Are you looking for blog writing jobs?
No. I’m not talking about the prolific Craigslist ads and content-mill stuff that pays $5 to $10 per blog post.
If those are the types of writing jobs you’ve been chasing, it’s time to get some new clients. You can do better.
If you ask the Interwebs, there’s an estimated 400 million blogs online. Sure, lots of those are dead sites or personal blogs with pictures of kids, cats, and crafts. And you won’t find any writing jobs there. But there are blog writing jobs that pay.
Do a little digging, and you’ll find business blogs in virtually any niche designed to engage readers, drive website traffic, and promote a product or service. You’ll also find niche news-style blogs that operate similar to a newspaper or magazine.
Both of these types of blog writing jobs are money for the serious freelancer. Why? Well-run blogs publish frequently and need content. That means one blog writing assignment can easily turn into a regular gig.
Looking for more blog writing jobs? Check out this list of 10 sites that pay $75 and up per assignment.
1. Elite Personal Finance
If you want to write for Elite Personal Finance, there’s two things you’ll need to know. First, you’ll need to know the ins and outs of finance, credit, home loans, ways to make money online, identify theft, or investing. And second, you’ll need to know how to write for millennials, the site’s target audience.
- Pays: $100 per assignment
- Guidelines: 1,000 to 3,000 words
- Tip: Pitch a guest post idea from the list of accepted topics, and increase your chances of acceptance with an original image or artwork.
2. Freelance Mom
You don’t have to be a mom to write for this site (dad’s can write for this site, too). But you do need to know what it’s like to balance taking care of kids, freelancing, and running your own business. Your personal story and experience can help connect you with readers, but your guest post needs to be more than a this-happened-to-me story.
- Pays: $75 to $100 per guest post
- Guidelines: 900 to 1,500 words
- Tip: Increase your chances of acceptance by including a 30-minute action plan with your guest post, or pitch a how-to or lessons-learned post related to freelancing.
3. Knitty
Here’s a niche blog for knitters who are passionate about knitting patterns, clothing design, new and emerging fiber materials, techniques and innovations in knitting, and more. You can get paid for guest post tutorials about knitting-related topics that teach readers new skills or techniques, or earn by sharing original knitting patterns.
- Pays: $120 to $200
- Guidelines: 1,000 to 2,000 words
- Tip: Include original photos with your guest post tutorial pitch to increase your chance of acceptance. Knitty, also publishes the blog KnittySpin for people who enjoy handspun knitting. Editor Jillian Moreno recently wrote about the difference between combo-draft and combo-spin knitting.
4. List Verse
Chances are pretty good you’ve been sucked into reading a curious list post about something you stumbled upon online. Right? Ever thought about writing one of those list posts yourself about something you’re curious about?
That’s exactly the kind of stuff List Verse publishes…list posts about things like “10 Fake Viral News Stories From The Early 20th Century,” “10 Forgotten People Who Nearly Changed The Course Of History,” “10 Fascinating Facts About Surgery,” and many more.
- Pays: $100 per list post
- Guidelines: Pitch with a completed and original list post that includes at least 10 pieces of information
- Tip: The more offbeat, novel, or interesting, the more likely your post will be accepted.
5. Make a Living Writing
What do you know about the business and craft of freelance writing? If you’ve been around the block a few times, or you’re new to freelancing, and learned a valuable lesson to grow your business, land new clients, use social media for marketing, or make more money, pitch a guest post idea to share your tip with other writers. It’s the reason Carol Tice created the blog in the first place…help writers move up, earn more, and make a living writing.
- Pays: $75 to $100 per guest post.
- Guidelines: 1,000-plus words per guest post with actionable advice other writers can follow
- Tip: Study the blog and guidelines before pitching. Typically publishes 2-3 paid guest posts a month. Screen shots, social proof, and/or video related to your post increases your chance of acceptance. If English is your second language, read this before pitching.
6. The Penny Hoarder
Be frugal. Spend wisely. Save for the future. Earn more money. Enjoy your life. That’s what The Penny Hoarder Founder and CEO Kyle Taylor envisioned helping people with when he launched this personal finance site 10 years ago. Now it’s one of the most widely-read personal finance blogs on the Internet.
If you want to write for The Penny Hoarder, here’s what Kyle is looking for in a pitch: “We’re looking for freelance writers who have fun, unique ideas for earning or saving money. We’d love to hear your personal experience, especially if you can share detailed numbers, strategies, and advice.”
- Pays: $75 and up per guest post
- Guidelines: 700 to 900 words
- Tip: Increase your chance of acceptance by pitching a guest post about unique jobs/ways to make money, eating/travel on a budget, guides to earning and saving.
7. Priceonomics
How much is that doggy in the window? No not just the price tag. What’s the cost of breeding, medical care, food and shelter, and advertising that determines the price of the dog? If you can think like that and find the answers, you can write for Priceonomics, a data-driven news site founded by Rohin Dhar.
A couple recent blog posts to get your creative-data brain going include: “The States with the Worst Eating and Exercise Habits in America,” “Here’s How Much Your Healthcare Costs Rise as You Age,” and “Why Security Breaches Just Keep Getting Bigger and More Expensive.”
- Pays: $250 to $1,000 per assignment
- Guidelines: Depends on assignment
- Tip: Pitch a plan to write one of the nine story ideas on the guidelines page. Include a brief bio about yourself, and link to your most popular published credit online.
8. Pxleyes
If you know your way around the Adobe Suite of software products like PhotoShop, Illustrator, Fireworks, or InDesign, the image-editing software GIMP, or software-based graphic design tools, you can write a tutorial about how to perform a specific task or project and get paid. Check out these creative tutorials for examples and ideas before pitching.
- Pays: $200 per tutorial
- Guidelines: Step-by-step tutorial to complete a task using graphic-design software
- Tip: Review examples before developing original tutorial idea.
9. Refinery 29
If you can already riff on fashion trends, celebrity tattoo gossip, shopping and make-up must-haves, career moves, relationships, movie pics, and the kind of stuff girlfriends like to talk about, you already know what the Refinery 29 audience wants. Or if you don’t know all the nitty gritty right now, you at least know who to call and where to go to get the scoop and pitch a guest post idea to Refinery 29.
- Pays: $75 and up per assignment
- Guidelines: Based on assignment
- Tip: Refinery 29 Editor Neha Gandhi wants guest post pitches about pop culture in South Korea, bargain shopping stories, tips and hacks, and college-campus-life trends and issues.
10. Yummy Mummy Club
There’s a lot that goes into being a mom. And if you don’t keep yourself in check, it’s easy to become a husk of your pre-babies self. That’s usually a recipe for feeling frustrated, unfulfilled, frustrated, conflicted. It’s exactly why the Yummy Mummy Club was born. If you’ve got advice to share with soon-to-be-moms or moms raising kids, this is the place to turn your wisdom, heartache, and life experience into a paid assignment.
Pays:$100 per guest post
Guidelines: Based on assignment
Tip: Read the submission guidelines and pitch an idea based on the Yummy Mummy Club editorial calendar.
Get more blog writing jobs
If you want to land more blog writing jobs, there’s a basic process you should follow.
- Study the blog. Read a dozen or more blog posts on the site and get familiar with the content.
- Pay attention to the headlines, lede paragraphs, writing style, and target audience. Bonus points if you can pick out key phrases. Note: Blog posts tend to have more subheads, pull quotes, bulleted lists, and graphic elements than traditional news writing.
- Generate blog post ideas. Come up with a fresh idea for a guest post. Write a working headline and brief summary. Craft the headline with a key phrase that gets search traffic.
- Pitch the editor. Write a letter of introduction or query letter and pitch your guest post ideas to the editor. Yes, directly to the editor, not the generic editor@ black-hole-email address.
- Tip: Many blogs don’t publish submission guidelines, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hire freelancers to write blog posts. Find a blog in your niche that looks like a potential client, and pitch the editor.
Blog writing jobs can be a great way to boost your income, because effective blogs publish at least once a week or more. Want to make a living writing? Go get a new blog writing client.
Need helping landing blog-writing jobs? Let’s discuss in the comments below.
Evan Jensen is the blog editor for Make a Living Writing. When he’s not on a writing deadline, or catching up on emails, he’s training to run another 100-mile ultramarathon.
