Some just want a read-through of the book for style, flow and content. Others want the technical edit. I get a lot of these requests due to my military background (13 years working for Air Force News Agency and broadcasting detachments overseas covering military issues for radio, television and the Internet).

Some want military jargon and technical details fact-checked, others are just trying to make sure they get military service details correct such as uniforms and service-specific acronyms. Then there those who are confident enough in all of the above and just want the usual copy editing for grammar, spelling, punctuation and the like.

For an experienced editor, expectation management is second nature. Showing an author or scriptwriter what you are willing to do on one level for X amount of dollars sometimes isn’t the answer. Instead? Defining what your work does NOT cover for that fee and time commitment is sometimes the most important thing.

Once I had a potential client who decided he wanted a lot of in-person meetings, with an ever-changing set of tasks and requirements. I tried very hard to direct this person to the most cost-effective use of time and resources based on his stated goals for the project, but he wouldn’t listen–or come up with his own ideas on how it should proceed.

I got the strangest feeling he wanted company, rather than an editor. The lack of direction seemed to be a way to prolong things, intentional or not.

In the end, I had to turn down the work. It paid very well, but I couldn’t obligate myself to his ever-shifting projects and constant meetings. Sometimes even your best attempts at expectation management don’t work and you have to walk away. But for projects where you work out clearly defined goals, deliverables, and deadlines, the rewards for patience are wonderful.

My advice for the new editor is to define for yourself first what level of editing you are willing to do, how much you want to charge, and how long you think a given project should take. Knowing your own tolerances going into a project can help you to be more flexible and accommodating when needed, and assist when it is time to stand your ground where appropriate.

Joe Wallace is a freelance editor and writer. He is available for books, scripts, and video games and has several colleagues he works with on larger projects. If you need one editor or several, feel free to get in touch: jwallace (at) freelance-zone (dot) com.

Wallace recently completed a script editing project in English for a Japanese client and is currently editing a book on voice acting for a Chicago-based voiceover professional. He spends his spare time blogging about rare vinyl records at Turntabling.net and working on electronic music projects.

1. Google loves sites that are deep and have plenty of content. If your site is light on the content side, try adding a professional-sounding-but-personable blog. You can update once or twice a week and see how it goes–just make sure to take the advice of the next step into consideration when writing it.

2. Use keywords the same way you would when writing or editing SEO content. Don’t skimp on the phrases that you want Google to associate with your resume page, but don’t stuff them in at every turn, either.

3. Name your images with Google-friendly file names. “Picture 1A.jpg” isn’t going to help you out much. “Freelance Editor at work.jpg” might be more helpful. Know what I mean?

4. In addition to posting your resume, work samples, and related material, try posting a page about your experiences. An about me-type page that’s tucked away somewhere on the site for the REALLY curious adds more keywords to your resume page and also gives a bit of insight into who you are, your work ethic and experience. Just don’t turn it into a commercial for yourself. Keep it personable and fun to read.

5. Get other sites to link to you–especially any professional organizations you belong to or other groups. The more incoming links to your resume page from legit sources, the better.

In King’s book, On Writing, he throws in a few pages from his story 1408, showing the before and after from his own work–but you can do the same using one of your actual clients (with their permission, of course). Naturally if you can’t get permission you’ll have to edit one of your own first drafts, but this is a GREAT way of showing off your editorial chops.

It’s even better if you can also show a .jpg of a page you’ve marked up with editing symbols and such as an extra gimmick. Nobody edits much that way any more, but it’s a good visual and very effective when positioned properly.

Writers post writing samples, why not post editing samples? Something to consider next time you revamp your resume page.

In the meantime, here is a list of links we’ve been enjoying lately-there’s a bit of nepotism here with a couple of inclusions (friend blogs) but we found some interesting things to ruminate over here:

FreelanceWriterVille

The Writing Journey

A different (but valuable) perspective on the editing game–APhotoEditor.com

Find An Editor has promise but we’re not sure how current this is…

a 2007 article on hiring editors at Folio.com

There could be a number of reasons for this, but it is fascinating as a concept. Writers’ work is frequently seen as little more than a commodity. I remember one CEO asking what the difference between a product description and a blog was. He failed to understand even the most basic concept of blogging–that a blog is an entity and not an individual piece of work.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with that–until you presume to try and structure a company around things like blogs and social media. But I digress. It’s fascinating that editing isn’t the target of scam sites and low-payers. It seems that giving someone the ultimate responsibility for printed or online material getting completed in an accurate, readable fashion isn’t something you can simply throw a few pennies at.

Imagine a job ad where an editor was offered the same terms as some of these low-balling writing gigs. “Editor wanted for revisions. One dollar per article.” They’d be laughed out of court!

That said, I am sure some try–or have tried. Have you seen such laughable ads? If so, we’re dying to hear from you. Please post your experiences in the comments and share your favorite bad editor job story. Some of us think these are less plentiful than for writers…but what’s YOUR experience?

One of the best rules of thumb to follow when editing your own work is to put it away for the day and don’t look at it again until tomorrow. That gives you a fresh set of eyes to look at the work with in the morning and you are more likely to catch little mistakes and hard-to-spot errors. One thing you shouldn’t do is try to self-edit after just having worked on the piece–at least give yourself the benefit of sleeping on THAT edit and looking at it again fresh the following day.

In cases where you simply can’t afford the time to let the copy go until tomorrow, try reading the piece backwards from the end of the last paragraph to your opening line. This helps you catch spelling mistakes and punctuation issues. You’ll have to read it the right way around to catch poor usage, but when you do, try reading it aloud.

But Pneuma isn’t the only help available for self publishers. Angela Hoy at WritersWeekly also runs a self publishing company, Booklocker.com. Writersweekly and Booklocker both offer help for authors including the most helpful Whispers and Warnings section which can serve as early warning against troubled and/or unscrupulous publishing companies.

And finally, the Science Fiction Writers of America have a fascinating page about print-on-demand and self-publishing including a pros-n-cons look the issues related to publishing your own work.

What about the proper use of semicolons? WritingHood.com has four tips to help you remember what you learned so long ago.

And then there’s the flagrant abuse of the apostrophe, which has aggravated at least one person so much they dedicated an entire website to it.

ParagraphPunch is another site dedicated to a single idea, but this one’s for pay. Alas, some who need it are too stingy to shell out…but it’s there should you need a bit of schooling.

And finally, show your writers this Self Editing Success article by Carole Moore if you really need to send a message. With a little luck the writer will take a hint…but this is also good for keeping oneself honest when you lack decent input from a more experienced writer or editor.

Those who have already performed their first hunt for freelancers know why that is. If you’ve never hunted for a decent freelance writer, you couldn’t possibly be prepared for the onslaught of inappropriate responses to your “writer wanted” ad, but trust us when we say you’ll get about 90% unusable responses.

NewOf those ten percent, the ones you actually want to work with will make up probably five percent or less. That’s why you want to hang on to the GOOD responses–who wants to deal with that other 90% again if they don’t have to?