Writing-World - the site for freelance writers

Breathing new life into the old blog

Tap, tap! Is this thing on? And has it really been six months since I last posted here? Apparently so, and no, the fact that this is the second "fresh start" post on the front page of this blog definitely hasn't escaped me, but let's give this another try, shall we?

There are lots of reasons for my total neglect of Writing World over the past year, with lack of time being a major one. The main reason, however, is the one I talked about in this post: the fact that I'm no longer a freelance writer, and am now running my blogging business full-time instead. Not only has that claimed almost all of my time recently, it also means that I'm now totally distanced from the world of freelance writing, and ill-equipped to advise anyone else about it. Hence the lack of posts on my blog about...freelance writing.

I do have a solution, though. I may not have much to say about freelancing these days, but I do have a lot to say about blogging, and I don't really have a place to say it: I post the occasional rant on my personal blog, but I don't want to bore people with shop talk, and as for my long-suffering husband, well, I think he's suffered enough.

This year, then, I'm going to be using Writing World as my place to blog about...blogging. What it's like to blog for a living, tips, advice, er, rants: they can all live here, because while I know the world doesn't really need another blog about blogging, I know I need a place to be able to talk about my working life without cluttering up my other sites.

That's the plan, anyway. As to how long it lasts... um, let's just wait and see, shall we? I know those of you who subscribe to this site (if there are any of you left after the long absence) for freelance writing advice will probably want to unsubscribe around about now, and understandably so. If any of you are interested in making a living out of blogging, though, I hope you'll stick around - and feel free to ask any questions!

How NOT to use blogs to market your product: the Microplane mistake

This post was originally published on my beauty blog, Hey-Dollface.com, which is where the "incident", for want of a better word, happened. I thought I'd also post it here, though, because it's an excellent example of how NOT to use blog comments to try and market your product: and I guess it's also a good lesson to bloggers to trust your gut instincts and take the time to check out your comments if you think there's something fishy going on. Of all of my sites, Hey-Dollface is the one that gets targeted most by spammers, presumably because it's so product-based, but this was the most blatant example of bad self-promotion I've seen in a while.

NOTE: Although I did contact Microplane asking them for an official comment, and making it clear that I was writing a follow-up about this, to date the only response I've had has been from the person who originally commented on my blog. Needless to say, if the company do get in touch to further clarify the situation, I'll be happy to publish their response.

*  *  *

Sometimes writing for a beauty blog - or any blog, really - can be quite the eye opener. It's amazing what some companies will do to try and promote themselves while dissing their competitors, and today I came across a good example of this, on my post about the Ped Egg.

In my post, I compared the Ped Egg to the Microplane Foot File. I've used both, and liked both products (you can read my review of the Microplane here), and as I noted in my review, the only real difference between the two, for me, is the price, with Microplane the more expensive of the two. I stand by that opinion, and the respective costings are simple fact which anyone can check out for themselves.

A New Start

 

As those of you who read my personal blog (hi, both of you!) might already know, this has been a big week for me, and the start of April and Springtime also marks the start of a slight change of direction in my writing career.

As of last Friday, I'm no longer a freelance writer.

Don't worry, it sounds more dramatic than it actually is. On Friday, I wrote my last ever blog post for my last remaining freelance client. That client was Shiny Media, and I've been working for them on a freelance basis for around four years now, most recently as editor of their shoe blog, Shoewawa.

During that time, though, I've also been working on my own blogs, and those sites have been growing fast: so fast, in fact, that I've been gradually forced to cut back on the amount of time I spend writing for other people, and increase the time I spend working on my own sites. Eventually I reached the point where Shiny was my last remaining freelance client, and as much as I've loved writing for the company (it was Shiny Media that got me into professional blogging in the first place, and without the experience I gained with them, I probably wouldn't be writing this now), I've always known that if I really wanted to grown my own business, the time would come when I had to give up the freelance work and focus on my own sites exclusively.

Well, it looks like that time has come, and I couldn't be more excited about it - and a little nervous, too, obviously. As of now, I'm totally my own boss: all of my income will be coming from the Midas Media network of blogs, and I won't be taking on any more freelance commissions. Well, not unless Vogue come calling, obviously...

We have lots of things planned for the sites. (By "we", incidentally, I mean me and Terry, who isn't often mentioned here, but who is constantly working away in the background, running the technical side of things: I'm not totally a one-woman show!) There will be a change of blogging platform, a little face lift here and there, added features, and also a new blog launching in the next few months.

I hope you'll stick around and see what happens!

As for WritingWorld, well, although I'm no longer freelancing myself, I'm hoping the change will be a positive one here, too. Hopefully the extra time will allow me to update the site more frequently, but you can probably expect more of an emphasis on making a living through blogging, as that's what I'll be focusing on myself.

Five ways to instantly make your blog look more professional

I get a lot of emails every week from new bloggers who want to know how they can make their blogs look that little bit more professional.

Obviously there are lots of answers to this question, but here are five things you can do right now that will make a big difference to how people will perceive your site.

(Note: these tips are aimed at people who want to blog professionally, and make money from it. If you blog for personal reasons, they may not apply to you.)

1. Don't use a generic template

There are thousands of different (free) blog templates available for all kinds of blogging platforms - so why are so many bloggers all using the same two or three of them? As soon as someone lands on your site and sees that generic Blogger/Typepad/Wordpress template, they're going to think you're an amateur who either doesn't know how to change the look of your blog, or just just can't be bothered doing it. Neither of those impressions will encourage people to come back, and you're not giving them much to remember you by, either.Why would you want your blog to look the same as everyone else's?

This doesn't mean you have to go for a custom design, of course (although if you're really serious about blogging professionally, I'd recommend at least thinking about it). Typepad, for instance, makes it very easy to change the colours, fonts and layout of your blog, and to upload a new banner. It's a long time since I last used Blogger, but I remember it being relatively easy to customise too, and I believe the service has improved drastically since then. Wordpress, meanwhile, has thousands of different templates you can use for free, and yet most users seem to plump for the same handful of designs.

At the very least, try to use a custom banner with some kind of logo: it's your brand, but if you stick to the generic template provided, the only brand you're promoting is Blogger's. (Or Typepad's, or ... you get the picture.)

When good brands go SPAM

...and I'm not talking about the spammer who keeps emailing Terry using the subject line, "Terry you're an idiot" and providing a pornographic image in the body of the email - although that's about as bad as it gets, to be honest.

No, the spam that's really annoying me at the moment is the blog comment spam that comes from large, legitimate businesses: businesses who should know better, in other words.

Today I've had to delete two spam comments from my blogs, both of which were promoting brands which are household names. When I looked at the email addresses of the people posting the spam, and typed the suffix of those addresses into Google, in both cases they took me to the websites of online marketing agencies who list these household-name companies as their clients.

Interesting. I wonder if the clients in question know their reputations are being systematically ruined by marketing companies spamming blogs in their name? And if they condone that kind of behaviour?

I know that if I was paying a marketing company to promote my website, I would be horrified to think that they were using comment or email spam to do it. I have no wish to be known as a spammer, and that's exactly what will happen to these brands unless they take steps to find out what their marketers are getting up to on their behalf.

This isn't the first time I've encountered this issue, but it has particularly annoyed me today because it so happens that both of the companies being spammed on my blogs are ones I have affiliate relationships with - affiliate relationships I'm now seriously reconsidering given that I really don't want to support spammers.

Needless to say, the spam has been deleted and the IPs banned. But I think the next time I'm contacted by representatives of the brands in question, I will be asking them if they're aware of what's happening...

Ask Writing World: What are the best and worst things about blogging for a living?

(image: stock.chng)

Remember Skribit? It's that little widget that lives in the top right sidebar and allows you to ask me questions to answer here on the blog. And here's the first of them! You asked:

What are the best and worst things about blogging for a living?

I'm going to give you the bad news first. When I think about the downside of blogging for a living, the first thing that springs to mind is the sheer relentlessness of it. I work much harder and longer hours as a pro-blogger than I ever did in a "regular" job - as an example, I'm writing this at 9:30pm, and sometimes I feel like I never stop. As soon as one day's posts are written, I'm busy thinking up posts for the next day, queuing up articles to cover holidays, answering emails, trying to keep up with RSS feeds, analysing stats, you name it. Holidays are almost impossible, because I'm still currently a one-woman band. Weekends are a thing of the past. Every day I have to force myself to be creative, even if creative is the last thing I feel like, and I also have to be all things to all people: writer, editor, marketer, advertising executive, saleswoman, search engine optimisation expert, cleaner... The list goes on.

Then there are the blog trolls.

Blog Trolls: Where do they find the time?

Earlier this week, I woke up this morning to find that someone had tried to post well over 100 comments on The Fashion Police, all complaining about the choice of category I'd filed certain posts in.

There were dozens and dozens of comments, all saying things like "This should be in the 'catwalk fashion' category!" and "This should be in 'fashion news'", interspersed with comments like "I have no idea why you've filed this here!" and "This entire category has too many posts in it!"

Now, in some cases, the commenter had a point. The Fashion Police currently has well over 2000 posts in its archive, and yes, some of those have been miscategorized. Most of them hadn't been, though: they were in the categories I wanted them to be in, it was just that this girl thought she knew better and wanted to correct me.

Guest bloggers required at The Fashion Police!

Any fashion bloggers/fanatics out there?

We're currently looking for guest bloggers to fill a number of slots on the site in the first two weeks of June this year at TheFashionPolice.net. What you write about is up to you, and we're fairly flexible on subject matter, so all we ask is that your post be fashion-related, and that you take a look at the site before sending in your submission to find out what kind of things we typically write about, and what we've covered before.

You'll find submission guidelines here, and if you have any questions, feel free to ask!

"So, how much do you actually make from this 'blogging' thing, then?"

It always goes the exact same way.

"So, you're still working from home, then?"

"Yes, that's right."

"Hmmm. Still doing that 'blogging' thing?"

"I am, yes."

* Pause *

"And you actually make money from that then?"

Rubinman.co.uk in Dogs Today magazine this month

So go figure: I update five of my own blogs every week, plus one I get paid to edit. Guess which blog got some press attention this month? The one about my dog, of course...

It's ironic because, of all the blogs I'm responsible for, Rubinman is the one I pay least attention to. It started out as just a bit of fun, and we don't even run ads on it because although I know that we could probably make something of it with a bit of time and energy, it's time and energy I don't have at the moment, so I've been content to let it coast along with the occasional update, which have, admittedly, been getting more frequent over the past few weeks.

Yes, folks, it's a blog about my dog - and it was featured in an article about blogging/podcasting in this month's Dog's Today magazine in the UK, in which Rubin'sblog was described as "offbeat and amusing". Of course, I can't take any credit for that: it is the dog's blog, after all...