Blogging Tips

In yesterday’s post (Part I of this three-part series), we discussed putting together a freelance writing marketing plan so that you can land more writing gigs in 2009.

Step 1 of Your Freelance Writing Marketing Plan: Target a Niche

Part I discussed why you should target a niche. Many freelance writers never take the time to do this, which is why I think so many have a hard time landing writing jobs. Their marketing is too scattered.

When you target a niche, you talk to one specific group, which is a lot easier than trying to be everything to everybody.

Step 2 of Your Freelance Writing Marketing Plan: Make a List of Services to Offer

Now that you know who your target market is, it’s time to look at your service offerings. Many freelance writers don’t even have a specific list of services that they offer. Again, it’s because they try to be everything to everybody.

Even if you are a generalist, you should have a set list of services that you offer so potential clients can make easy decisions about working with you. In marketing, there is an old adage that says confused clients don’t buy. When you try to be everything to everybody, prospects don’t recognize you as being good for anything.

But, when you define your target market and offer them a set list of services, you reel prospects in with a specific skill. As clients get to know you and your work, you will inevitably get different kinds of work from them.

Marketing Tip: Clarity sells; confusion repels.

How to Come Up With a List of Freelance Writing Services

There are two ways to come up with a list of freelance writing services to offer prospects.

The first way is to go with your primary skill set. For example, if you’ve worked in-house at a public relations firm, press releases may be your forte. Then, you can offer those as your primary service. To back up a minute, if you decide to go this route, be sure you choose your target market according to what your skill set is.

The second way to come up with a list of freelance writing services is to build your services around what your target market needs.

For example, I’m an SEO writer. My service offerings are geared around what my target market needs. Internet marketing and search firms need SEO articles, meta tag writing, social media marketing, etc. So I offer all of these services.

Writing Services Tip: When you’re just starting out, don’t try to offer too much, especially if you’re not readily familiar how to provide that service. When I first started out as an SEO writer, I offered one service – SEO article writing. I expanded my service offerings as clients began to request them more and more.

This allowed me to grow slowly, and really learn about each service as I went along.

In the final part of this series tomorrow, we’ll discuss pricing your freelance writing services — pricing them to make a real living as a freelance writer.