My Journey to Freelance Writing Success

My name is Tom Nyarunda, a Christian, a husband and a father. I am a trained counseling psychologist, preacher and motivational speaker, but I work full-time as a freelance writer.

My journey in freelance writing began accidentally some time in 2012 or thereabouts. I had seen many advertisements and pop ups on my computer about online product surveys and basically that’s what introduced me to online work. I got interested but most companies seemed to work in the United States and so I decided to ask a friend who lived there whether they were genuine.

My friend advised me to start doing freelance writing

The friend told me to forget about online surveys and instead try freelance writing, and that’s the first time I heard of that word. Since he didn’t do it, he gave me the email address of this friend and told me to ask him about it. I wrote an email to the friend of my friend, and all he did was send me a link to what used to be www.getafreelancer.com, now www.freelancer.com.

Once I visited the site, I tried and finally registered. I learned how to place bids. About 2 months into the registration, I saw a job advert. The client preferred a Seventh-day Adventist (I’m one) and I jumped at the opportunity.

The Bulgarian lady hired me and gave me a re-writing task. I honestly told her I was completely green in the field. She was very kind and showed me what to do. Of course later I got into article writing.

The most I was earning per article was $3 per 500 words

For a number of years I worked at Freelancer, getting clients and losing some. While I worked for hours on end, the highest amount of money I earned per article was $3 for a 500 word article.

I finally got a client who gave me so much work that I stopped bidding for about four years. I thought I was lucky to have non-stop work. But the problem was I did too many articles to survive. Apart from not having time for myself, I literally lived from hand to mouth.

I was earning at most $600 per month, but I was working way too much

By the beginning of 2017 I was so tired of the state of affairs. The best I could ever do working from sunrise to sunset (literally), five days a week, was at most $600 monthly. At the beginning of 2017, I started searching for something better and decided sign up to Upwork.

For a while, nothing was forthcoming. Sometime in May 2017 I saw an advert by FreelancerKenya on Facebook and in my mind I thought I could also register and start placing bids.

Once I discovered that FreelancerKenya offers training on freelance writing, I took time debating whether I really needed the training because I “knew” I was experienced. In July I read about a lady who was earning $400 a week after the training and decided to give it a try.

I got one tough client…and Upwork suspended my account

I registered for the training in August 2017 and completed it. The best thing I learned was that I didn’t have to rely on content mills to get jobs.

While on training, I was hired by a local writing company that was paying $3.5 for 500 words. The client was so tough. He would reject work at the slightest chance, such as when you were not available to make an immediate correction.

While still at it, I received a notification from Upwork that my account had been suspended due to sending too many proposals without being hired. It was sad, but Walter encouraged me to use the other methods in the course. To go straight for the direct clients.

It felt like heaven came down. I earn up to $75 per 500 words

So in September 2017, I started cold-pitching, which I learned in Walter’s course. In the process of searching, I came to learn about blockchain and cryptocurrency.

I got my first job in December 2017, writing for an American company, Cryptosumer, where I wrote using their pen name. I wrote for them at the rate of $0.04 per word, making it $20 for 500 words and that was like heaven come down for me.

Since February 2018, I have written for a number of clients that I contacted through Reddit. The prices have been ranging from $0.04 to $0.15 per word, meaning I earn from $20 to $75 for a 500 word article. The best thing about Reddit is they don’t accept job adverts that pay less than $0.05 per word to freelancers.

My big breakthrough

My big breakthrough came partially in May 2018 when I was hired by a company in Hong Kong, Bitrates, to write a news article daily at $30 for a 300 word article. I worked there for 3 months.

In the middle of August 2018, I saw an advert in Reddit for a cryptocurrency journalist. Thankfully, I got hired and in September I earned 0.19 Bitcoin, which was the equivalent of $1200 or KSh. 120,000. In October 2018, I earned 0.41 Bitcoin which at the time was equivalent to $2600 USD or Ksh. 260,000.

My current workload…no more donkey work!

I currently write an average of 3 to 4 news articles daily, taking me three to four hours. I make between $90 and $120 daily, five days a week. I want to sincerely thank Brother Walter for his course that opened my eyes. I encourage everyone who is struggling that you don’t have to take the long route that I took.

Brother Walter, thank you and God bless you most sincerely. To my comrades, you can do this.

Regards,

Tom Nyarunda