It’s A Women’s World

Finding a job can be rather irksome and difficult at times. I certainly won’t argue that it isn’t. I can still recall when I moved to Salem, Oregon back in 2001. I moved there with my wife and daughter. My wife found a great job and I was trying to finish college since I was already half way done. I definitely needed a job as well. I had total intentions of acquiring a bartending position at one of the local hot spots. This is what I had just been doing back home, prior to the move. Man was I ever in for a surprise. I ventured out to search all the bars and clubs for openings. None had anything to offer. Furthermore, many claimed that they would only hire inside. So if you weren’t already employed there, you probably wouldn’t get a bartending gig. This was not encouraging to say the least. Eventually I found a job, but it sure took a great deal of searching. Fortunately this is no longer an issue with all the great online job service websites. Today you can simply get on the web and start surfing. I wish I had been hip to this back then.

If you’re searching for online job service websites, then you won’t have to look far. Trust me when I say that there are many of these search engines to pick and choose from. Hey, try them all out if you please. Some may have more to offer than others. Pop open Google.com and punch in your specified job, education or location and the terms “job search.” You will soon be browsing through oodles of positions available. Test the waters with engines such as Monster.com and CareerBuilder.com. These are wonderful sites to begin your searching on. It’s a synch to narrow your job search by field of expertise and location. Find the job you truly want in the area you desire to live. Online job service websites make it that easy.

My wife and I both took full advantage of cyberspace job service engines to find careers. I actually helped my wife find her current engineering position. I showed her a website called dice.com, which offers countless available engineering positions of all sorts. After a couple hours of browsing and thinking, she started sending out resumes. This is all done electronically of course. With contemporary online job service search engines it can be simplified for you as well.

Working at home as a writer is one of the largest work at home categories. Being a freelance writer has traditionally been a work at home job. Now that working at home is becoming more popular, there have been more writers in the industry. If you like to write and have a good grasp of the English language, you will never be at a loss for the work at home writing jobs.

Starting your career as a work at home writer is as easy as doing some Internet research and applying for a job. There are many ways to break into the writing field, even if you have no previous experience. Online opportunities abound and there are still many writers who stay exclusively in the print market.

While many writers dream of one day writing the great American novel, most writers are realistic in knowing that they are going to have to do some other types of writing to get paid on a consistent basis. Writing for pay is mostly, if not exclusively, done in the non-fiction genre. While occasionally you will find contests for fiction writing or for poetry, these opportunities are few and far between when compared to the non-fiction opportunities.

Writing from home as a Wahm requires that you have a reliable Internet connection, good written communication skills and the ability to be a self-starter. As a writer, you will be in charge of your time and your projects. There will always be deadlines to meet and new writing opportunities to try. You will be responsible for balancing your writing with the rest of your life. You must also have the ability to research a wide variety of topics. As you accept assignments, you’ll be challenged to learn about and write about topics that you may have little experience in.

Freelance writing from home can break down into three specific areas: writing for print, writing for the web and blogging. Although blogging is technically writing for the web, there are many distinctions that make it different from other web writing opportunities.

Writing for print is what people generally think of when they hear the term “freelance writer.” Wahm writers who write for the print markets need to first build a reputation as reliable and eloquent writer. If you’ve never written for the print markets before, start with smaller, local publications and then work from there. You’ll need to find a list of publications that are accepting “queries.” Queries are a combination of a letter of introduction and a pitch for a story idea. Most writers rely on the Writer’s Market reference guide for lists of publications. The Writer’s Market has comprehensive information on a variety of newsletters, magazines and other publications that are taking queries. Start with topics that you know the most about and try writing a few queries to get yourself going in the print market.

The only drawback to writing for print is that the period between when you write and when you get paid can be months long. For many Wahms, this is just not feasible. Writing for the web, however, can meet their income needs and still allow them to write from home. There are many categories of writing for the web. You can be a ghostwriter for e-books or other Internet media. Many people need copywriters to provide content for their sales letters and websites. You can also offer your services to webmasters who need fresh content for their blog or newsletter. The opportunities are endless.

Blogging is yet another way to make money as a writing Wahm. Blogs are an ever growing form of Internet media. Blog writers generally provide their own content. You can make money as a Wahm by starting your own blog and posting to it daily. If you love to write, you can start several blogs at once and multiply your earnings. Once you become an experienced blogger, you can apply for blogging jobs and post for other people.