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freelance jobs

Who’s Hiring?

By Amanda Smyth Connor1362732_happy_friends

In this crap economy, is anyone still hiring freelance writers?

Yes! Squee! Oh for joy, some wonderful companies are still hiring! And you might be surprised to hear which companies are in need of fabulous writers like yourself.

1. Gaming companies. Game development companies like Zynga and EA are in a state of fast growth and are pumping out games for various platforms faster that you can say “Alec Baldwin playing Words with Friends.” Look for jobs like “community manager” for social media positions and “content developers” for freelance writing positions.

2. Political campaigns. I’m not talking about writing speeches for Obama (although if you can get that gig, I’d ask that you put in a good word for me.) I’m talking about offering your services up to local politicians in need of bloggers, content managers and social media assistants. Just beware the skeletons in the closet.

3. Start-Ups! Keep a close eye on any start-up that you hear about. It may mean short-term gigs because funds are tight, but start-up companies notoriously need content created in large quantities very quickly as they work to build SEO and marketing campaigns. This will mean flexibility on your part when it comes to tight turnaround and jumping from one project to the next, but if you can get in good on the ground floor of a good start-up, you can position yourself for loads of steady freelance work. ps. Etsy is hiring bloggers right now. FYI.

4. Hit up my favorite industry job board – Mediabistro.com. They have full-time, part-time and freelance job listings for the writing, editing and social media industries. Check it out.

Amanda Smyth Connor is a social media manager for a major publishing company, owns her own wedding planning business and has managed online communities and content development for many start-up and Fortune 500 companies.  She has been a professional editor for more years than she can remember.

advice

What Color is Your Parachute?

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freelance-writing-advice

Many won’t remember, but the headline for this post was the title of a very popular career book. The title implies you should be planning ahead before a career change is thrust upon you. I can’t think of any better advice in today’s screwball economy.

There are plenty of freelance writing advice books out there advising you not to put all your freelance eggs in one basket; this advice was never more relevant than it is now. How many income sources do you have as a fulltime freelancer? How many of them do you expect to have in six months? Are some of them looking a bit shaky lately? If so, it’s time to start branching out–find some new potential clients or sources for work BEFORE you get the bad news and you’ll be able to transition from a sinking ship to something with a bit more stability.

There are a couple of ways to do this–one of the best is to send out letters of introduction to potential clients and let them know you’re available for work. Even if you have a full plate at the moment, you make yourself known–and chances are there might be a small delay between the time a future client actually gets back to you anyway. If a current lucrative gig suddenly goes south, you can always send a follow-up letter to let them know you have open availability.

Catherine has written elsewhere about letters of introduction, but one thing you should know–the earlier you start, the shorter your lag time could be from the day you find out a source of income has gone away and you pick up a new one.