Sometimes, but not often. I’ve been surfing a variety of writers market job boards for a few years now and met with very little success. That changed earlier this week when I landed my first writing contract via an online job listing.
Normally, any articles I sell are through pitch letters sent out blind to editors (not really blind because I’ve researched the magazine, etc and determined that my idea will fit their needs) and not by an ad placed online. The success rate for pitch letters is pretty low, so it’s a good thing to have several making the rounds at any one time.
But theoretically job boards should solve that problem because editors are making their needs known right up front: “We need stories about ___.” So, I whip up a pitch about ____ and wait. And wait. But I never have any success or even get a reply. It’s frustrating, but I can only wonder at how many emails an article call on a writer’s job board gets (a truck load, I bet.)
The key to my recent success with a writing job board is focus. The reason I landed this latest article is because I had previously written on the topic, so in addition to having much of the research done, I have already proved that I can write on this subject. It’s becoming my focus and that paid off in this case. But, it can be a frustrating experience to see hundreds of writing jobs that don’t fall into your focused writing niche. I can’t write business articles, but everyday I see hundreds of postings looking for that sort of thing. And there’s no use faking it, because editors will know.
For that reason the secret of online writing market boards, no matter how frequently they’re updated or what the quality of the postings are, is finding that one job out of a hundred that fits your writing niche, whether it’s kids, parenting or tropical flowers in southern Texas.
Knowing your writinig niche and having more than one, is a great way make increase your chances with writing market boards. It also helps you skim through them very quickly, because there is always a lot of crap posting out there, but that’s a whole other post.
Here’s a quick list of some of the writing job boards I check out regularly. If you’ve searched for writing job boards in the past, these might be familiar to you. The quality of their postings can vary, but each has turned up a promising lead for me in the past:
writersweekly.com – By far the best source for all around writing news. They offer their market listings via rss feed, which is very handy. Drop it into bloglines and away you go. This is where I found my latest article commission.
Inkygirl – Debbie Ohi is the a one-woman-bottomless-cup of writers markets. She was the founder of the great (and sadly offline) Inkspot.com. Her current weblog for writers has a frequently updated list of writer’s jobs culled from various sources. She also offers an rss feed and the quality of her postings is always very high.
writerfind.com – Lots of international work that can be done from anywhere. In the past I’ve submitted to jobs advertised on this board and actually got a response. It was still a “no thanks” but the response alone merits a placeement in this list. Their amount of free listings has dropped dramatically lately, but they offer a paid service. I haven’t tried it out and I don’t plan to.
Freelancwriting.com – Although I’ve never met with success on this board, I always return because their postings are frequently updated and they do the courtesy of splitting their boards into paying and non-paying. The quality can vary and I’ve seen some outrageous job postings on there (ie – “I need a writing credit: will buy completed children’s novel for $50.00″ – seriously!). Check it out but skim at your own risk.
That’s just a quick list of my top writing job boards. As I said, the success rate for me and these things is pretty low. I’d like to know if anyone else has had better luck with getting writing jobs online. Where did you go and what was the key to your success? Drop me a comment and share it with the world.
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