Ghostwriting Series #3: My Learning Curve

Hello and Good Monday everyone!

A quick, shameless plug before we dive into the meat of this post: my first ever blog interview after hooking my agent just went live over on Brenda Drake's blog, so please go check it out! It's me and my super secret Pitchwars mentor, now revealed, chatting about the experience.

Today is the final post of the ghostwriting series I've had going as my family moved cross country. If you haven't had a chance to see post 1 and post 2 with Marcia Layton Turner, be sure to check them out! She has great tips and experience to help you break into and succeed at this unique faucet of freelance work. I'm not nearly as accomplished in ghostwriting as Ms. Turner, but I thought I'd share a little bit about what I have learned as I meandered this part of my short freelancing career.

Source: www.laustel.com

Unlike the sort of projects Marcia accomplished in 30 days, I started on much smaller projects. I wrote a fun bath book to accompany a bath toy, and got raving reviews from the client. (This was a small step that later lead me to writing picture books, but that's a topic for another post.) In addition to this project, I also took on half a dozen 25-page recipe eBooks. Most of the focus on these books was formatting, but it still required some research and creative writing before each recipe.I also did sporadic articles and short eBooks in between these, all with a clause in contract that these were ghostwriting and I would never have a public claim on them.

The first significant ghostwriting project came from a current client that had already tested me out on several of these smaller ghostwriting projects. She approached me after having hired and fired another ghostwriter, who from what I could understand, didn't have the same voice or conviction on the topic that she could tell I did. The client had a better grasp of what she wanted and felt confident in me (even though I didn't). But at that precise moment in my life, finances were tight and the big number offered was too tempting. I reasoned that the research was done, that I simply needed to rewrite it in her style and format all 40,000 words. That could be done in a month, no problem.

However, my lack of experience didn't prepare me for the depth that ghostwriting goes compared to other freelance writing I'd been doing. There were hours of additional research I needed to do, and it was harder for me to focus on the topic and write then cranking out some content articles. Thankfully, the client was gracious with deadlines and willing to pay for my additional time.

Through this experience, I learned a few key things that I want to share with you. These may reiterate some of Marcia's suggestions, but that just means their even more relevant.

1. It's really important to understand the project before you take the job. It's expected that you ask lots of questions and understand the client's audience, intentions, and needs. Break down the time period you'll need to complete the project and make sure you're getting paid accordingly. If you are taking the project on alone, give yourself some leeway hours just in case.

2. Once the project starts, communicate regularly with the client. If you've preproposed deadlines or check-in days, be sure to stick to them. In my case, the communication kept her in the loop and led to more pay when I made her aware of every step and why it took so much longer then originally planned.

3. Loving or knowing the topic well ahead of time makes the project go smoother. Most freelancers have one or more niches that they write within, and often those topics are what they are passionate about. Those are the ghostwriting topics you should consider, especially when you will be working on it for a month or for thousands of words. In my case, this big project called to my passion for natural health care and treatments.

In the end, this ghostwriting endeavor taught me a lot about deadlines and my time's worth. I also discovered that if I'm going to write that many words for one manuscript, I'd rather it be mine and fictional. But it was a wonderful learning experience, and I still chalk it up to extra writing practice.

Have you done any ghostwriting work? What was your experience like? Please tell me in the comments below!

Ghostwriting Series #2: How Can You Ghostwrite a Book in 30 days?

Source: www.laustel.com

In March, I had special guest Marcia Layton Turner, co-founder of the Association of Ghostwriters, give us the pros and cons of ghostwriting as a form of freelancing. She wanted to give more insight and I couldn't resist hearing more. So let's let her have the floor again for part two of this series.

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“How long does it take to ghostwrite a book?” I am frequently asked. The answer, of course, is, “It depends.” 

It depends on how much research is already available, how much research still needs to be done, whether there is an approved outline, how many interviews are needed, how long the desired finished product is, but most of all, it depends on when the client wants it done.

I’ve found that, like most corporate meetings, book writing projects can expand to fill the time allotted. So give me four months and it will take four months. Give me six and it will take six. Give me 30 days and a large enough financial incentive and I will find a way to get it done in 30 days.

Yes, it may require the help of others, such as transcriptionists and online researchers, but you can write a book in 30 days and it can be of top quality, believe it or not. The last book I wrote in 30 days was bought by a major publisher and is expected to sell hundreds of thousands – even millions – of copies.

Here is my process for getting it done:

Line up a team of specialists to which you can outsource. Even if you clear your calendar, turn down all other work, and limit sleep to three hours a night, it’s possible you won’t finish the book in time without outside help. Identify the work to be done that does not require your involvement, where you don’t add much value. That includes research, setting interview appointments, fact checking, transcribing interviews, and editing, to name some of the most common tasks you can delegate.

Quickly wrap up any work already in-house. While you can and should turn down any new opportunities that arise in the next three weeks, or at least try and push them into next month, you can’t suddenly drop work you’re in the middle of or have committed to. So take the next few days, as you’re ramping up on the book, to focus on the work you need to finish. You’ll be much more able to focus on the big project if you’re not worried about that little project due next Thursday. Then turn your attention to the book.

Start with the end in mind. Work backward from your desired due date using your outline and a calendar as a guide. Set deadlines based on the number of chapters. If you have 15 chapters to write, that’s a chapter every two days. Ten chapters? You have three days each.

Determine where the missing information is. Talk through your outline up front and assess where you will get the background material you’ll need. Do you need to schedule interviews with individuals, scour Lexis-Nexis for old articles, flip through court records on site somewhere? Once you know where your information is you can divide up the tasks and assign them to specialists to complete, so you can stay focused on writing.

Schedule client interviews. Since your author-client is the book’s visionary, it’s up to him or her to guide your work. Schedule phone or in-person interviews according to your work schedule, so that you’re working in linear fashion through the chapters. Make sure your client is available to give you what you need information-wise. A 30-day schedule only works if everyone is devoted to the task.

Get on the phone. Following your agreed-up work schedule, interview your client to collect the information you need. What are their thoughts, observations, key points, questions, or opinions on the material shared in the introduction? If they can’t answer your questions, who can? Ask questions, push back, and agree on what the chapter should contain.

Get started. Once you have all the background information you can get your hands on, write. I always want to peruse and study all the information related to a chapter, to wrap my head around the content, and then I start to write. Once you know the point and how the client wants to get there, using the background information you’ve been given, it shouldn’t take too long to write it up. 

A 45,000-word book of, say, 15 chapters, requires about 3,000 words per chapter. That’s essentially a long magazine article. Surrounded by the material – your interviews, background research, statistics, reports, and a chapter outline - it is very possible to power through a draft.

Will it be perfect? No, it’s a rough draft. The goal is to shape the material into what the client wanted to convey in that chapter in a way that sounds like they wrote it. You’ll edit and massage it later. Right now, your task is to simply get it down on paper.

Move on to the next chapter. Once you’ve completed the introduction, or chapter 1 – some writers prefer to leave the introduction to last – get on the phone to talk through chapter 2. Then write.

The process becomes very methodical, very systematic.

Once you have a rough draft of the book, it’s time to circle back around and talk through each chapter draft with your client. What do they like, what do they not like? Where is it missing a key fact from last year’s Census data? Where is it missing an anecdote? Who can be hired to get that information while you focus on the actual editing?

You may also choose to hire an editor to take a first pass at your first draft, suggesting needed revisions and pointing out obvious holes. Working in tandem with an editor – they’re editing as you’re writing - can help you arrive at a publishable manuscript faster.

Are 30-day book projects the norm? No, thank goodness. But when a client is given an opportunity to speak at a major conference next quarter and wants to sell books at the back of the room, or would like to hand out a book as a client gift at the end of the year, you may need to figure out how to get it done in time for them.

While devoting yourself 24/7 to a book for 30 days can be stressful, painful, and tiring, the upside is that you can earn a sizeable fee in little more than four weeks. Tacking on a surcharge of between 20-50% of the total project value isn’t unheard of. 

For many ghostwriters, that’s reason enough to write a book in 30 days.

Marcia Layton Turner is a ghostwriter and freelancer who focuses mainly on business topics. She has authored, co-authored, or ghosted more than 30 non-fiction books. She is also founder and executive director of the Association of Ghostwriters. Connect with her on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.

Thank you so much Marcia for sharing your wisdom with us again today. I'll be rounding out this series next week with some tidbits of experience I have  from ghostwriting projects of my own. See you then!

Ghostwriting Series #1: The Pros and Cons of Ghostwriting with Marcia Layton Turner

Source: www.laustel.com

 Ghostwriting seems to be a lessor discussed facet of freelance work. It's been an important part of the launching of my career, but I don't consider myself an expert. So for this series, I'm going to let an guru share her wealth of knowledge and experience with my readers in a two to one ratio with my own. Her 30 plus pieces speak for themselves. Please welcome Marcia Layton Turner to EG Moore Freelance and Fiction!

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If you’ve thought about getting in to ghostwriting, you’re not alone. After all, with magazine and newspaper work disappearing and web content writing often paying paltry rates, the higher pay that ghostwriting often offers looks mighty appealing. At least that’s what I hear from friends and colleagues who are on the hunt for new writing income sources.

What some don’t realize, however, is that ghostwriting is different from writing magazine articles, authoring books, or crafting blog posts for your own blog. You have your own distinctive voice. That voice might be casual and conversational or it might be scholarly, or it might be opinionated and peppered with expletives. We all have our own style and tone that we’re most comfortable with.

The biggest preconceived notion about ghostwriting is that it’s just like any other kind of writing for money. It’s not.

Ghostwriting requires well-honed writing skills on top of the ability to adopt someone else’s voice. That means writing to match another person’s tone, style, rhythm, vocabulary, and word preferences. A friend should be able to read something you’ve written in another’s voice and believe your client wrote it. That’s what a good ghostwriter does. It’s a skill that can be learned, of course, but it does add another element to writing assignments that can make it tough for some writers to do well.

There are a number of pros and cons with respect to ghostwriting.

Figuring out how to match your client’s voice is perhaps the biggest con. That is, it’s a challenge that must be overcome to be good at ghostwriting and to build a solid base of clients. Being able to mimic how another person communicates is just as important, maybe even more so, than mastering the topic. Writing articles or blog posts as a freelancer in your own voice is simpler.

Another con, or challenge, in ghostwriting is that some clients misunderstand the role of a ghostwriter. They may think that hiring a ghost means they don’t have to participate at all in the development of their book – they’ve turned that over to you. They’re wrong, of course, but clients who hadn’t planned to make time to be interviewed or to brainstorm how best to approach the topic of their book may become irritated at your request for their time. That’s why they hired a ghostwriter, they think.

Finally, whether you’re writing blog posts, an article, or a book for a client, you’re dependent on their being available to provide input and feedback on your work. Unfortunately, not all clients understand that. Finding time to connect can be difficult when dealing with very busy people, as most ghostwriting clients are.

Despite these factors to consider before striking out as a ghostwriter, there are plenty of pros as well.

For those of us who struggle to come up with our own ideas to sell to publishers, clients who want to hire us to write about their topic makes life much easier. As a ghostwriter, you don’t have to come up with ideas yourself, though sharing your perspective and feedback with clients regarding their ideas is essential.

And when it comes to research, a ghostwriting client typically has background information and opinions to share that can lead you to sources and material you might never have come across. Having access to clients who have expertise on a subject can make research so much faster and easier.

The reason many freelancers decide to explore ghostwriting has more to do with money than anything else, however. This is the biggest pro of all: ghostwriting projects often pay well. And by comparison to publisher advances today, ghostwriting fees look very attractive.

Yes, the money is good. But where it’s easy to identify outlets who might buy your written work, it’s more difficult to identify who might need your ghostwriting services. Many clients prefer not to reveal their need for professional writing help, making it hard to determine who, exactly, is in your target market.

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t aim to be a ghostwriter, only that there are a few barriers you’ll need to overcome and some challenges inherent in the job to be aware of.

As someone who earns close to 80% of her income from ghostwriting, I think the best part of being a ghostwriter is the opportunity to explore new topics, guided by the leading experts in their field. I certainly learn something new every day.

Marcia Layton Turner is a ghostwriter and freelancer who focuses mainly on business topics. She has authored, co-authored, or ghosted more than 30 non-fiction books. She is also founder and executive director of the Association of Ghostwriters. Connect with her on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook.

Thanks again Marcia! This ghostwriting series will continue in mid April, where Marcia will give you an example from her career and how to use ghostwriting to further your freelancing career.