Tag Archives: blogs

Serious Niche Writing: Ken Foster

Ken Foster is a writer who seems to have cornered his market. Foster loves dogs, and as the author of The Dogs Who Found Me and other titles he proves you can use plenty of ink on subjects which seem to be written to death. If you have a passion for the topic combined with strong writing, you can definitely rise above your peers in a niche littered with inferior material.

Foster is obviously in love with his subject matter. He started the Sula Foundation to encourage responsible pit bull ownership, and he wrote the forward for the dog-themed photo essay book The Dog Who Loved Cheerios and Other Tales of Excess.

For Ken Foster, dogs are much more than cutesy subject matter. He seems to be writing on dogs full-time, and while frustrated in my early-morning search for an About Me section on his various sites, his blog posts indicate seemingly round-the-clock coverage of all things dog-related. He writes and blogs about court cases involving dogs, guests on talk radio programs. . .Foster has the dog beat fully covered.

He is a shining example of someone who has found inventive ways to keep himself getting paid to write about his passions. For new and struggling writers, Foster’s sites could be considered required reading. Here’s an author who maintains multiple websites on the same general topics, working with tireless devotion to both his craft and his subjects. His writing is inspirational because it’s proof that any topic, when covered with skill and ingenuity, can become a major source of material if you have the right level of dedication. I strongly recommend a long look at these sites if you are interested in carving out your own niche in a specialty topic.

And some of us will linger a lot longer over those dog photos than we should, but that’s one of the occupational hazards in this business…you’ll just have to ditch that third coffee break in favor of those doggy faces.

Sarah Skerrett on Personal Branding

Yes, we should be at the end of our technical problems today (with a little luck) and Sarah will be posting under her own login soon. In the meantime, check out her take on personal branding…she indirectly raises an issue I’ll have a go at in my own editorial next week–the value of using content sites such as Associated Content to raise your Google clout, as opposed to the dubious practice using it to build a list of writing credits. I got the idea after following the link Sara provides in the article, so cheers to both her and Tina Samules for inspiring more content on FZ! In the meantime, check out Sarah Skerrett on Personal Branding. Once again, welcome aboard, Sarah…

The most challenging personal aspect of securing freelance projects is tooting your own horn. There is a fine line between honest self-promotion with the intention of highlighting your credentials and sounding like a pompous, know-it-all jerk who can do anything. There is also a fine line between taking a long shot on a project because you think you have the aptitude and knowledge to complete it successfully and wasting a client’s time because you think you can “quickly acquire” technical terminology needed for an HVAC manual for a heating and air company. Continue reading Sarah Skerrett on Personal Branding

Sarah Skerrett on Elance

No, we won’t be prefacing all of Sarah’s headlines with her name, we’re just slow getting her set up with her own Freelance-Zone login due to a technical problem. This is Sarah’s first full-fledged FZ post…welcome aboard, Sarah!

I recently got half-way through setting up an account with Elance (www.elance.com), an eBay-style job auction site for freelancers. Divided into “industries,” Writing & Translation is the second-largest pool of jobs (Web & Programming took the first place trophy, with Admin Support rounding out the top three), however some of these jobs are cross-disciplinary and can fall in multiple categories. When I heard from a colleague about Elance and its business model, I immediately checked it out and was only further intrigued when I saw, “15,000+ projects posted in the last 30 days.”

I’ve also been intrigued by Goobers (a peanut butter-and-jelly-combo in a jar) for several years. Same for commemorative plates, mechanical pencils, and audio cards. As with these products, after the initial excitement, a “too-good-to-be-true” feeling set in. Continue reading Sarah Skerrett on Elance

Stuntdubl Speaks Up On LinkBait

Internet marketing consultant Todd Malicoat, better known in the SEO community as Stuntdubl, had quite a lot to say about the ins and outs of linkbait in a recent interview at VKI Studios. Stuntdubl is a site dedicated to helping SEO writers and marketers find jobs, learn the trade and discover a few secrets about search engine optimization. I find this site quite useful for writers–even fiction and trade mag writers who have little to do with SEO on a daily basis.

What? You don’t know what SEO or “linkbait” is and you’re pissed off that I didn’t spell it out for you? Shame on you, writer. You need to know how your career can be affected by Google, search engine optimization, and building traffic through linkbait. A writing blog or resume site needs to be optimized with these things in mind or risk being left in the dust by more savvy writers.

Any technique you can learn as a writer to increase traffic to your own site is an important tool of your trade. If you aren’t a restless self-promoter, you are behind your game. For every one of us who doesn’t bother to seek the cutting edge for their resume sites, blogs and other promotional tools, there are five writers who ARE hip to these things and they will beat you to the next gig. No writer should ever be caught saying “I don’t understand the Internet.”

I know I’ve got much to catch up on with regard to SEO, linkbait and other tools–Todd Malicoat’s blog is one way I try to keep up with the times. I just wish I’d found this one sooner.

Listen to the interview here.

Why the Chicago Tribune is Going To Fold

Tonight, I watched an episode of a local news program called Chicago Tonight. One segment included a discussion with three guests about the future of newspapers. One of those guests was an editor from the venerable Tribune, another was a former writer for the Chicago Sun-Times. Needless to say, between these two gents the experience level was high.

The discussion was fairly gloomy–people in charge at the Tribune are desperate to save the paper from certain death, and have been brainstorming a variety of ideas on how to prevent its demise. Between the editor at the Trib and the former writer for the Sun-Times, I got the distinct impression that nobody in charge of one of Chicago’s most respected daily papers really understands why newspapers are getting slaughtered.

The worst example of this came when the editor at the Chicago Tribune stated quite clearly that he is “not Internet savvy”. I said out loud to the television, ‘And that’s why the Chicago Tribune is going to fold.”

The Internet is not killing newspapers–they are doing a fine job of committing suicide all by themselves. Any editor who does not understand and respect the ‘net is doomed just as surely as a woolly mammoth sinking into the La Brea tar pits. Bleat all you want, big fellah. You’re still going down.

But why?

I would love to pimp myself out to these newspapers as a consultant–or better yet as a new media ombudsman–and command a hefty fee to show them how NOT to get murdered in the age of the Internet. Since no offers are currently forthcoming, I’ll share a few “secrets” here. Continue reading Why the Chicago Tribune is Going To Fold

Writer In Progress

Beth Morrow’s Writer In Progress blog tagline makes it clear she has the same attitude as Freelance-Zone, but Beth is MUCH nicer about it. I can’t remember if we’ve covered Beth’s work before and I’m too busy to search through the archives (read: too lazy). Regardless, I am really enjoying the site. Especially the links section as I am constantly on the prowl for new writer sites to look at. My favorite part of a list of links as extensive as Beth’s is rediscovering sites I looked at earlier in the year, then forgot all about as looming deadlines obscure all else.

One aspect of Writer In Progress that caught my eye is a little widget on her page from Feedjit. This displays the activity of visitors to her site in real time. I know I’m too busy to keep up with all the improvements and new developments in blogging tech, but that one surprised me enough to think I should keep more regular tabs on the geekier side of blogging so I can add a few new bells & whistles of my own. Cheers to Beth for prodding me to take a more active interest in page design.

Writer In Progress is definitely worth a look. Drop by and stay a while..