My Journey To Earning Money As A Freelance Writer

I'd like to share a little information about myself and why I am embarking on a career as a freelance writer.

My name is Preston, and I live in a small rural low income community in the Northeast corner of Texas. Until a few months ago, I drove a truck across country and made pretty decent money doing so. But, because of some new laws governing the health and safety of truck drivers, I can no longer pass the required DOT physical to be a long haul truck driver.

Now, don't feel sorry for me because I was getting really tired and stressed out over being away from home so much.So, it didn't really bother me too much.

Although my kids are grown, I didn't like being away from my wife and my grand-daughter that I truly adore. And I hated to be away from her for weeks at a time. It really hurt when I would be on the phone with my wife or daughter, and I would here my grand-daughter asking for "pa pa". I found out later that when she would talk to me on the phone, she would go out on our front porch and yell "pa pa" really loud, thinking that would somehow get me home sooner. I cried when my wife told me about it, and I wanted off the road right then and there. The problem was that we didn't have everything paid for just yet, and my wife's income was not going to cover all the debts and bills. I felt trapped. But, as fate would have it, my company doctor would not pass me when it came time for my DOT physical because of my weight issue and the blood pressure medication I have to take. My personal doctor tried changing the meds, but that cause me to almost have a heart attack. So, that's the end of the truck driving chapter of my life.

After I had resigned myself to staying put and trying to find a job, I spent my first day at home alone. I got on my laptop and started searching for something I could do for a living. There were not many jobs available, and I was not qualified for the jobs that were. So, I made my first mistake and started looking at online jobs. "Oh boy" I thought, "The possibilities are endless. Why didn't I do this sooner?" There were tons of online jobs available. All I had to do was pay my "fee", or purchase a "training package" and I would be making a full time income from home in my spare time. ..... yeah .... right! I fell for one scam after another until my wife said "No more!"

Okay, it seemed like that chapter of my life was shorted lived, until I ran into one of my old classmates at a homecoming football game. We started talking about the old days and I asked him what he was doing now. He said he started writing articles and reviews for online businesses and websites and was making pretty good money. I almost stopped listening until he said it was a lot of work and took a long time until he had reached a livable income. Now that I knew he wasn't leading me into a get-rich-quick scheme, I started listening a little better. We decided to meet the next day for coffee and he would tell me more about it.

We met at the local coffee shop and he laid it all out for me. He said to start with freelance blogging on blog websites. "Blogging?" Is that even legal? Is that some kind of affliction or disease? What in the world is "blogging"? So, he explained it to me. Okay, I got it now.

He told me to not purchase any "training material" about blogging. He said everything I needed to know was available online for free. Well, he was right. I wish I had talked to him before I spent most of my savings on all those get-rich-quick programs and super affiliate eBooks.

My friend showed me some of his earnings from publishing companies, website review companies, and article writing companies. After reading some of his work, I said "I took photojournalism in high school and one year of college, I can do this." Again, he urged me to write some freelance blogs first. He walked me through his list of free blog sites that would put ads on my posts and split the money earned from these ads with me. He told me how I would need to learn how to get traffic to my blogs in order to make money with them. Now I'm scared again: This sounds like the trouble I had with that affiliate marketing course that I bought. They made it sound so simple. Purchase a domain and web hosting (through their affiliate link, of course), build a slick website, join the affiliate networks, put my affiliate links and banners on my site, and the money would just start pouring into my account. They forgot to tell me about the hard part: Traffic! Now, here we go again with the "gotta get traffic" stuff.

After my little meltdown, he said "Preston, it takes time, but you can do it." He also told me that blog sites already had some traffic built in and that most of them were already search engine optimized. All I needed to do was concentrate on writing good quality and unique articles. He said he would check my work and give me tips on how to improve my writing skills. "Don't try to be an English Lit professor", he said. "Just let it come naturally and have fun with it. Write a few blogs about your experiences and we will go from there."

We talked about realistic goals. He said, at first, I should not expect to earn more than a few dollars a week, or even a month. Really? That much, huh? (I can be sarcastic sometimes). We discussed how to start low and build on it day by day, week by week. And he said when my writing skills were up to par with what article and review writing companies were seeking, I could apply to them and had a much better chance of being accepted. He told me that he earns the bulk of his income doing that, but he also still has his blogs that are earning enough that he gets several checks each month.

So, for the past month, I have been writing blogs on several different free sites like HubPages. (I have another HubPage account that I use to submit stories and recipes). I started this account because I wanted separate identities for separate subjects. I'm devoting this account to my experiences learning how to earn an online income. I have a lot of advice about what NOT to do online, and am now learning what TO do online to earn money.

Now that I have a starting point, I have something to build on. I'm more motivated than ever to continue writing articles. I really enjoy this blogging thing and can sit for hours writing about different topics.

As I continue writing, I am also reading and learning about backlinking, bookmarking, social networks, and everything else to do with SEO. Who knows, maybe some day my blogging income will go over what I was making as a truck driver.

I will keep you up to date on my progress as I write and learn more and more.

Thanks for reading my Hub and have a wonderful day.

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