Even in a dreadful, difficult economy, writers of children’s literature can find ways to be paid for the stories they produce.
Has the economy got you down? Have hard times hit you at home? Are you looking at a pile of children’s stories that haven’t yet earned you a cent? Don’t despair… because even in a depression, or recession, stories are still being published, one way or another. Here’s a list of ten suggestions for writers of children’s literature looking for money-making opportunities during hard times.
1. Learn how to craft great stories to improve your chance of being published.
Before you get too far into the lifestyle of a children’s story writer, be sure you’ve got the necessary education. You don’t need to go through an expensive course of study unless you want to and can afford to. Honestly, if I was younger I’d give it a whirl just for the confidence and knowledge the literary college degree would give me, but at my age (not telling) I’m not willing to put myself through the stress of more college education. Your mileage may vary!
A less expensive option is to buy and read books on writing for children, such as Nancy Lamb’s stellar book on writing for children, The Writer’s Guide to Crafting Stories for Children. If you can’t afford to go to college, this Portable MFA in Creative Writing might be just what you need.
Get yourself a writer’s notebook and fill it with ideas for children’s stories. Wherever you go, whatever you do, be on the lookout for story ideas, then write one daily, until you get good at it… and then write more. The more you practice at writing children’s stories, the better you’ll be at it. You may write ten bad stories for every one good story, but when you get that one good story, what a treasure! The more practice you get, the better you’ll be at writing stories for children.
2. Realize editors may not be able to buy from you, but sub to them anyhow.
Even though the economy is bad and publishers are reeling with the double whammy of recession/depression and a growing online self-publishing industry, don’t be afraid to sub to print publishers – both magazine publishers and book publishers. The worst they can say is “no”. You know they have to buy from someone. Children’s literature still gets sold and published in print media. You might as well be in the running. Like they say about buying a lottery ticket, you can’t win if you don’t play. So, be a player!
For those with unpublished novel-length manuscripts, after trying to sell through agents to the big New York publishing houses, consider small scale publishers. Some of my friends have been getting their novels published in those venues and now have nice shiny books to show off to family and friends.
3. After subbing to print children’s magazines, try online children’s magazines.
So, you have a story that no print publisher will accept. They’re inundated by hundreds of great manuscripts every week and can only choose three, so your fantastic story got nothing but rejection slips. (Sorry!) Don’t despair. There are other options. One thing you can do is sub to an online children’s magazine or e-zine. There are several sites that accept subs of children’s literature for online publication. Use Google to find them, then make your list of preferred sites to publish at. Start at the top of your list, and start subbing.
Note: There are still a lot of online publishers who don’t pay cash, so this might not be your best choice for making money with your story. If you don’t like the pay (or non-pay) don’t send in your story. There are other options.
I probably haven’t told you anything you don’t already know . . . yet. Maybe you’ll come across some new ideas in the rest of the article. I wanted to cover the basics first as they can’t be left out.
4. If something doesn’t sell, revise it and resubmit.
If you’ve tried all the print and online publishers of children’s literature, and your story hasn’t sold, maybe it is time for a major revision. Take another look at your story. By now you should know more about stories for children than you did when you wrote it, so re-think the entire thing. Does your main character need some new, more pronounced and unique characteristic? Would a new plot twist jazz things up?
If you’re working on a novel manuscript try a completely different approach to chapter one. Some agents/editors read the first paragraph only and accept or reject based on that very small sample of your writing. Do not mention the weather in paragraph one!
After making significant positive changes, you might try resubmitting to your favorite agents. Or, maybe you’d like to head straight to the next idea. See item #5, below.
5. Take advantage of online self-publishing opportunities.
There are many online publishing opportunities these days. I will mention only a few. My current favorite is Amazon’s Kindle Direct Publishing which publishes both digitally and in print-on-demand. That’s how my book, River Girl, is published.
I’m a big fan of Kindle for low-cost, easily portable, eco-friendly reading material.
If you have a collection of short stories for children, bundle them together and publish all at one time. If your unpublished manuscript is book-length, it can stand alone. Do not price it too high. The better the price, the more likely it is to be purchased, especially if you’re not yet famous.
6. Have a monetized blog.
A blog in a niche you are extremely familiar with can earn significant amounts of money with advertising. Choose a niche related to children or literature, or whatever your heart is really into, and write useful, well-planned articles two or three times every week. You’ll be surprised how much you can earn.
I’ve tried Blogger.Com blogs, and still have a few, but I earn a lot more with my blogs on WordPress that use my owned domain names. I’ve earned nothing with my Blogger.Com blogs, sad to say, even though I’ve placed advertising on them.
I’d suggest a children’s literature related blog, but honestly, the field is glutted with information already. You’d be better off looking for a blogging niche that isn’t saturated already. Most importantly, choose a topic you won’t get tired of writing about. It should be something close to your heart.
7. Write for online article writing sites.
Did you know you can earn money by writing articles for websites owned by others? I earned a lot of money at Squidoo.Com before it was shut down in 2014. Another site that has proven profitable for many people – and where I’m writing now – is HubPages. You can post children’s stories there, but that isn’t what will earn a lot of money, nor will poetry earn much there. However if you sold toys or children’s books and offered your self-published storybooks as well, you could earn a fair amount over the course of several years.
This isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme. Earning money at HubPages takes dedication, time, patience, and a bit of online marketing strategy. Lots of people are doing it – from home-bound housewives to men wishing to create a self-generated income that will allow them to stay home rather than be tied to a job forevermore. After several years you can expect to see over $1000 monthly if you publish articles in the right niches and work hard at building your article base.
8. Create a chapbook to sell locally.
Get creative! Collect your favorite children’s stories and poems into one volume of say, about thirty to forty pages. Give it a nice title, and a title page and table of contents. You can print these at home, or have them printed at a copy shop and secured with plastic comb binding. Get the cover printed on colored paper for a nice contrast to the white inner pages.
When your chapbook is printed, visit local bookshops to inquire about sales opportunities. In my town (a very small town) there are no bookshops. I would hit the grocery story, the mini-mart, and the mercantile. Most likely I’d be offered consignment opportunities.
9. Give what you want: a publishing opportunity.
I developed this website (Literature For Kids) with the intention of giving people exactly what I’d like to get – an opportunity to have children’s stories and poems published online, with payment. Initially I did that at a loss. I eventually made enough money to pay writers. I received the money through advertising. A few years later the ad company decided not to allow their ads on content intended for children so I shut down the e-zine and created a blog. Perhaps you could do better than I did.
There are other ways to earn money by helping other writers of children’s stories… for example, see the next suggestion.
10. Join with other writers to create anthologies for children.
Organize writers in your city in a group anthology project. Request manuscripts written for children and group all chosen submissions into an enticing volume. This would make you the editor! Publish the stories and poems either with self-publishing opportunities (see item #5, above) or as a chapbook (see item #8, above). Divide the profit in an equitable way with all contributors.
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I hope these suggestions give writers of children’s literature some hope that even during the hardest economic times great children’s stories can still be published even if it be in non-traditional ways. There’s always money to be made by writing for children. There’s no reason you must give your writing away. Of course, it isn’t going to be a living wage for most of us, but the joy of producing stories children love to read usually motivates us to continue on.
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