That might be true, but it’s usually mentioned as a subtle jab when you’re resisting an assignment. And it completely ignores whether you want to write about some tedious topic just to make a buck.

I was once paid $25 per hour to ghostwrite articles on overt and covert pre-employment testing. I did hours of research on topics like how to use these tests to identify drug users or to screen out employees who are more likely to file worker’s compensation claims. It was interesting for a while, and then it wasn’t anymore. Despite having a satisfied client, I had to quit after writing a few articles.

I’m not suggesting you never write about subjects that bore you. We all have to pay the bills, and good writers can write about most subjects with a little research. Hey, I spent a hundred hours writing for my website about carpet stains. It wasn’t fun, but I’ve earned more than $59,000 from the site, so I guess it was worth it.

However, writing for my website about ultralight backpacking was much more interesting, and you know what? That site has generated $56,000 of income over the years.

How to get paid to write what you want

What can you learn from my story?

Figure out ways to get paid to write what you want to write.

Before you say it’s impossible, here are five options to try.

1. Create a website or blog

First, a warning: It’s tough to make money with a website or blog.

For many years my wife and I wrote about anything that interested us, put it on our websites, and made money from Google AdSense ads. At one point we made more than $10,000 per month, but alas, that revenue is now down to about $900 per month and it continues to fall due to changes in the search engine algorithms.

So it’s no longer that easy to make money from a website. In fact, to succeed now you need a decent niche based on keyword research, search engine optimization skills (if you don’t pay for help) and a solid marketing plan.

On the plus side, there are many ways to make money from a blog besides Google AdSense. Create and sell ebooks, or dive into affiliate marketing. And for a freelance writer, the most obvious might be to use it as a way to connect with clients.

Since you can start a blog for less than your weekly coffee budget and write about whatever you want, it might be worth a shot, right?

2. Approach clients you want to work with

Freelancing has some limitations, but subject matter isn’t necessarily one of them. Just choose the right clients.

OK, if you get a particularly lucrative contract to write about the historical spread between short and long-term interest rates, go for it (remember those bills).

But why not also seek out the owners and editors of businesses and websites you love and send out a few proposals and queries?

Writing in a niche you enjoy makes the work go much quicker — plus, it’s fun to get paid to write about experiences or subjects you love.

3. Write first, sell later

In a previous post I suggested writing an article before pitching it, but I forgot to include what may be the biggest advantage of that strategy: You can write exactly what you want.

Yes, an editor may want changes, but at least you get to write what you want about a subject you enjoy.

I wrote this article because I wanted to. You’re reading it because I wrote it first, then proposed it to The Write Life. If they hadn’t wanted to run it, I would have tried selling it elsewhere, or maybe I would have put it on one of my websites to make something from ads on the page.

When you write an article just because you love the topic, you can have a particular client in mind, or you can look for a buyer once the piece is finished. All sorts of websites pay for content — there are even websites that pay for personal essays — so why not write a few pieces you really want to write? You might sell some of them.

4. Write a book and get it published

It isn’t easy to publish a book traditionally, and even if you succeed and then use all the tricks for maximizing your book profits, you may not make much. While selling books can be a challenge, there are many major success stories. Consider the iconic example of J.K. Rowling becoming a billionaire from her Harry Potter series. You never know!

Here’s my more modest example: I wrote 101 Weird Ways to Make Money because an editor at Wiley discovered my website and my 5,000-subscriber newsletter on that subject. (Keep that in mind; publishers love to see that you already have an author platform.) He called me and asked me to write the book.

I had the website and newsletter because I’ve always been fascinated by ways to make money, and I love writing about them. So I spent six weeks writing a book on one of my favorite subjects. In four years, I’ve made only $19,000 in royalties because I’m a slouch when it comes to marketing my book. But I enjoyed writing the book and I got paid.

So write the book you want to write, and then see if you can get it published. It’s worth trying at least once. If you don’t find a publisher, consider the next option…

5. Self-publish your book

When you self-publish, you can write whatever you want. You don’t need to send query letters, make unwanted changes or get approval from anyone for anything. I’m not saying you should ignore good advice or skip hiring an editor, but it is nice to have more control over your work.

Of course, publishing in printed form can get expensive. Authors who share what it costs to self-publish their books report a wide variety of experiences, but I spent less than $900 each of the two times I’ve self-published print books. I may have lost $100 on one book — the one I most-enjoyed writing (sigh). I made about a $3,000 profit on the other, and it took me a month to write it.

Rather than publish in print, I prefer to self-publish on ebook platforms like Amazon Kindle. I’ve made thousands of dollars from the books I’ve published there, and the most I have ever spent was $15 each for a few cover designs. With royalties of up to 70%, you don’t need huge sales number to make decent money with Kindle books, so write what you want and throw it out there to see if it will sell. Here are some more useful tips on how to self publish a book.

Of course, spending time and money on marketing could have helped my sales, but I just wanted to write. I’m not suggesting you emulate my apathy toward marketing. It’s far more important to your success than your writing skills if you hope to make much money from your work. But I was content to take what should have been marketing time and spend it writing yet another ebook, hoping that too would sell a few copies.

Just write what you want

At some point, I’ll probably have to write again about employment tests or something equally boring (to me) just to pay the bills.

But for now, I’m going to finish this article and work on a short story about a disease that stops people from killing each other. Who knows if I’ll ever get paid for that (not likely), but sometimes you just have to write what you want to write.

How often are you able to make money from your most enjoyable and creative work — the stuff you want to write?

This is an updated version of a story that was previously published. We update our posts as often as possible to ensure they’re useful for our readers.

Photo via  Igisheva Maria/ Shutterstock 

They seemed to cut the glare, but I notice she isn’t wearing them any longer.

That’s not surprising. The evidence for computer glasses is mixed. Whether or not they work may depend on how they’re constructed and who is wearing them. So if you have eye strain and headaches from hours in front of your computer, the only way you’ll know if computer glasses provide relief is to try them.

But achy eyes may be a minor problem compared to some of the other health risks of writing.

In fact, if you sit in front of that computer for enough hours every day, you might even die!

Don’t panic. Read on to learn how to deal with wrist pain, fatigue, and other health risks of being a writer.

Premature death and other hazards of writing

Too much sitting is linked to diabetes, heart disease and premature death, according to a recent study highlighted by the Harvard Medical School Health Blog.

It noted that the average person spends more than 50 percent of his or her waking hours sitting down, but that figure might be higher for the average writer.

The study was a meta-analysis of 47 other studies, which makes the findings pretty solid. The researchers concluded: “Prolonged sedentary time was independently associated with deleterious health outcomes regardless of physical activity.”

Yes, they found that your risk of dying increases with prolonged sitting, even if you exercise up to an hour per day!

Apparently, the only sure way to reduce your risk is to sit for shorter periods of time. The authors of the study offered these two tips:

1. Stand up and/or move around for three minutes every half hour.
2. Use a timer or alarm app to remind you to get up.

I just got up to vacuum the living room. Now where was I?

Clearly, you have to find natural break times so you don’t lose your train of thought or interrupt the flow of your writing. But avoiding premature death probably makes it worth the effort.

You might consider trying a standing desk. Standing has an additional advantage of burning more calories than sitting (and yes, sitting is correlated with obesity). According to one online calorie calculator, I could burn almost 300 more calories daily if I worked standing up.

Some desks are convertible, letting you sit and stand depending on the task and your mood. I tried a standing desk and found that hours on my feet were hard on my back. Alternating between sitting and standing would probably help. An anti-fatigue mat beneath your standing desk space may be a good idea too. (Maybe you should let friends and family know these make great gifts for writers!)

How to manage the writing-related health issues

Eye strain and fatigue. Pain in your wrists, shoulders, and neck. Repetitive motion injuries. The University of Pittsburgh Environmental Health and Safety department notes these among additional health risks of computer use.

Been there, done that — every one of them. Writing is dangerous for your health!

Fortunately the University of Pittsburgh’s EHS department and other experts offer some tips for avoiding these problems, or at least relieving the pain. They include:

• Alternate tasks frequently
• Take frequent breaks
• Use a good ergonomic chair
• Sit against the back of the chair
• Relax your shoulders
• Use a light touch on the keyboard
• Have your arms parallel with floor and level with keyboard
• Stop to let your arms relax from time to time
• Keep work materials within easy reach
• Adjust the computer screen angle to reduce glare
• Blink often when working at your computer
• Frequently stop to focus your eyes on more distant objects
• Have your computer screen at eye level or slightly lower

I’ll add an obvious tip to that list: Spend less time writing.

To do that and still get some work done, I brainstorm while taking walks, carrying a recording device as I go. I probably have more ideas for new articles during a 20-minute walk than I get from an hour in front of the computer. And it’s good exercise.

Well, despite having splurged for a good chair and adding a soft pillow, my bottom is sore as I write this — along with my eyes and shoulders. I don’t like pain. I also don’t like the idea of dying prematurely. So I’m going for a walk and a swim before I start my next post. You might want to take a break too.

Have you suffered any health problems from writing? What do you do for relief?

You can jump on a plane and then, while on a beach in Thailand or in a ski lodge in Canada, tap away at that laptop to pay for the trip.

Well, that’s the theory anyhow. But the first time you try working while traveling, you’ll likely find it’s more difficult than anticipated.

When I first tried to write while traveling, I realized my usual routine was broken. Hunting down morning tea was an adventure rather than a short walk to the kitchen. Hotel checkout times snuck up on me just when I was doing my best writing. And there were distractions; after all, I travel to see things and have new experiences, so it wasn’t easy to fit work into my days on the road.

Of course, you could just take a vacation from writing and get back to work when you return home. But here’s a thought: If you can learn to write while away from home, you can afford to take trips more often.

And yes, I did finally learn how to get some work done while traveling. So if you like to travel and want to do more of it, here are some tips for making a living writing while on the road.

Prepare before you leave to increase productivity

Your important files need to be available wherever you are. That’s not a problem if you use the same laptop at home and on the road. Otherwise, consider free cloud storage options like Dropbox or Google Documents, so you can access everything regardless of your location. Just remember to upload everything necessary before you leave.

You can also install a remote access program to use your home computer that lets you log in from anywhere. LifeHacker recommends using either TeamViewer, or the built-in remote connection options available on many Macs and PCs with Windows Professional. All of these options require leaving your computer on with the remote program running, so don’t make the mistake of powering off before you head to the airport.

I prefer to carry important files on a USB flash drive. That way I can still work where there’s no internet connection, and if my laptop crashes, I can still accomplish some work from any computer. Imagine you’re using your home desktop remotely and it shuts down on day one of a two-week trip. Of course, you could use cloud storage, remote access and a USB flash drive for total safety and convenience, but most of us don’t take that many precautions.

What about passwords? Don’t leave home without them. Bring a paper list or email it to yourself. For security, add a certain number of digits and letters to each password but leave those off the cheat sheet, making them unusable to anyone who sees the list. Just remember the pattern you add, or you won’t be able to access anything at all!

Bring tools that will help you write your best

Even when using a laptop, my big clumsy fingers prefer a regular keyboard, so I take one on road trips. I use a small tape recorder for safely taking notes while driving; many of my best ideas come on long quiet stretches of highway.

You’ll have to decide which tools are most important for you, but here are some possibilities to consider for your list (and you should have a list, so nothing is forgotten):

• Laptop
• USB flash drive
• Keyboard
• Mouse and mousepad
• Extra battery for mouse
• Camera
• Pen and paper
• Tape recorder
• Headphones
• USB plugin for wireless mouse and keyboard

Check your internet connection before you move in

One night in a hotel, my wife and I had already used the pool and watched a movie when we discovered the wireless signal in our room was worthless. Management moved us despite the room already being well-used, but it was a hassle.

Lesson learned: Always check the connection before you settle into your room.

Let your surroundings inspire your work

You will be distracted from writing when you travel, but you can also be inspired. Once, sitting with my laptop in a rented cabin in the mountains of Colorado, it occurred to me how wonderful it was that I could work from anywhere, so I wrote about that for one of my websites. On another occasion, after a catamaran cruise on Lake Tahoe, I wrote about the experience and sold the article. And many writers find simply changing their setting and routine makes them more reflective and in a position to produce their best personal essays.

You don’t have to cover travel topics just because you’re traveling. Inspiration can come for just about any niche you work in. If you write about small businesses, check out the ones around you. If you write for a landscaping magazine investigate how yards are commonly landscaped in the cities or countries you visit. Keep an open mind get inspired.

Develop your own unique travel routine

Routines keep you focused and prevent deadly procrastination. But since you probably can’t replicate your home pattern, you may need to develop a routine just for traveling.

I find it easiest to write as soon as I get up in the morning, and maybe for an hour just after I check into a hotel (by that time the pool or bar is calling my name). I also find I can work well at the airport if I arrive a couple hours early, especially if I’ve brought an internet hotspot with me.

But I have a confession: I can’t write half as much while traveling as I do at home. Instead, I do other things to be productive. For example, long road trips and a micro-cassette recorder help me come home with a ton of new ideas I can execute once I’m back at home. And although it’s tough to write articles in hotel rooms and fast food restaurant booths, when in these places I find it easy to do research and take notes for future articles.

Of course, what works for me may not work for you. Perhaps you have to stay several days in each place to get some writing done and truly enjoy the trip. Maybe you should go to a coffee shop wherever you are, if that’s how you normally work.

Write outside, write inside — who knows until you try. To find a routine that works for you, just hit the road and start experimenting.

Do you try to write when traveling, and if so, what routines work best for you?

What about weekends? Sure, right after you catch up on the household chores you put off all week.

It’s tough enough to build your writing career part-time around other commitments, but it’s especially difficult if you have a day job.

Fortunately, not all jobs are equal. In fact, some types of work leave you ample time to write: jobs where you can write while on the clock, positions with limited days or hours, and gigs where you control when and how much you work.

Jobs that let you write at work

I used to drive an electric tram for residents of a wealthy community in Florida, and my employer encouraged me to bring books or even a laptop if I wanted to read or write during slow times. And sure enough, during the off-season, I often waited for an hour or more between passengers.

Few employers may allow you to write while on the job, but if you’re serious about your writing and need a day job, try one of these positions:

Security guard
“I wrote Enjoy the Decline in 45 days while pulling 16 hour shifts sitting at a warehouse as a security guard,” says author Aaron Clarey. He also wrote his 324-page book, Behind the Housing Crash, while working at that same job.

Clarey suggests writers ask to be assigned night shifts, when they’ll likely have fewer administrative than they would during the day. However, day shifts can be productive as well; author Mark Allan Gunnells says:

I’m a security guard, and have pockets of downtime throughout the day. I have trained myself to write in those pockets. It isn’t ideal for some, the constant stop-and-start method, but I’ve managed to make it work.

When I wrote while working as a security guard, the biggest problem I faced was the number of interruptions. Gunnells may have adapted to that stop-and-start environment, but my own solution was to do the preparatory work instead of the actual writing.

For example, I researched my topic online, found sources and took notes. When I later wrote my articles, they came quickly and easily since I already had information, sources and a general outline ready.

Pet sitter or House sitter
While they may not be full-time gigs, these jobs leave you lots of time to write.

When I was younger, I wrote while getting paid to watch dogs for family and friends. When my wife and I travel, we pay our pet sitter $60 per night to stay with our two cats. Apart from a few minutes of play time and feeding, the rest of her eight-hour stay is open for whatever she wants to do — including writing.

Other possibilities
Consider alternative positions that offer lots of downtime during your working hours, and don’t be afraid to get creative. For example:

• A late-shift hotel clerk can write while waiting for the phone to ring or a guest to check in
• An elder-care driver can write while waiting for passengers at appointments
• A campground host can write when he’s not welcoming guests or accepting bookings
• A baby sitter can write after the kids are in bed

It may not be easy to fit in writing time at work, but it’s possible. Rodrigo Ribera D’Ebre says he wrote a novel during breaks while working in an office cubicle at an auto insurance company. Short story author Lisa Proctor says her boss let her write on the job when she was a clerk at a bookshop.

Some employers are happy to let writers write, as long as they get their work done. Why not ask?

Part-time work that pays well

A miserable day job can be good motivation for launching your writing career, and you might even use lunch breaks to plan how you’ll quit your job and start freelancing.

But if you need the extra income, consider a part-time job to support your writing. To maximize your writing time, look for a position that pays well for your time, so you can afford to work fewer hours.

If you only want to work a couple of days each week, one of the best opportunities may be bartending. If you have previous experience serving drinks or waiting tables, you might convince a bar or club owner to let you work only Friday and Saturday nights — the busiest times for most bars.

The tips can be surprisingly good. “Tending bar at a busy nightclub, I regularly pulled in upwards of three hundred dollars a night, and on many Fridays I took in more than $600,” says Rob Dohearty. On his best night, he earned $1,600, and that was at a rural tavern where he normally made only about $100 per night. However, he warns that without experience you’ll probably get the slow shifts to start, and you’ll make much less.

Also consider jobs that require you to work five days or more each week, but for a limited number of hours. For example, many people who deliver newspapers to the coin-operated boxes on street corners (a job I used to have), work just two to four hours each morning. Just be prepared to get up at three or four in the morning each day!

Here are some other part-time possibilities with the potential for decent hourly incomes:

• Waiting tables in an expensive restaurant
• Cutting hair
• Substitute teaching
• Doing morning janitorial work for offices or schools
• Driving a school bus

As a school bus driver, you can use the time between morning and afternoon runs to write, and you get summers off.

Flexible, writing-friendly jobs

The best gig for writers would allow you to work when you want and as much or as little as you want. That way, when you have paid writing projects you can slack off on the other work, and when writing income falls you have a backup. But is there such a job?

Yes. As a search engine evaluator — a job I started nine months ago — I work when I want, day or night, for $13.50 per hour. The most I’ve worked is 53 hours in a month, and although the company says you have to work at least 20 hours, I have recently dropped to fewer than five hours monthly, which is apparently just enough to keep from getting fired.

As a search engine evaluator, you rate search results based on various factors. The employers provide the minimal training necessary. Companies that hire for these positions include Leapforce, Lionbridge and Appen Butler Hill, and may also offer other at-home part-time positions.

Jobs that let you work as many hours as you like, whenever you like, are rare. Get creative to brainstorm opportunities based on your skills. Perhaps a family member with a business can hire you to work the days and hours that fit best with your writing schedule — another way I’ve been able to work while having time to write.

Do you have a job that leaves you time to write? How do you fit writing around a day job?

Yes, that sentence does make sense — if you know how to use the Amazon Associates Program to boost the revenue from your books.

Here’s what happened: A visitor to one of my websites clicked a link to the Amazon sales page for my book, 101 Weird Ways to Make Money.

After adding a copy to his cart, he continued shopping.

The link to the book’s sales page includes my Amazon affiliate code, so not only did I earn a royalty from my publisher, but Amazon paid me a commission for the book as well as anything else the visitor bought within 24 hours, which in this case included that battery pack.

If you haven’t taken advantage of Amazon’s Associates Program to earn royalties from your links to your books — and other products — you’ll want to get started.

How Amazon Associates Works

When you sign up for Amazon Associates, you’re paid 4 to 10 percent commission for sales you refer to Amazon using your affiliate links (the URLs that include your unique tracking code). The exact percentage depends on the types of products sold and your sales volume for the month.

Of course, you can earn commissions by linking to any product on Amazon (more on that in a moment), but as an author your first goal is to squeeze more profit from your book sales. Every time you promote your books on your website or blog, make sure to use your affiliate links.

Here’s an example for traditionally published authors. Suppose the cover price of your book is $19.95, and Amazon is currently charging $14.95 (their price often changes and its generally below list price). When a visitor clicks the link on your blog and buys a copy from Amazon, you’ll get at least 59 cents (4 percent) as a commission — in addition to whatever the royalty is from your publisher.

Self-published? If your ebook sells for $5.99 in the Kindle store, you’re probably already earning a royalty of $4.19 (Amazon pays up to 70 percent), which is great. But why not also get an extra 24 cents by linking to your book with your affiliate code to earn a 4 percent commission? And if you sell enough books, you can do even better.

For example, if you sell more than six items through your referral links in a month, your commission goes up to 6 percent. Notice I said “items,” because the people who buy your books will also buy other things while shopping on Amazon, and you earn a commission on those sales as long as they occur within 24 hours (or longer if the visitor adds an item to her shopping cart and returns to pay later).

Some items have set rates, while others’ rates fluctuate based on volume. Here are some examples of the set rates from Amazon’s Advertising Fee Schedule:

• Grocery products: 4 percent
• Instant video products: 6 percent
• Headphone products: 6 percent
• Jewelry products: 10 percent
• Game downloads: 10 percent

How much money can you earn from Amazon Associates?

I receive a royalty of $1.50 from my publisher for each book I sell, so if I also get a 77-cent affiliate commission (6 percent when Amazon sells my book for $12.95), that’s a 51 percent boost in revenue per book.

I don’t sell 100 copies weekly like I did back when the book first came out, and most sales now aren’t through my links, so that extra revenue has dropped to less than 10 dollars each month.

On the other hand, after replacing regular links with my affiliate links years ago, I haven’t had to spend one extra minute to keep making that extra money.

Then there are those “other” sales. Once I started using this strategy, I was surprised to see that on top of the affiliate income for my books, I was making another $30 monthly in commissions for other items people bought after arriving at Amazon through my links. That too has dropped as sales have declined, but hey, every little bit helps.

The payoff can be bigger than my experience indicates. “On average, I make a few hundred dollars each month from my affiliate account, because every time I link to my books from my website I use an Amazon Associates URL that’s got a tracking ID attached,” said Paul Jarvis in a post at Forbes. A few hundred dollars a month is a few thousand dollars a year — not a bad payoff for taking a few minutes to set things up the right way.

Playing by Amazon’s affiliate rules

Authors often think it’s against the rules to use affiliate links for their own books.

Here’s the truth: It isn’t.

What is against the rules is using your affiliate links when you buy things for yourself.

It’s perfectly okay to make commissions on your books when other people buy them. This is true when you sell Kindle books, too.

In response to the question, “Can I link to my Kindle book via the Amazon Associates program?” Amazon says:

Yes, the Amazon Associates Program provides vendors specially formatted links to Amazon on their websites in exchange for advertising fees when their visitors follow the links and place an order. Anyone with a website may apply for our Associates Program, although we do have certain requirements that may prevent a site from participating.

One of those “certain requirements” is that you live in an approved state, a list that fortunately includes all but five states. According to the Associates Program Operating Agreement, the only states where you can’t participate are Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Missouri and Rhode Island.

If you happen to live in one of those states you’re out of luck . . . almost. You still can sign up for the Books-a-Million affiliate program and send your readers to their website to buy your books. You’ll get a 5 percent commission on sales made within 30 days of the customer using your link to arrive at BooksAMillion.com.

Read up on the rest of Amazon’s rules. You can’t use affiliate links in emails or PDFs, for example, and Amazon requires you to disclose on your site or blog that you are “a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program.” Getting your affiliate account closed means your extra income stream is gone, and it’s easy to make a mistake. In fact, I may have used my affiliate link in my newsletters once or twice before realizing this was against the rules.

What does the law say about affiliate advertising?

As an advertiser (which is essentially what you become), you also have to be aware of Federal Trade Commission (FTC) regulations. For example, the FTC Guidelines say you have to disclose the fact that you might receive payment when visitors use your links to buy something, and they provide these more specific suggestions:

• Place the disclosure as close as possible to the triggering claim.
• Preferably, design advertisements so that “scrolling” is not necessary in order to find a disclosure.
• Necessary disclosures should not be relegated to “terms of use” and similar contractual agreements.

A simple disclosure might look something like this:

Disclosure: This website may be compensated for linking to other sites or for sales of products we link to.

Some bloggers put a statement at the bottom of each page, while others just provide a link there to a disclosure page that has the more-detailed information. That has apparently been enough for website and blog owners to avoid trouble with the FTC so far, but it also appears that neither practice is in complete compliance with the regulations, so you may have to put that disclosure a bit closer to the links. (I’m not a lawyer, though, so you may want to speak with one to make sure you’re covered.)

Of course, you could be very clear and label it “My affiliate link to my book,” or even say something like, “Do me a favor and use this link to check out my book, so I can make a commission if you buy it.” (Editor’s note: Since we published this post, it sounds like Amazon has started discouraging this type of wording.)

How to make more money with Amazon Associates

It’s possible to make even more affiliate income while promoting your books. One method is to share the sales pages on social media using your affiliate code.

This is tricky because it is against Amazon’s rules to shorten your affiliate URLs and they may be too long for Twitter, or might be shortened automatically on Facebook.

Fortunately, Amazon provides a way to share your book’s sales page on Twitter and Facebook while using your affiliate tracking code.

Go to your book’s sales page while logged into your affiliate account, then use the “share” tab at the top to post to Twitter or Facebook. Here’s a simple tutorial that walks you through the process.

Another way to get an Amazon-approved short link is to search for your book from your Associates home page. See the yellow “Get Link” button? Click the arrow next to it and choose “Shorten URL with amzn.to?”

I discovered another creative way to boost your affiliate income in a Kindle publishers’ forum. “One thing I’ve done is post product links to the equipment that I or my fictional hero use in the books. Things like knives, optics, tents and such,” said one user.

For example, he says he made an 8 percent commission on a rifle scope that costs over $2,000 — that’s more than $160 from one sale through his affiliate link!

Letting your book’s characters sell things for you is a neat trick! Unfortunately, the consensus of Kindle forum users is that it’s against the rules to include affiliate links in Kindle books.

Many authors get away with it and Amazon has not fully clarified the matter, but a safer strategy might be to have “character profile” pages on your website, with affiliate links to each character’s favorite products. You could then link to those profile pages at the end of your book, or link to a “more information” page on your site.

Finally, your readers probably value your opinion, so why not have a list of your favorite books by other authors on your website or blog? Of course, you’ll link to all of their books using your Amazon Associates links.

Will you join Amazon Associates?

The program offers a way to boost your income from book sales. More than ever writers have to be marketers anyhow, so why not add affiliate marketing to your plan? You’ll at least make more money from your own books, and perhaps profit from recommending other books and products as well.

Do you use affiliate links to promote your books?

Photo via  Ollyy / Shutterstock 

However, where you guest post has a huge effect on your results. Sharing your thoughts on a blog with a lot of clout in your niche will make a much bigger difference to your reputation and traffic than guest-posting on your brother’s blog that only your parents read.

For many writers, the ultimate guest-posting goal is a mainstream authority publication such as The Huffington Post. It’s not easy to become published on this site, but in my experience it’s certainly worth the effort: Not only did it add to my writing resume, but my first post as a Huffington Post blogger brought in $800 within a few days.

That’s why I want to share with you how to write for The Huffington Post. Here’s a detailed look at my experience, plus advice from other HuffPo bloggers on how to pitch for the best results and how to make the most of your new byline.

How to Write for The Huffington Post

While joining the ranks of Huffington Post bloggers isn’t the easiest task, it is doable. Catherine Alford and others who have succeeded say they did the following:

• Modeled their post after the style of one of the bloggers in the targeted section
• Sent a short pitch, emphasizing the most interesting aspects of their idea
• Sent a complete package, with pitch, author bio and head shot
• Commented on The Huffington Post Facebook page until invited by an editor to write something
• Developed a relationship with a current HuffPo blogger by commenting on posts and asked for help submitting a piece to an editor
• Contacted the editor of the targeted section by email

Huffington Post blogger Lisa Arends advocates reading posts daily in the section you would like to write for, and contributing “well-thought-out responses.” She says, “Keep this up for a while and you may get lucky and have an editor contact you with a blog idea.” If not, at least you’ve built a reputation for smart comments, which may help when you pitch an idea.

If none of the above methods work, simply submit a well-written post using the form on The Huffington Post contact page. It asks for your “final or near-final draft,” which must be less than 1,000 words.

My experience blogging on The Huffington Post

My story is a little bit different; I was lucky enough to have some help. I had just published my book, 101 Weird Ways to Make Money, and my publisher’s publicist arranged for me to create an article and slideshow for The Huffington Post on weird jobs that can become businesses.

In that article, I linked to my website, which had been seeing between 700 and 1,000 page views and earning between $12 and $30 daily through Google AdSense, with an average of $20 per day.

Here’s the traffic and revenue I earned the day the article ran (Monday, August 15, 2011) and the following days:

After Thursday, the numbers resumed their normal range, though my traffic stayed slightly higher, with 1,200 to 1,500 daily page views. But revenue of $531, instead of the $80 I would normally have earned in four days, suggests the traffic from The Huffington Post link was worth at least $450. Not bad for one post!

In addition, my website includes links to several of my other sites, so I’m sure I picked up another $50 worth of indirect traffic for those sites. And I linked to my book in the article and author bio, so I sold quite a few copies that week.

All together, that article and slideshow on The Huffington Post was probably worth $800 in additional income within a few days. In addition, it helped me attract visitors to my sites and promote sales of my book for several months.

It was a (very busy) year before I realized I had not just a post, but my own blog set up on The Huffington Post. I requested my password and started posting occasionally. The results were never as dramatic as that first post, but I did see increased traffic and book sales. And best of all, the editors never objected to my posts containing relevant links to my own websites.

How to Earn Money by Writing for Free

While The Huffington Post does not generally pay its bloggers, as my experience demonstrates, it’s still possible to earn cash by writing for free. Here are the strategies I used:

Include specific, valuable links

To start, be strategic when choosing links to include in your author bio. For example, if you’ve written a book or created a course, link to that. If you’re a freelance writer, you’ll want to link to your writer website or online portfolio. If you’ve monetized a website with affiliate products or pay-per-click advertising, link to it.

In addition, if any of these links are relevant to your post’s content, include them on related anchor text in the body of your post. I’ll reiterate: the links must be relevant. If they’re not, the editors will likely remove them.

Aim for the front page

For these links to be valuable, a lot of people need to see and click them, which means you’ll need a lot of readers. I was a extremely lucky with my first post; it was featured on the front page of the HuffPost Small Business section, which brought in a ton of readers. Later posts never approached that level of traffic.

With these results in mind, it can’t hurt to aim for this special treatment. Look at what’s being shared on your targeted section’s front page. Are the featured articles controversial or fun? Are they short or long? Do they have shocking titles?

Many big names blog on The Huffington Post, so competition for better placement is tough. When former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich’s post is on the front page of the Politics section, yours isn’t likely to push his aside. On the other hand, he doesn’t write every day. If you’re working in a section with fewer big names, you might have an even better chance to get a good post featured. Study your targeted section to learn the famous bloggers in your niche and how often they post.

Share your post as much as possible

Promote your post to your own networks to direct as much traffic to it as possible, as you would with any guest post. Share it with your Facebook and Twitter followers, write a short blurb about it on your blog or email it to your newsletter subscribers.

With a bit of luck, your HuffPo post might even go viral. Blogger Catherine Alford was lucky enough to see her recent post blow up:

[It] went hugely viral with more than 220,000 likes and 43,000+ shares. That viral post also led to me getting interviewed on Huffington Post Live, which led to tons of emails and new readers. There’s no doubt that it’s beneficial to any writing career to be an author there.

Whether or not your post goes viral, you’ll at least point a few new readers toward your site and offerings and add “Huffington Post Blogger” to your resume.

If you’ve been published on The Huffington Post, how did you do it and what results did you see? If you haven’t, would you like see your byline there?

What’s next: do you query the editors with short outlines and start writing only after your proposals are approved? Or do you write the articles first, and then try to sell them?

There’s no hard-and-fast rule about this situation — except that you must read each site’s guidelines before pitching! — so you’ll have to decide which way works best for you. However, having tried it both ways, here are eight compelling reasons to write your posts before pitching them.

1. You already know you can write the article

Recently, an editor approved my proposal for a post (not yet written) on how anyone can be a movie producer. I had done some research prior to pitching, but I soon discovered that investing in films as a producer had since become much more expensive and complicated — making the article unsuitable for that blog’s readers. There was no way around it: I had to tell the editor I couldn’t write the article.

You don’t want to promise an article you can’t deliver, especially if you’re trying to land a new client or establish a new relationship with an editor. Of course, if you do enough research you’ll know you can complete an article — but at that point the work might be half done, so why not finish it? Using a template for your article can help ensure its structure stays on track.

2. You know it will work for a client

Sometimes you can propose and write a great article, but it isn’t quite right for your client’s blog or magazine, even if it seemed like it would be when you first pitched it. You might have to rework it in some way that’s unsatisfying or just drop it, whereas if you had written it first, you could have found the perfect outlet for that perfect article.

Once an article is finished, it’s much easier to see if it will fit well in a particular publication. Knowing this before you pitch an editor saves you the time of querying outlets that won’t be the right fit.

3. You can submit your work immediately

Many blogs and magazines specify that they want a query, not the full article. But more than once, I’ve sold an article because I put it in the email anyway. Somewhere in my query I mention “the article is below if you’re interested,” and I make sure it follows everything else, including my signature.

Yes, this violates a rule. But if an editor is interested, instead of contacting me to read more, she merely scrolls down. Otherwise, she can stop at my signature. How could that add more work or trouble to an editor’s life? Note that I’ve pasted the article into the body of my email; I’m not clogging her inbox with an unwanted attachment.

In any case, if you don’t want to risk breaking the rules, having the article already written means you can send it as soon as a client expresses interest — before that interest wanes.

4. You can pitch your post elsewhere

What do you do when you spend the time to write a great article and the client you have in mind rejects it? Sell it to someone else!

I recently sold an article several months after it was rejected by the editor of the blog for which I originally wrote it. I had to change a few lines, but I earned $35 more than the first client was paying.

[bctt tweet=”Re-pitch your unsold articles to other clients, says @stevegillman”]

Keep your unsold articles organized and regularly offer them to other clients. This is especially important if the article will go stale, like ones that mention news items or new products. If the article still doesn’t sell . . .

5. You can use it on your own blog

When your articles don’t sell you can always use them on your own blog or website. This works best if you write mainly in one niche. My specialty at the moment is personal finance, and I have several related websites. Sometimes I’m happy when my editors reject a few articles, because then I have content for my own sites (for which I seem to procrastinate otherwise).

Interestingly, the rejected articles often get the best response from my readers, perhaps because they’re edgier. Nobody wanted to touch my article on making money as a “professional cuddler,” for example, but my newsletter readers and website visitors loved the piece.

Of course, you’ll still want to get paid for your work. Consider monetizing your website with Google AdSense, promoting affiliate products, or selling your own books. My best “money site” only brings in about $200 per month now, but every little bit helps.

6. You can add it to your portfolio

When you can’t find the appropriate client for a good article, you at least have a solid addition to your portfolio. Post it on your blog or website and add the link to the clips you send in queries.

7. It’s less stressful

I can’t be the only one who gets a little stressed when facing deadlines for articles that I haven’t written on topics that may not be as interesting as I hoped.

It’s so much more relaxing to have the work done when proposing articles. And it’s likely that the quality of your articles will be higher when you aren’t rushing to meet a deadline.

8. The article is more likely to sell

Try this experiment: write a description of an article, then write the article, and then write a new description based on the finished piece.

How do your two descriptions compare? I doubt they’ll be the same, and I suspect the second one will be more interesting. Having a better description helps sell your article — because now you know exactly what you’re selling.

In any case, writing your description after the article is done helps it more accurately reflect the finished product when you include it in a query, and that makes for a satisfied client.

The bottom line

To properly propose a piece for a client, you’re going to do some research and outline an article. If you’re putting that much work into it already, why not just finish a draft of the article?

A finished post is more likely to sell, and in the case that it doesn’t, you have several more options. For your next guest post, why not try writing first?

Do you write first or query first? Why do you use your preferred method?

But what if you could also make an extra $0.50 on each sale? If you sold four thousand copies this year, that would add up to an extra $2,000 in your pocket — which might make it worth spending an hour or two setting up the processes.

Here are four ways you can squeeze more profit out of each sale. One strategy will even help boost your book in Amazon’s ranking’s! Let’s get started.

1. Get paid a commission on top of a royalty

When my book, 101 Weird Ways to Make Money, was published, I promoted it to my mailing lists and on my websites. At first, I just linked to the sales page on Barnes and Noble. They had preordered several thousand copies for their physical stores, and my editor at Wiley (rightly) suggested that we should reward them.

Then I noticed that the link my editor gave me had Wiley’s affiliate code in it — my publisher was selling the books to Barnes and Noble, but also making a commission on each sale to buyers I referred. Why couldn’t that be my affiliate code? I changed it the next day. I later did the same for my Amazon links.

Here’s how it works with Amazon’s Associates Program (Barnes and Noble’s program is similar): I refer newsletter subscribers and website visitors to the sales pages through links that contain my affiliate code. I then get a 4 to 8.5 percent commission, depending on that month’s sales volume. At the moment they sell the book for about $14.00, so my affiliate commission is at least 56 cents — on top of the $1.50 royalty from my publisher.

Amazon says it’s also okay to do this with books you’ve published on Kindle. On my Kindle titles that I’ve self-published, I start with a 70% royalty (unheard of with print books), and then make a commission. On a $5.99 sale I refer, I earn a $4.19 royalty and another 4% from the Associates Program, or about 24 cents. That brings my total to $4.43 on a book that sells for just $5.99. That’s 74% — not a bad profit margin for a book!

Here’s another little secret about those affiliate programs: when people use the link on your blog or Facebook page to buy your book, you’ll also make a commission on anything else they buy during that visit. When I looked closely at my affiliate sales report, I noticed that I was making money for music downloads, kitchen gadgets and other items, none of which I promoted. People who go to get my book apparently buy other things at the same time, and I get paid. Every little bit helps.

Note: Amazon does not accept affiliates in certain states, in which case you can use Barnes and Noble’s Affiliate Program and make 6% on sales of your own books, on top of your royalties.

2. Sell more by yourself

It’s nice to have bookstores selling your book even while you sleep, but you might get a dollar or less on each sale as your royalty. If you buy your books wholesale from your publisher and sell them on your own, you can make as much as $10 on a book with a $19.95 cover price.

[bctt tweet=”Buy your books wholesale from your publisher & sell them on your own to make a profit.”]

Some authors find it very profitable to sell their books at speaking engagements and other public functions. Despite being a very social person, I don’t like being in the spotlight. But if you’re out there doing presentations and promoting your book, bring plenty of copies to sell.

You can also ship books yourself. Once in a while, someone wants to buy a book from me directly, so I tell them to send a check. You could choose to do this even when selling your books through social media or by other means. Even if you pay the shipping charges, you make more than your usual royalty by buying wholesale and selling at full retail.

3. Make self-published books smaller

A traditional publisher pays you a set percentage as a royalty. On the other hand, if you use a publish-on-demand (POD) company to do it yourself, your profit is whatever is left over after your cost-per-book is deducted from the wholesale price book vendors pay for it. And there’s a reasonable limit to what you can ask for a book. That’s why smaller books make sense.

For example, if your book retails for $14.95, and book sellers pay $7.47 for it, and your cost is $7.37, you’ll make all of ten cents per sale. But if you cut the size of the book down so your cost is just $5.47, you’ll be making $2.00 per copy — twenty times as much!

I’ve self-published two books for $9.95 that each make more profit per sale than a book I sell for $14.95. That one was too big, and I’ve learned from my mistake.

Sometimes it’s hard to reduce that word count, but keep the cost of production in mind as you write. Nonfiction can always be more concise. If it is fiction, consider breaking a good story into two books in a series instead of one long one.

4. Cut costs on traditionally published books

With Wiley, I had negotiated away the clause in the contract that required me to buy some copies. Authors typically pay their publisher 50% of the cover price, and to buy 100 copies, as Wiley wanted me to do, would have eaten up a sizeable chunk of my advance.

Of course, I still needed to buy some copies for friends, family and promotional giveaways in my newsletters, so I went to Amazon and discovered two very interesting facts.

First, I found that, unlike books bought wholesale through your publisher, an author’s retail purchases are part of various book industry sales statistics, like those used to put together best-sellers lists. Apparently buying your own books is a controversial marketing practice, but it isn’t illegal.

Even if buying copies of your book doesn’t push it onto any top-10 list other than some obscure sub-category on Amazon, the numbers matter. Libraries, for example, try to stock popular titles, and your purchases might push your book one copy past whatever threshold they use to determine what’s popular.

The second thing I discovered is that it can be cheaper to buy from Amazon than from my publisher. With shipping, I would have paid over $10 each to get my books from Wiley, and I wouldn’t earn royalties on these wholesale purchases (I asked, of course). But when new books are released, Amazon tries to have the lowest price online, and you can use that to your advantage.

For a while, Amazon sold my book for $11.30, which is quite a discount from the $19.95 cover price. I bought enough copies to get free shipping, and I made a royalty of $1.50 on each one. That brought my total net cost down to $9.80 per book, 50 cents less than the per-book cost of $10.30 or so I would have paid (with shipping) to get them from my publisher.

You have to do this shortly after publication, because that’s when Amazon will have their lowest price. Buy as many books as you think you will need all at once too, to get free shipping and to boost that sales ranking.

Alas, it is against Amazon’s rules to use your own affiliate link to buy from them, or I would have gotten another 45 cents back on each book.

Yes, oddly, you can buy at retail for less than wholesale, and also get statistical credit for these sales. Keep that trick in mind, especially if you need a few hundred copies of your book for speaking engagements. The less you pay, the more money you make.

How do you maximize your profit from each book you sell?