Freelance Editing / Proofreading

[n4056175]

Hello all,

I am a 26 year old accountant from Australia who is interested in escaping from the financial world and breaking into the industry as a freelance proofreader or editor. Would anyone have any suggestions regarding how to do this?

I have offered my services free of charge to my local newspaper and applied for a couple of online advertisements but without the experience behind me am not having much luck.

Any suggestions you might have would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

Emma Walker
exceptionalediting@westnet.com.au

[gpuss]

Hello, n4056175 (noobish? - I can't work that one out )

In the section in which you posted (The business ...) there are a few threads where people have discussed such problems (e.g. viewtopic.php?f=7&t=356) and it's something we all have to tackle at the start. I always say that a small percentage of people you contact will have work, so the more you contact, the better; of course you could get lucky with your choices or have no luck at all.

A good starting point is to seek out spelling errors that have made it to print/web, and point them out to the owner, offering to correct any future output as it can be pretty embarrassing for those concerned. Way back when, I googled "proffessionalism" and sent the resulting site owners a messages saying: "Do you give two Fs for professionalism?" Those who understood the joke responded quite positively and it did lead to some work.

[KellyNicholls]

Gpuss - that is a great line ('Do you give two Fs for professioanlism?')!

Emma - with the little experience you have I think your best bet may be what you are doing - offering your services for free - in order to build up your experience. It may be worth offering to help students at your local university (especially international students) who would benefit from your proofreading/editing skills.

[n4056175]

Hi Kelly and gpuss,

Thanks very much for your responses. I've been looking around various forums and have had a few people take up my 'freebie' offer. I've also had one offer to proofread some articles for a small fee. After only trying for about a week or so I think things are looking pretty good.

There is a local newspaper published in my hometown which has absolutely atrocious spelling. I wrote to the editor pointing out all the mistakes I could find and again offering a 'freebie'. He didn't take me up on it but seemed appreciative of my email - I got the impression that someone is going to get their butt kicked.

Hopefully, this will all lead to some good experience which could then increase my chances. In the meantime, I get to read a whole lot of interesting literature!

Thanks again,
Emma
(FYI - n4056175 was my student code from university all those years ago. I use it when I create online accounts in a lot of places because it's unique to me and my name 'Emma Walker' is quite common )

[KellyNicholls]

Oh, I'm glad you're feeling confident. I find that proofreading can be a hard slog at times - working alone, the uncertainty of work etc - and so I am glad that I have found like-minded people on this forum that I can share with and bounce ideas off. You'll have to keep us updated on your progress.

Good luck with it all and stay positive!

[gpuss]

It's weird that someone would not take you up on an offer to do work for free. The only reasons I can think of are confidentiality and a feeling that "if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is." Were you explicit in saying why you wanted to do it? (You could point them to this forum and this thread if you think it might help.) And if you can offer your assurance of confidentiality, it could help too. They might want to protect their scoops!