8 Ways To Make Money With Your Short Stories, Poems, and Personal Essays

by | Submit Your Writing, Submitting Your Poetry | 6 comments

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Deadline: Thursday, February 22nd

Poets and short story writers rarely fill their bank accounts by publishing their writing in traditional literary journal markets. But there are some ways to make money on your poetry, short stories, and personal essays without sacrificing the quality of your writing. Just how much money you’ll make as a writer is up to you. Check out our tips!

How To Make Money Writing—And Publishing—Poetry, Short Stories, And Personal Essays

Enter creative writing contests offering cash prizes. Many writing contests hosted by reputable organizations offer cash prizes. Although you might have to pay an entry fee, winning could reward you tenfold. And guess what—it may be easier to win a writing contest than you think!

Search for paying markets for your short stories, poems, and narrative nonfiction. While most don’t have the budget to pay writers, there are a number of literary journals and magazines that are able to pay writers for poetry, short stories, and personal essays. However, it will take time and lots of research to find them. Read through submission guidelines to see if the literary markets you’re targeting will pay to publish your work.

Think outside your genre box. Poets can make money by submitting their work to greeting card companies. Story writers and essayists can submit to niche magazines that accept freelance queries. Just remember: If you want to entice an editor to publish your creative writing in a magazine that isn’t solely dedicated to creative writing, the shorter your submission, the better!

Apply for grants. The government and some philanthropic organizations regularly offer grants to writers of both fiction and nonfiction. Learn how to apply for a grant.

Teach/tutor. If publishing your short stories, personal essays, or poems isn’t earning you any extra cash, consider teaching. You don’t need to hold a masters degree to teach: You can organize workshops for local community groups; teach at writing conferences; or instruct a continuing education course. You can also tutor private students in language arts.  Find out more about paying jobs for writers.

Publish (or self-publish) a collection and actively market it. When you have a collection of stories or poems to sell (rather than just a single story or poem ready for submission), you can create a product that readers may want to buy. Just be sure your production costs (if you have any) don’t eat up your potential profit. And just like every published author, be prepared to market your book and work to boost sales.

Get speaking gigs. If your reputation as a writer is strong enough that audiences are excited to hear you read and speak, then you might be able to garner speaker’s fees from local organizations. Consider connecting with a local publicist to help you book paying gigs. And—of course—have copies of your story or poetry collection ready to sell.

Consider commentary. While fewer and fewer online outlets seem to be actually paying their writers for commentary and opinion pieces, there may be a market for you if you’ve got a quirky perspective and voice. Consider pitching a commentary column to your local newspaper about regional life. Or approach paying markets online.

And Remember: Making Money On Your Writing Doesn’t Always Happen Immediately

Publishing your writing in traditional literary journals probably won’t result in your needing to fill out a 1099 tax form at year’s end, but you might be surprised by the incredible things that can happen to you if you publish in a literary journal. Your short story that didn’t earn a dime could attract the notice of a literary agent who wants to represent you and sell your full-length short story collection for thousands of dollars. (Believe it or not, success stories like this happen all the time: Here are just a few of the incredible true stories of things that happened to our clients after publishing in a lit mag.) So don’t shortchange yourself: Failure to make money now doesn’t mean you won’t make money with your writing later on.

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Writer QuestionsQUESTION: Have you ever made money publishing a story, poem, or personal essay? Tell us about it!

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6 Comments

  1. Lynette Benton

    This inside information is invaluable. Thank you so much for sharing it!

    Reply
  2. Goutam roy

    I want to earn from writing poems and stories

    Reply
  3. Louis Huynh

    Definitely in love with this!

    Reply
  4. Brilliance

    I want to earn money by writing stories

    Reply
  5. Nickyfloxy2

    I want to earn money from my poetry writing

    Reply
  6. Atul

    I want to earn money while writing stories on life of comman man

    Reply

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