How Do I Become an In-Demand Freelance Writer?

From the archive. First published February 2021.

I am a freelancer. I am doing all right. There is nothing too fancy to boast about here.

I finished college five years ago, a basic journalism course that ran for three years. They taught me a ton of terms, like ‘masthead’ and ‘libel’. Hardly useful.

We even had professionals and successful journalists addressing us from the podium on how the future of journalism rested on our shoulders.

I think three girls in the first row took them seriously.

Don’t get me wrong. The course was good enough. But nobody had much insight into how to be a financially successful writer.

Nobody ever taught us how to go from a day job with a novel on the side to full-time writing.

So I left my job and started looking for the answers myself.

(I am still working on my novel though.)

Being a successful one-man army is more than making my cup of coffee and sticking to my to-do list.

In fact, half of the job is client management rather than writing. I definitely recommend an assistant if you can afford one.

Until then, let me share five lessons I have learned that can help you become an in-demand writer.

1. Volume Wins

The game of online writing is simple. Gary Vaynerchuk has been saying it for over a decade.

Volume wins.

The rule stays the same whichever platform or format you pick: months and years of consistent volume win.

2. Demonstrate what you promise

There is nothing better than proving to a potential client what you are promising.

There are already enough sleazy writers.

Once someone sees that you have produced similar results for someone else, the chances that they will invest in you go up tremendously.

3. Communicate

Treat your clients no worse than your spouse, and if you’re a lousy partner to start with, treat them better than that.

You need to address all of your client’s doubts. Make sure they review and agree to your terms before working with you.

Here are a few things you should communicate:

• A clear list of the client’s tasks you will work on.

• A deadline for your project. Both the date and time by which you would submit the project.

• The price, the payment method and the number of revisions included in the price. Also mention the extra cost and the consequences if the project goes outside its scope, which it often does.

• The best mode and time to communicate with you.

4. You can’t go viral on command

If a client says he wants to go viral, you must sit him down and break it to him that there is no secret to virality.

Sorry, Sir!

Except, of course, consistent content that’s helpful to their audience.

I have ghostwritten about 500 articles for various clients. Only about 50 of them have performed well, and 11 of those have gone viral.

That’s spinning the wheel 500 times and missing the mark 450 times. But when it hits, it makes up for the rest.

5. Almost all growth hacks are nonsense

In the early days I spent hours looking for the master’s spell to get more views and subscribers.

Only one thing actually worked: consistently creating useful content.

Cross out everything else.

If this helped, subscribe to Yogic Productivity on Substack, where the Sunday post arrives by email. If you would like somewhere to think out loud, an Explorative Letter is a pen friend who writes back. And if you run a yoga or wellness brand and want content that sounds like you, let's talk.