How much can you earn from your writing

Many people ask me how much do I earn from my writing? I tell them freelance income fluctuates month to month. However, I am never worried about earning a certain minimum level even under worst circumstances, because the demand for online writer continues to and will continue to grow. Yet, if you do not earn enough or earn little, you are solely responsible for it. Chances are you are not making sincere efforts to find clients, or write, or both. The chances are you are a beginning writer struggling to find your way through. The following guidelines will help you build your writing career.

How to begin earning from writing online
There is no straight answer to the question how much can you earn from writing. It depends on a number of factors: (i) your writing experience (ii) time you give to writing (iii) the rate (per page/per hour) you receive for writing (iv) your writing speed (v) the quality of your writing (vi) meeting the guidelines sent by clients (vii) continuing to learn while growing within the profession (viii) building a strong niche or a set of niches you want to write in (ix) building your trust as a writer, and (x) developing strong relationships with your clients so you continue to get repeat orders.

If you are looking to start earning online from your writing, the best place to go is elance which is the marketplace for freelance writers and employers looking for one another. The signup process is easy and you can begin bidding on available jobs within moments of signing. However, if you are new to writing process, it is advisable to build a portfolio. Almost every client wants to see your sample or past work before they decide to hire you. Don't have a portfolio? No problem.

How to build a portfolio
There are several webcompanies who are open to your writing. Some of the well known among them are Associated Content (Now a division of Yahoo), Yahoo Voices, Hubpages, Triond, and several others. You may go to one or more of these sites and begin publishing your work so that you can showcase your writing samples to the employers. Additionally, you get paid residual earning for your writing on these sites. But for some initial years, your writing at these sites may not be enough to meet even the expenses for your evening snack. So, that's probably the reason you may want go for upfront payments for your writing job.

How much do the clients pay you
During your initial career as a freelancer with nothing much to showcase, you may not expect to earn well. There are more clients looking for $1to$5 per page writers. Yet, sites like elance, Guru, freelancer, and others are flooded with bidders for these jobs. After some experience, reputation and excellent portfolio to showcase you may find clients paying at least $10 per page which in my opinion is the minimum, a freelance writer deserves. Typically, a page contains about 300 words. There are many clients offering that much although in overall terms of percentage, they form a small minority.

Take your first step
While many persons have told me they are interested in writing and would like to make writing a secondary source of their income, but not many among them actually begin writing. You have to take the first step. Go, write anything that comes to your mind. Practice writing. Get familiar with your key board and begin to press letters. Sooner or later that will become your habit, a habit that you cannot live without. Once you begin writing on your desktop and publish your first work, you will feel like having won the Olympic race. It is the first step that is difficult, the rest is easy.