Take the work out of getting work
One of the most time-consuming things about finding freelance writing gigs is applying for them. I’m a writer, but writing an email to get a new job seems to be the hardest thing about my job.
I can find all the right words to explain how the bailout will affect consumer’s credit, but not enough words to say why I’m the right candidate. I know I should be selling myself, but I don’t want to come off as cheesy or arrogant. All this goes through my mind as I’m reading through an ad for a job I really like.
I was spending too much time writing out the perfect response to a job ad. So, I decided to do something about it.
I wrote a few canned responses and saved them as Outlook templates. Then, whenever I need to respond to an ad, I just choose a template, tweak it a little and send it off. No more time wasted thinking about what I was going to say.
Invest time upfront writing a job ad, then responding to ads is so much easier. As time goes on, be sure to tweak your templates based on your response rate.
Hi, I’ve been trying to break into freelancing for a few months now. I even wrote more than twenty articles so that prospective clients/employers would have a chance to see what I can do for them. However, I still haven’t found a paying client (I got one volunteer job where I’ll be posting twice per month). I’ve even gone to Triond where I’ve managed to earn a penny after posting a story which took me two hours to write and research.
How would you write a query letter if you had nothing by way of experience to add to your resume? I’d appreciate some advice on the matter.
Cheers,
Steven