Not Doing This Zero-Effort Writing Trick Is Costing You Money

Photo by Kelly Dawson

Years ago, when I was starting out as a writer, I was preoccupied with one thing and one thing only: scale. I was single-handedly focused on writing as many stories as possible as fast as I could, simply because I thought that was the track toward a stable career. As long as I had coffee and a few hours of quiet on my side, I could pump out at least two stories a day. I did exactly that for quite some time — even on weekends.

There’s a lot of advice out there about how to make it as a writer, and I want to dispel a lot of the ones I see:

• You don’t have to wake up early to be a successful writer. Write whenever you are most awake, and remember there’s no shame in your night-owl game.
• You don’t have to have a built-in audience to grow your brand. As long as you write consistently and cleanly, your career will grow.
• And finally, particularly for the purposes of this essay, you don’t have to write as much content as possible. The opposite is often true: Quality beats out quantity.

Yes, it is important to map out a ladder of your own making in any career, and doing so as a self-employed writer is as necessary as a blank page. You should be figuring out how to ascend the ranks and grow your network in order to contribute to recognizable…