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Archive for the ‘Writing Tips’ Category

Boredom…..a disease that strikes just about anyone who does repetitive work for prolonged periods of time. Boredom can strike anyone and writers are no exception. Well, in short….yes, I get bored with writing too. My fingers uncharacteristically ache whenever a thought or reminder dawns on me that the time has come for me to….well, tap out, yet, another article on a subject matter that is of no concern to me as a person or individual.

But tell that to a website designer and the designer can tell you the same thing. Yeah, it gets boring.

Here’s where a writer’s sense of responsibility and capability comes in. As much as I, sometimes, feel the dislike of having to delve into a topic that is off my tangent, I remind myself that this is my job and I have the heavy responsibility of delivering whether I like it or not. My preference is of no concern to the client. They are depending on me to come up with articles or web content that makes sense…but most importantly, makes them money.

So, I counter the attack of the boredom with creative writing. A sentence at the top of my head can actually spur a lot or ignite a fire that dimmed when I am trying to fight off the feeling of jadedness.

Reading and writing outside of the scope of work is an extremely important aspect of keeping the fire of passion (for writing) alive in us. Creative work is often that demanding. The same goes for people who act, do voice-overs, perform on stage, give powerful speeches or dance.

As a writer, I sweep my boredom aside, my own personal longings into a closet or under a carpet so that I can focus. But not before I delve very fleetingly into something that I love doing. Like blogging, like now.

I write a lot of fiction as well….short stories, long stories, an inspirational paragraph or an outline of a story. For more or less twenty to thirty minutes every day, I open these up and add to them whenever I feel boredom strike.

Then after that, I close the ‘drawer’ in my mind and reconnect with my work. Let’s face it, if I were to let boredom dictate my work as a writer, I would be delivering crap to all my clients from time to time and honestly speaking, I can’t afford to do that.

No, let me rephrase that….I refuse to do that. I value my work and the integrity that I stand for more than anyone can ever imagine. I fought way too hard to establish myself to let all of that slip away. It takes but only one simple mistake to lose the trust that I have developed and earned from my clients.

So now that I’ve dealt with the issue of boredom, it’s time for me to get back to work.

Boredom, I’ll see you again tomorrow. For now, cheerios!

Your goal to achieving maximum writing results cannot be obtained if your readers’ interest fades. In fact, the majority of writing fails to be read because of what the author wrote in the headline, and sub-headline(s). As shown here it takes the additional power of descriptive word lists to achieve reader inspiration.

Think of which of these titles sound more appealing to you. “A list of ten things your dentist did not telling you about brushing your teeth.” Alternatively, choose this title. “Don’t stick that toothbrush on your germ infested teeth.” I am sure you made the same choice as I did. Keywords in the second example were toothbrush and teeth. The motivational, descriptive words are stick, and germ infested. Combined they produce a desire by the reader to continue reading. What good is your interesting story, article, sales piece, or book if it never is read?

For maximum writing results, there are two critical areas where your writing must shine above the stars. These are eyeball grabbing headlines, and earth shattering sub-headlines. In the case of book writing, that would encompass chapter titles. You might have a natural born knack for writing that easily flows unto your document. It is all meaning less, unless you knock the socks off your reader. The problem is that the time frame to accomplish this key feat, only lasts from three to five seconds. You have to grab the reader by their receding hair to awaken their feelings to read on. The time proven method is using motivational words, and thought provoking descriptive word phrases.

Like most writers, you probably do not currently have a killer library of these. Therefore, I am going to provide you with 50 beneficial words and phrases to start your two descriptive word lists. Your other list should be of motivational, inspirational, and action power words. Referring to these descriptive word combinations will not only enhance the desire to read on, but also spice up the intensity level of interest in what you are writing.

Here is the first of the two descriptive word lists - words

This sample consists of the words accelerate, action-packed, adventurous, affordable, aggressive, allstar, amazing, amplify, anxious, artistic, aspiring, assertive, astonish, attract, awakening, awarded, awesome, backbone, beastly, bewildered, beefy, bargain, blasting, bliss, blazing, blockbuster, and boiling.

Here is the second of the two descriptive word lists - word phrases

This sampling is composed of the word phrases: a child could do it, 2 products in 1, a date with destiny, the masterpiece collection, a very elite opportunity, as recent surveys show, achieve the impossible, act now for this bonus, activate the fuse, all bets are off, the obstacles are eliminated, alleviate the pain, always a knockout, ambush the competition, ask yourself this question, at your fingertips, attack with conviction, avoid feeling insecure, award winning features, awaken to a new era, bag a trophy, be the first to call, begin tomorrow today, behind door #4, best kept secret, better than striking gold, look behind the scenes, beyond normal boundaries, big hitters only, blistering speed, bone chilling, brilliant deduction, and bullet proof system.

Build a burning desire to bypass your competition by building a strong foundation for writing effectively.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Well published author, Don Yerke likes to concentrate on what you don’t know or what no one else dares to print. Tell it like it is.

Watch for his new paperback book debuting on Amazon early this summer. It is loaded with great insurance marketing and recruiting information.

Come and get your FREE “Think and Grow Rich” Ebook by Napoleon Hill instantly. The website address is http://www.agentsinsurancemarketing.com

I’ve received many messages from my friends and visitors of both my blog and websites asking me for advice on how to get started as a freelance writer. One of them asked me, point-blank, no-holds-barred, ‘How to get clients ah?’

The internet is a vast space for you to explore your options. In the same way that it is a vast space with an abundance of opportunities, it’s also filled with competitors….with sharp nails…and fangs. They will not hesitate to sink their fangs and nails into your flesh. Especially now that the economy is nose-diving into a pit of possible oblivion, competition is even tougher.

But it’s not impossible to thrive as a freelance writer today and here’s how you’re going to get started.

Write write write and then write some more

No matter how tedious you think this is going to be, I’ll hit you with it. There’s no escaping this. If you want to start building your career as a freelance writer, you’ve got to write, write, write and write some more. Write till it becomes very natural to you. In an ironic way, this is how you’re going to pay for your tuition fees….through experience.

Write for free, write to publicize yourself, write to promote your services, write for peanuts, write and get criticized….this is the first task right there at the top of your to-do list.

Publish articles for free

This is a small part of article marketing. If you’re not familiar, here’s how it works. You write for free, you post it up on an article directory, other website owners go in in search of articles to post in their own website or blog, they find yours, publish it and link it to your own website or profile page.

Essentially, you’re saying, ‘Hey, take this and publish it. It’s free…no, really, it’s free. It’s really….here, try me….please?’ The only condition about publishing your article(s) for free is for them to include your byline (this is where the publicity stunt is, folks) and a link (if you have) back to where you want your potential clients to find you.

Blog about everything, show off what you’ve got

For me, the internet and the blogging platform is the next best thing to an orgasm. You’re running your own tabloid, no editor breathing down your throat and you’re a columnist overnight – use it and use it wisely. Now, although blogs were meant to be online journals IN THE BEGINNING, I believe that they have evolved to an extent that everyone’s got one and if you don’t have one and want to have an online career, you’ll have better chances of making it where the zebras live.

So, start a blog and start displaying your talent.

Bid for projects through freelance websites

In order to reap the rewards of your hard work, experience and skills set, you’ve first got to learn how to grovel. Eat dirt. Getafreelancer (there are many others, so, do your homework) is a haven for grovelers because employers know that most green horns get their starts here and you’re going to have to do the same. In Getafreelancer, an employer posts a project, an army of people bid for the project at less-than-self-respectful prices and then the employer picks one. Most of the time, you’d have to go down really low to get a hold of the project but hey, this is where you start.

The main purpose is for you to get the experience and also build your portfolio.

Somewhere down the road, when you’ve successfully marketed yourself as a freelance writer, people want to see a portfolio. Since you’ve groveled, kissed shoes, begged and worked for peanuts so much, you’ve probably got a tidy bundle of portfolio to show off.

That, my friends, is when your groveling pays off.

Good luck to you!

It’s a matter of habit, really. However, the fact remains that where I sit down, yield the pen (or rather, the keyboard) to write the stuff that I churn out for my freelance writing clients is extremely important to me. This has, partly, to do with discipline. I’ve disciplined myself to tune into my work and come in sync with the topics that I have to write about only when I am sitting in my little ‘office’, a little room that I guard with my life.

Hence, whether I own an iPhone or a laptop is completely irrelevant to me. Of course, there ARE other freelance writers who can sit down and write whatever it is that is required of them whenever or wherever. But that’s just not me. I would rather associate a place that I feel comfortable with doning the ‘thinking cap’ instead of writing on my bed or in the living hall. The feelings just don’t flow.

And besides, I’ve two kids. Which means that I need to train them so that they don’t interupt me whenever I am working on something. Ever since they were young, I’ve taught them that mommy works from home, she writes and whenever she writes, she’s in THAT room over there. And when she’s in THAT room over there, unless it’s really urgent and requires immediate attention, they would have to wait.

But it’s a two way street, of course. For every article that I finish, I would stop, give myself a break and go out and hangout with them for a while. This is the only way I can balance my freelance writing career and my family life.

I envy those who can do their freelance work everywhere because this simply means that they can literally travel without any problems at all and STILL continue to deliver top-notch stuff to their clients. In time, I would have to learnt how to do the same thing. But for now, I think for a lot of people, in order to write well, you need to be in the right frame of mind. And the atmosphere and environment is crucial to how efficient the freelance writer is whenever she/he is behind the keyboard.

Patience and Persistence.

Some people get easily frustrated and give up halfway when trying to learn a new trait. I think that’s such a waste, especially when there’s potential for growth in that person. Just because a person signs up for violin lessons doesn’t make that person a Vanessa Mae within a couple of months or a year. Taking up golf does not make a person Tiger Woods within months. These examples I just gave are people who are born to excel because they have the attitude and the right upbringing.

Most importantly, they know what it takes to make it in their own respective industry. It takes persistence, practice, lots of patients and most probably a lot of tears as well. Learning how to write well for the internet, author a book or become a freelance writer takes a lot of practice and patience as well. And this is the encouraging word that I would love to leave aspiring writers with today.

There WILL be criticisms and some people will hate whatever you’ve written. Some other professional writers will scoff at your effort. You could have spent countless hours just toiling over a seemingly well-written piece, thinking that it’s the best piece you have written thus far, only to have people say that it’s stuff kindergarten kids come up with.

Trust me, people, especially critics, are exceptionally cruel when evaluating works of others. As it turns out, it’s far easier to say negative things about what someone have written than to say nice things about it. The negative points, after all, is far more apparent in the beginning. To find the good things in what you have written, it takes effort and not a lot of people are willing to put effort into finding GOOD THINGS to say about what you have written.

In order to make it in this online world and to be a well-paid freelance writer or freelance web content writer, you’ll need to learn how to take criticisms seriously without letting it dampen your will to succeed.

With every backlash, you are one step closer to perfection.

Web content writing is tricky business, mainly because of one thing and one thing only. When writing web content for clients, the writer needs to sit in a position whereby it gives them the chance to see things from the consumer’s perspective. Have you not heard about the logic behind people wanting to know ‘what’s in it for them?’ Well, it rings even truer for people who write web content because frankly speaking, web content writers have very little time and space to move around with copy and words.

The web content writer have to get right to the point because the readers’ main focus would be his/her own needs and expectations.

The goal of a web content writer is to either provide an answer, dispense information, address an issue, suggest a solution, or offer instructions. If a web content writer writes too much in a ‘promo’ style of writing, the readers are just going to….for lack of a better word, tune out and click off.

It’s extremely crucial for web content writers to be able to sit in the seat of the readers and imagine his or her reaction when reading it. If the web content does not offer them what they are looking for within that very short period of time….it’s gone. You’ve lost your chance.

I would also like to place focus on the opening lines on your web pages. Are you telling them STRAIGHT UP what they’re about to find? Is the ending of your web content POWERFUL enough to make the readers go….’Ooohh, I think I would like to have that’ or at least ‘Mmmm….that’s interesting’.

Otherwise, no matter how many flowery words you use in your website, you’re not going to be able to sell anything because the visitors to your website is NOT FINDING it interesting FOR THEM.

So, write FOR your readers instead of TO them.

If you’re new to the cyberworld and have heard the word ‘article marketing’ uttered a few times, you must be wondering what articles had to do with marketing and how can both ‘article’ and ‘marketing’ be combined into one single word. Well, here’s the thing. On the web, word is a big thing. When you have words, you have the chance to market yourself - hence, the word article marketing.

All you have to do is to sit down and write an article a day for every day of the month and post them in sites like www.ezinearticles.com and then in your own personal blog or website; within a couple of months, I can promise you that you’ll see a difference in the numbers!

Perhaps, in the beginning, you should be warned not to expect tens of thousands of visitors to your website or blog. Internet marketing is a slow and steady thing - within a couple of months, I am VERY SURE, if you;ve done your work well, you will see a difference.

So, there you go. One article a day. That’s all you need.

by Marjorie J McDonald

When deciding on a topic to write or speak about gather the information you want to present to the reader or audience. Place the information in categories relating to various aspects of your topic. From there, sort the information into level of importance from most important to least important in being able to communicate about your topic.

You then can determine what would actually contribute to presenting your topic clearly and what would be extra information that could add some value. Then determine what information would subtract value from your subject or fall into rambling about the subject.

Next, begin to gather the main points of your topic by putting them in order of what the reader needs to know first and then continue to what they would need or want to know last. You will be introducing your topic, giving information about your topic and then explaining to your reader or listener why this information would be of value for them to know.

Sort the main points into an outline. When you have the major part of the outline in place begin to add to those main points just enough extra information to increase the descriptions and give value to the topic so your reader or listener would feel like it was helpful additional information to understand the topic.

Write down your information and add just enough to keep it interesting and maybe, at that point, just a few extra tidbits that would add but were not really necessary. This way you will be staying on topic and the reader or listener will be able to determine if they want to find out more about the topic you have presented to them.

If you just stay with the main facts with limited extra information the reader or listener will value your presentation more and can then easily determine if getting more information would work for them. They will appreciate your ability to present information and stay on topic. It shows respect for their time and that places you as a writer or speaker higher on their list to come back to you for information in the future.

And now I invite you to join me for a series of writing exercises to help you discover your areas of interest in writing as well as increasing your creativity. You may access these exercises by visiting http://www.freecreativewritingstrategies.com

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
You also may enjoy visiting my blog at

http://www.creativewritingmadeeasy.com

By Deborah Owen 

While it is true that a few people can skip protocol and begin writing for large markets without writing credits, the ordinary person cannot. Be prepared, because every publication will want to know where you have been published before, and you should have a list of publications as long as your arm.Write for ezines that pay in subscriptions, (some will pay $5). Write for your church bulletin and bulletins at work. Go to your local newspaper and ask if they need someone to cover sports and/or political meetings. (These are hard jobs to fill, and almost every paper needs someone in these positions.)

You may be asking yourself, “But if I give writing references in ezines, bulletins, and local papers, won’t the editor know I’ve been working for nothing?” Yes, they will, but they won’t care. They will admire you for your tenacity. They will know you’ve been out working and learning the market, and they’ll know that you must be some kind of a decent writer, or no one would have published you.

There is yet another way that you can get experience, and that is writing for Associated Content and other such places. You can also write for article distribution centers. Everything counts.

When you send your first piece into a magazine, don’t make the mistake of saying, “My teacher said she liked this piece,” “I’ve never been published before, but I’ll be a hard worker,” or “I belong to a writer’s club and they voted this article as the best of the month.” These are amateur remarks, and any editor will recognize them as such.

If you don’t have any publication credits, avoid the subject altogether. Give the short story on how you got into writing and what your goals are, and always thank the editor for his time in reading your submission.

In conclusion: write articles free of charge to get publishing credits (and keep dated clippings from each one in a scrap book, as you will need that information later on); present yourself well and have the audacity of a Rockefeller. Remember, you’re selling yourself. Most of the time, you’ll get the chance you’re looking for, if you bluff your way through it.

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Receive a free writing evaluation by clicking here: http://www.creativewritinginstitute.com. Send in stories for the newsletter! Cool things happen at CWI.

Marketing on the web may be competitive. What is required to beat off your competition is that powerful sales copy. It must be outstanding, well written and most importantly, it must be powerful in giving that lethal blow to your competitors.

The success of your online marketing campaign depends very much on the effectiveness of your marketing copy. It really can make or break your campaign, simply because if it is not working well, you will not get much traffic and you will not be able to close your sales.

There is something within your marketing copy that is of vital importance to its success. It is none other than the headline itself. The word speaks for itself. It must be outstanding and it must be lethal. How then can you best power up your headlines to achieve success?

(1) Determine what works best

Find out what kind of headline do you want for your marketing copy, and how will this headline create the impact that you want in order to get sales. Understand realistically what is the intention of your headline and how it can be made to beat off your competition. In a nutshell, you have got to do some brainstorming to reach a consensus on what is the best headline for your marketing copy.

(2) Create the first powerful strike

Headlines are created to capture and influence attention and interest. It is therefore vital to exercise a good selection of words for your headlines. These words must be able to strike that first blow, and they must be able to retain the interest of readers too. Words that are effective and sell powerfully will help power up your headlines. You will get to stimulate the interest of readers and eventually influence their wallets.

(3) Catch all attention

In order to capture the attention of your readers, your headlines must first of all catch their attention. That said, creation of attention-grabbing headlines will lead readers to continue reading your marketing copy. Their mental interest will be sustained and the chances of closing them are very high. In a nutshell, catch their attention and capture their mental focus. Support your headline with a sub-headline which just adds on to describing your offer.

(4) Capitalize on the power of words

Words if used correctly can be very powerful. They will help power up your headlines as the latter are usually the first sentences in your marketing copy. Use “power” words such as proven, secrets, free, success, unleash and power in your headlines. They have been proven to create powerful impact upon readers, and bring them to making buying decisions.

In conclusion, creating powerful headlines will help your business tremendously. They will influence the conversion rates positively and will help spin your marketing copy effectively. Competition will be beaten flat.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

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