• Tweet

Recently, I found myself in quite the mess. I had been down as many of my clients seemed to, not abandon me, yet, just didn’t seem to have any work that needing completing. My freelance writing income came to a dead stand still, and after some expensive weekends I was finding my wallet left without much to draw.

I decided that now would be the time to go out and look for some new clients. Normally, when my work comes to a standstill like this, I head to forums and post the type of writing I can do, as well as listing a price well below the normal project fees I prefer to work for. Generally, the work on these forums is quite easy, so the time saved from lighter research generally makes up for the absence of higher project costs.

Despite listing what I enjoy writing, I get all sorts of offers on other niches people need articles written for. One of the first projects thrown at me after waiting a few hours for a response is something I absolute dread writing on. The project was worth a lot of money though, and I need that. I emailed the client back saying I’d take it.

I got to work. Two hours later, I was only 500 words in on a 5000 word project. This isn’t my typical magazine article or heavily researched sales copy that I need to write. This is a niche article for a blog with light SEO work applied. Why is it taking me so long to do this? The problem lies in that I hate writing on this niche.

It’s a boring niche. There are hundreds of articles on this niche already, so making anything new and exciting on it is a nearly impossible task. I hate the subject matter and the blandness of it all. It’s like toilet-fodder to me.

This 1 day project took me 3 days. It was a lot of forcing myself. I had to play games to keep my mind focused on writing these ‘damn’ articles instead of popping open Call of Duty 4 (excellent game, by the way). I should have been able to do this? within 5 hours, yet instead, I sat confounded in the depths of my own boredom trudging away, key by key, the words… the 5000 words that felt like 5 million… on a topic I just despise.

My lesson to myself: Don’t take freelance writing projects you can’t stand. It is pointless. An hour after I picked up this project, I got another one on a niche that I practically live off. I actually finished it in between the project I hated. While getting paid in the end was nice, I wanted to punch myself in the face for doing something so ignorant. Next time someone wants that niche written, I’m charging 3 times my normal rate.

A better choice would just be not to write on it ever again. And I don’t think I will. Follow suit.