A Few Words from Byron
Happy New Year! I hope you rang in 2015 with the three F’s—great friends, family and food.
December seems like a blur… I spent most of the month planning for the upcoming year, including forecasting numbers and developing employee advancement. I oversaw about 100 other things you may be interested in, including the rollout of a new WriterAccess site design.
I also finalized an opportunity to host The Content Marketing Conference for writers, customers and fans in Las Vegas on May 12th to 14th. More on that to come.
Wishing you a happy and healthy 2015!
New Year New You
Since January is all about resolutions and self-betterment, we thought you may be interested in ways to improve your writing skills, content marketing skills and freelance career.
Below are some of our favorite sites for just those purposes:
Skills/E-Courses:
Daily Grammar Lessons
Harvard Extension School
Content Marketing:
The Content Marketing Institute
Publishing:
Agent Query
Freelance Communities/Resources:
The Writer
Writer Unboxed
The Renegade Writer
And Something to Get You Outside Your Comfort Zone:
The Moth
Team Update
Holiday Edition: Kristin traveled to Rochester, NY for Christmas and started Chinese Calligraphy. Charlotte’s holiday included 6 siblings, 5 panicked calls to UPS, 4 plane trips, 3 engagement parties, 2 surprise birthday parties and a pop tart in a pine tree. Lauren spent the holiday wedding planning with her fiancé in Ireland. When asked, Glen summed up his holiday in two words – “much merryfication.” And finally, Rob drew inspiration from Laura Hillenbrand’s “Seabiscuit”, spending much of December directing a team of forensic pathologists in determining the precise cause of death in trampled jockeys. As it turns out, most cases were attributed to blunt horse trauma.
Last Month’s Contest Winner
Last month we asked you to come up with a contest your fellow writers might find fun and jump at the chance to try. You gave us enough contest inspiration to last well into 2015!
The randomly selected contest winner is: Douglas A from Northvale, NJ!
Congratulations, Doug! Let us know how you’d like your winnings—in the form of $100 cash or a $125 Starbucks Gift Card!
New Contest
Direct from Doug A:
Here’s a contest for people who plan a very long life. Take a current news topic—anything—and rewrite it for a hundred years from now. Remember it has to sound relevant in a world 100 years in the future.
We all want to live long and prosper (thank you, Mr. Spock). Here’s a chance to make it, and prosper as a news writer a hundred years from now. My favorite example of time warp news is an article concerning urban pollution and congestion. The congestion was horse drawn carriages and the pollution was from the fuel source. Today it is cars, but Scientific American stated at the time that the horseless carriage was free of waste and nearly silent in operation.
As always, the winner of this contest will be awarded $100 cash or a $125 Starbucks gift card.
Blog Posts of the Month
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Using Pinterest as a Search Engine With all of the discussion of Google’s ups and downs, it is easy to forget that Google isn’t the only search engine available for use. In fact, one of the more recent developments online… by Paula A |
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Inflection Deflection As a freelance writer, I have private clients with whom I have frequent in-person interaction. After years of face-to-face contact, we know and understand each other’s intentions instinctively. At the same time, I have clients through Internet platforms. They are anonymous, faceless, formless, ageless, without gender, and without nationality. The platform assigns them a code, which many times resembles a… by Wendy H |
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Yes, I Do Work, And No, I’m Sorry, But I Can’t Help You During My Workday As a professional writer, you have likely encountered various issues regarding your family and friends accepting your work as a true job. I personally have experienced it countless times. For example, my husband’s grandmother, whom I dearly love, doesn’t drive, and therefore needs to be driven… by Brandie P |
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Feedback Please
Now that the holidays are over we hope your resolutions are in full swing. Let us know if we can help with any. And as always, we’d love to get your feedback on the new site design.
Hope your 2015 is off to a great start. Looking forward to exciting things to come!
Cheers,
