Low-Writing Seasons: Strategies to Help Freelancers Stay Afloat

Freelancing Tips: How to Deal with Low-Writing Seasons

As with many industries, workers find there are high and low seasons. There are periods where work pours in faster than it can be completed and periods when even begging for morsels of anything to do is lacking. For writers, the low season can be detrimental to one's livelihood, which is especially true in academic writing. However, the biggest obstacle to consistent work is the individual themselves.

Putting all one's focus on a single work source or industry is not wise. It's like putting all your eggs in one basket. If the basket breaks, all the eggs are lost. If you have two or more baskets with the eggs spread out, you will only lose the eggs in the broken basket. The same is true with freelance writing.

If you depend on a single source to meet your writing income, you are likely to be disappointed (and broke) later. No single industry can sustain everyone, all the time. In fact, all industries have high and low periods. A wise freelance writer diversifies his or her income resources so that there is a backup in the event one or more source doesn't provide enough work or, worse case, closes.

A FEW RECOMMENDED STRATEGIES INCLUDE:

- Know the peak season for your desired industry

- Join freelance communities

- Develop a reputation for meeting deadlines and providing quality work

- Create a website that showcases your freelance roles

- Be active on social media

Peak Writing Seasons

In academic writing, freelancers find that summer can be one of the driest writing times. A common mistake is to work through a single academic writing source. Freelancers who work through several companies are more likely to have enough work to make it through the slow summer months. Holidays or seasons where academic institutions have lower enrollment also leads to a decline in academic writing work. To avoid this decline, freelancers will want to diversify their skills by offering other services such as general writing and editing for other industries and the general public.

Join Freelance Communities

Knowing which freelancing community to join is important. Some sources require freelancers to pay a monthly fee to access open job or project lists. In low academic writing seasons, it can be difficult for freelancers to make enough to maintain these fees. As such, it is important to choose the community wisely to get the best return (i.e. work) for the investment. When possible, it is best to be active in communities that offer free access, particularly those that allow members to post their freelance profiles and/or work samples.

Develop Your Reputation

During peak seasons, freelancers will want to strive to meet deadlines and provide the highest quality work. If you are frequently late with assignments and find that you are being constantly asked to revise your work, these red flags could signal trouble for the low writing season. How, you might wonder? Think about it this way...

In slow seasons, writing companies want their best writers to handle incoming projects. When there are more writers than there are projects, a company will consider a number of factors when deciding which writer to assign. A company is likely to look at which writers were consistent, met deadlines, and provided the best work during the peak season and assign low-season projects to them. In fact, if you have been consistently late or always asking for deadline extensions during the peak season, it could be that you received projects only because the company had a lot of projects to assign and the more reliable writers were booked. That is something you want to avoid. Don't become "that" freelancer where a writing source views you as a last resort. Be the company's go-to freelancer because your reputation screams timeliness and quality.

Create a Website That Showcases Your Freelance Writing Roles

Today's freelancer lives in the midst of the technology revolution where everything is instant and automated. The way a freelancer presents his or her work and talents must match the times. If you do not have a web presence, you are missing vital and potentially lucrative income sources. Best of all, with the high quality free web services available, freelancers have no excuse for not having a web portfolio. In fact, most free services (i.e. Wix, Weebly, WordPress) have WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) capabilities making design as easy as filling out an online form. Speaking of online forms, it is good to incorporate a form on your website where potential customers or clients can inquire about a project or request a quote.

Be Active on Social Media

Social media is not for everyone, but it has rapidly become a vital part of doing business for all industries. There are a number of social media platforms but the most popular and beneficial are Facebook and Twitter. Perhaps you already have a profile for these platforms. If so, that's great. But do you have a Facebook page for your freelance services? If not, you are again missing out on a vital source to attract potential revenue.

Whatever your freelance preference, there are ways to mitigate the low seasons and drive income to your inbox and, ultimately, your pocketbook. Just remember, don't rely on a single source to provide all your incomes needs. Diversify your sources and your talents. Put yourself out there for potential customers to see. And, most importantly, develop and maintain your reputation for timeliness and quality.

Happy freelancing and best of luck!

It ain't glamorous, but you can always deliver pizzas part-time (or whatever) until things pick up.

Slow seasons can be a blessing for the prolific academic writers who are busy most of the season to the point where they can barely complete 8 hours of sleep or have any time to relax and enjoy the fruits of their labor. However, not being able to earn an adequate amount for the expense account due to the lack or slow inflow of orders could prove to be a real problem. When I was still actively writing, I opted to use the slow season to enhance my work opportunities. This was the time I took to write my e-books, work as a ghost writer for politicians, participate in paid blogging services, and other similar activities. It helped me hone my writing style, increase my knowledge regarding current events that may become topics for discussion during the upcoming academic year, and also, gave my brain a rest from the constant academic writing styles I had to practice. I pretty much free wheeled when it came to my writing jobs. Doing whatever writing job came along that offered a decent salary or selling myself to some new, potential clients whom I knew would end up becoming my regular non-academic clients. These were the clients who normally kept me afloat during the slow academic season.

Perhaps I underestimated you (one of my many character flaws). .

Is this For Freelancers?
can anyone please guide me in how to start freelancing?

No. The above advice and discussion is only for writers that are already established in the world of academic writing. It is not meant for people starting out in the business. If you are a freelancer who just wants to get your feet wet for now, it would be better for you to work for an established, legitimate writing company for now. That way you can familiarize yourself with the business without the pressure of having to promote yourself and seek out new / regular clients. You can look up the writing companies that advertise in EssayNews and inquire as to whether or not they are accepting writer applicants at the moment. The reason I suggest EssayNews is because these are typically more reliable companies than the ones that you can find advertising on social media or search engines. It may be difficult for you to find a writer slot in any company, be it legitimate or a scam because there are just too many 3rd rate writers proliferating in these companies these days. Here's hoping that you find the right company to set you up in the business before you actually start to independently freelance.

I'm not saying this to insult you purposely, but if you can't even compose grammatically-correct forum posts consisting of one or two short sentences, then you can't possibly have a realistic hope of writing for a living, at least not in English. I can't tell from your posts whether English is even your first language. If it isn't, you just have to understand that your English needs to improve substantially before thinking about writing in English for a living; if it is, then you have a lot of work to do just to learn how to write before you can think realistically about writing for a living (even for ESL clients). If you think I'm wrong about that, just type out one short paragraph of about 100 words right here on any topic of your choice to demonstrate how good a writer you are.

Low writing seasons tend to be the time I take for myself. I either go on a well deserved break, leaving my office in the capable hands of my staff, who know I am only a messenger text away if they need me or, I take on a big company project that will allow for a collective writing effort between myself and my team of selected writers. The big company projects are what helps to keep the bills paid during the low writing seasons. While some of my writers may struggle who make their monthly income during these times, those who prove themselves to me tend to benefit from my writing contacts since I bring them onboard for certain writing projects.

The low season is the best time for a writer to discover his own limitations or develop his other writing related skills. I encourage my writers to take the time to read. Read anything. It could be anything from historical books to comic books. All that is important is that they give their brain a break while still enhancing their writing skills and widening their writing scope. While it may not help pay the bills during the slow season, it will certainly help them to earn better and prepare for the next low season, this time with a buffer fund set up for at least 3 months.

I think that the primary struggle of a lot of writers is this low-writing season. While there are ways to garner income during this period, I do also agree that it affects the whole logistics of the job. The high-writing seasons therefore appear to be hunting grounds for earning a tremendous amount of money in order to have the sufficient count as a backburner in case something falls off the radar. It is critical for writers to be wise regardless to ensure that they survive in the industry.

I don't think there's really very much you can do besides develop the largest possible clientele in general. The more clients you have, the more work you'll get tricking in even during the slowest periods when fewer clients need work and those who do need less work than they usually do during the rest of the year.

This is quite a bold statement still. During the slowest periods, freelance writers can even have a tendency to get nearly zero orders. This goes especially for academic writers. I find that diversifying one's portfolio would definitely help in writing more efficiently because you'll be able to fill in empty days with other writing tasks. Being diverse is more critical as this also leads to having a larger clientele.

I'm curious what you'd consider to be "bold" about referring to the slowest season as a time when fewer clients need work.

I referred to it as "bold" because it somehow appeared to me as though there would be consistent work even during slower months. The main issue that I have found with academic writing is that, not unless you practically own the site or have repeat clients who go to school even during off-school season, finding work in particular periods is a dragging activity.

I find that one of the best ways to deal with the low writing season is to make sure that my YT channel is constantly updated. By offering off-cam tutorials to students regarding various writing topics, I am able to monetize my time during the slow and peak seasons. The more short videos I have, which refer the viewers to my site and other services, I end up doing some self-promotion, while educating the students. They normally show their appreciation by hiring my services during the academic year or, hiring me to teach them how to write during their vacation season. By using social media to my advantage, I am able to monetize my wacky tutorial clips. Slow season income solved (a bit) !