If I’m gonna tell you it’s ok NOT to have a writing niche, I’d better back it up with advice about how to get clients without one, right? Well… here ya go!
Contacts and Social Media
Instead of cold pitching directly, you can look for clients through your contacts and on social media. Position yourself as a versatile copywriter, and then build and leverage a personal connection to land the gigs.
LinkedIn and Facebook
LinkedIn and Facebook are the two social media platforms that I recommend for this. In order to find good work, you must be active, helpful, and visible. Connect with other writers who may be offloading work. Connect with related service providers such as website builders, brand consultants, or social media managers. These people may need writers.
Make connections in the areas where your potential clients are. If you want to write for bloggers, join blogging groups or connect with bloggers. Passionate about writing for fitness people or about pet care? Find groups catering to those.
How to Advertise for Work
If you’re visible on these platforms, you can post that you’re available for work. You can also mention it in your profile (for more details, see my post How to Ask for Work without Being a Weirdo). Some friends on Facebook may not have known that you write blog posts, and now can send some work your way!
Share about writing, and share your writing. Have your clips available on your profile. This demonstrates your knowledge and skill. Share and celebrate the writing of your connections to build goodwill.
Social media is not a silver bullet; don’t spend all your time there. But it is useful to build connections and a presence.
Pitch Companies Directly
Another strategy when you don’t have a niche is to pitch companies directly. You offer them specific services, such as blog posts, case studies, or white papers, etc. I personally got a lot of interest that way when I was starting out.
To help your focus, you can concentrate pitching on a type of business, or only your local area. You can even go through the Yellow Pages–if a business paid for a paper ad, they’ve got to have a marketing budget! You can position yourself as a versatile, local copywriter who would love to help with their promotion.
More Experiences Writing=More Data
The more writing work you do, for whatever niche or business, the better of a feel you get for what you do and don’t like. What kind of clients do you enjoy working with? What kind of writing assignments leave rocks in your socks?
As you work out your strengths and interests, you can either step into a niche that you enjoy or start leveraging the clips you do have into higher-paid pitching.
Questions?
If you have questions about any of this, come join my free Facebook Group, The Ink Well Guild. Even if you don’t have questions, we are a great group of writers to hang out with online. We give each other support and celebrate our successes.
Clips Camp
If you need help getting great writing samples for your portfolio, I have a course called Clips Camp.
It’s a three-week course for new and advanced new freelance writers who want to get started with high-paid client work. If you’re on Upwork or Fiverr and miserable, if you haven’t even done anything to get started and you don’t know what the first step is, then Clips Camp is for you.
I teach you how to put together a solid portfolio of writing samples that position you as the kind of awesome writer that awesome clients want to hire. If you want in on that or you just want more information, go to clipscamp.com, and I will see you on the inside!
