There are only five things (other than my laptop) that I use every single day in my writing business. Only five items! Find out what they are: five essential tools for writers.

Just a quick share. Over the last week or so I've been addicted to Rachel Kaufman's Media Jobs Daily and wanted to suggest that freelancers and aspiring freelancers take a look at her feeds.

While I am grateful that she linked to my income disclosure, it's more than that. Kaufman shares freelance industry news that is infomative and interesting. She keeps readers updated on job markets, and her blogs about authors and writers really help to feed the writing spirit.

MediaJobsDaily is hosted at MediaBistro.com, which is a great source for classes and job listings.

When I wrote my article about the Top 15 Gifts for Writers and Readers, I didn't realize that suggesting an action figure of the writer's favorite author would indirectly feed into some odd behaviors. It seems that Scott William Carter, an author with an interesting blog and several books, actually speaks to his Poe figure. And then blogs those conversations. Funny! Although, since I regularly talk to my dog, Jack, throughout the lonely writing day, I guess I don't have a leg to stand on!

What do you do to combat the long writing hours? Anyone like to write at Starbucks?

I recently read about project creep- and then it happened to me!

Project creep- or "scope creep" - is when a project grows from its original parameters into something more. For example, you agree to write two articles, but are asked later to also market those articles through social media outlets- with no mention of adjusting fees.

Scope Creep is defined here at About.com Consulting.  About.com's management page has an interesting example of scope creep here, and desktop publishing talks about preventing scope creep.  So, knowing what it is-- have you ever experienced it?

I'm going to be more proactive this year! I'm going to keep my writing business producing throughout November, December and January! I'm taking these 7 Steps to Prep for the Holidays for Writers.

Hi freelancers. I know a lot of you are doing National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) right now, so I just wanted to encourage you and wish you luck. This is probably a good time to remind you that About.com has a channel on Fiction Writing, and I've noticed that Ginny has a lot of great quality articles on NaNoWriMo. She's an excellent resource! 

Last week I had an editor on the verge of accepting a pitch, but she asked for a PDF of a previously published article. The article I wanted to sent her was perfect- except that it was a bad copy. I had scanned it, but I didn't want to cut it out of the magazine, as it was the only copy I had. So, it scanned badly, as the thickness of the magazine let the light in. I couldn't send that messy PDF to an editor!

Generally, this isn't a problem because most magazines seem to provide 2 courtesy copies.  I can cut up one and file away the other. But when a magazine sends only one copy, I'm kind of at a loss. I have a physcial portfolio, a website with links, and a folder of PDFs on my hard drive. Here's how I use them:

• Physical portfolio: shown to local clients
• Website: hopefully browsed by potential clients, it has links to stories that make it online, but no PDFs, as I assume that would be a copyright violation against the magazine. I can't just scan my articles out of a magazine and put them online. I do ask some editors/publishers for permission, but not the bigger magazines.
• PDFs on my hard drive. These are emailed to editors. Now, I don't display these, because, as I said above, they are scans of the actual physical magazine, but I'm not even sure that scanning and emailing them is really a good practice, due to copyright issues.

A little help here? Perhaps someone who has been in magazines a lot longer than I have can clue us into some tips in portfolio management?

That's what Brigitte Thompson must have done when she wrote "Bookkeeping Basics for Freelance Writers." I think you need this book. No, I know you need this book! If you are a freelance writer who earns any dollar amount, this book will help you manage it, track it, and keep it. Check it out!

Couple notes to follow up on my Demand Studios post. First, someone on Twitter (follow me there, I'm @AllenaT) noted that Demand Studios didn't say "health insurance" per se, but, moreso, "health care."  Ok, so let's wait and see what pans out.

On to more timely things. Apparently there was a shakedown in the freelance writing blogosphere, in which one writer called out another writer, and everyone eventually had it out about Demand Studios at at third blog. Since I posted about Demand Studios' "health care" yesterday, I've received questions asking if I recommend them. 

Do I?

Hmm, do I?

You can start with content production. Heck, you can do whatever you want. I always, always say that I personally would not spend too much time there, maybe get your feet wet. I'd like to see an upward arc in your clips (if I was hiring you). I also beg writers to watch their hourly pay. If you take on a $5 article, please, please don't spend an hour on it.

Does it impact your clips? Do editors look at you and laugh? I have been known to say that I, personally, wouldn't hire writers with pay-per-clicks as their clips. But, again, that's because I'd like to see that upwards arc. Start at the bottom, and go up. Don't expect to be writing for Glamour tomorrow, but don't settle in for 5 years of Demand Studios, either. Figure out where you want to go. Your mantra might be "I need to pay my mortgage." Or, it might be "I need to make $xx an hour," or, "I need to see my own ideas in print magazines." Then, figure out how to get there.

Then...

Go.

I just wanted to quickly recommend a book for those of you out there who are caught in the "I want to write a book before I die" category. It's by Thomas Williams, and it's called How To Write Your Book (Guaranteed!!). Although I enjoyed it, I can't fully review it, as it's outside the scope of this website. However, since I know that a lot of you freelance writers out there have a book in your head, I thought a quick blog mention would be ok with folks.