The Easiest Way to Get Writing Clients By Linda Formichelli

Writers always ask, "What's the easiest way to find clients?"

Well, here's the thing: Do you want the easiest way to market—or do you want the way that will actually land you gigs? I've discovered there's an inverse relationship between how easy a marketing technique is and how effective it is.

Writers who research markets and send out query letters (to magazines) and letters of introduction (to businesses) earn way more than those who pick the low-hanging fruit from content mills, job boards, and bidding sites.

I learned this from hard experience:

• Years ago, I built my own prospect list using a business directory at the library, called to verify names, and snail mailed sales letters. My letter garnered an 11% response rate—and enough gigs to kick-start my career in copywriting. On the other hand, when I bought a mailing list from Hoover's a few years ago, all I got was a prospect complaining that his name was spelled wrong. And when I hired someone on Fiverr a couple months ago to compile a list for me, I got a 0% response rate.

• I get better results sending personalized connection invites to prospects on LinkedIn than relying on my profile to entice people to contact me.

• I once tried to attract copywriting clients via Google ads. The results? Not even a nibble.

In short: Shoe leather counts. There's a huge difference between reaching out to prospects for work (yay!)—and doing the virtual equivalent of lying there on the couch and hoping prospects will come to you (boo).

Of course, it's a great idea to have a compelling website that ranks high for your search terms, and a good LinkedIn profile. But those tactics equal you waiting around and making other people do the work instead of you going out there and drumming up gigs.

Don't be like most struggling writers who take the easy way and then whine that they're not making any money. Figure out who your prospects are and go after them with letters of introduction, query letters, sales letters, warm calls, cold calls, LinkedIn InMails, DMs on Twitter...whatever suits you best.

These are proven ways to get work. They're not as easy as downloading a premade list, building a profile on a content mill, or trolling job boards—but they're way more effective.

Linda Formichelli has been writing full-time since 1997. She's the co-founder of Renegade Writer Press, where she and Diana Burrell publish books for writers and other smart people. Their latest is From Pitch to Published: How to Sell Your Article Ideas to Magazines.