It’s no lie –
I’ve been freelance writing since 2014 and have worked with amazing small businesses, influencers and big brands.
During this time, I learned I didn’t have to hustle as hard or write as much, or be fully booked to make a living as a writer.
I created other income streams – like having other websites and creating digital products – which allowed me to work from home indefinitely.
But, I also refined my freelance writing service so that my value increased, making my writing rate substantially increase as well.
I share my journey in this Youtube video if you want to know more about how I became a successful freelance writer.
What helped me grow as a freelance writer was setting actionable goals, and for the past two years, my goal was to secure big brand writing gigs and I did just that!
So, when 2021 rolled around, I wanted to try something new.
I decided I wanted to break into email copywriting.
I chose this specific short copywriting service because of Samar Owais.
She recently did a freelance writing training on email copywriting in the Writeto1k private Facebook group.
I often get expert freelance writers like Samar, Elise Dopson, Alicia Rades, or Carrie Smith to share advanced tactics to help my course students.
And Samar didn’t disappoint!
I loved her training, and it really excited me to the possibility of a new freelance writing service.
But, there was another reason why I wanted a new writing gig – I wanted to show my course students that I do what I preach.
I didn’t just try freelance writing on a whim in 2014, then secured a few clients and created a course, and stopped freelance writing.
It’s the complete opposite.
I haven’t stopped securing freelance writing jobs.
What I Offer as an Email Copywriter
In Samar’s training, she talked about creating a welcome series for the eCommerce and SaaS industries.
I liked the idea of offering welcome series campaigns and product funnels or product deal emails to creators and service providers.
I have experience in my own business writing marketing emails and learned and applied copywriting to my content over the years.
While I write digital marketing content for the SaaS industry, I wanted my new service to be varied.
Working with other creators and service providers like coaches, designers or eBook/course creators allowed me to try out different niches.
My rate for email copywriting is standard as well – $150 per email. Over time I will up my email rate to $300 per email, but this is a process.
Here is an invoice from one of my clients.
I’m comfortable with this rate and the type of work involved for this rate. Once I have more time for this type of writing gig I can increase my value and rate.
Most of my clients hired me to either write a new welcome series – 4-5 emails or tweak an existing series where I edit or write a few new emails in the sequence.
I have another potential client for an eBook launch sequence, and I’m excited to work on this project in the future.
How Am I Gaining Freelance Writing Clients in a New Service?
At the beginning of offering this service, I didn’t focus on getting potential clients to my writer website.
My writer website is optimized for long-form SEO clients.
I doubt a mompreneur is looking at my writer website wanting to hire me.
Instead, I had to show my experience as an email copywriter to my ideal client using other methods.
I did this by:
- Writing a blog post on how to write an email (showing my experience in this new writing niche)
- I shared my new service to my email list for writers and bloggers
- Created Instagram Lives about email writing and email marketing
- Created social media posts and videos about email writing and email marketing
All of this directed to my new service and helped me land new clients.
As well, I leveraged my existing audience to land clients. Since I mostly do warm pitching (not always cold pitching), I reached out to other mom bloggers, course students in a course I recently took about Facebook Ads and my email list for clients.
Based on all of this, I really didn’t spend too much time actively finding clients.
I just don’t have the time.
I had to stop promoting my business online for an entire month while I updated a traffic course.
I also have several blogs that I needed to update and other courses I’m slowly updating.
Oh, and we are painting and adding new flooring to our house, and this is totally disrupting my workday (I can’t work in my office).
So, I’m saying that I didn’t devote as much time as I wanted to for this new service! I hope I’ll find time soon because I enjoy this short copywriting project!
Updating My Business
Since all of this, I’ve added some copy about my new service on my writer website, and I recently changed my LinkedIn banner to reflect my new client and service.
I’m excited to see how this new service plays out as an established freelance writer.
I’m fortunate I can pick and choose my clients and decide if the project is worth my time and effort.
I love working with other moms and sharing their business with my audience.
And I absolutely love writing!
How to Get Started With a New Freelance Writing Niche
Is it possible for someone completely new to online writing and freelancing to gain writing jobs?
Yes!
This is how I started as a brand new freelance writer with absolutely no experience in my writing niche (in fact, I didn’t even know what writing niche or writing service I wanted to have).
So, how do you start writing online?
1. Pick a Writing Niche
A writing niche is a topic in an industry. For example, baby care in the parenting industry.
I tell new writing students to pick three niche topics they are interested in or have experience in.
For me, that was parenting, natural health and education/psychology.
Notice that digital marketing isn’t on that list?
The great thing about being a freelance writer is that you can pivot and change whenever you want!
By setting up my writer website and finding ways to get in front of my ideal client, I learned about digital marketing tactics.
I fell in love with learning about this new topic and decided to write about it on my blog and guest post on business sites.
I suddenly found my freelance writing niche!
If you need help finding your niche, download my free booming niches guide with 72 writing niches to choose from!
2. Pick Your Ideal Client
Now the fun part begins.
After finding a particular topic – or two – you enjoy writing about, start thinking about the client you want to work for.
Are they solopreneurs?
Small businesses?
Coaches or authors?
Startups?
Notable brands?
Finding the right client means making a living out of this.
While I love working with other mompreneurs, I know, I can’t make a living from this type of client. I need to move up to influencers, entrepreneurs and small businesses to make a living writing emails.
And it’s the same process for you!
3. Draft Up Writing Samples
Now you need to show you are a legit writer.
You do that by creating writing samples in your chosen writing niche.
If you have a few niche topics, create a few writing samples in those niche topics!
House your samples on your writer website or on a portfolio site, like Contently.
4. Develop a Pitching Process
Clients aren’t going to find you; you have to hustle and find clients yourself.
You do this with a pitching process.
Your pitch is the first introduction to you, your service and your writing skill.
As a beginner, it’s not unheard of to send hundreds of pitches before you hear back from a potential lead.
You can streamline this process with a pitch template.
While it’s best to send personalized pitches to gain a writing job, you can lean on templates for portions of your pitch.
To help you out, pick up my free cold pitching swipe file with converting pitches!
5. Keep on Hustling
Once you land that first freelance writing job, don’t stop there!
Keep on hustling and marketing your business.
An easy way to hustle to more writing clients is to create a challenge.
Hold yourself accountable and do the work and you WILL land clients.
Some challenges you can do are:
- Write 1,000 words a day challenge
- Pitch 5 times a day for 30 days
- Source leads on LinkedIn for 15 days
- Get on one Medium publication every week for 30 days
This is what helped one of my Writeto1k students land multiple clients.
6. Consider Taking My Free Course
If you want to land your first client enroll in my free course, Get Paid to Write!
I give you the tools to get started and show you the right places to find writing gigs.
Now is The Time to Freelance Write
According to a Stanford article, up to 42% of US workers are now working from home – up from only 17% before the pandemic hit.
This tells me that this is the perfect time to quit your 9-5 job for good and dive into freelance writing. The freelance industry is NOT over-saturated; thousands of businesses start online every single day, and every day there are thousands of freelance writing gigs available.
It is possible to make money writing in 2021!
I hope my story inspires you. I started freelance writing in 2014 and have never stopped!
Over that time, I’ve grown my business, diversified my income streams, networked with some of the biggest influencers in this industry and made amazing online and IRL friends!
I’ve also helped over 25,000 writers land their first client and make a living writing!
So, what are you waiting for?
Tell me in the comments what your writing niche is! I love to hear your story!
Please pin me!
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