Write for a living

What’s the First Thing You Do Each Morning?

January 16, 2012

This post from Seth Godin about the first thing you do when you sit down at the computer really made me think. He writes: …the first thing you do should be to lay tracks to accomplish your goals, not to hear how others have reacted/responded/insisted to what happened yesterday. He’s right about my habits: usually […]

Read the Rest →

Q&A: Mindy Long on Building a Porfolio as a Freelance Writer

December 19, 2011

Lots of writers are looking to make a living from freelancing, whether out of choice or obligation. But going it on your own as a writer isn’t as easy as it looks. So whenever I meet someone who’s doing it successfully, I want to learn how. That’s why I invited Mindy Long here today. A […]

Read the Rest →

Q&A: Writer Sean Platt on Making Money Online

October 31, 2011

If you're a writer interested in making money online, don’t miss these insights from author and entrepreneur Sean Platt. Sean writes everything from children's books to horror novels to landing pages for websites. He co-founded CIMedia, an independent publisher with a focus on writing and social media, and is a contributing writer for Copyblogger. But […]

Read the Rest →

When to Invest In Your Writing

October 6, 2011

We can only teach ourselves so much. You can practice, practice, practice. You can read blog posts and watch YouTube tutorials. You can — and this is my favorite — closely watch others who successfully do what you want to do and see how they do it. But if you really want to take your […]

Read the Rest →

When You’re Forced to Prioritize

July 25, 2011

Someone special to me passed away this weekend. So I spent the last week in upstate New York with family, first hoping and then grieving. It’s crazy how, during times like this, work — and by work, I mean both my day job and my side biz — falls so quickly on the ladder of […]

Read the Rest →

Q&A: Gigi Rosenberg on Grant Writing

May 31, 2011

What writer wouldn’t want to win a grant to support her projects? To help us figure out how to do that, Gigi Rosenberg joins us today. Gigi works as a coach, teaching artists and others how to make fabulous presentations. She’s also a memoirist, and most importantly for this interview, author of recently released The […]

Read the Rest →

Advice for a Young Writer

May 16, 2011

Readers sometimes write to me asking for advice on writing, social media or their job search. When I think that advice might be helpful to a broader audience, I like to share it here (with the inquirer’s permission). Here’s a note that hit my inbox last week: Hi Alexis, I just wanted to say how […]

Read the Rest →

Choosing priorities (or why I’m not going to SXSW)

March 5, 2011

For anyone into social media, Web journalism and the intersection of the two, SXSW is thee conference. Most people know it as a music or film festival, but I’m referring to the Interactive arm, which draws thousands of geeks from around the country each year. I bought my ticket months ago, when they first went […]

Read the Rest →

An idea to get your writer’s foot in the door

January 24, 2011

Writers who don’t have many published clips often ask me how they can get their foot in the door. By this point, they usually have decent writing skills, but don’t know which publications to approach to get their first few stories published. Here’s what I tell them: Try your alumni publication. Alumni magazines are often […]

Read the Rest →

Funding your writing: Q&A with C. Hope Clark

November 15, 2010

I love sharing fabulous resources on this blog. I enjoyed bringing you Mira’s List. And Marian Schembari. And The Creative Penn. Today we’re adding another to the ranks: C. Hope Clark and her FundsforWriters. Through her popular newsletter, website and blog, Hope helps writers find grants, contests, freelance gigs and other resources that can help […]

Read the Rest →