Are you interested in becoming an article content writer? If so, it’s a very freedom oriented field. You can set your own hours, work from home, and you are your own boss – how great is that? The problem is that most aspiring article writers don’t know how to start their article writing career.
This article shows you two ways to start your career as an article writer:
– Submitting To Magazines, and…
– Using The Internet
Let’s explore the first.
1) HOW MAGAZINES GET MATERIAL
Magazine articles can come from four different places:
– Regular members of the magazine’s staff,
– Professional or amateur free-lance writers,
– Specialists who write as an occupation, and…
– Readers of the periodical who send in material based on their own experience.
The staff system of magazine article writing has been adopted by a few general magazines and by a number of class periodicals. The staff is recruited from writers and editors on newspapers and other magazines. And the magazine members often perform various editorial duties in addition to writing articles. Publications edited in this way buy few if any articles from outsiders.
Magazines that do not follow the staff system depend largely or entirely on contributors. Every editor daily receives many manuscripts submitted by writers on their own initiative. From these he selects the material best adapted to his publication. Experienced writers often submit an outline of an article to a magazine editor for his approval before preparing the material for publication.
Freelance article writers of reputation may be asked by magazine editors to prepare articles on given subjects. In addition to material obtained in these ways, articles may be secured from specialists who write as an occupation. An editor generally decides on the subject that he thinks will interest his readers at a given time and then selects the authority best fitted to treat it in a popular way.
To induce well-known men to prepare such articles, an editor generally offers them more than he normally pays. A periodical may encourage its readers to send in short articles giving their own experiences, and explaining how to do something in which they have become skilled. These personal experience articles have a reality and human interest that make them eminently readable.
To obtain the kinds of articles, magazines sometimes offer prizes for the best – reserving the privilege of publishing acceptable articles that do not win an award. Since you’re an aspiring writer, you should take advantage of these prize contests as a possible means of getting both publication and money for your work.
2) USING THE INTERNET
This is probably the most wide-open field. It is international in scope and there are millions of websites that need the services of article writers. The current increase in blogging coupled with changes in how a search engine ranks a website have made the demand for quality articles huge. Some larger websites have staff writers, but the majority rely on freelance writers for content. Just about any topic is open for article writing.
If there is a topic out there, you can bet that there is a website that covers it. For the amateur writer, the Internet is probably the best place to polish your skills. You can write articles in advance and sell them, or write articles specially for webmasters, or even produce articles to post on free article directory websites to advance your name.
Some greats to visit online to start your article writing career are:
1) Elance.com
2) Freelanceswitch.com
3) Freelancers.net
4) Guru.com
5) iFreelance.com
Now of course once you join these sites you will have to learn how to market your services also. Because a great service is nothing without a strong marketing plan to get the word out about it.
Be sure to harness the full capacities of the Internet when starting out in your article writing career. It will be well worth it.
