Time Savers for Writers Articles | Writing

By: Matthew Hick

Every writer knows that the best way to make money is to write more, and you can’t write more unless you learn how to save time researching, writing and editing your work.

One of a writers main time wasters is in researching. It’s easy to get carried away with research once you really dig in since there are always so many interesting facts to uncover. Besides, the longer you research the more you put off the real work – writing! But that won’t get words on paper and money in your bank account. So here are a few ways to save time while researching:

Limit Yourself.
Never give yourself unended time to research any article. Limit your time to a few minutes, a few hours or just a few days, depending on the type and scale of project you’re working on.

Watch the Computer.
While researching online should save loads of time, too often it’s just the opposite. It’s easy to lose track of time while surfing the net, so be careful to keep track of how long you spend googling your subject.

Use Children’s Resources.
They may be basic, but that’s the point. Children’s websites, encyclopedia’s and other reference materials are simple, to the point and usually a very interesting read. Use them as much as possible for quick research projects that require little more than a basic overview of a topic.

Use Pre-Made Press Releases for Quotes and Statistics.
Finding sources, scheduling interviews, not to mention conducting them can all waste valuable writing time. Still, you may need that expert quote or national study result to complete your piece. The quickest way to obtain these is to look up a national organization or research facility that specializes in your area of interest and check out their press archives for a press release (complete with quotes and stats) that are free for you to use! For instance, while working on a recent article on marketing nuts to supermarket consumers, I was able to pull dozens of statistics and quotes from a national nuts board for quick and easy research. The entire story took about 15 minutes of research time!

Hire Help.
Busy writers have also learned the art of delegation, especially when researching stories. Anyone can dig up facts and figures. Only you can put it all together in a readable and interesting article. Hire a high schooler in need of a few extra bucks to help research topics both online and at the library.