When Good Enough is Good Enough: Part 3

Unfortunately, writing large quantities of text for somewhat small amounts of money means that you need to cut time out of your writing process somewhere in order to stay competitive. There are many different ways that you can cut time out of your process, and it's important to choose ones that you're comfortable with.

There's something that you need to be aware of, though: you're cutting corners. Often, you'll be intentionally doing work that is not as great as it could be. This might make you sick, it might make you regret taking on this job, and it might make you question your abilities as a writer. But if you want to profit from this ground level of freelance writing, then there is something you must do:

Suck it up.

There are a number of different places in which you can cut time out of your process:

• Editing: skim content through Microsoft Office and fix only those things which Office flags as being incorrect. (Often, employers will only be looking for this anyway, especially if they are non-native English speakers.)

• Formatting: save all of it for completion.

• Multiple files: write all of your content in one large file, and break it up later. This way, you don't have to deal with losing your writing flow to create a new file.

• Don't sweat the details: so long as the piece meets requirements for keywords and length, don't worry about the quality any more than is necessary to make sure its readable.

• Time limits: if it isn't perfect after your article time interval has elapsed, then too bad. Fix it later if there's time, but don't compromise your working speed for effort that will go both unnoticed and unpaid.

In the end, you're the ultimate arbiter on when something is good enough for publication. You should note, again, that these rules apply only when your name is not attached to the product.