Need to find £1,000 quickly!

globbits

skintchick wrote:

You're talking, sort of, about working as a freelance writer.

I am a commissioning editor and won't read articles written and sent en spec. My freelancers all pitch ideas to me, and I would only commisison an unknown writer if I'd seen their cuts.

You seem to work for a different market to me, and perhaps I did get the wrong end of the stick, but my comments about selling a real life story still stand, as do my comments in this post about commissioning in the real life market.

Most people won't be able to write to a sufficient standard to be commissioned, although I accept that trade mags and that sort of thing have much lower standards than the market I work for.

So their option will be to sell their own story, which is what I was referring to.

For my market, a great real life story will always involve other people. Medical stories are health, not real life. The sort of thing I work with is My Dad Made Me Pregnant, and delightful stuff like that.

Think very tabloid!!

If members of MSE send snippets in, hoping to get £60 a time, then they too will be 'freelancing'. It's true that they won't get paid for these until the snippets are published, but there is a huge market for material from 'ordinary people' out there; the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook lists virtually every single magazine, newspaper and other media source (including radio and TV) in the world.

Yes, it's a very competitive market, but my advice was solely (and sincerely) aimed at simply 'another way to possibly make money' - as this thread was all about the subject. I am in touch with editors and agents, and am featured in a book you'll find in the library, all about how to get published, as well as writing a play which was performed in 1984 - and quite honestly, the old saying 'Everyone has a story within them' is perfectly true. I belong to a Writers' Circle, where 'ordinary' housewives can write fiction and send it in for the price of a stamp - and get accepted, paid and published - if they are very good, and very lucky. People who don't buy stamps won't know if they are good enough or not. I say try it; it's fun.

Now, I didn't say just anything is acceptable. Clearly, magazines are looking for specifics; no good writing a car-maintenance article for Woman's Own, for instance. Which is where A C Black's excellent Yearbook comes in. Within that book, there are 1000's of markets for those '£60 for a tip' type snippets, which you stated in your post, and which I hinted at in the word 'anecdote' in my original post.

It's a humungous market, and there IS money to be made. It's also fun.

I write fiction, but the articles you suggest are also well within the grasp of ordinary folk. My daughter just sold an article to House Call magazine and they interviewed her on the phone for 10 minutes, and will call to see her at her convenience. Basically, she is going to get loadsa dosh for the price of a stamp. People either go for it (with a little hassle) or they don't; simple as that. My daughter is 24, works as a cashier and sleeps when not working.

And I do take exception that medical stories are 'health, not real life'. My own experiences were not only real life, but life and death. But that wasn't the point; the point was that I put a stamp on an envelope and went for it!

As for trade magazines having 'lower standards', I might put that to Essentials, for whom I have written!

halloweenqueen_2

I went away to a relatives for a few days and we went to a local auction, they sold loads of old tat for quite good money, if you don't fancy a boot fair maybe its a thought.

Emmzi

Great time to be offering to do tidy ups on people's gardens!

Loopy_Laura_2

I am a Party Organiser for a company selling 'ladies speciality items'! I love it, make quite a lot of comission from it and it's really flexible, no start up costs and you can start pretty much right away. Have posted on here before about it, you can make on average about £40-60 per night...but as I say you work as much as you want. Please feel free to e-mail me if you want further details

laura_monty20@hotmail.com

P.S You need to be female (Genuine Occuspational Qualification!) and over 18.

xx

skintchick

Bambywamby wrote:

Most people won't be able to write to a sufficient standard to be commissioned, although I accept that trade mags and that sort of thing have much lower standards than the market I work for....The sort of thing I work with is My Dad Made Me Pregnant, and delightful stuff like that.

Hmmmmmm.

I know :rolleyes: I meant the standard of writing rather than the lovely topics!! Although that was an extreme example!

skintchick

globbits wrote:

As for trade magazines having 'lower standards', I might put that to Essentials, for whom I have written!

To clarify and sorry for thread hijacking, Essentials is a consumer magazine in a similar but slightly different market to me (Although I too have written for them in the past), and not a trade magazine.

And now I'm stopping. I only meant to prevent people from flooding mags with articles that aren;t wanted, and wasting thier time. Clearly you have a fine career writing fiction going on, which is cool, but as I have been in magazines for ooh seven years, and worked in newspapers before that for years, i just wanted to temper your enthusiastic advice with a bit of the view from the other side of the fence (ie from a commissioner).

I menat no offence, was ill when I typed it which might have meant I didn;t think so carefully about how I was coming across, so I'm sorry to any and all I offended, and especially to you Globbits.

Hopefully, the older DFWs know me well enough to know I don;t mean to be horrible, only helpful, but sometimes it all comes out wrong :rolleyes:

globbits

skintchick wrote:

To clarify and sorry for thread hijacking, Essentials is a consumer magazine in a similar but slightly different market to me (Although I too have written for them in the past), and not a trade magazine.

And now I'm stopping. I only meant to prevent people from flooding mags with articles that aren;t wanted, and wasting thier time. Clearly you have a fine career writing fiction going on, which is cool, but as I have been in magazines for ooh seven years, and worked in newspapers before that for years, i just wanted to temper your enthusiastic advice with a bit of the view from the other side of the fence (ie from a commissioner).

I menat no offence, was ill when I typed it which might have meant I didn;t think so carefully about how I was coming across, so I'm sorry to any and all I offended, and especially to you Globbits.

Hopefully, the older DFWs know me well enough to know I don;t mean to be horrible, only helpful, but sometimes it all comes out wrong :rolleyes:

The point is that people WILL flood magazines with unwanted material, and it is up to magazine staff to reject (or accept) the material. Even Agatha Christie suffered rejection slips! Magazines positively encourage people to send stuff in, and I don't think I've worked with one British magazine that hasn't said as much within its pages; also, books like the best-selling (and essential part of any library) Writer's & Artists' Yearbook, absolutely bulge with information that enables the writer, playwright, poet and snippet creator, to market their material and possibly (I didn't say definitely) make a bit of money. Whether you succeed or not, it's still great fun. I've sent a synopsis to the BBC, a play I wrote, and I assure you it was read, digested, and returned to me (they didn't want it, unfortunately) and I know for certain that many fiction editors (for example) read everything that is sent to them by 'unknowns' and will suggest ways to improve or edit the work, if it shows potential.

Same with photographs. If you are 'on the spot' when something special or odd happens, or you see someone famous and take a picture, there is also a market for items like this. It costs zilch to take a camera with you everywhere you go, and I've sold photos to local newspapers that were taken completely off the cuff. Magazines and newspapers cannot exist without interaction from the people who buy them, and not every article is commissioned specially.

SallyJayne_2

That all sounds very exciting. Do you write under a pseudonym globbits? I wonder if I've read any of your articles.

globbits

SallyJayne wrote:

That all sounds very exciting. Do you write under a pseudonym globbits? I wonder if I've read any of your articles.

Yes and yes. Welcome to MSE and thank you for registering today. :beer:

carrottopsuk

I just wondered how you got on Miffi. Hope you succeeded in paying your friend back