Make money writing: 10 business ideas if you like to write

Do you like to write? So maybe you want to find ways to earn money writing. That is why I have prepared a list with a selection of business ideas for writers. 

In most cases they are concepts for small businesses, freelance type, but you can live very well from them, individually or together. Here are ten ideas.

Ghostwriter

The expert ghostwriter, also known as a Negro, is a person hired to write works on behalf of another. 

In other words, the autobiography, short story or novel will be published under the name of an author, usually famous, while the writing work will have been done by someone else.

This happens very often, because many famous people do not have the time, the will, or the literary talent to write a quality book. 

In this case, your job will be to go find people who may have commercial potential and propose to help them write something, be it an autobiography, be it an advice book based on their activity, or any other publication.

It is an activity where recommendations work a lot, so if you get some influential clients, you can have access to more people.

Write for small businesses

In many small companies the people who run the business are very good at their business, but not at writing , and they need the support of another person to write many documents, particularly in external communication. 

One way to earn money writing is precisely to help those small businesses, and not lose customers by not taking care of their writing.

Doing student work

You can’t imagine the number of times students have contacted me to hire my business plan development service just because they had to make a business plan for a subject, and they didn’t want to do it (or didn’t know how). 

Until now, I have always said no, because my opinion is that when a teacher asks that an exercise be done, it has a formative purpose,

and I am not going to interfere in the formation of a person, even though it is she herself, ask me for the favor. 

But there is clearly a market for doing student work, and if you like writing, it could be a pretty profitable way to make a living, as long as you have no moral objections.

Help candidates write their CVs and motivation letters

Getting a job is complicated, and to highlight, one of the few tools available is the resume and the motivation letter. 

Not everyone has the gift of knowing how to write well. In a CV the same can be said in a short and elegant way or in a confusing and long way. 

In the motivation letter the impact of a good style is even greater. 

Helping those candidates improve their chances of passing the screening filters is another way to tap into your taste in writing.

Have a blog

Perhaps the best known option to earn money writing is to have your own blog. 

The truth is that you can generate interesting income, especially if you use your platform as a tool to sell your own products,

which in this case should also have a literary base, since that is what you like. 

But you have to be aware that there are many blogs, therefore there is a lot of competition to stand out both in search engine results and in social networks. 

And don’t forget that a blog takes time : you don’t get traffic from one day to the next,

and you need to publish in a very regular way, both to satisfy your readers and search engines.

Be a freelance reporter

If you are a journalist, one of the most original ways to earn money thanks to your writing talent is to be a freelance reporter. 

With the difficulties of the traditional press, independent professionals are increasingly being used for press content. 

Which means that you can work for different media, and therefore in theory you could have a significant income. 

Of course, there are many journalists in the market, and a lot of competition.

Correct the works of others

If you are not familiar with the world of publishing,

you have to know that one of the most important stages before publishing a book is the correction of the work. 

There are two types of proofreading: one for the most common mistakes (typography and grammar) and one for correcting the style. 

Authors who self-publish their works usually entrust this correction phase to acquaintances or do it themselves,

but in the professional publishing sector, proofreaders are hired, who charge per word, in a similar way to translators.

Write articles for company publications

Companies need original and quality content for their newsletters,

their web pages, their blogs, and any other publication they may need. 

And often, they do not have their own writing team,

but instead look for freelance writers to be able to prepare that content. 

If you manage to create a portfolio of several companies in a sector whose subject matter you control,

you can have an interesting business and earn a lot of money writing.

Publish your own book

The reason for talking about this option near the end of this article is because 

it is not easy to make money selling your own book. But it is not impossible either. 

Based on my experience and that of several people I know, what usually works best to sell a book is to publish it on paper and spread it through your network of contacts. 

Of course, you have to arm yourself with patience and organize events, to sell the copies little by little. In addition, that requires you to have a network of contacts, either very large, or very committed to your work, to the point of recommending the book to third parties, so that you can sell to more people. 

You always have the risk of ending up with a long unsold stock of books, but with effort they can be sold.

Another option is to sell an electronic format . For that you can publish your book on Amazon or other platforms, or you can simply use a blog as your platform to get readers. Of course, it cannot be a blog dedicated only to your book. 

For it to work, you should have a blog on a topic, get visits, and once you have them use it to promote and sell your book.

Translate

Contrary to what many people may think, translation is not an automatic exercise. That’s why translation programs keep failing a lot. 

Translating is understanding the meaning of a phrase in one language, and expressing it again in another language. 

This usually involves major changes in style and vocabulary. In other words: translating is an exercise in rewriting. 

Therefore, if you master at least two languages, you should consider the option of translating, not only business documents, but also books. 

For example, you could go looking at the works of independent writers with some success on the Internet, and propose to translate their book into another language. 

A native English speaker could translate one of the successful independent works of Amazon Spain, to publish it on the platforms of the United Kingdom or the United States of the American giant, markets with much more potential for the author.

To charge you would have two options: the classic system is for words ,

but it is very likely that the authors are not willing to pay you a significant amount without knowing if they can later sell their book in another language. 

That is why a commission can be contemplated on the sales of the translated version. Or any combination of a fixed amount and a variable amount.