There are so many daunting truths about graduating with a writing degree. First off, unless you have a job set up prior to graduation, have interned already, or have been published and paid for your work, graduating could be a very unsettling process. There are so many avenues to beginning a career as a writer, especially if you plan on being a freelance writer. I found myself having a huge reality check after graduating, not because I hadn’t worked hard on my writing, but because I didn’t prepare myself for writing in this day of age, where publishing and advertising is an ever-changing field. These are a few key points that every student should try and accomplish prior to graduating so that they don’t find themselves overwhelmed.
Get Published as Soon as Possible
It doesn’t matter where you get published, school paper or magazine or a local, to a nationwide publication, just get published. There are so many positives to being published, first of all, you’re doing what you set out to do, write and be recognized. Once you’ve been published a barrage of feelings will ensue, feelings like you obviously fear not being published again, or the work was not good enough, but also that pure feeling of success. But focus on that success and build off of it. Once you’re published, share that work with family, friends, but most of all your social media.
Read, Read and Then Read Some More
If you want to come off as an experienced writer then you better have experience and that doesn’t simply mean penning in your journal or tapping away your inner thoughts all night. You need to know writers your age, writers in your category and whether you are writing novels or articles you need to know your facts. If you’re writing a novel it helps to be able to pitch it by relating your book to current authors. This shows that you know what your readers are reading right now along with what’s being published in your subject area. Also, agents don’t tend to steer towards the next “Gatsby” or “Gone with the Wind”, that’s far too much of a stretch of a comparison. If you’re writing articles you want to make sure that you maneuver from the generalized content for your article area. You don’t want to produce a copy of another article, you want to make sure that you are relaying new and important information to your reader as much as you can. You also also want your work to stand out and it helps to take a sideways approach to the subject, telling a reader about a new way to do it or giving a personal spin on the story is easier when you know what’s already been put out there. Plus if you want to be read you have to put in the work of reading other’s pieces.
Make a Personal Website and Blog
I don’t care who you are or what you do, just make a website. Okay, mayyybee not everyone needs one, but if you plan on putting yourself out there in your industry, I highly suggest it. These days even your Aunt Becky can create a website. Wix.com offers tons of free designs along with free images and provide site guides which help the building process, no HTML required. They also volunteer a blog option where you can either use their blogging tool or embed most blogging platforms into your website. Wordress.com is another great platform where writers have built their websites and blogs. It’s not as self explanatory as Wix, but is an older platform and they seem to have more kinks worked out along with better SEO. Learning SEO and HTML embedding is an afternoon’s work but can definitely vamp up it’s appearance along with appearing in more searches and create a more professional looking portfolio. Writing a blog also helps you hone in on what you want to write by choosing a theme and you will gain experience in the field prior to entering.
Twitter is Like a Second Resume for Writers
Twitter has become much more than a platform to stand on and shout from. For many, it’s a place to spread wisdom and garner knowledge on current social issues, but for writers, it’s a place to promote their writing. In an age like today where everyone wants faster and everything delivered sooner, publishers don’t want to work to promote their writers. With talk spaces like Facebook and Twitter, they expect for you to use those platforms to put your words out in the universe. For articles, publishers see Twitter as a way for you to share what you wrote with your followers on their websites so that they garner more clicks from you. This also shows that you have an understanding of current society and what society want to see in it. If you have tons of followers and retweets, to them it appears like you know what the public wants along with an understanding of the platform. It’s also a great way to stay up on what is circulating around the web, what the trending, hashtags and breaking news that is posted even first on Twitter rather than television.
Twitter hosts a #PitchWars for novelists where they are able to pitch their completed manuscripts. It is where published/agented authors, editors, or industry interns choose one writer each to mentor. #PitMad is a pitch party on Twitter where writers tweet a 280-character pitch for their completed, polished, unpublished manuscripts. Agents and editors make requests by liking/favoriting the tweeted pitch. These have garnered authors various book deals and is a great way to see what is curreny being pitched. Various agents also post what categories in fiction, non fiction and young adult that they are in search of with the hashtag #mswl.
Find Your Niché
Ignore your idols, the writers whom you aspired to be and simply chose to write what you want to write. The simple truth is that if you’re always trying to be someone else then you are never going to put out fresh content. The world has seen it and they’ve moved on, what they want is new and eye opening subject matter. When you find your area that you feel most comfortable writing in, then the writing comes much more naturally. Those stints of writers blocks where you cant seem to write down a damn word, move on to another more interesting topic and come back to other one later. When you write what you want to write you produce more and are able to frame a personal and fresh spin on what you’re putting out there.
Writers Market 2019 is your best guide to finding out how to, query and where to get published, whether it is a novel or freelance.
NOW GO WRITE, WRITE, AND WRITE SOME MORE!
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