Are you a student, fresh graduate, aspiring journalist or freelance writer hoping to get hired by a magazine, newspaper, distinguished publishing house or get freelancing writing jobs?
The most important thing for aspiring freelance writers is to gain real-world experience and writing credentials.
The publishing world is a highly competitive industry. A great many students graduate each year but only a few manage to get the jobs they desire.

In this guide, we’ll share tips on how to get published online, gain writing experience and writing credentials which will help you impress your future employers and increase your chances of landing your dream job.

TIP 1: Self-Publish Your Articles Online

If you haven’t gotten published anywhere online, start by publishing your articles yourself!
Create a free blog where you feature your best articles to demonstrate your writing skills.
When contacting potential employers, you can include a link to your blog where they can get a taste of your writing style and skill.

Don’t make this your personal blog with “Facebook” style updates about everything you ate and saw on the subway.
Keep this blog professional, publish only articles you are truly proud of. This is your writing portfolio.

I recommend you create a blog specific to the topic you’re most interested in writing about.
If you are an article writer who’s skilled in research and can write about any topic, this is a great skill to demonstrate by creating (5 or more) separate blogs each on a different topic.

The best free blogging platforms which are easy to use and offer the best functionalities are WordPress.com, Blogspot.com, Tumblr.com and Weebly.com

TIP 2: Become a Guest Writer on a Popular Website or Blog

One of the best writing credentials is having your article published on a reputable website or blog.
Many websites are eager to accept articles by “guest writers” in order to grow their website with more content.
Some websites have a page for guest writers to submit articles, while others who don’t mention accepting articles from guest writers may still publish an article you send to them if it is well written and a valuable contribution to their site.

How to become a guest writer?
The first step to becoming a guest writer (also known as contributing writer) is to search Google for phrases such as “become a guest writer”.
You will likely find many websites in search of guest writers.

Another method is to search Google for popular websites on the theme you are most interested in writing about.
Almost every website will have a contact form or a contact email address.
Once you find a suitable target website, reach out to the website owner through the contact form.

Write a polite letter introducing yourself, listing your skills, your most notable achievements, and telling them how you’d like to contribute an article you’ve written which you think would interest their readers.
Include a link to your article (you can upload the PDF or word document on Google drive, Dropbox, WeTransfer etc.).

Always remember to be polite and friendly when contacting website owners.
Keep in mind that it’s a numbers game. Some won’t receive your email, some won’t answer, some will decline your offer and some will gladly accept your article. It’s those who accept your article who matter.

Even if after 2 days of sending out emails you only get published on 4 websites, if those websites are important ones, that’s great for your CV!

Having your articles published on high-authority websites which receive a lot of traffic may even help you be found and hired by future employers.
Always make sure to ask the website publishing your articles to include an “about you” section, your contacts or a link/s to your website.

TIP 3: Get an Internship at a Magazine, Press or Publishing House

You’re never too old to apply for an internship at a magazine. I recommend that you apply to as many magazines (in the industry in which you’re interested in working) as possible. Most of the large magazines receive hundreds of internship applications. Apply to both large and small magazines and presses.
Increase your chances of landing an internship by having an impressive CV and writing credentials.
Part-time internships are great as you may be able to juggle 2 internships at the same time and gain even more credentials for your CV.

TIP 4: Publish Your Articles Online on Article Sites

There are platforms such as EzineArticles, ArticlesBase etc. where any freelance writer can join and publish their articles.
By submitting your articles to these platforms, you stand the chance that website owners in search of content may come across your article and republish it on their website.

There are a lot of badly written articles on these sites. If your article is high quality and if you submit multiple articles to these platforms, your chances of being found and republished on other websites will be higher.
Keep track of which websites republish your articles and if the website looks or sounds important, add them to your credentials.

You can find a list of the best article sites by searching Google for “best article sites 2017”.
I hope these tips help you! Feel free to leave a comment if you have any ideas you’d like to share.