by Joe Wallace

Here’s something you’ll probably catch on to as you read all the freelance advice you can on Google; most of the “don’t do this” advice is stuff the writer (OK, me) has screwed up themselves at some point in the past.

This kind of freelance help is valuable because we’ve made mistakes so you don’t have to. In fact, that was Yo Prinzel’s tag line once upon a time at her excellent blog Freelance Writerville. Or was it another blog she worked on? I can’t remember.

And that’s another dirty little secret of freelancing nobody talks about. We go on and on about don’t do this and don’t do that, but the one thing NOBODY seems to talk about is how long you have to wait before your old screw ups fall off the radar.

If you sent a horribly amateurish query letter to an editor or tried to market yourself to a new client in some ridiculously noob fashion, how much down time do you need before you pick up your lance and tilt at that windmill one more time?

Fortunately, there’s a remarkably short wait between “I’ve made an ass of myself” and “You’re hired!” The reasons for this are much the same as those we freelance advice spinners give about doing it right in the first place–editors are very busy, there’s often a high turnover, and the amateurs are a mere blip on an editor or marketing person’s radar.

In other words, if you screwed up, don’t give up. Let some time pass, polish your material and your approach and give it another try. The old editor may have moved on, or forgotten about you altogether.

Whatever you do, don’t reference the last time you tried to make contact. Just approach as though you were doing it for the very first time and hope for the best. If the editor does remember you, she might not even know why.

Get in the game and keep swinging. You WILL knock it out of the park sooner or later.