There is no physical possible way for me to write every article that my clients bring to me. It certainly isn’t a bad problem to have — and it took plenty of marketing to get to this point — but I can’t bring myself to turn down work, even as I’m looking for ways to cut back on my work. But that doesn’t mean that the only option is to drive myself a little bit crazier because I want the money that goes along with these projects. It doesn’t hurt that my clients are a lot happier if I can take care of all the work they can give me.

Bringing in another writer is just about the only way I have found to take on these projects without losing sleep. But there are some ethical concerns that go along with bringing in help that I think are crucial to consider. After all, if someone screws up on a project that is just for you, that’s one thing. If it is a project for a client, however, your reputation is on the line — not the person actually responsible.

Is Your Client Cool With It?

My clients, when they first come to me, are looking to pay Thursday Bram to write something for them — not any other writer. Not everyone is willing to pay me to edit something someone else has written or to manage a project without actually banging out a few words myself. That’s fine with me. I charge rates that make me comfortable doing all the work myself.

It’s only when I’ve got an okay from the client that I’m willing to bring in someone else. My client has to be fully aware of not only the fact that I’m not the one writing the material, but to have approved who I’m working with. The situation has to be fully transparent.

Are You Cool With Freelancers’ Rates?

When I started out as a freelance writer, I picked up several assignments that other writers were outsourcing. The pay was on the level that my experience was getting me elsewhere, but I know there was a significant difference between what I was getting and what the original contractor was getting.

As a result, I tend to price the work I outsource a little lower than my standard rates. I’m still paying a fair rate to the other writers involved, but I don’t feel right about adding much more of a margin than the actual time I’m spending on a given project. If I’m only going to spend 15 minutes editing or tweaking a blog post, I’m not about to charge my hourly rate for the whole project.

At the same time, I’m very worried about putting other writers in a bad place, financially speaking. I’m often on the other end of the paycheck and I don’t want anyone to think that I haven’t treated them fairly. As a result, I’ve been thinking about what I can offer the writers I work with to make projects more worth their while — especially since I’m looking for opportunities to bring in more work for them. So far, that’s included little things, like offering free hosting for a couple of great writers’ websites (I host a couple of my clients’ websites already). But I’d love to put together something that reaches a little farther. If you’ve got any suggestions on the support you’d want in a freelance job, I’m happy to hear it.

Are You Able to Handle the Logistics?

Outsourcing a project doesn’t entirely get things off your plate. You’ve still got to make sure that the project is going well, that everybody gets what they need and so forth. So far, I’ve been using Google Wave to manage everything, along with OmniFocus (the task management tool I use for my own work). But I can tell that this won’t last — OmniFocus isn’t exactly robust and Google Wave is effectively being discontinued.

So I’m on a hunt for a new approach to managing things. I have a pretty specific idea of what the end result needs to look like, but I’m definitely struggling with the best way of making the transition. This is certainly not a problem that a freelancer working on her own runs into.

When your team consists of more than just you, it becomes very clear very quickly that you need a simple approach. You need everyone to be able to check just one place to stay on the same page — and to be able to make the connection between your approach and they way they manage their own tasks. It’s a problem we often see from the other end: we have standard invoicing procedures but different clients require us to invoice in different ways, resulting in freelancers getting frustrated. The same problem shows up in asking freelancers to handle work in different ways.

An Informal Poll

I’d like to know if you’ve ever outsourced part or all of a writing project to another freelancer. What worked? What didn’t?

And if you haven’t, why not?

Image by Flickr user Mike Baird

I have an admission to make: when I wrote The Freelance Writer’s Guide to Passive Income, I thought about making it longer. A lot longer, as a matter of fact, because I really wanted to provide a lot of information on affiliate marketing. It was a tough decision, but I eventually came to the conclusion that it wasn’t the best option. Not only would it have driven the price of the ebook up, but — according to a couple of people who helped me by reading through outlines and drafts — a lot of readers would have wound up with a bad case of information overload.

I didn’t leave out affiliate marketing, by any means, but I reduced the amount of information that I was planning to include. If you’re focused on affiliate marketing as the key strategy by which you plan to make money from your writing, though, you’re going to need something more.

Affiliate Marketing as an Income Source

As a writer, affiliate marketing can be a great way to earn money without having to hand over everything you write to someone else. You don’t have to worry about the hassle of finding advertisers, you can focus on topics that interest you and you can focus on products that you genuinely believe in. It can be as simple a matter as starting a blog and writing on a regular basis — provided that you have a good grounding in affiliate marketing. That can include:

• Where to find good affiliate programs
• How to promote affiliate products effectively and actually make sales
• How to bring traffic into your site

While I gave an overview of that material in my ebook — more than enough to get you started with affiliate marketing on the side if you’re freelancing as well — I didn’t go into the sort of depth you’ll need if you want to turn affiliate marketing into a full-time income.

If that is indeed the case, though, you’re not high and dry. There are a number of sites that you can collect that information from or — assuming you’d like to dive into the information and actually get down to business — Corbett Barr is relaunching Affiliate Marketing for Beginners today. I consider this course complementary to my ebook: where I offer a broad set of resources, Corbett gets down deep into affiliate marketing techniques that can actually benefit writers.

It’s incredibly realistic as a program in ways that many affiliate marketing training courses aren’t. Corbett gets into how the numbers break down and the sorts of income you can expect in given situations, rather than waving around big numbers like so many internet marketers are prone to. That’s on top of the five modules of the course, the opportunity to ask Corbett questions, example sites to study (which happen to actually make money) and, if you choose the deluxe version, a lot more.

Affiliate Marketing and Passive Income

Because I think that my ebook and Corbett’s course go so well together, I’m offering a special deal today only: If you purchase Affiliate Marketing for Beginners through the link below, I’ll give you a copy of The Freelance Writer’s Guide to Passive Income for free. If you’ve already got my ebook, I’ll give you a sneak peek (a free copy as soon as it’s ready) at the ebook I’m planning to offer next. All you have to do is forward your email receipt to thursday@thursdaybram.com.

And, for the record, the link is an affiliate link.

Buy Affiliate Marketing for Beginners

I flew out to San Diego last Friday to see my husband, who happens to be working out here this summer. I found out that BarCamp San Diego was Saturday and Sunday — I’m a fan of BarCamps and other small sort-of conferences because they’re almost always free and you get to hear from a lot of people who are truly passionate about the projects they’re working on. This weekend was no different… but I wound up giving a talk myself.

If you aren’t familiar with the BarCamp format, it’s pretty spur of the moment: all the attendees show up about an hour before talks are scheduled to start and hash out the day’s speakers. Before that point, no one really knows who will be speaking and what they’ll be talking about, and that can include the speakers. As people were hanging out and chatting, I wound up on one of my standard soap boxes — making money off of writing online. If you do that at a BarCamp, you quickly wind up on the schedule.

That meant, between the next few sessions, I had to distill my soap box down into about 30 minutes of coherent presentation. I’ve included my notes below, but I simply wound up focusing on giving a broad overview on how a blogger can make money, mentioned a few key bloggers who are good role models and then offered about ten minutes for questions about the specifics people were wondering about.

Five Things to Do Before Trying to Make Money as a Blogger

1. Use WordPress. Furthermore, get your own domain name and host it yourself. Sure, there are other blogging tools out there, but WordPress is the horse I’m betting on. It’s more robust, has a bigger community of developers and the user interface is very friendly for new bloggers.
2. Look for money-making opportunities, besides advertising. It’s hard to make a living off of AdSense and it’s getting harder. Most other approaches to advertising require you to have a lot more traffic than you will when you’re starting out.
3. Network with the other bloggers covering your topic. Having a network is crucial to making money, even if it’s only a matter of discussing a product idea with a friend who can say ‘I tried that and it didn’t work so well.’
4. Listen to your readers. Maybe your readership is ten of your closest friends and your mom. Assuming your mom is only there to be supportive, your friends can still give you a good idea of what you’re doing well and where you can improve. As you grow, keep listening: ask readers questions, especially about what they’d be willing to buy from you.
5. Write as much as you can. Even if you don’t consider yourself a fabulous writer, you have to write as much as possible. The practice will make you a better writer, which is an absolute necessity for a career as a blogger.

Five Strategies to Make Money Blogging

1. Set yourself up as an expert and sell consulting services or freelance services
2. Use your blog as a portfolio and land paid blogging gigs on other websites
3. Sell information products (like ebooks or webinars) related to your blog
4. Sell physical products related to your blog (like t-shirts, cookware or whatever your niche is)
5. Use affiliate links to promote other companies products

This is just a smattering of options, of course. There are plenty more. But these are the big ones — the ones that absolutely have to be covered when you’re limited to thirty minutes of chatting. I think it’s worth noting that that these five methods all fall into one of two categories of making money from blogging, as do all the alternatives: indirect and direct income. Direct income comes from advertising, selling a product and so on, while indirect income comes from establishing your expertise and using it to land bigger gigs (such as consulting or writing).

I think two bloggers really typify the difference: Darren Rowse and Chris Brogan. Chris has built a whole company around his expertise and the expertise of the people he works with, earning a nice chunk of change from consulting and speaking gigs. Darren has also built up a company, but he’s focused more on ebooks, membership sites and more directly selling to his readership. There is some overlap between what they do, of course. Both of these bloggers are immensely successful, though, and make for wonderful blogging role models.

I don’t write for content mills (or sites that I consider to be on par with content mills). That means sites that just crank out content on every imaginable subject, typically hoping to make some money by putting ads next to articles that have been optimized for certain keywords. I did write for such sites in the past, but at this stage in my career, content mills aren’t the right places for me to work.

But I don’t necessarily think that content mills are a bad thing. I also don’t think that they’re a new thing. While the SEO aspect is new, companies that hired writers cheaply to turn out mountains of content certainly aren’t. At the beginning of the 20th century, there were hundreds of magazines that looked for formulaic stories they could buy for next to nothing and then print on the cheapest paper available. Ever heard of a penny dreadful? There were plenty of concerns when such magazines were becoming popular that they drove down the wages writers could earn and many ‘professional’ writers decried both their content and appearance.

3 Things That Are Wrong with Content Mills

I’ll admit that there are some things about the average content mill that do bother me. I know that these don’t necessarily match up with other freelance writers out there and it’s definitely worth checking out some of the commentary that other bloggers have posted before you make up your own mind.

1. There’s very little mobility. If you write for a magazine or a blog, rather than a content mill, you tend to have some options to move forward. You can often get a higher pay rate after you’ve been working with a publication for a while or may be able to take on an expanded role like contributing editor. But few content mills offer a significant chance to move forward. In my opinion, this is a big problem — provided that you want to keep your freelance career moving forward.
2. The guidelines aren’t always clear. With many content mills, an assignment consists of keywords the writer is expected to use and not much more. That means that it’s not unheard of for a writer to have to do a couple of rounds of rewrites in order to meet unstated requirements. Not only is that an incredibly frustrating way to work, but it reduces the actual amount of work that a writer can do.
3. It’s an easy way out. There are plenty of people who pick up assignments through content mills who do it simply because it’s the easiest option. It’s also the easiest option to keep working on assignments from content mills. It’s not a question of ethics or anything like that, but merely a personal opinion that this sort of easy way out is not useful for freelance writers looking for a career — only for writers looking for a little money (and little is really the operative word).

3 Things That Might Just Be Right

For some freelance writers, though, content mills aren’t necessarily a bad thing. There are certain factors that make them appealing, at least in some situations.

1. There’s always work available. Especially when you’re first starting out as a freelance writer, having a steady source of work can make the difference between whether you’ll pay the bills in any given month. If something happens to a big client, it’s not usually out of the question to pick up enough work to get by if you’re willing to put in the hours on a content site.
2. Payment always comes through. It’s relatively rare that a content mill doesn’t pay its writers. These days, at least a few content mills are owned by major corporations like Yahoo and AOL, meaning that freelancers have at least a little less to worry about in terms of getting paid. Even those not owned by big corporations are typically paying thousands of writers every month, making it a better bet than some clients who work with only freelancer.
3. Writers can pick and choose. First of all, writers don’t have to work for content mills in the first place — but even if you do write for one, you have a huge level of choice about what you take on. You can take an article or two to fill in the gaps between work from your main clients, or you can take on every assignment a content site offers. You can write about a whole list of different topics. You can decide to stop working for a content mill at any time with no contractual obligations.

When I first received a review copy of The Wealthy Freelancer, by Ed Gandia, Pete Savage and Steve Slaunwhite, I have to admit that I could have been a little more excited. I’ve seen plenty of ‘get rich quick’ schemes targeted at freelance writers and the book’s cover made me wonder a little bit: it’s got an expensive car on the front, along with the subtitle, ’12 Secrets to a Great Income and an Enviable Lifestyle.’

I was wrong — very wrong — to think that The Wealthy Freelancer could have any relation to a ‘get rich quick’ scheme, though. There’s plenty of hard work ahead for any writer who reads the book and takes its advice to heart, but there’s also very savvy business strategies that really are effective for freelancers.

The Approach to Success

In The Wealthy Freelancer, Gandia, Savage and Slaunwhite focus on giving freelancers a way to build a path that lead directly to our goals. The problem that many freelancers (especially freelance writers) face is that it seems like once we get started freelancing, there doesn’t seem to be a clear path to move forward. We all know that we want higher paying clients and more business — but how do we get it?

The path outlined in this book is a more traditional business approach than many freelancers start out with. Considering how many of us start out freelancing on the side and have to pick up the business aspects along the way, having this sort of approach outlined is very good. Among other things, The Wealthy Freelancer will show you how to treat your freelance career as a business.

Sales for Freelancers

I don’t know how many times a freelancer has told me that he or she is a very creative person and just isn’t good with sales. The problem is that, if you want to be a successful freelancer, you have to be very good at sales — you have to be able to win over clients left and right. The Wealthy Freelancer lays out the details of making sales in a way that not all freelancers will be comfortable with right off the bat, but that can make a world of difference for your income if you can get comfortable with them.

Gandia, Savage and Slaunwhite describe who to locate high probability prospects, nurture prospective clients and build buzz about your work. They don’t just tell you how to do it, either. They provide sample emails and even conversations you can use to approach the sort of people you want to have as clients. This book will quickly become a key resource if you ever struggle with sales.

If the business side of freelance writing ever gives you problems, if you aren’t sure about how to keep your career moving forward or if you just want to see how these three freelancers upped their income, I recommend The Wealthy Freelancer (affiliate link).

When you walk into a car dealership to buy a new car, you’re thinking in terms of a set price. But the salesman is thinking in terms of what he can add on to that base rate: heated seats, an extended warranty and all those other add-ons that you’re offered before you actually get around to buying the car. There’s a reason they think that way: it can make a single sale more lucrative.

Thinking in terms of add-ons can also work for freelance writers. For most of us, projects are a matter of quoting a base rate and then finishing it. I’m not suggesting some sort of back-and-forth with your clients, but offering a few additional options on top of a basic estimate can make both your bank account and your client happier.

• A ghost blogger can offer to find and resize photos for posts.
• An article writer can offer to put together a sidebar.
• A copy writer can offer to format text for the web with HTML.

To make this approach particularly useful, sit down with the lists of the services you already offer as a matter of course. Think about all the extra touches that would make it easier for your clients to make use of your work. If you need to diagram it out, do so: for each service, you can probably think of at least two or three additional steps. It’s best to set prices for these services on the stop, pegging them to your existing rates.

From there, you can make a habit of mentioning such options as you send out estimates. If you use templates to handle some of the routine parts of communicating with a client, work up a couple of paragraphs to add to your estimate templates.

This sort of thing doesn’t need to be a hard sell. Instead, it’s a matter of suggesting solutions to problems a client may not have even thought of yet. While not following the example of that car salesman willing to play hard ball may not bring in quite as much money, you may be pleasantly surprised by clients making use of the add-ons you offer.

Writing is a creative process. Every client gets a different end result and pays you accordingly for your time. At least, that’s what we like to think. But the truth of the matter is that some certain types of writing can look very similar from client to client. You could even create a template for such pieces and at least start with filling in the blanks.

A good example is a press release. When a client comes to me, asking me to write a press release, I’ve got a form that I ask him to fill out. A lot of it is basic organizational information and standard details I need to know in order to create the press release. But each line on that form corresponds to a line in my press release template. When I get the information back from my client, I just plug it in to the template.

Of course, that doesn’t make for a great press release and I would never send a client a fill-in-the-blank press release. But it gives me a starting point that lets me get my work done a lot faster than starting from scratch each time. It’s like a very detailed outline — you know that you’re going to have to move stuff around, but you know everything you want to get across and you have a general line of thought you want to follow.

There are plenty of opportunities to use this sort of template as a starting point:

• Resumes
• Marketing letters
• Some blog posts (like big lists)

I can even think of a way to turn a template into a marketing tool: release it to your customers, free of charge and then let them see why just filling in the blanks doesn’t result in a solid piece of writing. They’ll see that they need you to take their project to the next level. Of course, you’d need to refine the strategy a bit for specific customer bases, bust as templated marketing method, it’s not too bad.

Are there any other ways that you may use templates to speed up your writing? Or have you used templates in other ways to build your business?

I’m not the biggest fan of kill fees, mostly because they tend to mean that I completed a project to the best of my abilities but my client decided not to pay me the full price for my time. If I’m working on a piece that gets killed, I won’t turn down a kill fee, but I also won’t abandon the piece.

I’ve actually been seeing fewer kill fees of late: while magazines, newspapers and some other publications will offer them to writers when a story is killed, many online publications and other websites do no such thing. That fact makes it even more important to explore alternatives to simply jettisoning a project.

Selling a Killed Story

When one of your articles is killed, all rights should immediately revert to you, which means you can publish the article anywhere you’d like. That offers you a lot of options.

• Pitching it to a competing publication: Just because your article wasn’t right for one editor doesn’t mean that you can’t submit it to another who publishes similar material. Personally, since I almost never submit work on spec, I tend to use articles that haven’t gotten published for one reason or another as a way to break into markets that want to see the first article on spec. Since it’s written already, there’s nothing to lose.
• Submit it to a content site: I have several articles that somehow never managed to get printed up on Constant Content.* I get a solid trickle of money for the articles I have up there, without having to run around finding new publications to submit to. It’s certainly not my largest income source, but it’s useful to me. It’s worth noting that Constant Content is not a content mill — you set the price for people to use your article. You don’t have to worry about page views or anything like that to make money. Evergreen content is the most likely to make you money on Constant Content.
• Use it in your own projects: Hopefully, you have a couple of money-making projects of your own in the works, like a blog or an ebook. If your killed article fits in with the topics of your personal projects, you can use it to move that project along. It’s not the sort of upfront money you’ll make by selling the article, but you may be making money off of it for years to come. You can even use it as a guest post to market your work.

The only thing you shouldn’t do with a killed story is let it sit around gathering dust. If it’s a timely article, you need to get it in another editor’s lap or posted somewhere else before it becomes irrelevant. It can take a little work you weren’t planning to do, but the alternative is receiving no payment for your work, except some fraction of what you expected when you agreed to write the article.

*That’s a referral link. If you sell articles through Constant Content after clicking my link, I get a cut of their commission.

Earlier this month, Freelancers Union pointed to posts talking about NBC Universal and Time’s practice of asking freelancers to pay a portion of their invoices in order to get paid in a timely fashion.

So, rather than waiting the typical 60 days to get paid by Time Inc., for example, you could let them take 4% of what they owe you and get paid within 3 days. Instead of waiting 75 days to receive your owed wages by NBC Universal, pay them 2.5% of your wages, and you’ll get paid in a mere 15 days.

There are two ways to think about this issue. The first is from the point of view of big companies with thousands of contractors: it’s not unheard of for big companies to get a break on pricing if they agree to turn around payments quickly — and for many big companies, turning around an invoice in under sixty days is a minor miracle worthy of applause. For most large companies, getting a rush payment of an invoice takes extra resources so why shouldn’t they get a discount on the price in order to do so?

Then there’s the point of view of the freelancer. If a freelancer submits an invoice, it should be paid in a reasonable amount of time — and ‘reasonable’ should take into consideration the fact that freelancers don’t have the steadiest of incomes. And even the thought of getting less the amount actually on the bottom line of that invoice is painful.

I’ve spent the better part of a week trying to decide why I just don’t feel as angry as most of the commentors on Freelancers Union’s post seem to be. Maybe I’ve worked in industries where net-60 (payment 60 days after receipt of an invoice) is considered normal. Maybe it’s because I’ve been known to offer my clients a discount myself if they can pay immediately after receiving my invoice. Maybe it’s because I’m used to getting paid through PayPal and I’ve raised my rates so that unexpected fees aren’t a problem. Maybe it’s because I won’t even start on a project if I don’t have the timeline for payments spelled out in writing.

I don’t have a problem waiting 60 days for a payment — as long as I know from the beginning of the project when to expect my payment. I actually get a lot more irritated at the idea of freelancers willingly giving up a chunk of payment just to get their money early.

If you’re faced with a client that requires you to jump through hoops in order to get paid, you don’t have to sweat it. Instead, a better approach is to raise the rate you charge so that you can absorb extra fees, offer a discount if appropriate and be adequately rewarded for that extra wait for your paycheck. It doesn’t have to be a big change, either. In many cases, five percent would more than cover it.

These days, getting a book published isn’t just a matter of getting an editor to take a look at your work. It takes a lot of ingenuity and a willingness to pursue a project on your own. J.C. Hutchins did just that. His book, 7th Son: Descent, was rejected by publishers. J.C. bought a microphone, recorded an audiobook and shared it as a free serialized podcast. His podcast attracted tens of thousands of listeners, which, in turn, attracted the attention of St. Martin’s Press.

St. Martin’s Press released 7th Son: Descent on October 27th. The novel was recently option by Warner Bros. On its release day, it hit 188 overall at Amazon.com. To put it mildly, it’s a success.

In order to get behind the scenes on how J.C. was able to turn publishers’ rejections into success, he agreed to answer a couple of questions for us.

How did your first attempt to get published go? Did you get any responses? How many queries did you send out?

It was a disaster — and I have only myself to blame. I wanted to tell an epic story about high-tech conspiracies, human cloning and a villain so cruel he’d make Cobra Commander wet the bed . . . and I did just that. I spent three years writing and editing 7th Son, and when I came up for air in 2005, I was the proud papa of a 1,200-page manuscript. Most thrillers never clock past the 400-page mark. I hadn’t written a book. I’d written a phone book.

I’d doomed my story. I pitched around 60 agents, and was universally rejected. During ’05, I was listening to podcasts, and discovered novelists who were releasing their unpublished manuscripts as self-produced, free serialized audiobooks. I smelled an emerging trend, and reckoned that since I couldn’t sell 7th Son, I’d share it.

I rebranded my epic story as a trilogy, and chopped my monstrous manuscript into thirds — act one became 7th Son: Descent, act two became “book two,” etc. I began recording and releasing the first novel in early 2006.

What was the learning curve like as you started offering your book as a podcast? How did you learn how to record your audiobook and promote it online?

I studied the space before I ever recorded a word. I did online research on recommended equipment (microphones and mixers, mostly), listened closely to other podcast novels to spot best practices (and things to avoid), and watched how others promoted their work.

My greatest learning curve came in the recording process. I discovered that I was — and remain — a terrible narrator. My performances are great in the final product, but I constantly flub lines. My audio requires lots of meticulous editing.

I’m not a born promoter; it’s a learned skill. I was timid to promote at first … but once I realized the success of the podcast hinged solely on my personal commitment to evangelize it, I got learning, fast. It’s been a blast, experimenting with promotions over the past four years.

How did you attract listeners? How did your audience lead to a deal with St. Martin’s Press and eventually a movie option?

Back in 2006, I quickly saw the flaws in most podcast promotion of the time (popularity content-style voting on a few websites, shilling for reviews in iTunes, etc.), and realized the fastest way for me as a “new kid” to score credibility was to cross-promote with influential podcasters. I’d invite them on my show for a quick two-minute cameo in which they read a “previously on 7th Son” segment and could promote whatever they wished. These folks then mentioned their 7th Son appearances on their shows, which drove listeners to my site.

My most successful promotional campaigns have been variants on this cross-promotion model. No one spends a dime, and everyone comes away a winner.

Most of the folks who came to the 7th Son podcast enjoyed it, appreciated the entertainment value (and the fact that I was giving it away), and wanted to help spread the word. I created an online street team called “The 7th Son Ministry of Propaganda,” and crafted evangelistic missions for my listeners. I also solicited fan-created artwork, music, poetry — whatever fans wanted to create, they could, and I’d post it on my site (and thank them in my podcasts). I didn’t know it at the time, but I was building a vocal, emotionally-invested audience.

The success of the podcast eventually helped get me a literary agent in 2007 — I pitched more than 200 that time around. It also put me on the radar of St. Martin’s Press. An editor there approached me for a “for hire” supernatural thriller project, a gig I happily accepted. Once my foot was in the door, I pitched them on 7th Son, and they went for it.

With a book contract signed, my film agent then pitched studios. The film rights for the trilogy were optioned to Warner Bros. late last year.

What sort of marketing did you do for the launch of the actual book? How did you sell so many copies in your first week?

I took everything I learned from my four years of promotion, and used the very best ideas. I wanted to dazzle longtime fans and newcomers with killer content, so I wrote and podcasted original fiction — a prequel short story anthology set two weeks before the events seen in 7th Son: Descent. I enlisted the help of a musician friend, who — with my help — created songs “written and performed” by a folk musician in the book. This became a crowd-pleaser. I also recorded a brand-new version of the “print edition” of 7th Son: Descent, featuring the new scenes and plot twists seen in the print novel.

With content covered, I approached several influential websites and asked if they’d be interested in re-distributing this, and other, content. In exchange for access to their audiences, I’d promote their work with in-content advertising. Sites such as BoingBoing.net agreed, putting my work before audiences that had never before heard of 7th Son. This content began rolling out a few weeks before the novel’s bookstore debut.

On the day of publication, 20 websites — including those of BoingBoing, Chris Brogan, Grammar Girl, C.C. Chapman, Tor.com and others — released a 10-chapter PDF excerpt of the book. These sites also received in-PDF adverts for their participation. That PDF has been online for about a month, and has been downloaded more than 30,000 times. Again: no money was spent by anyone, yet everyone benefited from the multi-site distribution and cross-promotion.

Finally, I’m also doing gobs of dirt-under-the-fingernails outreach — pitching blogs, podcasters and mainstream media. In the past month, I’ve done more than 60 online interviews/guest posts … and if I have anything to say about it, this is just the beginning.

Why are you continuing to offer free fiction on your website? What’s your next step?

Free content serves several purposes:

1. it keeps my current fans fat and happy, which is a priority
2. the low barrier of entry ensures new fans can experience my work risk-free, see if it’s right for them, and support the work by purchasing a copy of the novel
3. the fiction can be freely redistributed by fans, which increases the size of my community
4. it’s fun.

What’s next? More free audio fiction in early 2010. By the summer, I aim to be writing two new novels, and sending some movie treatments to my film agent. I still gotta put food on my table.

What advice can you offer to writers trying to find a home for their manuscripts? Any resources you can point writers to?

While I’ve found success with the Free loss leader model, I always suggest that writers submit their manuscripts to agents the traditional way first. If you snag representation, you’ll save yourself a great amount of energy and effort creating — for instance — a podcast audiobook. (Every 30 minutes of final audio often represents around 6-8 hours of behind-the-scenes effort.) If the gatekeepers turn up their noses, screw ‘em. Embrace the DIY route. Create your own success. Don’t let anyone tell you your work doesn’t have value. With the Free model, the market (aka listeners) decide.

The best one-stop resource I’ve found is AgentQuery.com. It has a robust listing of agents representing all genres. It’s also free to use.

What do you see as the future of how books will come to market? Will publishing houses still pick and choose from slush piles? Can we expect more writers to succeed by building online platforms?

I don’t think we’ll see much change in the process during the next five years or so. Major publishers are very slow to change, and — while writers can grouse about it — the current system of finding an agent to pitch your work to publishers works well. It offers some quality control. Despite 7th Son’s podcast success, it took me acquiring an agent to get business done.

I don’t suggest writers submit unagented, unsolicited manuscripts to publishers’ slush piles. Few publishers accept them, and those who do can literally take years reviewing them. While that manuscript is in that single publisher’s hands, it cannot be presented to any other publisher. You essentially forfeit any leverage or influence you have. Get an agent, cut a deal with a small independent publisher, or self-publish.

I absolutely believe we’ll see more online success stories like 7th Son’s in the years ahead. Creators who embrace this DIY approach are in for some seriously hard work, especially if they want to create the best-possible product, and promote it effectively. But those who do can build a thriving fan base, and their works’ successes can build a strong business case for publishers.

You can learn more about J.C. Hutchins at his website, where you can also read his work!