Freelance Writers: The Future Is in Your Hands
Posted by Admin Team on Tue, Jun 22, 2010 @ 09:00 AM
By Rebecca Smith Hurd
Forget all the "sky is falling" talk about the death of print media. Freelance writers working today have an opportunity to reinvent and re-create themselves with more independence and autonomy than we could before, Jim Bettinger, director of the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships, said during his opening remarks at the first Future of Freelancing conference. "It feels like we're back on offense again," he said.
The gathering of mid-career professionals, held June 18 and 19 at Stanford University in Northern California, featured panel discussions about everything from entrepreneurship and investigative reporting to social media and the digital revolution. The general consensus among speakers, who represented newspapers, magazines, books, websites, blogs, and related businesses, was that now more than ever writers can control their own professional destinies.
After all, Bettinger noted, quoting either French playwright Molière or American computer scientist Alan Kay: "The best way to predict the future is to invent it." Here are few tips gleaned from the conference on how to go about doing just that.
Collaborate for leverage Whether you're looking for office space, health insurance or new clients, joining forces with others can really pay off: Collective bargaining power tends to drive prices down and the odds up across the board. Brett Levy, a former L.A. Times editor who co-founded the Journalism Shop, helps experienced reporters and editors get freelance work. His site recently partnered with eByline, which connects news organizations with writers to buy, sell, and distribute stories. The service lets writers "hang their shingle" for free and then either pitch stories or wait to be contacted by participating publishers, many of which are mid-sized newspapers. Writers can negotiate exclusive or nonexclusive contracts, and groups like the Journalism Shop can shop around its writers. Levy believes content platforms like Ebyline, Publish2 and Seed "may become the hottest area" in freelancing-if enough writers and publishers get onboard.
Promote yourself (and your brand) Although writers are rarely obligated to maintain a blog, a Twitter account or a Facebook page, having a strong online presence is likely to increase your success as a freelancer exponentially. This particularly applies to aspiring authors. If you can show a literary agent, an editor or a book publisher that there's an existing market for your idea, that you already have an audience, they are more likely to consider buying your book, said Dawn Davis, editorial director of Amistad, a HarperCollins imprint. And, the more legwork you do to promote yourself, the easier it is for your editor to convince the publisher to spend more on doing even more. Writers should think of the marketing process as a collaboration, she said.
Publish yourself
Technology has made do-it-yourself an economic reality for freelance writers of all kinds. The costs of starting a blog or producing an e-book, or even a printed book, are relatively low. Many blogs, like Grammar Girl and Sh*t My Dad Says, have evolved into successful books-and self-published works sometimes get picked up for reprint by larger publishers. Various panelists also noted that a finished story, project or book is often just the beginning of a dialog with readers-and that a follow-up pieces, speaking engagements, consulting gigs, and various add-on services can drive up the value of your information.
Provide extras (for extra pay)Speaking of add-ons, some magazines now pay writers extra for supplying additional content to accompany their well-crafted prose. For example, Wired will occasionally pony up cash for everything from "deep captions" to voiceover scripts, says articles editor Mark Robinson. Audio and video recordings can prove valuable, too. What doesn't get used online can make the fact-checker's job easier and even help you, the writer, remember details for the narrative that aren't in your notes.
If all that sounds like a whole lot of extra work for freelance writers, well, maybe it is. But veterans in the field promise the effort will pay off. "There's more opportunity out there than there has been in years," said Scott Robson, vice president, new movie initiatives for MTV. "You can actually earn a decent amount of money if you're willing to put in time and energy. Not Vanity Fair or New Yorker rates, but you can put food on the table."