Becoming a writer (book author or newspaper columnist)

SapphireFlames

I'm being made redundant at the end of April and I haven't had any job offers yet, so I'm already thinking about what to do if my redundancy date arrives and I still haven't managed to find a permanent job.

Every few days I have different ideas about what to do, but my latest idea is becoming a writer. I work in IT and data analysis, so those would me my specialist subjects. I was thinking of starting off by writing a book to teach people basic programming skills.

I enjoy writing and I enjoy IT, so this would seem like a perfect job for me, especially as I would be able to work from home or wherever I liked. What are the things I would need to consider before starting? My main concern would be spending days/weeks writing a book and then not being able to find anyone willing to publish it. However, I'm aware there are websites which allow you to self-publish a book, such as Lulu and Blurb, but I think you would only be able to sell them online rather than through a bookshop.

Another idea I had was writing a weekly column for my local newspaper on the subject of end-user IT, covering a different aspect of IT each week - for example, software reviews, how to protect your PC against viruses and so on. My local daily newspaper doesn't currently have an IT column, so I think it would be good to start one.
How difficult would it be for me to get my own newspaper column and how would I go about it? Would I write a sample column and send it to the editor, along with a covering letter asking if I can have my own column each week? IT changes and develops very rapidly, so at least I'd never run out of topics to write about.

spg1

Another idea I had was writing a weekly column for my local newspaper on the subject of end-user IT, covering a different aspect of IT each week - for example, software reviews, how to protect your PC against viruses and so on. My local daily newspaper doesn't currently have an IT column, so I think it would be good to start one.
How difficult would it be for me to get my own newspaper column and how would I go about it? Would I write a sample column and send it to the editor, along with a covering letter asking if I can have my own column each week? IT changes and develops very rapidly, so at least I'd never run out of topics to write about.

Local newspapers are in a bad way at the moment and I would say there would be very, very little chance of getting them to pay for a column. In addition they are usually not short of offers from businesses offering to write such columns for free in return for publicity.
But I suppose if you decided to set yourself up as some sort of freelance IT consultant this could be a way of publicising your new venture or even promoting a book......

SapphireFlames

Thank you for your help. I guess there would be nothing to lose in trying though, especially as I haven't seen any IT columns in my local newspaper at all, even from businesses.

Is anyone able to help me with the other part of my query, with regard to publishing a book?

cally6008

give tracey an email - info@gamlingaywriters.org.uk (she's an author already and runs a writing group which several members are authors as well)

Kay_Peel

I think you need to be realistic about your chances of writing a book that someone will want to publish and that people will want to buy. Go into any library or any major bookshop like Waterstones and go to the section on IT - what do you see? You'll see hundreds and thousands of books on your subject, written by experienced writers and illustrated by top class artists and photographers. .

Then go to Ebay and see the number of ebooks that are available for 99 p with no-one buying them.

To succeed as a writer you must have a distinctive 'voice' and a novel way of presenting the material. You must see a gap in the market and know your target audience. It helps if you have some experience of writing - as a journalist, columnist, reviewer or whatever. it also helps if you've had some feedback from someone who has read your work and said 'You're good at this. I love the way you write - it really hooks me in and I enjoy your style.'.

Self-publishing is only profitable for the printer and not the author. You need a good editor to quality control your output and cut out all the bad writing that may be unintelligible to others. Self-publishers just print what they've written and it's usually bad - you could be the exception to the rule!

A self-publisher ends up with a thousand books in their back bedroom and they have to sell them in competion with places like Ebay and Amazon.

You can't decide to be a writer just because you like writing and you think it will be nice to work on a book from home. You've got to know that you have talent, originality and the ability to sell yourself to publishers. You have to be prepared to write a first draft, re-write it, write a second draft and re-write it and so on. It's no easy option.


Good luck.

el_gringo_3

Why don't you try writing content for internet sites, what with your background? Some pay, some don't, but once you have a bit of a rep you may start to get to do product reviews, go to industry events and make stronger contacts etc etc? Throw in a bit of work for SEO companies as well and you've got another angle.

Wakey2008

I wouldn't bank on writing providing you an income if you were made redundant.

I've been writing for about seven years and get around 60 articles published in newspapers and magazines a year but I still have to work as a mortgage adviser 25 hours per week to pay the bills.

As someone pointed out, newspapers are in a bad way and very few are looking to pay for freelance articles and the ones that do pay peanuts. Websites tend to pay even less, if at all.

This said it's an enjoyable experience and will allow you to meet interesting people. I would never discourage anyone from writing but I would advise you to be a realist and not to expect too much.

rao_2

With the ebook route I mentioned in another thread about Clickbank.com which is a purely digital vendor and you can make use of their affiliate network to get people pushing your book for you for a cut of the profits.

Or as el_gringo mentioned there's a few options for writing on the web. Though many of the typical sites you see for web-writing seem to pay little to nothing, that is mostly because they also accept any standard of writing because they still earn a few pennies for any viewers to the content. But the higher paying sites are the ones that have tighter quality control rules, pay upfront and actually reject you if you aren't up to a higher standard. Like Demand Studios, About.com and Suite 101 etc. where you have to actually go through a review process to become an author. Or slightly lower is Associated Content, Constant Content but still higher than most and will reject articles based on writing standards.

This forum I stumbled across seems like it might be useful for you as the members there seem in the same position of looking into all the different avenues for putting their writing out there. Including non-webby routes if you've got what it takes.
http://absolutewrite.com/forums/

And a nice Squidoo lens I came across:
http://www.squidoo.com/writingfulltime

Also this MSE threads I rememebr particpating in, probably lots out there before these though as I'm pretty new around here:

Blogging for a second income

Website Article Writing