#ChroniclesOfAWriter – Should writing really be a business?

Adedoyin Jaiyesimi

“I feel like a fraud when I ‘flaunt’ my writing. It makes me appear cocky.”

“I just want the freedom to be creative and write what I want, when I want. Writing shouldn’t really be a business.”

Thanks to our coaching sessions at The Sparkle Writer’s Hub, I get to have one on one interaction with a lot of writers.

Many are ready to take writing to the next level. They’ve been writing creatively or just putting down the words as they come for years. Now, they want to make something out of it and I help them figure out how to achieve this.

Transitioning from being a personal writer to becoming a professional writer requires a certain kind of shift for that transition to be successful.

One thing I make our writers realize is that to become a successful professional writer, they must begin to see writing as a business. You can imagine that this statement meets with some resistance from these writers.

I understand.

You want the freedom to write how you want and when you want to. You don’t want your creativity to be limited in any way.

This is ok if you want to be a fiction writer (actually, it’s not the best but we’ll talk about that another time) or remain as a personal writer.

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To become a professional writer who makes money from writing any kind of content, you need structure. Writing is a business and the sooner you begin to see it that way, the sooner you’ll start getting the rewards of being a professional writer.

If writing is a business, it means you need to define the services that you offer. While speaking to writers who registered for The Sparkle Writer’s Network, I realized some of them don’t know the kind of writing opportunity that they want.

When I ask them what kind of writing they want to do, I get generic answers like, “Oh, I want to write articles and edit.” That is too vague. What kind of articles do you want to write? In what area or field? If you want to edit, what are they things that you want to edit? If you think the only thing there is to editing is editing books, then you really have a limited view of what you can do as a professional writer.

Be specific with what you want and the services you offer. Then you need to define how much you want to be paid for those services. I have shared how you should determine the price to charge as a freelance writer in a previous post. You can read it if you don’t know what to charge for your services.

Once you’ve defined your service offering and how much you want to charge, you will have a clearer idea of who your target audience/ client is and what approach you need to take when you want to advertise your services. Yes, you need to advertise your services but there is a subtle art for achieving this.

Don’t make the mistake of advertising yourself as a professional writer on social media without defining your services and your price first. Clients today are very specific about the type of writers that they need. While generic work like ghostwriting and editing will bring you money, doing more specialized content will bring you more money if you position yourself correctly.

I’m offering a free 20-minute coaching session to writers who are finding the transition from personal to professional writing challenging. If you’re stuck in your writing career, or you need to figure out how you can begin to make money from your writing skill, then sign up for a coaching session by sending an email to [email protected] or you can leave a comment and I’ll get in touch with you. The sessions will take place on Thursday 22nd September. I look forward to talking to you!

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