Writing can be an enjoyable hobby, but it is a very different world to explore when you make it your job. Writing careers have unfortunately been underestimated for years, primarily because they aren’t seen as very profitable. Nowadays, however, the value and demand for writers have been increasing. SEO optimization, social media marketing, freelance writing, and other written content-based work have grown in importance, and so have the job opportunities as noted in our previous post Why Be a Writer in 2022. If you’re an aspiring writer, here are a few questions you’ll need to ask yourself to know if a writing career is right for you.
Can I keep up with industry trends?
Readers are constantly looking for the latest information on the industries they’re interested in, and using outdated material won’t be very useful if you want people to read your work.
A guide to writing careers by Maryville University explains that a well-versed writer makes sure they’re updated on the most recent statistics, facts, and news so that they can properly convey their message to others. For example, to be able to effectively explain certain subjects to readers, technical writers need to stay abreast of the latest technology, tools, and coding languages. Grant writers should know about the organizations they’re writing for, as well as the latest trends around the industry.
Regardless of your field, you’ll need to be prepared to do a lot of research — from searching for articles to interviewing experts — so your finger is always on the pulse of the industry you’re working in. Reading extensively is a must for any writer, so if that’s something you’re willing and eager to do, writing could be perfect for you.
Can I handle criticism?
Written work must go through a lengthy revision process to ensure it’s in line with the client’s standards. Your writing isn’t always going to get a pass on the first try, and you’ll inevitably get some critique and criticism for it. Receiving criticism is never easy whether you’re a newbie or an experienced writer, but it’s essential to your growth.
It’s important to remember that people aren’t attacking you personally, but that they’re pointing out areas for improvement to guide you in the right direction. Constructive criticism should provide you with actionable tips on correcting and improving your writing, and it’s up to you to choose how to incorporate it into your piece. According to research from the American Psychological Association, honest and thorough feedback is the best way to pinpoint what needs fixing, and that’s something you might find you need when you start writing.
Am I willing to learn on the job?
A writing job may require you to write about all genres and topics, requiring you to be versatile. You will need to know what kind of tone to use for the type of piece you are writing; a lifestyle article may need a light-hearted tone, while technical work requires a more serious approach.
According to Medium’s article, The Hottest Writing Industry in Demand in 2022, jobs like copywriting need writers to prepare all kinds of content, from marketing materials to emails, so knowing various writing styles comes in handy. It helps to create a portfolio of your written works to show how you write in specific genres and forms. Clients and recruiters can get a better feel for your specialties by looking through your samples.
But don’t just stick to what you know. Writing jobs will often push you out of your comfort zone, and you have to be willing to learn to write about many things along the way.
Writing is a viable career choice, but not one that can be taken lightly. Take the proper time to grow and develop your writing as you consider a potential career in the field.
According to who you ask Twitter is dead. In a surprising move, South African-born American entrepreneur Elon Musk proposed to buy out Twitter after previously acquiring 9.1% of the company’s stock for $2 billion on April 14th, 2022. With all the controversy surrounding the Twitter buyout Bethany Jett and Cyle Young answer, the question of whether is Twitter dead for the writing world?
Twitter is a versatile platform that can be used for many things, from finding new clients and growing your audience to becoming an even better writer. In previous articles, we’ve discussed How to Find Content to Share on Social Media and Tips for TikTok. Now without getting into things or stepping on toes, Twitter has seemed to suffer recently from people thinking that if they don’t agree with what is being said that they are wrong. This has sent shockwaves throughout the Twitter community and as a result, we’ve seen some users completely stop using the platform.
Is Twitter Dead?
That being said, we would like to explain some of the changes that may be coming to Twitter and why you should still be on the platform as a writer. First, Twitter has been a very viable platform for the writing world and is going to come back into relevance. With it being huge in the Writing and Entertainment world, you have to go where your audience is.
This is basic marketing.
You’re not gonna try to promote your book at an NHRA event and expect to get results (unless the book is geared for high-powered cars, but we digress on that for now).
Next up are the changes that Elon Musk spoke about implementing on the platform. The biggest takeaway that you should know about this is the open-source algorithm information. Without getting nerdy, the algorithm is what drives your content. Miss the algorithm and your content hits a small group of people. Nail the algorithm and your content can go viral in hours.
But what does this mean?
Platforms do not really share what can trigger the algorithm. Savy people will often figure these algorithms out over time. Now if you know exactly what you need to do to trigger the algorithm it’s huge. Your strategies can be tailored specifically to your needs as a writer. Now for the best part, hitting that algorithm will rapidly grow your platform. Putting that into numbers for a visualization would you rather have 10% of your current audience buy your books or 5% of a million followers buy your books.
Hear us Out:
Part of this podcast episode is all about Twitter, and the second half is about diversifying your writing income. Enjoy!
Bethany and Cyle go into this in greater detail on the Serious Writer Podcast and we urge you to tune in to hear what they have to say. As the famous quote goes “Knowing is Half the Battle”, if you are not competitive on Twitter you are only hurting yourself. Spend the time learning and following what is going on with Twitter to stay ahead of the game, because it’s not just about having a great book you have to get it into the hands of the right people.
Everything you learned in school and know about writing is wrong. Adverbs are bad verbs. The writing world is different than the educational writing world.
Learning to write well is like learning a new language. There are many rules and guidelines that schools teach you, but in reality there’s no right or wrong way of doing things when it comes down just writing creatively for your own personal satisfaction – at least not until we get into the nitty-gritties: adverbs versus verbs; passive voice over active suddenly becomes important (hint hint); how long should sentences be? What kind?? Umm.. anyways
In Episode 7 of the Serious Writer Podcast Bethany Jett and Cyle Young discuss why everything you know about writing is wrong and what you can do to change it:
Go to a writers conference. Now.
Read in your genre and subgenre. Learn the style of that genre.
Get the resources you need from the beginning. (Emotions thesaurus & Story Trumps Structure)
TIP: The 1st book might not be published.
You can practice into publish later.
Fear: I won’t have another story after this one.
Tip: Learn the rules first before you break them.
Modern story is based on 3-act structure. Act 1 is short. Act 2 is rising action over the middle and it’s longer; character development. Climax. Act 3 is descending action.
Fantasy: Hero’s Journey of the 3-Act Structure.
04. Know how to structure a story.
05. Set a regular writing time period or a daily word count. Earnest Hemingway – writes 500 words a day. Stephen King writes 2000 words a day. Jack London – 1500. Mark Twain – 1400. Michael Crighton – 10,000 words – Jurassic Park. Suggestion – start lower until you’re consistent.
06. Just write and don’t edit.
07. Write in scene, not sequence. The Tik Tok guide to writing a book.
Lately we have been talking a lot about freelance writing and different ways to make money writing. We believe that freelance work can really improve you as a writer – which in turn can get you closer to that first published book! Thats what the Serious Writer team is here for as we present to you the Best Writing Markets in 2022.
The freelance writing world is a competitive one, but it’s also an exciting time to be looking for work as writers in many different industries are being hired. I’ve put together some profitable markets where you can find companies who need your services and suggestions on how best to utilize these opportunities!
The following are five from that list I think will be most profitable in 2022. If none of these interest you, stay tuned and listen closely because there is more coming your way soon!
Cryptocurrency/Blockchain
With the rise of bitcoin and blockchain, there is an astonishing increase in the need for people who can write about this industry. These skills will be highly sought-after in 2022 as it becomes more popular with every day that goes by! There are only so many slots available because not everyone has knowledge on both topics–ability counts most here; if you’ve got written words flowing from your fingers like honey, we suggest pursuing this market (there is a reason we place it first!!).
Where to Look: Information Technology and Tech companies. specialized content writing job boards such as CryptocurrencyJobs.co, and Prowriter are also great places to scan for potential work.
Finance/Personal Finance
The economy is still feeling the effects of recent events, and many people are struggling to stay financially stable. If you can write about credit cards or mortgage companies in an engaging way, then there are plenty more jobs in this industry!
Where to Look: credit unions, banks, mortgage lenders, investment companies, accounting or tax firms, and financial planning firms. Also check websites that specialize in money management and LinkedIn.
Alternative Health/CBD Products
With the increased popularity of health practices like natural medicine and essential oils, there’s no shortage in demand for content. If you’re an expert with essential oils or CBD/cannabis knowledge then get ready to make some money! As a side note, we expect this industry to only grow in the years to come which can be great news for you if you’re looking for a steady income.
Where to Look: health, fitness, and though it makes take a little platform growth TikTok and Facebook can be great places for this market.
Travel
This industry took a hit in the last few years. The travel industry has been on a rise in recent months as people are traveling more frequently. If you can write about your favorite spots for families or provide first-hand tips to visitors looking into visiting exotic destinations, there’s always room for this type of writing! We advise that this industry is going to be more competitive as it is not a small niche market compared to the others on our list.
Where to Look: restaurants and food venues, travel companies and publications, and hotels.
In a world where search engine optimization plays a critical role in content discovery, many people are choosing to become SEO specialists. With high salaries and an ever-growing list of tasks available for those with the right skillset—from social media marketing campaigns through content writing or link building–the rewards can be significant if you understand SEO basics.
SEO can seem like a daunting challenge and rightfully so with today’s ever-changing landscape. So to make the process of learning SEO easier, we’ve put together a few basics that will get you moving in the right direction.
SEO Basics and Why it Matters
SEO is the process of making your website more visible on search engines. The higher up on SERPs (search engine results pages) you rank, the greater the chance people who search about your keywords will see your site first – which makes them much more likely to visit as well! You need to be thinking about your website’s online presence and how you can get ahead in the digital age. With people spending less time on their browsers, every second counts
Common SEO Terms
Crawling
The process of crawling is when a search engine sends out bots, called crawlers to visit pages on websites in order to find new content for their results page. This helps them stay up-to-date with all the latest updates and information available online
Ranking
This one is straightforward, the spot in which your website falls on a search engine page. The higher or closer you are to being #1 the better. Elements that affect a webpage’s ranking include: Website loading time Usability of site Backlinks Fulfilling the search intent Age of the website Technical SEO (use of headers, relevant keyword placement, meta descriptions, and so on)
Indexing
When a search engine crawler bot visits your website, it analyzes the content on that page to better understand what you’re trying to convey.
SERP
An acronym for Search Engine Results Pages. For example, when you type “pie” into a Google query, the pages you see are a result.
Traffic
The term traffic is used to describe the visitors to your page after the website appears on a search engine result page.
Keywords
Keywords are the most important element of SEO copy. They define what you’re trying to sell and how by giving search engines relevant insights into your product or service offerings through keywords that they can use in their algorithms when ranking websites against each other based on user queries entered at any given moment during popular searches
Best Practices
Keywords are the link between sites and their content. This is why SEO specialists spend time researching what users search for so they can include keywords in the site’s written material to help rank it high on Google searches
It’s important that you use correct spelling, grammar (including punctuation), sentence structure as well as utilize plenty of relevant words when writing an optimized piece
When it comes to SEO, you’re just scratching the surface. There are people who literally make their careers out of this skill and having basic knowledge will help online writers tremendously by setting them apart from the crowd. It’s not enough anymore to just have great content on your site, getting the traffic is the key – especially if your goal is just starting out as an aspiring writer looking toward getting published!
In our previous article, we spoke about Freelance Writing Jobs (For Beginners) and you’re probably asking yourself why do we keep bringing it up? Well, I’m glad you asked! In that article, we spoke about how to get started in freelancing and what type of work might be best suited for beginners. The age of social media has arrived, and freelance writing is on the rise. So, capitalize on it.
Freelance writing for social media platforms not only allows you to write every day (something we stress), but it also teaches us new skills such as SEO and how different things work on each individual site. It’s an opportunity that will force your creativity into overdrive because there are so many possibilities! You may even make some cash from all these different opportunities.
The world of social media is changing so rapidly, it’s tough to keep up. Luckily there are freelancers who specialize in creating content for these communities and they want nothing more than your business!
Master of None
As the saying goes “Jack of all trades, Master of none. You can’t just be good at one thing when it comes to picking up freelance social media jobs. You need the whole package – writing, design skills, and an understanding of how different platforms work so you know what will appeal on each network or website your content appears under its own heading.
Social Media has largely become a visual medium which means there are often visuals involved in a project like Facebook status updates versus Twitter hashtags.
To find social media jobs, meetup groups are a good place to start. Local businesses that require the use of social media will often post job openings on these types of platforms as well – so you should subscribe and keep an eye out!
With this information in mind, it’s easy enough to gain employment by simply joining local networking events where possible employers advertise their hiring needs or reach out directly through career sites like LinkedIn (or other websites). advertising your freelance skills means being able not only to show off what kind of expertise you have built up but also gives.
