Coffee shops? Every once in a while it’s good for the hermit writer to shake off the cobwebs, pack up their laptop and head to where there’s action.

The other day I left the comforts of my house to do an in person interview and while I was out I stopped over at a hot coffee house that caters to all types of clientel, but freelancers tend to pop up there pretty frequently. Not only did I have fun, I re-connected with a graphic designer friend who rekindled a dormant project we had discussed.

Getting out of your regular work setting can recharge your batteries and give you the opportunity to connect with those who have similar interests and get your business card or brochure in front of new people.

What Phobias are Keeping You from Writing Success?

Writers are strange little creatures. We have habits, comforts, ticks and phobias (and I use this word loosely). They are no different than others really except a lot of our issues are work-related. We like a certain type of pen to use when we interview. We have a certain creature comfort like coffee, well-sharpened pencils, etc. We also have certain phobias that will sometimes keep us from working to our greatest potential.

Today I thought I’d open up the discussion on phobias and together we can come up with solutions to help each other get through and maybe be a little less weird – oh who am I kidding !

Perfection

It can become a problem when you take into account the quest of perfection or fear of not achieving perfection often leads to delayed assignments. A fear that the assignment isn’t perfect will have a writer either afraid to start an assignment or keep them from turning one in because of never-ending rewrites or tweaks.

One coping aid for a perfection quest is to make yourself start the article. Just start typing. Often when you start the rest will flow a little easier and you’ll wonder what was all the fuss. One trick for endless edits is to send your work to a friend – preferably a writer or editor – who can look over the piece and fawn over your smart and on point writing. Or at least they can give you a couple of spots to look at so you can satisfy that pesky “I know there is something wrong with it” feeling. Don’t use that last tip as a crutch though, you will need to be able to know when to stop on your own without always having an outside source pat you on the head.

Interviewing

Interviewing phobia can be intense. I have a problem with phone interviewing. Sure it’s easy and is often the only way you’re going to catch a source, but I hate the telephone. I have no problem interviewing, I have a problem lifting the phone off the cradle, dialing and waiting for the person on the other end to answer. Others may have trouble just talking to people in general, meeting for an interview can be kind of like meeting someone for a first date – intimidating and a little awkward at first.

In either case, interviewing anxiety often stems from either a lack of self-confidence on the writer’s part or an over active imagination. Interview subjects are usually a lot more nervous to talk to you and if you’re well prepared for an interview – a couple of ice breaking questions, boning up on background information, a firm grasp of basic interviewing techniques, you’ll soon find yourself over the jitters within the first few minutes of the conversation.

Not all of our fears/phobias can be worked out as easily as the ones above, but we can learn tips and tricks to manage them better. Don’t suffer through a fear, ask the FWJ community for help and learn how to manage it!

Got a phobia or a tip for overcoming one? Post it below!

Writing Tip of the Day: Build Your Niche or Name?

It may sound like the same thing. Building your name and building your niche, but in actuality they are two different things. While it’s entirely possible (and ideal) to do build both your name and your profile within your niche at the same time, it is also possible to do one while not doing much for the other.

So do you know if there is an imbalance in your “brand building?”

Review Your Work

What does your work say about you? Your niche? Are you stuck in the low paying gigs that contribute toward your niche, but aren’t doing much to get your name out there? Do you have solid clips that showcase your writing abilities, but don’t necessarily focus on your chosen path of work?

When you take gigs, be mindful as to where they fit in the overall design of your career. If you are really a travel writer, but spend all of your time doing tech work, you are not on the right path. All writers should stop every so often to assess where they are and where they are headed.

Review Your Social Network

What type of things are you Tweeting and Facebooking about? What things are you posting? Who is in your social circle? Writers need to consider if they are following, friending and contributing info according to their niche, also being mindful if they are also portraying themselves in a positive professional light.

Some genres of writing aren’t necessarily the strictest when it comes to decorum so tweeting about random things may not affect you much. But, if you are say a parenting writer, you may either want to have a personal Twitter account to discuss your favorite swinger’s clubs and use your professional account to discuss potty training techniques.

A few things to remember:

• Make sure your social networking contributes to your work. Follow leaders and peers in your field of choice.
• Make sure to tweet & post links to your work so others can see and follow what you’re doing.
• Make sure your body of work reflects the type of career you are working for and toward.

Got any tips on building your niche & name?

5 Ways to Kill a Good Article

There are times when an article just doesn’t seem to come together. Most of the time a writer will struggle through it, turning it over and over in their mind, getting advice and sticking with it as long as they can until they can get it to gel. There are other times, however, when a writer will have heavy fault in killing an article,  bludgeoning it actions known to be fatal to articles.

5. Procrastinating. It’s a killer! Last minute work can strangle the fun,  substance  and life out of a piece.

4. Poor sources. Sources that don’t contribute anything worthwhile to the article, quotes that are generic and information any 10 year-old can get from Google is like beating the article with a lead pipe in the dining room.

3. Poor transitions. Congratulations, you’ve just strapped your audience in for a ride off of several cliff hangers and while speeding head-long into several abrupt endings and jarring turns.

2. Lazy editing. You let the misused homophones and dangling participles slide because the editor’s going to catch them right? Right. And the air bag is going to catch you after you forgo the seatbelt.

1. Missed deadline. The readers may never know you missed a deadline, but they also may never know you had an article set to appear in the publication. Missing a deadline is like the warnings at the end of prescription drug commercial. “May cause editor queasiness, rushed work, dropped article and missed copy issues because of tardiness, also may cause article death. Not to be used in by anyone writing, editing or thinking about writing or editing.”

Got anymore article killers? Share below!

Go Against Type & Type Up Creativity

A lot of us get caught up in our niches or types of writing. Blog posts, business writing, parenting writing and it can get a little tedious. Not to say you don’t enjoy what you do, just that every so often it feels good to do something against type. Your type.

It pays to stretch your writing muscles and get creative by experimenting with different writing genres. It may be just thing to juice up your writing in your specialty. For example, technical writers don’t have many opportunities to write humorous pieces or fictional fantasy pieces. You may suck at it in the beginning, but there are always things that can be learned by learning about a new style or area.

Venturing into other areas of writing doesn’t mean you have to be in it for paying gigs. I’m not talking about writing for free, you know how I feel about that – on rare occasions is it smart – I’m talking about freebie classes at bookstores, online courses or just writing for your own eyes.

The idea is to let your brain breathe, wander and stretch without the pressure of deadlines and electric bills affecting the work. If you find you really like it you can always jump into the paid world later.

I’ve got an interest in poetry, good poetry. Poetry that goes beyond the black-inked doom and gloom poems of my angst-ridden teenage years. Oh you know you have some too, don’t laugh – at least not too hard! It gives my brain the opportunity to play with words and phrases that move me emotionally – not necessarily something you’d get from an article on potty training. That brain stretching helps me turn words and phrases in more ways than before and that helps in every area of my work.

What areas of writing do you have a non-professional interest and what are you going to do about it? Tell us below!

Article Writing Must Reads

I’ve been blogging away here at the Freelance Writing Jobs Network for quite some time now and have compiled a pretty helpful lot of posts. However I realize those new to the site or those who may have missed a post don’t have time to go through all of the posts because you’re too busy writing! So here are a few of my favorite (and most helpful) article writing posts so far:

• Press Release Writing Intro
• Research – More Than Just Google
• Kill Fees – Not a Halloween Tale
• Best Query Advice
• You Missed a Deadline – Now What?
• Say What? A Quick Guide to Using Quotes

Hope these are a helpful quick reference on your article writing adventures!

Making Great Transitions in Articles

Writers traditionally get stuck in a couple places in their writing: in the beginning when they are trying to discover or develop their lead (lede), in the end when they are searching for just the right conclusion and at transition points throughout the article when they are tasked with introducing a new idea.

A good transition is like a listening to a great band or DJ. The music just flows from one song to another and all you notice is how good the music sounds. Bad transitions can feel like walking into a pole in the middle of a sidewalk. Jarred, the reader looks up and asks, “Where in the world did that come from?” as they stagger through the next set of ideas.

Transitions can be tricky and at times you need to look over the entire article to see where information fits and if you can rearrange information in a way that creates a better flow and easier transition. Ask yourself, “Where does the story/article naturally progress? What would a reader ask next?” Taking a moment to look at it from a reader’s perspective could be enough to illuminate the article’s pathway and make writing transitions easier.

One can choose to make transitions by using headers and bullet points. Some ideas will not flow naturally from one to the other and headers and bullet points are clear indicators that the article is going to move in another direction – a road map so to speak. Here is an article on using bullet points properly: “Bullets Make the Point.”

Quotes are another option for transitions. A good quote can be just what an article needs to introduce a new opinion, subject or direction. Remember, you don’t want to throw just any old quote in an article. The quote has to contribute to the article, give it a boost, a human voice, etc. “Say What?” A Quick Guide to Using Quotes” is a good place to explore how to pick and use quotes.

Got any transition tips? Have any questions? Write it below, I’d like to hear from you!

Inspirational Writers for Inspired Writing

Tuesday I talked about some common reasons why writers find themselves in a writing funk. One of the reasons I cited was when writers have too much work they don’t have enough time to read other great work. Then the thought came to me – if you don’t have time to read other work, you certainly don’t have time to look for great work you should be reading. So here are a few of my favs in a variety of catergories and please add your own below!

Parenting

DadCentric.Com – Be warned, there is a fair amount of profanity at this blog site, but the guys at DadCentric are great with their message – parenting includes dads too. The blog is funny, insightful and well written and one of those rare parenting blogs that points out the discrimination in product advertising toward dads.

The Motherlode – This parenting blog is a part of the New York Times’s website and it’s author Lisa Belkin is one of the best out there. Timely and timeless discussion with wit, compassion and lots of humor, this blog is a great one for your blogroll.

Writing

Freelance Writing Jobs Network (This site) – Several distinctive blogs with distinctive, expert voices and you may miss them! Some of you may visit some of our blogs, but let me tell you if you haven’t stopped in all of them you really are missing something.

The Renegade Writer – The spin-off blog to the successful book is chock full of ideas and tips about the writing life, specifically freelance writing.

Environmental

TreeHugger.Com – More environmental information than you can shake a stick at, a free-range, renewable resource stick I mean. Divided into helpful subsections and full of great photos, if you are going green, thinking about it or just want a source of great resources this is a great site. The best thing is topics get an overall treatment, then you have the option to ‘go deeper.’

Specialized

The SASCOM Magazine Blog - While taking a specialized look at the software tech industry the SASCOM blog is anything but boring and technical. The blog covers a wide range of topics from the Swine Flu outbreak to the environment, to leadership skills and how these seemingly unrelated topics coincide with the company, it’s mission and field.

I left out a gang of people I follow personally and those that have huge followings for a reason, I wanted to highlight some well known and lesser known places out there where writing rules. I know you all have some recommendations so list them below along with their subject matter and link!

Top 10 Reasons Why Your Writing is Suffering

Why aren’t I getting gigs? Why am I caught in this niche I have grown to hate? Where’s my career going? There are a lot of reasons why a writer’s work suffers and some are so common most writers have or will experience them at some point. Do any of them ring a bell?

1. You’re bored. There are times a writer needs to switch course or look for new ways to stay passionate about an familiar topic.
2. You’ve gotten lazy. Let’s be honest, sometimes freelancers slack off and don’t feel like doing what they are supposed to do. I’ve been there and it’s tough to get back on task, but take a look at that electric bill – feel like writing now?
3. You’re not reading enough. The more you write, the more money you make right? The more work you have can take away from the other things that make a writer great, like reading other great writers. It’s amazing the amount of inspiration one well written piece can provide another writer.
4. You’ve got too much work. It sounds like a good problem to have, but in reality too many projects can take away from the time you have to devote to the perfection each project. The result? Sloppy or rushed work and not too much to show for it.
5. You’re burned out. When’s the last time you took a break? Switched up the routine a bit? If you’re still thinking, you may need a breather, a chance to go off the grid for a day or so and recharge. Time to refresh is not a privilege it’s a necessity.
6. You’re lonely. Online social networking is great and you can make some wonderful friends, but you also need to get out there and make friends in and out the writing field. You need your writing friends to commiserate and appreciate the life you lead and you need non-writing friends to give a different perspective. A writer’s life can be a lonely one and it can drive you bonkers, don’t let it happen to you.
7. You don’t have any support. Are you battling deadlines, kids, bills and the feeling no one really understands what you do? You are in need of support – it makes all the difference in the world. When someone’s in your corner it can help you get over those hump days and it’s important to have someone to share the good times. Nothing like calling up a friend to relay the news of a hot new gig knowing they are just as excited as you are about it.
8. You’re not enjoying yourself anymore. An important indicator of having a great job is when you love what you do.  You don’t have to love it all the time, there are days I’d like to throw my laptop and favorite pen out the window, but generally I get a whiz bang out of writing. Recapture that magic and it’ll show up in your work.
9. You’re not charging enough. Raise your hand if you ever worked your butt off for a piece only to get the check and decide it’s just not worth it? Ok, hands down. What’s going on with your fee schedule? Should you really charge more and does your work justify it? This great article from James will help you make what you’re worth.
10. You’re not doing what you really want to do. You became a freelancer so you could travel the globe, or your local playground, finding tips and trends in a fascinating field. Six months later you’ve got SEO and tech work coming out of your ears. You keep telling yourself it pays the bills, but really a corporate job would do just as well if that’s all you wanted. Time to check your goals and develop a plan to get back to your dreams.

Getting to the bottom of what ails your pen is not only great for your career, it’s great for your health. People who are passionate about what they do live fuller and longer lives. Let’s get you back to living yours.

Thursday’s post: “Inspirational Writers for Inspired Writing”

Got any great tips on a common writing threat/malady? Have you dealt with one of these and overcome? Share below!

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