Ever noticed that the writers who tell other writers never to give away their work for free are usually established, successful writers who earn lots from their craft?
I get it. At that level, you’re already well known unlike the rest of us who are still struggling to get our work in front of the right people. I would never suggest that writers continuously give away their sweat. If someone keeps asking you to write for free beyond a sample article or two, that’s clearly exploitative behaviour.
With millions of writers and billions of blogs, it’s hard to break through the clutter even when your articles are smoking. A well placed article on a high traffic website, newspaper or magazine could just be the ticket to helping more people find you.
And it happens in other industries too. I interviewed Jua Cali for the November issue of Sage magazine and he told me he pounded the pavements for 2 years, giving his CD to DJs in radio stations just to get airplay. That was followed by a few gigs for which he wasn’t paid. But it was important to put his music out there and build his brand.
Even established companies have promotions where they have free giveaways to help promote awareness of their brands. Why should it be any different for writers? Some of the most successful have promotions where they bundle a best seller with a new release or vice versa in a buy-1-get-1-free deal for readers.
I read somewhere that you can have the best product or service, but if people don’t know about it; it may as well not exist. There’s a reason we call them best-selling books. It’s not about how well they’re written but whether they are selling. There are millions of shoddy titles out there earning a pretty penny, while well written books gather dust on bookshelves.
Marketing your work is a key part of the job and putting your stories in front of the target audience, especially in the early years when you don’t have a large platform, is part of the process.