So, guess who is a professional playwright now?

I got into the one-act thang a bit late. Having been penning and publishing short stories first and foremost in my illustrious career (it’s only illustrious to me, believe me) it didn’t take all that much time to be able to claim being a pro writer and seeing the coin from it (jingly change though it was). It had less to do with how wonderful my writing was then the fact that I really began all this stuff in earnest penning 800 # pre-recorded phone-sex scripts and being paid for them from the get go. I did spend the requisite time in the trenches sending out my sci-fi short stories, essays, etc. (and still do in fact) but for the most part when I began writing sex (and that was pretty damn early in my writing career) I got paid for it relatively quickly, so I was a pro none too long into the effort.

The SEO thang and the play writing seemed to have begun for me in earnest at the same time-though one has nothing to do with the other-and having just had a one-act run (or “go up” as we pros call it in the business) in the great city of Portland, OR and been paid for that effort (and my first time being so) I can now say I am a professional playwright. Which now leads me to (after all the bragging) my point for this installment.

Gotta get paid.

It doesn’t always happen and I am not saying only ever do this writing thing for the money, but truly if you want to make a living at this or at least earn some sort of self respect at it and maybe the respect of your peers, nothing emboldens one better then getting coin of the realm for your hard earned efforts. Which brings me to my point about SEO writing (see, you didn’t think I could tie it all in, did you?). As we all know from searching for work, there are plenty of places that are looking for written content and a good many of them on line. Most, if not all, businesses know about or have heard rumblings over what SEO is and want to have some of it on their site.  And because this writing is specialized-sorry, but not everybody can do it or do it well-the owners of the sites usually-and that’s usually with a big “ually”-know they must pay for a writer to write SEO. Now what they pay will vary and often they will attempt to low ball you on a price, as mostly everyone these days will for any and all services, so the more you can bring to the table about SEO-knowing what meta-tags are, knowing where to research keywords, how to monitor analytics to assure the client you are doing your job-the more valuable you are and the more you can demanded.

So I guess really this time out I want to impress you with a few things. One, it’s good to get paid for your writing, even if it is just a little bit and secondly, you can get more than just a little bit the more valuable you are to who hires you. My playwriting now, in the beginning stages though it is, is now just a tinge more valuable in the overall objective scheme of things because I have had a few plays produced at this writing and I have been paid now to do so. So getting paid, while not the reason we right, does help put food on the table and some crack into the old pipe.

Go forth and play this stage called life my little droogs with your writing wares and unlimited desire for abuse.

where it all happened, by the way can be seen here:

 

(Technorati code: ZNG4R4NEH8PA)