Level Up - Be a Freelance Blogger

Another 52 Free Resources for Freelance Bloggers

You want some free stuff? Not just any free stuff, but genuinely useful things you’ll be glad you found?

Here are 52 things just like that.

See, I poke around the internet a lot. Every now and then I find something so good, I bookmark it and keep going back to use it again. The coolest thing, though, is that so much of what I find is free! You can take it, use it, don’t have to pay a cent.

With 52 free resources on this list, you can try a new one every week for the next year. Or, if you’re impatient like me, you can go nuts and grab ’em all today. Up to you. Take a look and help yourself to whatever you want.

This list contains only resources I’ve used and liked, and only resources that are free to use. If they cost anything, it’ll be your email address or maybe a tweet. [Read more…]

By Robin Geuens 22 Comments

52 Free Tools and Resources to Superfuel Your Freelance Blogging

You know most people think we’re idiots, right?

I mean, why would we go through all the trouble of starting our own business when we could just get a job?

We could do as we’re told, quit working at 5pm, and watch TV for the rest of the night. Why make it hard for ourselves?

To be honest, they’re right.

It is a stupid thing to do.

Starting your own business requires a ton of hard work. It takes time and dedication to learn all the skills you need to get off the ground.

You have to know how to write. You have to know how to market. You have to know how to sell.

And we don’t have the luxury to stop thinking about our work when the clock hits 5pm. Once you choose this lifestyle, it creeps into your mind and you find yourself thinking about it all the time.

But once it starts working, man does it feel good. Seeing that hard-earned cash roll in makes it all worth it.

But again, it takes time. Lots of time.

To help you speed up the process, I’ve put together a list of tools and resources for you to use to supercharge your freelance blogging. It ranges from tools to get ideas quicker to resources that will give you a kick in the butt.

All of them are free or have a free plan. Don’t worry if it seems overwhelming, I’ll give you a PDF with all the links so you can keep it close. [Read more…]

By Sophie Lizard 141 Comments

49 Totally Free Resources for Freelance Bloggers

Free stuff is the best. Right?

Of course, you’d love to buy lots of exciting books and training courses and whatnot, but you haven’t got a ton of cash to spare.

That’s why you’re here, learning to make money from your blogging services. And while you learn, freebies are awesome!

But… sometimes freebies aren’t awesome. Sometimes free stuff is just junk that sucks your time, clutters up your memory, and ends up in the recycle bin.

This list is not about that kind of free stuff.

This list is solid. I checked out every single thing myself, and if it sucked, it got cut.

So here are the survivors, the worthy, the genuinely useful… 49 totally free resources for freelance blogging success.

If they cost anything, it’s your email address or maybe a tweet – no money involved. You’re welcome. 😉 [Read more…]

By Carol Tice 4 Comments

SEO for Bloggers: 5 Keys to Catchy Headlines

Are you sad that no one seems to read your blog posts?

It could be because of the lack of catchy headlines – more specifically, headlines that are both creatively written and contain a useful keyword phrase to help the search engines find you readers.

In short, you need to rank well in search engines for the phrases your audience uses to find your type of content.

You’d think that at this point, everyone understands Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and the need to have a strong keyword phrase in the headline of their blog post. But that’s not my experience.

I’ve reviewed hundreds of blog-post headlines in the decade I’ve run my Freelance Writers Den community. And time after time, I see headlines with no keyword phrase at all. Generic headlines that have zero chance of helping you gain readers from online search. Such as:

Watch Out for the Red Flags
Head High or Body High (for a legal cannabis blog)
How a Marathon Can Heal your Soul

What’s wrong with these headlines?

In that first one, we can’t even tell who the post is for, or what we’ll learn if we click and read it.

In all three cases, there is no strong keyword phrase that would help search engines deliver you some readers. At this point in the busy blogosphere, if you don’t take the time to weave a keyphrase into your headline, your post is basically doomed.

So how do you figure out what keyword phrase to use for your blog headline? And more importantly, how do you artfully weave it into your headline so it doesn’t seem spammy?

Let’s walk through five key steps to creating a winning, SEO-focused, catchy headline for your next blog post: [Read more…]

By Sophie Lizard 30 Comments

Business Skills for Freelance Bloggers (How to Survive and Grow Your Income)

When you decided to become a freelance blogger, did you immediately write up a 5-year business development plan? Calculate a full financial forecast?

If you did, you have everyone’s permission to skip this blog post and order more champagne while you wait for the rest of us to catch up.

But most freelance bloggers start with a talent for writing and then pick up a bit of business sense along the way. If that sounds more like you, don’t worry — you can still grow your blogging into a lucrative business. We just need to fill some of the gaps in your understanding of how your business works.

Here’s the important part, though: you need to fill the knowledge gaps in your business now, because every month they go unfilled is another month you go without the money you deserve. [Read more…]