I spent about three hours designing a booklet (8 pages) about what I offer as a guest speaker. I used a template that was in Microsoft Word. I added my own photos, moved a few things around, and did a quick edit.
Then it was sent to the printers. I had 25 copies printed out only to realize that there was a pretty giant typo on one of the pages. GUH. ALWAYS HAVE SOMEONE EDIT YOUR WORK, VANESSA. I couldn’t afford to re-print, so I got creative and wrote something new on address labels and stuck them in. It still looks nice.
Professional. Clean. Concise. (It’s our little secret about the typo, right?)
Inside includes descriptions about what I offer in terms of lessons/themes. There are photos of me and my family. A personal note, and my rates. ‘Cuz, yeah, mama needs to get paid.
I made a promise to myself about two months ago that I wouldn’t do as much (if any) ‘free’ stuff because, as much as my heart wants to, it’s important that I make money. I want to be the type of writer who can live off her craft. It’s hard and it’s scary especially because I love writing and talking about it and helping others do it…but I think I can make myself ask for money to guest speak – and creating a fancy booklet that reaches teachers/groups first is a smart way to start the conversation, right? Right.
So, I’m sending out a bunch of booklets to English teachers and departments around the city. Hopefully, someone will bite…if not all.
How do you to tell people what you have to offer? Is it hard for you to ask for money too?
Ah, the writer’s life.
VANESSA SHIELDS, writer 