Since 1993, I’ve worked as a free-lance writer. Since 1999, my site has been up and running. Even though this was the case, I didn’t start to blog seriously until 2005. I say this because building a blog has been one of the easiest ways I’ve found to make more money as a freelance writer. And the reason is pretty simple: it’s an online home that you can turn into any kind of money-making business you want.
Three ways a freelance writer can make more money
To give you more information, if you are a freelance writer, you are running a business. And since there are only so many hours in the day, you have three choices if you want to make more money from your writing skills. You can:
I Raise your rates for freelance writing and post them on your blog.
(ii) Take on more clients (post on your blog about the kind of work you do and how you can help clients reach their content marketing goals); or
iii. Find other ways to make money (and promote them via a blog; more on this below).
Now, the first two choices are simple and easy to do, but they also have a few problems. For instance, if you charge more for your freelance writing, you might lose customers. If you lose clients, you’ll probably have to replace at least some of them if you want to keep making the same amount of money.
If you choose option number two, which is to take on more clients, you will have less free time and may burn out. I’ve been there and done that, and let me tell you, it’s not fun.
This is why I like the third option best, and why I try to get freelance writers to see its value, because it can pay off (both literally and figuratively) for years to come.
As a freelance writer, here are some ways you can make money and promote them by starting a blog.
Here are three things I’ve done as a freelance writer that have not only helped me make more money but also made it easier for me to choose the kinds of clients I want to work with. This is because I’ve diversified my income.
Self-publishing: You can write and sell your own ebooks as a freelance writer. With sites like Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Smashwords, etc., it’s no longer necessary to have a “mainstream” publisher to make money selling books, especially ebooks, online.
Affiliate marketing: As a freelance writer, you probably use a few tools that you can easily market as an affiliate, such as your web hosting company, your newsletter provider, the WordPress theme you use for your website or blog, etc.
For example, I make a few hundred dollars a month just by letting people know about my web hosting business. I had a bad time with one host, so when I switched, I wrote a blog post about it, joined the affiliate program of my new host, and put a link to it on my site. That happened a few years ago, and I still get money from it.
Publishing Minisites: It’s easy to make a niche blog about something you’re really interested in. Then, to make money off of it, add some AdSense ads and/or some affiliate products that are related to your topic.
This is something else I do that brings in a few hundred dollars a month. And since I only update my niche blog a few times a month, it’s almost like making money on autopilot.
Building a blog is a good way to make money.
In the end, if you’re a freelance writer, you already know how to make money out of words. So don’t do it “just” for your clients; do it for yourself too. This will give you a lot more peace of mind as a freelancer because you’ll have more than one way to make money. In other words, you won’t be putting all of your eggs in one basket.
