We are looking for a writer who can make total of two posts per day (20 days a month) about luxury real estate, cars, boats, clothes and other high-end luxury products and properties.

The posts can be between 150 to 300 words each and must include one photo.

This is a long term blogger work so please be dedicated to commit to at least for a year.

The pay is fixed @ $250 per month. Payment via paypal at month end.

No blogger could live in luxury making $6 per post.

I did something scary today. Something that may ultimately lead to rejection – likely in the form of silence. As some of you may know, my home blog is a staunchly conservative political site. I go on television to opine about the evils of such and such a policy. I am not warm and fuzzy in my views.

Today I applied for a job with a Kennedy. Yes, those Kennedys.

Am I selling out? No. The Kennedy in question isn’t political. He doesn’t show up on the floor of the House to spew policy ideas to the powers that be. He has other projects, and doesn’t resign himself to just being part of the clan. Sure, he’s probably a Democrat, but Democrats are people, too! I likely wouldn’t ever get into a car near a lake with him, for good reason. Then again, he probably wouldn’t be asking me what I think about immigration amnesty, either.

This is a straightforward writing gig, for which I feel I am uniquely qualified. And if the employer were Joe Shmo, I wouldn’t have the slightest hesitation in applying. However, since it’s one of them, I freaked out. I spent hours deliberating over whether or not I should even try. I convinced myself it was a lost cause. Then it took me two hours to write the damn cover email! All because of a stupid surname.

I’ve worked with famous and iconic people before. I regularly get emails or texts from people that many are envious of my knowing. That’s not the part that scared me. I was scared by ideological differences that don’t even have anything to do with the job at hand!

So I sucked it up and hit send. Even if I don’t get the gig, at least I can look at myself in the mirror without shame for being a coward.

Geek Girl on the Street (http://geekgirlonthestreet.com) is a new web publication focusing on geeky adventure and storytelling. Launched in January 2010, we are thriving and growing, attracting +1,000 weekly visitors (we anticipate hitting our goal of 50,000 monthly visitors by December 2010). We are in search of writers who are interested in submitting geeky rants/opinions, vlog posts, interviews, product/event reviews, fan-fiction, original artwork and photography for publication. We also secure interviews/press passes to some of the country’s geekiest events for our writers – including SD Comic Con, C2E2, MacWorld, GDC, BlogHer, Maker Faire, APE and others… GGotS is a great indie publication to showcase your writing on!

Sounds pretty hip, and like it would have an easy, laid-back tone. Just my kind of thing.

But… Then it came to the compensation.

Here’s the OMG: We PAY FOR SUBMISSIONS.

(Granted it’s not a ton o’ $$ – but, in this economy something is better than nothing!)

Um, actually, no. What this ad says to me is that GGotS is going to vastly underpay any writer that is hired, and make that writer feel lucky for getting anything at all.

Now, in their defense, they haven’t actually mentioned a price, so it might be in line with other blogging gigs ($25-50 per post, depending on how much research and social media pimping is required). But it sounds more like the kind of place you should be grateful you’re hired at. Almost like an internship with a prestigious magazine.

If you are new to the blogging-as-business scene, perhaps this gig might suit you, if only to pad your collection of clips. But for me, and for other professional bloggers, it looks like too much effort for too little pay.

Their articles are upbeat, informative, hip and young in style. Very heavy into the how-to genre. For example, one of the articles available is How to Have an Affair. Think you can hack writing that kind of article?

Break Studios sign up can be found here.

Break Studios is for legal United States residents or citizens only, so don’t bother applying if you don’t legally reside or pay taxes within the US.

Articles for Break run between 200-800 words, and pay is low/medium. More than some of the penny-per-word content mills out there, but nothing that will allow retire writing just one article per day. The average seems to be about $10. They pay monthly via PayPal.

If you are looking to improve your article writing, try The Bloggers Guide to Effective Writing. Includes templates to streamline article writing, and tips to find inspiration when you truly believe there’s none to be found.

Good luck with Break Studios. Drop me a line after doing some business with them and let me know about the experience!

Ali Hale has turned blogging for clients (businesses, individuals, corporations) into a career, and her Staff Blogging Course helped me get started to do the same. I love blogging, and I wanted to make money doing what I loved.

With The Bloggers Guide to Effective Writing, Ali continues the lessons learned in Staff Blogging Course and builds on them. It takes and average writer and turns him or her into a great writer. An effective writer.

An effective writer gets the message across simply and efficiently. An effective writer can write an excellent message to blog readers without spending forever hemming and hawing over every semicolon. An effective writer writes what readers want to read.

For $29, The Bloggers Guide to Effective Writing will give you:

An 82-page ebook with fifteen chapters, which include the following:

• Why Good Writing Matters
• Coming Up With Ideas
• Writing At Different Stages
• Writing a Series of Posts
• Using Images
• Polishing Your Posts

PLUS: Templates for fast, effective blogging, AND, $10 off the Staff Blogging Course – did I mention I made money with it? So that means the Staff Blogging Course will only cost you $9. That’s right – nine bucks for a course that I made over $1000 with last year.

If anyone needs me, I’ll be curled up reading The Bloggers Guide to Effective Writing this weekend.

Click here to view more details about The Bloggers Guide to Effective Writing by Ali Hale.

People who find careers that suit their passions are generally the happiest. Yet many people get stuck in the drone rut, working a boring job they feel nothing for, just to meet the monthly bills.

You can blog for money!

Ali Hale’s Staff Blogging Course shows tells you what kind of skills and time you need to make a career out of blogging for others, plus shows you where and how to find blogging jobs.

I used this course last year and scored several gigs out of it – short and long term. And since then I have gone back and referred to certain sections of the e-book to inspire and refresh me.

If you have a real passion for blogging, check out Ali Hale’s Staff Blogging Course to learn how to turn your passion into profit.

For some reason though, she wasn’t in my Google Reader. Odd, considering I have about 120 writing and marketing blogs in there.

Anyhow, I’ve finally added Aliventures to my daily reading list. I’m liking it – she’s smart, makes sure to take time for herself, works to live and not the other way around, and seems to be a benevolent soul.

She’s got this great post up about motivation when times are good. How we can keep expanding without cramming our plates full for the sake of it:

If you’ve got an okay-but-static business, how about:

• Writing a book or ebook
• Producing a new product, or improving an existing one
• Getting featured in the press – or appearing on television
• Tithing 10% of your work time: donate your skills to a charity for free (for me, this means maintaining some websites and doing some writing for church groups)

Grab a bit of paper and brainstorm some ideas for your business or project. How can you take it forwards?

Add Ali to your daily reader via her RSS feed.

I also strongly recommend that writers who love to blog download Ali’s Staff Blogging Course. Make a living doing what you’re already addicted to!

Sounded good to me!

Seriously? Giving accessory and blowjob advice? And getting paid three large evey month for it? Sweet!

No, I didn’t get it. There’s was tons of great competition for it.

Elle online apparently had another job opening recently. This more recent gig was for a homeless blogger to write about life on the street. It would be one post a day (approximately an hour of writing time) and for this she would be paid…

$150 a month

From Read, Write, Web:

For a huge media brand that traffics in the culture of the wealthy and beautiful to win “compassion points” so cheaply seems ethically questionable. Ad sales for any pages Karp’s writing appears on would likely be very profitable. She’s put in front of the New York media circus as a poor unfortunate, in exchange for a famous magazine buying her breakfast each morning. Depending on her local laws, that rate of pay may not even be legal. The AP reports that Karp is being paid $150 per month and Karp links to the story without refutation of that key detail.

Brianna Karp could make more money working for a content mill than she will working for Elle. Admittedly, it’s a great launch pad, but as someone who was also homeless when I began my freelance writing business, even I know she’s being ripped off.

When I first began last year, I was charging about $12 for a blog post. I now charge no less than $20. A content mill will pay about $6. Elle is paying about $7, but the work is limited to one a day.

I have sent Brianna a copy of Ali Hale’s Staff Blogging Course. It’s a valuable resource for how to look for blogging gigs, and what to charge for them. Ms. Karp is being underpaid, and she’s letting it happen. I hope she learns to charge what she’s worth.

Don’t act like you’re hiring a full-time employee. - I’m shocked by how many people request formal resumes and such from potential freelancers. What’s worse though is that today I saw a company asking for things like cumulative GPAs. Folks, these traditional requests are fine if you’re hiring an employee. They’re often completely overboard when hiring someone for short-term per-project gigs. Instead look at their portfolios. Their work will speak for itself. (And frankly, there’s no reason you need someone’s GPA to hire them as a part-time, freelance blogger. That’s just silly and makes a bad impression – this particular advertiser came across as absurdly demanding for example with their list of requirements.)

I’ve seen ads like this. They’re so frustrating, because obviously some automaton in HR drafted the ad according to company hiring policy for employees, and no one has a clue how to hire a contractor. Ads for freelance writing gigs that ask you for transcripts or a list of every job you’ve ever had since McDonald’s when you were 15 are completely out of line (the exception being anything that requires a government security clearance, of course). You want to hire me as a writer, but want to know about when I mowed lawns in college? How does that apply in any way, shape or form to me writing your marketing copy?

And you want free custom samples? Are you on crack? Tell ya what: I’ll do for you what my tailor does for me. If I want something bespoke, I place a deposit that covers the cost of materials. Then if I return and hate the piece my tailor made for me, I lose the deposit. No hard feelings – we’re both covered. I don’t have to buy the piece, and he’s not out of pocket (this happened once with a pair of leather pants when I was a dominatrix – we moved on and continued our professional relationship). Seriously, do you go to a restaurant, eat a meal, then tell the waiter it was “just a sample” and you shouldn’t have to pay for it since you didn’t like it all that much? If I were the waiter you tried that on, I’d punch you in the stomach repeatedly till you vomited, thereby breaking you of a very bad habit of ripping off restaurants.

I’m so glad Jennifer wrote that piece. I think it should be sent to every person who places an unrealistic and ludicrous ad on Craigslist, looking to exploit freelance writers.

I had applied for a website content gig, through Craigslist if I remember correctly. I heard back from the client later the same day, and she seemed really excited to get things going. We chatted back and forth before I sent her some samples to give her an idea of what I could do for her.

Her response to these samples? “They do nothing for me.”

Ouch. Nothing? Not even make you itchy or something?

At first I felt like I’d been slapped, but I figured I had a chance to save this business relationship if only I dug deeper to find out what the client was really looking for (her instructions had been somewhat vague at the outset). So I asked her some questions about exactly who she would be marketing to, and more importantly I asked how hard a sell she wanted. My samples had all be very soft sells – suggestions more than anything.

I never heard back from her again. I really did “nothing for her” I guess.

Instead of being upset, I found the whole thing rather funny. What a way to address someone in a business transaction – a dismissive comment with absolutely no critique as to why you didn’t like it. Clearly I wasn’t meant to work with her. She wasn’t – as Havi Brooks always talks about – one of my right people.

So I didn’t let the rejection get to me. I got right back on the horse (I love that analogy, because I once was actually thrown from a horse and got back on it. A proud moment indeed) and kept plugging away to find my right people.

The very next day after this absurd rejection, I got a call from a guy who not only liked my work, but liked my mouthiness. My style. He was one of my right people, and I had applied to him on the same day as I had applied to Little Miss Not That Into You. I’ve been working with him ever since, and we’re getting along swimmingly.

Look, I hate rejection as much as the next person. I’d make a shitty telemarketer, because I’d probably cry all day. But I believe in myself, my talent and my product. I know someone else out there will, too. It just might take a little hunting is all.

I strongly suggest that anyone who wants to break into freelance writing or blogging for a living tries Ali Hale’s Staff Blogging Course. Do a read-through of the 6 modules, then go back and put the lessons into practice. I did, and have since scored TWO THREE blogging jobs in the last three weeks. Cost of the course: $19. Income of jobs I’ve scored: $125/wk. $180/wk.