If you’re looking for a flexible work from home job, and you’re a decent writer, getting paid to write articles might be right up your alley. Getting paid to write isn’t necessarily the most lucrative job in the world, but it’s a great side hustle due to it’s flexibility and low overhead. Another key benefit is that you can make money as a writer without a degree, but you should at least write about what you love. Do you want to get started? Great!
How to Find Your First Writing Gig
The most difficult part of writing from home is breaking into the business. After getting your first few writing gigs, more jobs will follow, if you do a few simple things.
1. Networking
One way to find your first writing job is to use your current network of friends, coworkers, or anyone else you know. Let people know that you are looking for a writing job.
Don’t limit your network to people you know in person. Talk to authors of blogs and websites you like, join LinkedIn to make new contacts, and get active on other social networking sites, such as Twitter and Facebook. Constantly be on the lookout for writing opportunities and step in as soon as the door opens.
2. Volunteer
Another way to find your first gig is to volunteer to write a piece for potential clients and wow them with both your writing skills and your fantastic customer service. For example, you can search for websites or blogs on the subject you like, contact the site owner, and offer to write an article (or two or three) for them.
Be sure to let them know that you’re trying to land a writing gig and not simply to write a guest article.
3. Join Sites That Pay You to Write
If the two ideas above doesn’t work out, you can also apply to join content writing websites. For example, you can join sites like, Constant Content, Link-Able and TextBroker to get your side career going. Once you become more established, you can branch out to private deals.
There are actually many sites that you can check out. Here is a good list of 92 Websites That Pay Writers $50+ that you can check out on Make a Living Writing.
4. Start Your Own Blog
If you are a little bit more adventurous, you can try making money writing for your own blog. You won’t get paid right away for each article that you write. However, if you learn to drive web traffic to your site and start to monetize it (e.g., add advertisements and affiliate links), you could end up earning far more than the per article writing gig.
How to Be a Successful Writer
1. Set Aside a Specific Time to Write
When I first started writing articles for money, I figured I’d squeeze in writing between other daily tasks, such as my full time job, housework, and family time. That is definitely the wrong approach!
If you are serious about being a paid writer, you need to set aside specific times to do your job. Any regular time will do. Some writers write early in the morning. Others write late at night. And some writers set aside one whole day on the weekend to write.
Whatever you do, make sure you have a block of time available to focus completely on your writing. Otherwise it’s too easy to miss deadlines or do a sloppy job. And if you do that, you may not be a paid article writer for long!
2. Strut Your Stuff with a Writer’s Website
Once you’ve landed a few writing jobs, make sure you set up a writer’s website. It doesn’t need to be elaborate, but you do need to showcase the writing jobs you’ve done. Before a potential client hires you, he will want to see samples of your work.
Having a website that contains samples of your work, your contact information, and a little bit about you is the best way to give clients the information they need before they decide to hire you. If they need to wait for you to email them samples of your work, they may just decide to hire someone else while waiting for your email.
Make it easy for people to hire you by putting all of your information on a website.
3. Deliver More than You Promise
Finally, if you want your writing career to really take off, make sure you treat your clients well.
- Deliver on your promises.
- Meet all deadlines.
- Proofread everything you turn in. Twice.
- Talk to your client, taking good notes on what he’s looking for in an article. Then write the article he’s looking for. Try to gather all the information you need upfront, but don’t be afraid to email with an occasional question if you need clarification on something.
You want to make your client’s life easier. You want him to be glad he hired you. And you want him to give you a good recommendation! All of those things will happen if you deliver on your promises 100% of the time.
Bottom Line
Getting paid to write articles isn’t a terribly difficult job, but being a consistently good writer takes commitment. If you have that commitment, plus a little grammatical know-how, you can do this job. It just takes a little perseverance.
Have you ever considered being a paid writer? Why haven’t you taken the plunge? If you are a paid writer, what tips can you offer new writers?
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Pinyo Bhulipongsanon is the owner of Moolanomy Personal Finance and a Realtor® licensed in Virginia and Maryland. Over the past 20 years, Pinyo has enjoyed a diverse career as an investor, entrepreneur, business executive, educator, financial literacy author, and Realtor®.
