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I haven’t posted here in a while. A long while. There’s one reason why: I went into full shutdown from freelance writer burn-out. I couldn’t even log into oDesk without getting a sick feeling in my stomach. The danger of destroying yourself from overworking is very real, and as part …

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Changes isn’t just a David Bowie song.

Not one of us hasn’t had to make one or more changes to a project before a buyer would accept it.  It happens, sometimes it’s because the buyer was vague about what they wanted, sometimes it’s because they change their mind part way through, and sometimes it’s because they wanted something different from what I delivered.

As many of you know, I spend a fair amount of time on the oDesk Community boards, and one question I’ve seen come up more than once is whether or not you should charge the buyer for changes.  Some providers, especially new providers on their first job, are concerned that if they do not make the changes for free, the buyer will give them bad feedback and effectively blacklist them.

It’s a valid fear, especially when someone is just finding their feet and doesn’t feel confident about working within the oDesk system.

The problem is that except in one specific case, making changes for free simply devalues you as a provider.
You, your work, and your time are not free.

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The Need
I’ve noticed a trend on oDesk and other contract writing sites. The trend is to hire as cheaply as possible and then either the buyer edits the material into something usable or hires someone else to do it. (And when they get someone else to take a second look, you can bet the posting will include the phrase, ‘easy job’.) In other words, some buyers set out knowing they won’t get a good product out of the box and hire writers based only on the lowest hourly rate. Editing is part of how they are thinking about the job.

Feeding into this same trend are first-time or amateur authors (of web sites, sales letters and content) who realize, after struggling with a project, the results aren’t what they imagined. They are also looking for editing services.

Finally, a still rare but growing area is ‘freshening’ a website. An older site has gone stale over time; the company or product has evolved or the website just gets a worn-out feel. Although I consider a new set of clothes rewriting, these jobs are seen by some buyers as simple editing.

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In a previous post, Becoming Invisible I mentioned some errors that shock readers out of the spell you are casting with your fine writing. I’ve accumulated more for my list and here they are.
Gaffs to avoid
These are mistakes I have collected from writing I have read or edited (and some I’ve made myself).

accept/except - She accepted (agreed to) the gifts, all except (excluding) the one from me.
principle/principal - The principle (rule) of parsimony was the principal (first, primary) reason I kept the article short.
discrete/discreet - The one means circumspect or prudent (discreet) and the other means separate from some group or category (discrete).
belief/believe - My belief (noun) is that you believe (verb) things I do not.
proceed/precede - To proceed is to continue or move on, precede means to go before in space or time, as an introduction might precede the main body of a book.
illusion/allusion - She mentioned the magician’s illusion (a false impression of reality) when making an allusion (implication or passing indirect reference) to how fake my passion seemed.
lay/lie - Lay is the action of placing something down (usually horizontally), while lie is the condition of being there. So, if I lay a book down on the table, it is lying there and it lies on the table.
to/too - The second means extremely, very, or in addition to. I am too (very) short for dancing and I am roundish too (in addition).
capital/capitol - Capitol is the building where the legislature meets, either in Washington D.C. or in a state. All the other meanings are capital.
then/than - Then is used for time and than is used in comparisons: I had more sense then (time) than (comparison) I have now.
accede/exceed - Accede means to agree to and exceed means to go beyond some measure or expectation.
access/excess - I had access to the secret vault where I found an excess of top secret documents.
all ready/ already - It’s already noon, are we all ready to go?
all together/altogether - We were all together on the train, although it was altogether too crowded to breathe.

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The doldrums; we all get them.

Those days when you just don’t feel like getting out of bed and doing anything.  All you want to do is lie in bed and doze.  The very last thing you want to do is get up and work; or worse yet get up and look for work.

So, what do you do when you do get them?
The first step is obvious:  you have to get out of bed.

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Here’s how my average day goes: I wake up anywhere from 5pm to 8pm. Then, I roll out of bed and check my E-Mail and IMs for anything that has popped up. Take a shower. Eat “breakfast.” Check oDesk for any jobs I might like and apply for them. Answer E-Mails. Call Tokyo/Berlin/wherever my international clients are if it’s the right time. Do a few hours of work. Read the news online. Work on another project. Watch a movie. Go to sleep. Rinse, repeat.

Here’s another average day: I wake up at 7am. Do the same things for timezones close to me. Enjoy free time with friends in the daylight hours.

Another thing I have to consider is the amount of money for a job. The buyer wants to find the cheapest (good) deal they can find, and I want them to take out a second mortgage to pay for my skills. Some buyers will offer a fair price for the work they want. That will garner them the most qualified applicants. Others are holding out for that one provider who is desperate enough to do a massive project for a pittance. So, you have to meet somewhere in the middle.

That’s what freelancing is all about. Freedom. A dichotomy exists which that freedom, however. As a freelancer, you’re able to work when you want, but you also have to work with international timezones. Sometimes, it’s necessary to communicate on their terms, so you have to adjust your schedule to fit with their timezone. There have been weeks where I have gone completely nocturnal. You also have to work inside their budget, or you won’t get the job at all.

By balancing my local clients, international clients, and my lifestyle, I’ve learned a few tips which can help you freelance more effectively. These are they:

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I have a confession to make: I make mistakes.
I don’t think I’m alone in that either. We all make mistakes and there really isn’t anything one can do about it except do the best you can to fix it and then move on.

Anyway, here’s what happened in this case. I took a job to write an eBook for someone, got the necessary source material and started to work. In hindsight I think I should have looked more deeply into some of the source material that came with it but that doesn’t matter at this point.

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Very simply, your mental state is directly tied to the success of your career. If you are experiencing some problems in your personal life, then it is likely to drag your career as a freelancer down. Sometimes, I don’t feel like working because I’m stressed out, and when I try to force myself to work, it goes very slowly. It can turn a fun, great job into something you wake up and dread doing.

So, if you’re down in the dumps, what can you do to drag yourself out? Well, that’s easier said than done. However, I have some tips to keep you on track.

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“Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!”- Lewis Carroll

In the end, I lost two working days, $25, and risked some bad feedback from an upset buyer. It started well enough…

The job posting was to ghost a hundred page e-book. More details came after an inquiry: The buyer already had most of the book done; he just wanted a rewrite. He said he was a writer himself and proudly pointed to a web page he’d written. His only problem was not having enough time to ‘tweak’ his e-book. Fair enough. I’m in.
An easy job starts to go downhill.
He touted it as an ‘easy job’ (don’t they always say that?) and sent me his first draft. There was a lot of material, and it wasn’t badly written, so I sent a letter of understanding to finalize the project and got to work. So far, as common as plastic ware.

Ah, but then I sent him my proposed table of contents and part of a chapter to get some feedback. “Oh,” he writes, “I sent you the wrong draft.”

“That part was already done by the first writer.”

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I’m big on referring other writers to oDesk. I like the setup here and I like the built in protections. But I find that many otherwise enthusiastic writers new to freelancing feel intimidated. They have a bit of trepidation about selling their ‘product’.Bound up in this anxiety is a fear that their writing isn’t good enough. They want to know if they have what it takes. They want training wheels and some way to find out if commercial writing will work for them. They need a confidence builder and an ego booster.
Trying on the writer’s hat.
Where can you go to try before you commit? Try content sites.

Sites where writers can post articles, have them rated, and sometimes earn a couple of dollars. The earning dollars part isn’t really where the value is. These sites are best used to get some practice writing articles for the net and some feedback.

The one I am most familiar with is Helium.com. I have to stress that it isn’t a good place to make steady money. It isn’t a brokered job site like oDesk and it is unlikely that you will build long-term relationships with any buyers.

That being said, it is a good place to write and submit articles in competition with other writers. Article titles are provided and multiple writers all write using the same title. Articles are rated against each other in a better/worse model. The nice thing here is a distinct lack of consequences if a particular article doesn’t do well. Here are some specifics about the site:

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