Earn Extra Money From Home

Earn Extra Money as a Web Copywriter

You are more than likely aware that selling online is a multi billion dollar industry, which is steadily growing each year. The selling of goods and services online has become so common place, that you can usually find a website for any brick and mortar business. As a matter of fact, these retail sales pages make up a good portion of online content. Businesses both big and small are coming online to widen their reach, and to increase their profits, by building web sites with plenty of pages for potential customers and search engines to find. Each word on every one of these pages had to be written by someone, and you can bet that they were paid to do the writing.

Many business owners who want to establish a web site to represent their business come online every day. These savvy individuals have realized that when they establish themselves online, they have a non stop online salesman working hard for them twenty four hours per day. This has created the perfect opportunity for talented writers to make a nice income from the comfort of their own home. It has also resulted in the demand for talented web copywriters to be at an all time high.

Although getting started as a web copywriter is much easier if you have had a formal education in writing, it is not necessarily required. There are many books about writing sales copy which can get you off to a very good start. Two of the best places to go to find books on copy writing is Amazon.com and eBay. Both have books on writing good copy regularly, and both also offer new and used books. Your local library is also a terrific source for information on writing. There are of course, several web sites which feature online forums you can join to get tips and critiques of your work.

Getting your foot in the door is the key to making a living at web copywriting. This is best achieved by building up a client list and establishing your online writing portfolio. You will need to show potential clients that you can write copy which sells, so you should definitely set up a web site to promote your writing services and showcase your talent. As you get clients, be sure to ask them for an honest review of the work you have done for them. Ask those who send you positive feedback if it would be permissible for you to use their comments as testimonials on your site. Client testimonials have been shown to add credibility and ease the concerns of the wary buyer. Use them to your advantage, but keep it honest and use only real testimonials from real clients for whom you have personally written.

Visit online forums which are focused on the writer. In these forums you will find writers in different stages of their writing careers. Some will be new, while others will have some experience, and there will also be professional writers with years of work experience under their belt. These forums are a goldmine of information and assistance. When you join a forum, be sure to be a contributor, and not just someone who always takes. Sure, you may not know a lot of the answers to questions asked, but you can let others know what you think of their writing when a critique request is posted. You can also use the forum search feature to search the forum for the answers to some questions, as there are plenty of questions which are frequently asked. As a matter of fact, you should use the forum search to see if your questions have been previously posted. This will definitely earn you some respect with the regulars.

Copy writers consider themselves to be full time students to the trade. This means that they are always looking at the ads and sales materials put out by others. You should learn to become a student to copy writing also, by reading as much promotional material as possible in your spare time. Look at what the writers are using, and what you may see they have in common. Learn to spot a good headline, and start a swipe file. A swipe file contains all of the great headlines and promotional copy you have seen used elsewhere. You can learn a lot by studying a good swipe file. Your swipe file is not to be used for plagiarism under any circumstance, but for inspiration and education.

While starting a copy writing career may not be a huge success overnight, you will find that as you continue to study the craft, your skills will sharpen and you will be able to get more writing jobs. When you first begin, concentrate on building your skills while building a client base by making use of the many online forums and freelance sites. On these sites you will find marketers who are just starting out themselves, who cannot afford to hire a professional sales copy writer, so they will gladly pay you to write good sales copy for them. Once you have your first client, do the absolute best you can for them. Then repeat the process. This will be the first stepping stone laid in your road to a rewarding career as a web sales copy writer.

Resources
As stated above a copywriting career could be more a marathon than a sprint. However, consider practicing writing your own copy for affiliate products or your own products you wish to promote. However, here is an interesting resource – how to get your first copywriting client in 14 days or less. That covers if you already have copywriting skills – if you don’t (or want to hone them) go here