The life of a freelance writer is often one that is greatly misunderstood. Some freelancers find themselves with the luxury of being able to stick to a regular 9 to 5 work schedule, and this is great for those that do.
For others, though, whenever a spark of creativity hits us, it doesn’t matter what time of day or night it is. We get out the pencil and paper, or for most modern writers, the computer, and we start jotting down our thoughts. After all, creative ideas tend to be few and far between when writing becomes a lifestyle, so getting them inked on a piece of paper or typed on a computer screen is vital to remembering them later.
Where do these ideas come from, though? Do we as writers simply sit in a chair twiddling our thumbs waiting for an idea to pop into our heads? No. We don’t have time for that. We have too many projects and personal responsibilities that require our attention.
Just like anyone, though, we do need a break every once in awhile, and when it comes to taking a break from the typing madness, we love hitting up social media sites. Sometimes, whether we’re looking for it or not, we end up coming across a posting from someone else that fosters our creativity.
If surfing social media sites can help fuel creativity, then which ones are the best?
Google+
Most people on Google+ don’t post regular status updates like they do on Facebook. Instead, they post things that relate to their professions. By taking a quick look at other writers’ profiles, it’s very easy to find a source of inspiration. For example, by typing in the phrase freelance fashion writers in the search box on Google+, a user will be provided with pages, people and postings that directly relate to the phrase being searched. By simply glimpsing over these suggestions, a creative idea is sure to be born.
With more than a billion users, it’s no wonder that Facebook provides inspiration and creativity from so many angles. No matter a person’s reason for logging in to this social media platform, something interesting is always to be seen. And now, thanks to Facebook’s new sharing practices, users are seeing postings made by people who aren’t even on their friends lists. And just as Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, once said, he wants Facebook to be the “best personalized newspaper in the world.”
The posts that are shown in a user’s news feed are now more likely than ever to be extremely suited to the interests of that user. As writers, this means we are likely to see posts that will truly give us a great idea for the content that we write.
Whitney W creates content for both online and offline clients. She spends her days switching back and forth between the roles of a content writer, mother and wife. As she continues to progress in her career as a content creator, she has learned the ins-and-outs surfing social media sites to find the creative ideas that she is constantly searching for.
