Books, articles, essays, plays or poems have one thing in common: they are written by authors. How differently authors work is already shown by the variety of their works. Freelance authors have turned their talent into a profession and earn money by writing.
The term author means according to its Latin word origin first of all only authorship. In this meaning, an author writes works of all kinds. In everyday use, however, the term now refers primarily to those individuals and professions who devote themselves to writing. This includes professions such as writers, journalists, or ghostwriters. Freelance authors are then those who pursue their activity on a freelance basis. That means, they take over the preparation of texts on their own initiative. In contrast to employed authors, freelance authors do not have only one employer or are bound to only one publisher. Accordingly, the field of application of freelance writers is also broad.
What does a freelance author do?
Freelance authors earn their living or at least a part of it by writing texts. Some freelance writers also use copywriting as a second career. They write texts for a wide variety of clients and are active in various professional sectors. Especially in the media sector, many publishing houses, magazines and newspapers use the services of freelance writers. In connection with the writing of newspaper and magazine articles, the term freelance journalist is more precise.
But companies, businesses and institutions also commission freelance writers with PR or business texts. In addition to business texts, freelance writers also support publishers or private individuals in writing books and write scientific texts for academics and institutions.
Becoming a freelance author
Freelance authors have the advantage of being able to decide on their own assignments. In addition, they can freely arrange their time and are not bound to fixed presence times in the office. At the same time, this freedom is also a disadvantage, because freelance writers can only earn money if they also have customers.
A basic requirement to work as a writer is a perfect command of the language and the ability to research topics carefully. For certain texts, specialist knowledge is also necessary. Since freelance writers often create commissioned texts for the online sector, it is advisable to inform oneself about search engine optimization and the latest developments.
The classic training as a freelance writer does not exist. Many authors practice this profession as career changers and acquire the respective knowledge through self-study. Depending on the industries in which someone wants to write commissioned texts, practical experience or a degree are advantageous. Because when companies have texts written for them, knowledge of the industry is helpful in order to use the appropriate style of language and the appropriate technical terms. Freelance writers in the field of journalism benefit from traineeships and internships. There are also journalism schools and the course of study journalism and journalism.
Freelance author, ghostwriter and copywriter
Freelance writers find their clients in many different ways. A convenient option are text agencies or ghostwriting agencies. At such agencies and text exchanges, authors can mainly find jobs for online texts such as blog articles or website texts. However, these agencies often charge a high commission for the placement of orders. Other freelance writers use advertisements or their own websites to draw attention to their services. The terms freelance writer, ghostwriter and copywriter are often used interchangeably, although there are minor differences. A freelance author writes all kinds of texts. Copywriters, on the other hand, specialize primarily in business and advertising texts. Ghostwriters, on the other hand, are in many cases freelance authors whose texts are not published under their name and take a back seat as the actual author.
Assign freelance authors
For companies, media, businesses and institutions, freelance writers offer the advantage of being able to adapt their assignments to demand and thus act flexibly. At the same time, they save time and resources. Sometimes it is also the case that no qualified employees are available for the texts and freelance writers have more competence and know-how.
A good cooperation with freelance writers is guaranteed if they know all the important details. The more detailed a client informs the author, the more likely he or she is to be satisfied with the work. At the same time, possible improvements and corrections should be discussed in advance.