Side Jobs That Help You Improve Your Writing Skills

It seems with the arrival of the digital age everyone's got something to say. Words are everywhere. Social media platforms are plastered with words. Online news sites are popping up every day, real and fake, featuring some writer who wants to be your go to person on the scene. And who doesn't know someone who has published a book on Amazon's Kindle platform? Yet, this isn't necessarily a bad thing. With the internet age, a lot more people are able to realize writing is their dream.

While everyone has something to say, as a writer, your goal is to get them to listen. Here are some side jobs that may actually help you improve your writing skills so your words are more than just more words.

1. Courtroom Stenographer

A courtroom stenographer goes through approximately six months of training before they're let loose to record every word uttered in the courtroom. As you're wondering how this helps you as a writer, you're also being impatient.

As a stenographer, you learn to listen to the details and capture them as you hear them. What this can do for you is help you develop dialogue with your characters if you're aspiring to be a fiction writer. Even if you're not, it's an experience worth writing about.

2. Blogging

Blogging has been big for over a decade now. It started with mommies sharing best child rearing practices and evolved into a platform for radical ideas regarding the current and biggest social issues. And yes, you can make money blogging.

Medium is a community of bloggers, and the company pays out writers every month, and they don't even have to have experience. It's a creative and crazy concept, but it seems to work. If you want to know if you're writing is good, see how your paycheck grows as you hone your skills from month to month.

3. Content Writer

You don't have to have a degree to be a content writer, though there's no denying it helps. Entry-level positions can be had as long as you can prove you have a good grasp on grammar, sentence structure and the ability to organize your thoughts into coherent paragraphs.

Best of all, as a freelancer, you can write as little or much as you like. As your writing improves, you'll be offered better writing gigs.

4. Self-Publisher

That wasn't really a jab at Amazon's Kindle program in the introductory paragraph. Actually, the KDP program Amazon offers has opened the doors to success for many writers who now earn a living self-publishing on Amazon.

Your first step into that program is to write something. It can be a collection of poetry, a novel, short stories, a self-help book, or even dirty romance. It seems they'll accept almost anything. That doesn't guarantee your success. If you're a terrible writer you'll get bashed in your ratings.

Once your written piece is complete, you upload it to the Amazon KDP publishing site, and they'll help you design a book cover and get it into their inventory. They even have marketing tools you can utilize, which you're going to have to do if you want anyone to find it.

5. Enter Competitions

There are a plethora of paper magazines and online magazines taking entries for writing competitions. Even your local city library has some type of competition. Entering a competition can be a rewarding experience, especially if you win a prize.

Entering competitions can also help you gain confidence in your writing skills. When people start writing they may hold back a bit at first, so getting your work read is important to achieving that confidence that you're in control of what you write, and it's possible the more outrageous it is, the more people will enjoy it. That might also work against you. Being outrageous is a talent you either have or you don't.

If you're a budding writer, there's really nothing stopping you from getting out there and writing, except maybe yourself. Put down your phone and dust off the laptop. It's time to get busy.