How did you become a self-sustained writer?
Many people have asked me this over the past forty years, so I have created a short answer: eighty percent luck, twenty percent pluck, and ten percent talent. The percentages may change depending on how much wine I’ve had — more wine, more luck — but the idea remains.
A longer answer might be more helpful. In many says I made my luck by being in the right places in the right times, and I was born with pluck, the son of depression-era parents who placed a high premium on hard work and ethics.
I also knew when I started that I needed a helluva lot of help. I asked the owner of a small PR firm to review my prose and he did and favored me with a small assignment for which he paid me an embarrassing pittance. He was satisfied enough to refer me to the VP of a large ad agency who agreed to review my work, and he was impressed enough to refer me to another small writing service that needed someone with industry experience. The owner favored me with a few small trial gigs and, when I completed them to her satisfaction — I’d be embarrassed to read them today, 40 years later — she showered me with work and eventually hired me.
She won with my industry expertise, I won with her writing and marketing expertise, and I learned that most people want to offer advice and help if asked. Which brings me to my specific answer to this article:
1. Study my books, The Power of Being Articulate and The Power of Writing Well. Articulate explains why writing/communicating is key to wealth and happiness, Writing Well how to create prose that places you above the norm and attracts paying assignments, your ultimate goal.
2. Send your best samples to local editors and creative directors at agencies (use full names and titles) and ask them to critique. Many will respond: it’s true that no temptation is so great as the temptation to critique another person’s work.
3. Call the person who was most positive and offer to take on a small assignment in return for more critique, not cash. It’s your best way to not only improve your writing but also to learn what sells, and it’s the critiquer’s best way to train a new employee. Another win-win.
A CEO of a huge conglomerate expands on these thoughts in the preface of Articulate:
Throughout recorded history, many thinkers have noted the importance of being articulate and the power of words; you’ll find a few of their comments in the book. Pete, however, goes a giant step further by connecting articulation to wealth and happiness, and to the clear thinking and better decisions that thwart mediocrity. He quite correctly points out that we think in words, and we need more words to think with as the issues we need to resolve become more complex, as they do as we rise in any organization and as our close relationships mature.
Pete has successfully and clearly connected wealth, happiness, and words with compelling evidence. Now you can make the same connections, and you can follow his succinct guidelines and become a true Articulate.
