selling words

Like a lot of people who blog or write in some form on a regular basis I’ve long dreamt of being paid to write. I can now happily say that that dream has now been fulfilled (and it was, in fact, one of the things on my Accomplished List). It’s definitely been a very interesting experience, so, naturally, I’m going to write about it here. 

But first a bit of background: A friend of mine works for the company that developed the GlycoLeap app. You may or may not have heard of it, but it’s basically a health-related app whereby people can take photos of their meals, and have trained dieticians give them feedback on their food choices. The app also collates information about things like physical activity and weight, so people can get a better idea of how they’re doing health-wise. It’s targeted toward people with diabetes, but anyone can use the app, really.

Anyway, since I am not a dietician, I’m not involved directly with the app, but there’s also a GlycoLeap blog, and that’s the other blog I’ve been writing for, and for which I’ve been getting paid. I think it was back in April that my friend first asked me if I’d be interested in contributing to the blog as a freelance writer; and since she’s a good friend, and since it seemed like a good opportunity to actually get paid for writing, I decided to take her up on the offer.

So she put me in touch with her boss, and he read some of the stuff from this blog, and I got a chance to write a trial article. From this, I learnt a lot about SEO and readability and how to make an article blog-worthy but also internet-worthy (because, in the end, the point of posting articles is to generate as many hits as possible). The trial went well, and I’ve been taken on board as a regular contributor, writing about one article per month.

I don’t really want to link my specific articles here (first, because I had to use my real name on that blog, and I’ve never written my real name here, not that it really matters, I suppose; and second, because I’m actually kind of shy/embarrassed about having written these articles, which are not the sort of thing I usually write or have written in the past), but if you head over to the GlycoLeap Blog, and have a bit of a browse around, you could probably figure out which ones are mine.

It is quite a bit of work, so I’m glad that I only have to produce one article per month, but it’s been very interesting (I previously had no idea about all this behind-the-scenes stuff) and rewarding too, and I’m genuinely grateful to have had this opportunity. Having said that, I’ve also realised that it’s probably not the sort of writing I’d like to do as my primary form of writing or primary job, but, as it is, it’s ok.

Initially, I was a bit uncomfortable about having to so thoroughly edit my writing to meet all the various SEO and readability criteria because I’m so used to writing whatever I like on this blog and publishing stuff after a couple of read-throughs (maybe I’m still a bit uncomfortable with it, and that’s why I’m a bit shy about publicising my articles, as I mentioned above) but, really, that’s just how it is with professional blogs. And, yes, I suppose in the end I am actually a bit proud and quite chuffed at having a paid writing job.

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