The Importance of Connections for Growing Your Writing Business

Guest post by Joan Mullally

There are many reasons why it is important to make the most of your connections and network when you decide to start your own writing business and to grow it to meet your business goals.

Your Social Networks

As most people in the modern business world have realized, it is not always a case of what you know, but who you know. Cultivating relationships with people who can advance your writing business is one of the best ways to ensure that it becomes a profitable enterprise.

Content is King

When you’re starting your writing business, you’ll be offering your writing skills as a service to busy entrepreneurs. If you’ve ever heard the phrase “Content is King,” you understand how important it is for websites, blogs, online corporate hubs, and more to have fresh content which is well-written and meets the needs of the intended audience.

Connecting with Clients

The first step in growing your writing business is to get clients. Using all the connections you have to spread the word about your new business is a good first step. Use LinkedIn, Facebook and any other network you are active on. Try to brand yourself as an expert in X topic, so that anyone looking for quality content about that topic will naturally think of you.

Offline connections

Don’t just connect online. There are huge opportunities offline for those willing to get out there to sell themselves. Local businesses are always looking for ways to get an attractive and up to date website without having to do all the work themselves from scratch.

After all, writing is a skill that not everyone possesses. Print up some business cards about your services and take them with you the next time you go shopping. Tell the business owners you know about your new business briefly and give them a card. Even if they don’t need your services themselves, they might tell others who do.

Your local Chamber of Commerce is also an excellent place to make connections. They are always organizing events and also looking for people who can give presentations about interesting and important topics of benefit to business owners. A talk about the importance of good business writing, with examples, can prove to most business owners that they could be doing a lot better. They are a potential client list you can make the most of immediately because your great presentation will be proof of just how good a writer you are.

Affiliates and Joint Venture Partners

Once you’ve started your writing business, it will be time to get affiliates and then joint venture partners. Affiliates will earn commission from the sales of your products and services. Joint Venture partners will usually do a revenue split. But don’t overlook the other opportunities that these connections offer besides sales. Many affiliates and JVPs are extremely knowledgeable about their niche. Pick their brains, and give them credit in your writing as appropriate.

Interviews with Experts

Interviews with top professionals is another great way to make the most of your connections, and one of the easiest ways to create great content. Start with your affiliates and JVPs, and ask them if they know others who are also interested in the same topics. Leverage their knowledge so your writing will have more of a ring of truth to it. Plus, you won’t have to do as much research as you otherwise would for topics your clients have given you that you might not necessarily know all about.

Writing Partnerships

Your affiliates and JVPs might also be willing to write part of the content for you, becoming a project partner you can split the proceeds with. They might be willing to be a guest blogger or contributor to your book. This is ideal if you are a slow writer, or don’t have the expertise needed to do full justice to the task. It can help you turn around your projects more quickly, for even more profits.

Leveraging Your Work for More Profits

Finally, using your connections to gather together experts can be a goldmine. One-on-one interviews, panels, discussions, forums and summits are all ways to make the most of your connections, and theirs if you ask them to invite contributors also. Record everything and transform them into transcripts, blog posts, articles and more.

Once you start to think about all the ways you can make the most of the connections you have, and widen your circle, you should have no trouble finding the kinds of clients you need to help grow your writing business.

 

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