Well, clearly my plan to blog about my work every month went to pot. But as Fred and Ginger say: Pick yourself up, brush yourself off, start all over again.

I’m reevaluating whether this monthly tactic is best for 2022, or if another way will work better, but for now, here are some of the highlights that happened in the last quarter of 2021:

Worked on several stories for the College of Education at the University of Maryland, one of my longest-term clients. After our interview about a lecture he gave, Professor Cam Scribner told me: “you really nailed down all of the exact sort of complexities that I would have brought up if we were teaching in a graduate seminar.”
Wrote a story for Goucher College on alumni entrepreneurs in the food business. I used to write a lot of food stories in my newspaper days, then I wrote for the now-defunct food section of Paste Magazine, but I haven’t had a lot of opportunities to write content marketing or copy about food. It’s a topic near and dear to my heart, so I’d love to get back into it.
My friend Melanie Padgett Powers, who is the managing editor of Dateline Federation Magazine for the Hemophilia Federation of America, recruited me for a piece on hemophilia families and adoptions. It was a pleasure getting to speak to the families.
I wrote a piece for marketing recruitment agency Torchlight Hire on what to know about paying a freelance writer. Writers are notoriously undervalued, and I hope marketing directors will pay attention and heed my words. For example, promising “great exposure,” but no/meager pay just doesn’t work. You wouldn’t expect your plumber/dentist/hairdresser to work for “exposure,” would you?
Wrote two pieces for ASJA Magazine, and continued my work as editor of the Weekly newsletter. One member described it as: “Lots of meaty information told in a brief, breezy style.”
Continued working as blog editor and strategist with designer Christy Batta. I love helping a business, whether a solo business or a large corporation, tell its stories. And as much as I enjoy doing the actual writing myself, I love the process of guiding and supporting someone else through the process of just as much.

In 2022, my goals include doing more content strategy, diving back into the food niche, continuing to build a niche in ad tech, writing even more stories about interesting people doing fascinating things, and building great relationships with clients and fellow writers and editors. You can email me at hello@redpeneditorial.co, or find me on LinkedIn or Twitter.

Wishing you a happy, healthy New Year.

So, it’s been a while. Between client work, marketing, and parenting an increasingly active toddler, actually doing work on my own content seems to be the thing that falls by the wayside. I would really like to fix this.

Last week, I was listening to the 100th episode of my favorite freelancing podcast, Deliberate Freelancer, hosted by fellow writer and editor Melanie Padgett Powers (who also happens to be a neighbor and a real life friend). She was interviewing another freelance writing heroine, Jennifer Goforth Gregory, and they were talking about keeping portfolios updated. Melanie, who as a managing editor, often hires writers, made a good point that she wants to know what folks have been publishing recently. It makes perfect sense.

I, you may have noticed, organize my clips by topic. And since I have more than a thousand bylines to my name, and no one wants me to share all of those, I limit my clips to highlights. But after listening to the Deliberate Freelancer episode, I’ve decided to add a “Recent Clips” section to my work page. So that’s something new coming up here at Red Pen Editorial Services.

But here’s the tiny glitch (besides the fact that I’m not always good about diligently updating my portfolio). As the company name suggests, I provide additional services beyond writing, i.e. editing. Even when I am writing, not all of my work is bylined. And some of my clients don’t even allow me to state publicly that I’ve written for them, or edited their work. That’s a whole ball of wax we’ll dive into at a later date. Frankly, I think it’s a lot of piffle, but with clients and toddlers, you learn to pick your battles.

Which leads to Goal #2. Each month, I want to write a post to share what I’ve been up to, in a way that doesn’t violate any of my contract terms. For instance, this spring, a few of my projects included copy editing DE&I and sustainability reports for a major media company, writing a feature for an education association and a couple of profiles for alumni magazines (all of which I can link upon publication), writing a blog post on addressable TV advertising vs OTT advertising for an ad tech company (which earned a featured snippet on Google), publishing a piece for one of my regular clients, Northern Virginia Magazine, on preparing children for the return to school, and have continued to serve as the volunteer editor of the ASJA Weekly newsletter editor for the American Society of Journalists and Authors.

I also hope to share interesting articles I’ve read, learning experiences (such as attending the ASJA virtual conference), and maybe even some lessons and frustrations. I’m excited to keep you updated! In advance, thanks for riding along with me.

All the best,

Holly