Anyone can do it. Learn a popular or in-demand skill. This would create some earning options for you. As a writer, have you ever fantasized about making money while sleeping? Passive income is the ideal solution to your desire. Passive income is lovely, but it is not for YouTubers or Instagram influencers. With the appropriate method, authors may generate passive income.
In this article, we’ll look at ten unexpected methods authors might generate passive money. From digital products to affiliate marketing. We’ll discuss a variety of alternatives for monetizing your writing skills. This is without spending all of your time on computers.
Let’s get into it.
1. E-books
Creating and selling e-books is one of the most popular ways for writers to earn passive income. Once you write and publish an e-book, you can earn money from it for years to come. There are several platforms like Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing, Barnes & Noble Press, and Kobo Writing Life. They allow you to publish your e-books.
2. Courses
If you have expertise in a particular subject or skill, you can create and sell an online course. Platforms like Udemy/ Skillshare allow you to upload & sell your courses. To a global audience. Once your course is live, you can continue to earn money from it without further effort.
3. Freelancing
It is an excellent way to earn passive income. You can write articles, blog posts, and other content for clients per project. Once you establish a solid client base, you can continue to earn money from your work. Even without seeking new clients.
4. Consulting
If you have a deep understanding of a particular industry or topic, you can consult individuals and businesses. You can charge hourly or per-project rates for your services.
5. Ghostwriting
This involves writing content for clients in their names. This is a great way to earn passive income as a writer. As you can continue to earn money from your work without credit or recognition. Platforms like Upwork and Fiverr are valuable places to find ghostwriting gigs.
6. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing involves promoting products or services to your audience. You earn a commission for each sale made through your unique affiliate link. We can promote products or services related to your niche and earn passive income from our audience’s purchases.
7. Newsletter Sponsorship
If you have a large email list or newsletter, you can sell sponsorship slots to brands or businesses. To make it more appealing, you could offer to create a customized segment or story around the product, which could increase engagement and result in a higher fee
8. Creating a Blog
Creating a blog and monetizing it through ads, sponsored content, and affiliate marketing is an effective way to earn passive income as a writer.
To make your blog stand out from the millions of others online, try creating a niche blog that focuses on a specific topic or audience. This will attract a more targeted audience, which could lead to higher engagement and conversions for your monetization efforts.
9. Self-Published Audiobooks
If you have written a book, you can create an audiobook version and sell it on platforms like Audible and iTunes. This allows you to earn passive income from your book without further effort. One creative approach is to produce niche audiobooks that cater to a specific audience, such as self-help, personal development, or meditation.
10. Creating a Digital Product
Creating a digital product like a template, workbook, or printable is a way for a writer. It is an excellent way to generate passive income. You can sell digital products on platforms like Etsy, Gumroad, and Creative Market.
Without a doubt, there are numerous possibilities. With the appropriate plan and dedication, you can create a passive income stream that will sustain you for years.
It all relies on your abilities, interests, and ambitions. Spend some time researching each of these tactics to see which one best suits your strengths and hobbies. With enough effort and patience, you may establish a thriving passive income stream that will support your writing career for years to come.
As a writer, passive income can provide financial stability while also allowing you to focus on your creative work. Whether you write an ebook or build an online course, there is always a passive income plan that can work for you.
However, it’s important to note that passive income isn’t truly passive. You’ll need to put in some initial effort to create the product or service, and you’ll need to keep it going over time.
However, with the appropriate method, you may earn money while sleeping and create a consistent revenue stream. So, start researching these surprising sources of passive income and pick the ideal approach for you.
How do Freelance Writers Make Money?
If you want to work as a freelance writer, you must be good with words and grammar. But there are other factors to consider, such as how to obtain employment and how freelancers are compensated.
Freelance writing is the practice of writing for money while working independently and not for a company or organization. Freelance writers produce whatever written text their clients require, whether from home or in a rented office location.
Writers can work for a variety of clients or for a single large client who provides a consistent stream of work. You can be a generalist, covering themes ranging from vehicles to architectural design. Alternatively, you can specialize in one field, such as culinary arts. Specialists may find more assignments than generalists because they build a body of knowledge that allows them to work faster, and they get a track record that editors come to know.
Freelance writers are not only writers; they are also marketing themselves and their skills to potential clients. Freelance writers are often business owners because they must form a business, whether it’s a solo enterprise or an LLC, to separate their personal finances from their business finances.
The successful freelance writer is often a combination of a creative wordsmith and a shrewd businessperson. Writing well is just the start. You must sell yourself effectively and manage your finances. Freelance writers create whatever their clients require, whether it’s magazine articles, website copy, press releases, blog entries, newsletters, internal business communications, or brochures. That’s the creative side.
However, freelance writers frequently treat their profession as if it were a company, spending part of their time looking for new clients and the other keeping track of their records.
Read Also: Generating Passive Income Through Affiliate Marketing: Job or Hobby?
If you’ve worked in the writing sector full-time, you might be able to find freelance writing jobs through connections you acquired at past positions. Starting from scratch takes more effort. You might want to create your own blog or writing project so that you have writing samples to show potential clients until you land your first paid employment. You can search writing sites such as Media Bistro or Journalism Jobs for gigs, and network as much as possible to find out about opportunities.
How Do Freelancers Get Paid?
Every client has its own process and payment type. For one article, a client may pay by the word or by the piece. If it’s a project, they may pay an hourly rate or a flat rate for the whole project. At other times, you may be put on a retainer to provide a certain amount of work every month as needed by the client.
Sometimes a client will want the writer to send an invoice when the work is done, or they’ll pay half up front and the remainder when the work is handed in. Sometimes, clients simply want a PayPal message reminding them that payment is due, and then they’ll disperse a check. Other clients have intricate computer systems that tell them when it’s time to pay a writer, and no action is needed on the part of the freelancer.
Many individuals and smaller businesses like the convenience of PayPal. However, large organizations stick to the more traditional system of sending checks or direct deposit by the due date noted on submitted invoices. Whatever kind of payment schedule is used, the writer has to be really good at budgeting and money management because the onus is on them to get paid in a timely fashion.
One reason this career exists is that people, or companies, often need only one project done at a time, such as one booklet written to launch a new product. Perhaps a business needs a copy produced for its new website. Hence, there’s no reason to hire an employee.
Instead, it’s simpler to enter into an agreement or contract with an individual writer. Even if the business ends up having several projects in a year, it’s still less expensive to farm out the work than hiring an employee who requires benefits such as health care.
The life of a freelance writer is not only an independent one with a great deal of flexibility. If you become skilled in the business side (and work hard enough) it can become a financially successful life.
How to be a Truly Great Freelance Writer
Once you have your basic building blocks in place, it’s time to take your writing from good to great. Here’s how:
1. Research everything thoroughly
Just like with any other skill, it takes time to really get familiar with the ins and outs of freelance writing. Researching around the subject can help – read all you can about how to write great articles, copy and blog posts, what kind of jobs can you get as a freelancer, how to set your rates, and how to optimize your writing for search engines. You’ll also find a huge volume of helpful and enjoyable information out there about how to become a writer and excel in the career, from those who have already made the leap.
2. Get familiar with the skills and tools that are required
As you develop your client offering, ask what other services they may value. You’ll probably find you can also sell editing services, image sourcing or editing, and maybe search engine optimization (SEO) or social media promotion. By educating yourself on these topics you could increase your income and serve your clients even better.
Great tools and resources for writers:
- Editing products like Grammarly, and Hemingway
- Copyright free image sourcing from places like Unsplash and Pixabay
- Image editing tools like Pixlr X
- Learn SEO with Moz
- Make quality infographics, photos, and posts with Canva
3. Become a master of organization
As a freelance worker, you’re in charge of your own workload – which means you’re a project manager, writer, editor, marketing manager, accountant, and HR representative all in one.
Create your own systems to make sure you keep on top of the organization, using some of the following tools:
- Make communication easier with Slack, WhatsApp or any of the other simple online solutions available
- Try task management programs such as Asana or Trello
- Manage your money on the go with a Wise Business account
4. Always continue honing your writing craft
Even experienced freelance writers can get better. Continue to educate yourself and learn about the writing skills you need for the type of content you are working on. A key way to get continual professional development is to read other writers working in the same field. Follow industry magazines, sign up to blogs in the same niche as yours, and make use of social media to keep up to date by following fellow writers on Twitter, Medium, and any other outlet you love.
If English isn’t your first language you can still make a career out of writing for English language publications based in your home country or in English-speaking parts of the world. You’ll need to follow the same basic steps as a native speaker – and if you need some extra practice with your writing you can consider blogging or taking on lower-paid work to build your portfolio.
5. Create an outstanding portfolio
Coming up with your portfolio is one of the first things you’ll do as an aspiring freelance writer — but your portfolio isn’t a static document, so you’ll need to update it and your pitch materials as your career and experience grow.
Pitching for work is intimidating when you’re first getting used to it. It’s well worth investing time in creating high-quality targeted pitches for clients you’re interested in working work. Find prospective customers on freelance marketplace websites like UpWork, Problogger, Fiverr and Textbroker, or contact companies and sites you love directly.
Your pitch should be a short and pithy introduction that gets customers interested. For example:
“I’m a freelance writer and digital nomad, specializing in creating engaging copy about the products, services and tools that make life better as a traveler and remote worker. I’d love to discuss how I can help you grow your business with compelling blog posts and articles, ad by generating energy in your social media channels”
Use it as a chance to get the reader’s attention, before providing more background, examples of your work, and your rates.
Getting started is always the most difficult thing about any new endeavor. Freelance writing is a great creative outlet, which can be fun as well as providing an income. And best of all you’ll need little to no monetary investment to get going. Get yourself a free blog or website, spend a bit of time daydreaming about your favorite topics to write about, and start writing. It’s really that simple.
Choose Your Freelance Writing Specialty
Choosing both the style of writing you wish to accomplish and the relevant specialization is critical to your future as a freelance writer. By focusing on an area in which you have skill and excitement, you will discover that you can write well without having to spend hours researching – and your energy will shine through in your writing. Examine both the areas of writing and some of their respective specialties.
Business-to-business (B2B) writing
Though sales teams often get the glory for closing B2B deals, the content that makes their clients aware of the product is from marketing teams, who often employ freelance writers.
This area of writing isn’t going away. In fact, B2B businesses are still bringing their products and services online, so this is a place where your business skills (if you’ve got a background in it) can really shine. Another interesting aspect of B2B writing is that it takes a different tone than writing for individual consumers. As business deals take longer to close, you can expect this type of content to both inform users and offer comparisons among various products and services.
Copywriting gets into the nitty-gritty of making the sentences, paragraphs, and entire articles flow and produce a desired action from your readers. This area of freelance writing often occurs on landing pages, where a copywriter is used to get the perfect words and phrases on the site to close the deal. For this reason, copywriters can make the big bucks. Of course, big money also means big results, as copy also comes with thorough testing, you can expect plenty of scrutiny and measurement alongside your writing.
Business-to-consumer (B2C) writing
B2C writing is one of the most dynamic options in freelance writing, where you will write content from the top and bottom of the funnel. For example, you could be writing an article about how to get to Dulles Airport in Washington, D.C or an article detailing where to buy the latest product from a famous brand. Both articles serve an essential function but are focused on readers at different phases of the customer journey.
Unlike B2B writing, you will often use a more informal tone. As strategies differ in each business’s content plan, you will find that your writing in this area can be quite dynamic.
You could choose one of these popular niches, or pick a favorite hobby or interest of your own for your personal blog:
- Travel
- Fitness and diet
- Health and wellbeing
- Family, relationships, and parenting
- Yoga and meditation
- Cooking and nutrition
- Finance and budgeting
- Leadership and careers
- Crafting, knitting or other creative hobbies
Freelancers often take the technical writing path if they hold niche expertise in a specific field. Some examples of fields where technical writing is flourishing are medicine, engineering, law, IT, and other STEM fields. Technical writing also offers quality pay, as experts with quality writing skills are rare.
You can expect to find an array of options for technical writing, from blogs on niche issues to technical documents necessary for both internal and external use. In the end, a technical writer is typically responsible for making complex topics more digestible for their target audience.
