A year ago, I wrote exclusively for print publications. I suspect that many freelance writers (and photographers and designers) are in the same boat — print is where the money is, and it’s what we’re used to doing.

However, today, I write exclusively for online publications. I’ve completely transitioned from print, and I couldn’t be happier.

Why did I make the transition? A number of reasons, actually:

1. Writing for blogs and websites is less work per article. Doing research for a magazine article can take a week or two. Even a freelance newspaper feature takes a day or two of tracking down sources, getting interviews, etc. But writing a blog post? I mainly write from my own experiences — you can say that’s 17 years of freelancing research, but all of that’s already done. And if I do additional research, it’s online or through email — not a difficult proposition.
2. It’s much more flexible. With print publications, you’ve got a set number of words (or inches). If you go over that amount, there’ll most likely be some cutting. In print, if you’re out of room, you’re out of room. There are also much stricter publishing deadlines in print. But on the web, if you go a few paragraphs over or under, no one cares. You generally have to stay within a certain range of course — they’re not going to pay you for one paragraph, and no one wants to read a novel-length article. But if you don’t hit extremes, you’re fine. And while blogs generally like to stick to certain publishing schedules, they don’t fold if they miss a post. So although I don’t recommend that you bust deadlines, if you have a good working relationship with an editor, there’s more wiggle room.
3. It pays more per hour. While you might get paid less per article (though not always), online articles generally don’t take as long, as there is usually less research involved (as mentioned above). So I can usually crank out more articles writing for online publications.
4. I set my own topics. With print publications, I’m often given a topic to write about. Sure, I can make suggestions, but it’s not really my decision. With blogs such as FreelanceSwitch, they generally trust me to make good decisions about the article topics, so I can set my own topics — and that means I’m writing about stuff that interests me. That shows in the writing.
5. The people I work with are exciting. While I worked with some great editors in print publications, there’s no doubt that bloggers in particular seem especially passionate and positive about their work. Collis and Cyan of FreelanceSwitch, for example, are among the two most encouraging, positive, excited and professional people I’ve ever worked with. Many other bloggers are just as passionate. That makes it a joy to do the work.
6. Everything is done online. I used to hate all the phone calls I had to make to work on print articles, not to mention the in-person interviews that had to be set up. Now, I can work through email, and through online applications, and everything is much easier and more fun.

If these reasons are compelling enough to prompt you to want to make the transition to online writing, you’ll probably be asking yourself how to go about it.

It’s not difficult, but if you follow my plan, don’t expect the transition to be instantaneous. I made a deliberately gradual transition, over the period of a few months, and I recommend a similar process.

For one thing, if you’re not so desperate to get online writing gigs write away, you are in a better negotiating position. Nothing is worse for negotiating than desperation and urgency. And if you do well with one or two online gigs, you’ll be able to point to those and show other online publications or blogs that you are well suited for the job.

Here’s the plan I recommend:

1. Target a few blogs and make contact. I picked a handful of blogs on topics I’d love to write about, that seemed to use freelance writers. I then contacted them, with a brief email letting them know who I was and the kind of writing I do, and asking if they’re interested in using me as a freelancer. The responses were very positive from most blogs I contacted.
2. Start writing a few posts a week, and drop some print work. After a few emails working out the details with these blogs, I set up a schedule where I wrote a few posts a week. My initial rate for these posts were at the lower end of my rate spectrum. It was a testing ground for me, feeling out the market, testing to see how I liked writing for these blogs, seeing how the new writing fit in with my schedule. To make room for them, I cut back on writing print articles a little.
3. Use those first posts to get new gigs. With the success of my first few batches of posts, I was able to point to them to get more work. If you make sure to do an outstanding job with each post, you shouldn’t have a hard time finding work. I wrote to a few more blogs (bigger ones this time) to see if they’d be interested.
4. Repeat, increasing your rate and getting better gigs. Every couple of months, I raised my rates, so that now I’m getting the rates I wanted. I also eliminated some of the blogs that didn’t pay well or required too much work. It was a gradual process of improving my writing commitments and rates.
5. Slowly get out of your print commitments. As I increased my online writing, I gradually dropped all of my print writing commitments. It actually felt great to notify my print editors that I wouldn’t be able to write for them anymore!
6. Enjoy. Today, I make more money than before, working much less than before. I am less stressed, and more passionate about my writing. Not a single complaint. I hope it works out for you too!