How did you feel the last time someone sent you a personalized thank you note out of the blue? It made your day, right?

But here’s the kicker. The next time you were in a position to help the person who made you feel great, you did so willingly. That’s the funny thing about a thank you. It has a habit of bringing good things back to the few people who still send them out.

Thank you notes are the simplest, cheapest, yet most powerful tool freelancers have at their disposal. Here are a few reasons to start sending more of them.

Send a thank you; win a client

When an editor rejected one of my ideas last year, I did what I always do—I sent my potential sources an email thanking them for the interesting quotes but unfortunately, the editor had rejected the story. One person responded. She told me how much she appreciated being kept in the loop because no other reporter ever did. By the way, she worked for a mid-sized, PR company looking for a part time freelancer. She’d checked out my website samples and wondered if I’d be interested in writing some press releases for her?

Um, yes?

By the end of 2011, that simple thank you note earned me $2,300. If her final project hadn’t clashed with my other year end deadlines I would have grossed even more.

Send a thank you; build a bridge

Thank you notes are also terrific bridge builders and I ought to know since I demolished quite a few in my callow youth. Here’s one every freelancer should build.

Who’s your least favorite person in your freelancing world? How about the surly clerk in Big Company X responsible for cutting your 1099 checks? Yup, definitely someone in desperate need of a few bridges and let me tell you why.

No one ever thanks the payroll clerk.

Payroll clerks are grunt workers. They are paid crappy salaries to run reports, open and close the monthly books, process company payroll and research all sorts of mind-numbing things like that one missing invoice from 2003 that’s somewhere in a haystack of dusty filing cabinets. The unluckier ones cannot take vacation at month end, quarter end or year-end, let alone between January 1 and April 15. Toss in a bunch of whiny freelancers to this thankless pressure cooker and even saint would snap.

So here’s what you do. The next time you (finally) get your check from Company X, give that clerk a call. Let her know how much you appreciate her help when she’s so busy. Make that personal connection even if it’s just a voice mail. Then follow up with a real, honest-to-God thank you note (like the old timers used to write back in the early 1990s)–card, envelope, stamps–the whole works. Not only will you make her day (maybe even her month) but chances are you’ll start getting those 1099 checks a lot faster.

Send a thank you; exit gracefully

A thank note also provides a graceful exit strategy—especially with tough clients. I know, I know, but when firing a particularly difficult client do not give in to the temptation to say how you really feel.

Instead, take the high road with a thank you note. Let the client know that while you are sorry that perhaps things didn’t quite work out the way you’d both hoped, you appreciated the opportunity to work together and wish him the best for his future endeavors.

There are three very good reasons to do this.

1. It’s a small world (three cheers for LinkedIn!) and you never know who this client is talking to.
2. Do you really want someone’s last memory of you to be a wild-eyed rant?

Perhaps all those brusque, 10:30pm-on-a-Friday-night emails were how your client cleared her desk for the weekend. Perhaps you could’ve done a better job clarifying certain project discrepancies but didn’t and are still fuming.

Blowing off steam certainly makes us feel better but what if the misperception was all in your head? Growl about it to your friends, kick the wall if you must, but do not blow your top when you fire a bad client. It’s simply not worth it.

The third reason why is simple. Saying thank you shows others that you are a professional. Regardless of what reality TV claims, class trumps crass every day of the week. You’ll be surprised at the number of good things that come from sending a thank you. At the very least, your mother would be proud. At the most, you will become someone everyone else wants to work with.

Gwynneth Anderson has small business in her bones. After watching her father build a thriving contracting company from scratch, she applied his lessons to her own business venture to help pay for college. After almost fifteen years of corporate ladder climbing, she decided to take her hard-won analytical skills and return to her entrepreneurial roots. Now her business is writing about business.

Forums give writers ways to make new writer friends, get advice, find job leads, and have their work critiqued. On the other hand, forums also give writers ways to be misinformed, be lazy reporters, and become involved in flame wars that make them want to unplug their modems for good.

Read on to learn how to get the most out of online communities for writers — and how to protect yourself from the pitfalls.

Get Advice

Most writers’ forums are frequented by people who want to share information with other writers. People who have been-there-done-that are usually happy to help newbies by answering their questions on how to break in to a particular genre, who to pitch at X magazine, how much publication Y pays, and what agent Z is like to work with. The downside is, anyone can post on these forums, and they can often do so anonymously, so it’s difficult to know whose advice to trust. Here’s how to get the best advice — and how to know who to listen to.

Do your due diligence. “I never read posts from anonymous posters with any serious intent,” says freelance writer and novelist Jennifer Haupt. “I’d never take advice from someone who won’t sign their name.” Not to say that all people who choose to be anonymous don’t know what they’re talking about…but you can’t check their creds, and that makes them suspect. Sleuth around for more info on the poster (or ask nicely for their credentials) before taking any advice to heart.

Give (at least) as much as you take. “Don’t be a newcomer on a forum and ask for editor names and contact info right away,” says freelance writer Yvonne Pesquera. “First make yourself known. Participate in discussions. Share your own leads and insights. Build up a rapport with the other online participants.” If you share leads and advice, your fellow forum-goers will be sure to reply when you need help.

Give details. To help other writers help you, be specific. For example, the question “Where can I send a query about dogs?” is much too broad. Is your idea about canine health, canine heroes, celebrities who love dogs? Each of these ideas has very different markets. Give as much detail as you can without giving away your whole idea.

Never say never. Once I mentioned on a forum that my business card says “My editors think I’m swell” on the back. One anonymous poster, who fancies himself quite the expert (but who I later discovered admits on his blog to being a struggling newbie), replied, “That does not belong on your business card.” Guess he wasn’t there all the times editors wrote to say how much they liked my tagline. “Always” and “never” are red flags for forum advice: Be wary of posters who say you should “never” call an editor or that you should “always” address an agent as Mr./Ms Lastname. Check the poster’s creds and use your common sense.

Get Connected

Forums are a great place to get to know other writers, banish loneliness, and make new friends — and, as a bonus, you can often gain assignments by networking. For example, when an editor approached me about an assignment that I couldn’t take on because the pay was below my minimum, I offered to help the editor find interested writers. I posted about the opportunity on a forum I frequent, and several writers landed assignments from this magazine. And it goes both ways: I estimate I’ve earned more than $30,000 from contacts I’ve made on a certain writers’ forum, including an Idiot’s Guide book contract and a regular gig with a national magazine. Want to connect with other writers for fun, friendship, and even profit? Here’s how.

Don’t give TMI. Even forums that require a subscription to join are public places, and you never know who’s reading; your dream agent or the editor at the magazine you want to crack may be among the lurkers. “I think writers make a huge mistake when they talk about unprofessional things they’ve done or talk in specifics about how an editor ripped them to shreds,” says book author and writing coach Jennifer Lawler. “I used to hire writers for a magazine I edited and you can bet that someone who talked about doing something unprofessional, short-cutting research, or airing petty complaints didn’t get assignments from me.”

Stop lurking. Forums can be scary places, and it’s sometimes difficult to get a handle on the etiquette. But if you never post, you won’t get the camaraderie and other benefits forums offer. Read the rules or FAQ if the forum has one, look through the archives to get an idea of what’s acceptable and what’s not — and then jump in.

Dodge flamewars. Flamewars — threads that degenerate into insults — are a pitfall on some writers’ forums. To avoid raising writers’ ire, “Always be respectful, even if you disagree with someone’s point of view or think they’ve said or done something dumb,” advises Elizabeth Kricfalusi, a marketing communications writer and magazine writer. Writers also get teed off when they see the same questions posted over and over, so be sure to search the archives to see if your question has already been answered, says Kricfalusi.

Give, then take. It can be tempting to post asking for writers to refer you to their editors or agents or to send you their overflow work, but these tactics are not looked upon kindly by forum-goers. Join the conversation, share information, and put your best work out there, and you’ll attract opportunities. That’s how I landed so many paying assignments from participating in a forum — I never came out and asked for people to hand me work, but as other writers got to know me they felt confident in referring me for assignments.

Get (and Give) Critiques

Want to know if your short story, query, article, or novel is ready to send out to that publisher, editor, or agent? Post your writing to a critique forum and let other writers have a crack at it. Having fresh eyes take a look at your work can reveal weaknesses you hadn’t noticed and give you ideas for improving your writing. You can also learn more about your craft by critiquing other writers’ work. Here’s how to critique (and be critiqued) with finesse.

Don’t dismiss negative critiques. “It can be hard not to just write off comments if they’re not all glowing and positive,” says freelance writer and editor Sarah Zobel. “As with any critique, you have to read them carefully and think about every single comment and whether it makes sense. If you start to see a trend, you should probably think seriously about whatever it is those readers are unanimous about.”

Be kind. When critiquing another writer’s work, ask yourself how you would feel if you received that same critique. “It’s just words on a screen, but it’s somebody’s words on a screen, and like you they worked hard putting them together into an article or essay,” says Zobel. “Sometimes people forget that and just say whatever comes to mind, not focusing on the fact that to the writer it may come across as cold and hurtful.” Also, be sure to critique the writing, not the writer — negative comments about the writer’s personality, upbringing, or mother are not acceptable.

Don’t take it personally. Let’s face it: There are jerks out there, and some of them happen to frequent critique forums. When Zobel posted a piece about how her kids believe in Santa, she was blasted by a writer who insisted that her kids were too old to believe in St. Nick. Says Zobel, “I learned to step back from my writing, to understand that it and I are two separate entities; that there are jerks in the world and I don’t have to take their comments personally.”

Be specific. Instead of giving overarching comments about another writer’s work, offer specific examples of what isn’t working and how you think the writer can fix it. For example, rather than saying, “I don’t find your characters believable,” tell the writer that you don’t find it believable that her 80-year-old main character would skateboard to the bingo parlor.

Be gracious. Writers take time from their own work to critique your writing, so be sure to say thank you — even if you don’t agree with their critiques.

Get Sources and Research

Many writers’ forums have areas for writers to post calls for sources. For example, I found some of the sources quoted in this very article by posting on various boards. Writers also use forums as a research tool when they’re writing about a topic new to them; we writers are a diverse bunch, and someone on a writers’ forum is sure to know how long it takes to string an archery bow, how cremains are stored, or what the Arabic word for “dad” is (to name a few questions on a forum I frequent). Here’s how to use forums to ace your research.

Google first. Nothing ticks off a professional writer more than seeing posts like “Who handles the health department at Magazine X?” and “I need a statistic on how many people are using Twitter.” Writers need to know how to research, so call the magazine and ask who the editor is, or search on Google for that stat. If you’ve tried everything you can think of with no luck, mention in your post that you’ve tried X, Y, and Z and are out of ideas. That way, other writers won’t feel like you’re asking them to do your research for you.

Don’t depend on writers. Many writers use writers’ forums to find sources for all kinds of articles, since writers often have other areas of expertise as well. But it’s disturbing to read an article about, say, money-saving tips and notice that all of the sources quoted are other writers. What would your editor say if she knew that all of your sources were your colleagues? (Answer: She’d say you’re a lazy reporter.) It’s okay to use a writer once in a while, but don’t get dependent on quoting your writer friends.

Go beyond the writers’ forums. To find sources, go to where the sources are; for example, when I was writing an article on Tourette’s, I joined a Tourette’s forum to find people to interview. “I also spend time on non-writing forums, depending upon my project roster,” agrees Devon Ellington, a full-time writer who publishes under a half a dozen names in both fiction and non-fiction. “I wrote an historical serial a few years ago, and a large section took place on a steamboat headed down the Mississippi. I joined a steamboat forum and they were an enormous resource.”

If you’re looking for advice, networking opportunities, critiques, or sources, join a writers’ forum and start posting. If you follow these tips and stick to the rules of the particular forum, you’ll connect with groups of writers who can help you — and who you can help as well.

This article first appeared in Writer’s Digest.

Whether you’re a new writer who’s staring at her first feature in a newsstand publication or a jaded professional who’s finally hit a career high with a 2,500-word feature in Esquire, beyond sending the clip with new story pitches there’s the question of “What else can I do with this shiny piece of paper I hold in my hands?”

I’ve given the question a lot of thought while wearing my jet-powered marketing/self-promotion hat; here are some of my ideas about how writers can work their clips more effectively.

1. Send a link to the published story to editors who rejected your idea.

Before you jab your burning torches and sharpened pitchforks at me, hear me out. You have to be thoughtful about this. If you’re sending the link to editors just to rub it in their faces — “Nah, nah, look what the NYT bought, you dumb-ass idiots — next time, be on the ball, okay?” — that’s not so cool and these editors will be thrilled they avoided working with such a reject rejected your idea … thrilled!

Tone is everything. If your motive is to get more work with the editors who rejected your idea, send them a new idea, then say something like, “Remember the story I pitched to you last summer about the snake hunters in Florida’s Everglades? X Magazine finally bought it and it ran last month. Here’s a link; I thought you’d like to see how it turned out.” This can be especially effective if the editor liked the idea, but it was nixed at a story meeting.

Even if he didn’t seem to love your idea, send him the link anyway. Your clip shows persistence — you believed in your idea and you continued to market it — and it gives him a little glimpse of how you turned your initial idea into a full-fledged story. It also shows you can toot your horn professionally with no hard feelings. Everyone wins.

2. Send the link to editors you work with regularly.

I aim to develop collegial relationships with my editors, so I occasionally do this with clips I’m exceptionally proud of. When I wrote a piece about British cookbooks for The Atlantic‘s food blog, I sent the link to a couple food editors I worked with; one had no idea I was such an Anglophile and she assigned me a piece about British food, and another editor added the clip to my resume package, which eventually landed me a lucrative short-term writing project.

I know two other writers who send out quarterly e-mails to editors that include links to recent clips. This is a brilliant idea, one that an established freelancer can steal for her marketing arsenal.

3. Tweet ‘em/Facebook ‘em. And ask your friends to retweet/repost.

I know a lot of writers are iffy about Twitter and wonder who the heck would be interested in their 140-character blurps about their morning coffee. Forget tweeting the cuppa Joe — tweet links to your clips and add relevant #hashtags to get other people to notice your story and retweet. Same thing with Facebook; post a link, write a little about why you’re happy with the story, and see what happens. The key is to get as many eyeballs reading your article — and with luck, some of those eyeballs will belong to people who hire awesome writers.

4. Alert the media!

A friend of mine wrote a thinky-piece for Reason that producers at NPR happened to read, and the next thing she knew, she was on a public television news program (or the radio, I forget) to talk about her research. She wasn’t paid for the NPR appearance, but it was certainly something worth crowing about in her credentials.And less impressive, but last year when I blogged about Sarah Ferguson and her latest scandal involving the British royal family, I got calls from the British media, including the BBC, to talk via satellite about Americans’ perception of Ferguson.

OK, great, you’re thinking — these media outlets came to you guys. But there’s no law that says you can’t reach out to the media. If you’ve written a story that’s controversial, timely, and/or challenges commonly held beliefs, start by calling the story desks of local news stations.

Here’s an example: you just wrote a feature for Parents about a grade-schooler who was bullied and successfully sued her school system. The week your story comes out, you notice a story about one school system’s flawed anti-bullying stance. Call your local news station and tell them who you are and what you’ve written and offer to speak to them on air if they’re doing a story on this. Even if they weren’t planning on covering the story, knowing that there’s an expert (that’s YOU) they can call upon may make them think, “Hmm, maybe we SHOULD do a story on this.”

5. And of course, add links to the clip on your website, blog about it (if you have a blog), and make copies to send to editors who want to see hard copies.

Because if I don’t mention all this, some Sherlock will point it out.

Any other ideas about how to work a clip? Add your comments below. [db]

You’ve found an editor on Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn. Should you ask to connect? Will the editor think you’re a stalker? If you connect, do you have to reign in your free expression, lest the editor sees photos of you with a lampshade on your head on Facebook, or catches your Twitter post about a PITA magazine? I spoke with editors and social media-savvy writers to give you the do’s and donts of networking with editors on social media.

Should I friend my editor?

Editors are fine with writers connecting with them on LinkedIn since it is a business network, but when it comes to their Facebook profiles, many editors have a “keep out” attitude. Here’s what three of them have to say:

“To me, my personal Facebook page is just that — my personal Facebook page. LinkedIn is another matter — that’s where professional interaction/online Rolodex-keeping should occur.”
— Editor at a national health magazine who asked to remain anonymous.

“I feel that Facebook, is my ‘private fun’ networking site. While I’ll occasionally (and that’s very occasionally) post a clip there, it’s mainly to stay in touch with family, friends, etc. I rarely even friend a coworker on Facebook actually. So if a writer was trying to network professionally with me via Facebook, I would likely not be too receptive to that.”
— Dennis McCafferty, Senior Writer (and an editor) at USA Weekend

“I view LinkedIn and Facebook differently. LinkedIn is a business site, and thus it makes sense to ‘link’ to writers. I use it as a tool to keep good writers in my network; I’m starting to use LinkedIn like a Rolodex. However, Facebook is more personal — I don’t like mixing business and my personal life. If a writer I don’t interact with on a social level tries to ‘friend’ me on Facebook, that to me is crossing a boundary. I’d certainly not recommend using Facebook for job or assignment hunting.”
— Michael Berg, Managing Editor at the custom publisher McMurry, Inc.

While you shouldn’t friend an editor you’ve never written for before, or who you have only a business relationship with, it’s fine to friend editors you’re, well, friendly with. Take Michelle Rafter, who owns the WordCount blog and writes about how businesses and consumers use social media for clients such as Inc.com, Workforce Management and YourSecurityResource.com. “I’ve friended several of my editors on Facebook,” she says — but those editors have all been colleagues of Rafter’s at some point in her career; for example, one was a fellow staff writer at a newspaper where she worked. “Before I’d friend any of the other editors I currently work with, I’d have to work with them for a while first to get to know them,” Rafter says. “My true test: being as comfortable chatting about non-work stuff as I am discussing my next assignment.”

Twitter seems to be a better platform for connecting to editors than Facebook — for your own privacy as well. “I’m probably following thirty editors, mostly on Twitter,” says Lola Augustine Brown, a freelancer who writes for Canadian Family, Pregnancy, Fashion and “anyone that wants to pay her a decent wage.” “On Twitter editors can’t see pictures of my exes, my kid, or that awful video of me drunk and singing ‘My heart will go on’ at a karaoke bar, so I think its preferable medium to do business on. I think that 90% of the editors I’m following are following me back, and some of those are at dream markets, so I’m pretty happy about that.”

Zachary Petit, managing editor of Writer’s Digest, gives this advice for figuring out whether an editor is receptive to connections from writers: “Does the editor use the sites for his own private use, or professionally, as more and more publications are mandating? If an editor is using Twitter or another network to promote her publication, career or platform — and in that case the profile won’t restrict viewing access — she’ll be glad for any added friends. But if there’s no public photo, access is restricted or she’s buried herself deep in the digital folds of the Web, chances are she doesn’t want to be found by just anyone.”

Do I have to watch what I say on social media if I connect with editors there?

Now you’re connected with an editor, and you’re frozen with fear. Will you never again be able to post about your hot dates, your one-too-many drinking sessions, or your PITA writing assignments?

Well…yeah. “My view is, if you wouldn’t say it in a crowded elevator, don’t put in on Facebook,” says the editor of a custom business magazine who asked to remain anonymous.

When corresponding with editors on social media, keep it professional unless you have a friendly relationship with them. “I expect people to be professional and respectful, as I try at all times to be to them,” says an editor at a parenting magazine who asked to remain anonymous. “That doesn’t mean overly formal, but ease of communication doesn’t mean we’re best buds.”

That’s not to say you have to be all business. Social media is, after all, social. “I like to connect with people on a personal level, especially those that I work with,” says Victoria Everman, a writer for Yoga Journal, Boho, and ReadyMade. “Though I don’t know if I will ever have the chance to meet some of my editors in-person, I do want to understand them more of a personal level; it feels like much more of a meaningful business relationship when you can share the usual ‘office chatter’ stuff online.”

Above all, be yourself, says Rafter. If you’re normally the class clown, for example, let your humor show. Don’t be so afraid of editors that you repress your natural character.

Michelle Rafter offers these tips for keeping your Twitter tweets professional — these can apply to Facebook and LinkedIn status updates as well:

• Don’t tweet about the minutiae of your day: I’m not a chef or food blogger so nobody cares what I had for breakfast.
• Don’t discuss the details of current projects: Lord knows my editor wouldn’t want me gabbing about some hot story with their direct competitor listening in.
• Don’t gripe about problems with a particular assignment or editor. This is a tough one, because Twitter was practically invented for public whining. A little whining is OK, if you can make it so anonymous nobody can guess exactly what you’re talking about.

Whatever you do, be sure not to abuse the social nature of social media by hounding an editor for an assignment. “One time, a writer friended my personal account so they could query our magazine via Facebook messages,” says Petit. “Ack! Don’t ever do that.”

Okay, I’m ready. So how do I connect with editors?

Everman searches for editors by entering their name into the keyword search, or finds them through mutual connections. She also notes that to find magazines’ Twitter tags, you can usually search Google for “twitter” and the magazine’s name. This way you’ll end up following the magazine’s official account, but you may not know which editor is behind the tweets. Brown trawls through the lists of her writer friends’ followers to find editors.

Once you find an editor, introduce yourself when you’re asking for the connection (on Facebook or LinkedIn) or when you start following her (on Twitter): Tell her who you are, what you do, and why you’re connecting with her (for example, you’re a fan of the magazine).

Using social media is a great way to connect with your editors on a more personal level. Using these tips from writers and editors, you can get a behind-the-scenes look at your editors’ lives and jobs, and they can get to know you as more than just an anonymous writer.

Do you follow your editors on social media? What are your tips for keeping it professional while keeping it real? Please post in the Comments below! [lf]

Fast forward to yesterday. A friend of mine who writes for the same magazine told me that she heard from this same writer asking for information on who to pitch.

There are two ways Jack could handle the situation of not knowing who to pitch:

1. He could go to 123custompublishing.com, get their phone number, call, and ask for the name of the editor at X magazine. He could then call or e-mail the editor to introduce himself. Time elapsed: 10 minutes.

2. He could ignore the valuable information I shared, wait three weeks, and then contact another writer for the magazine, hoping that since I failed him, this writer would be able to hand him the editor’s contact info on a silver platter. Time elapsed: Three weeks.

If he had chosen course #1, Jack might have had an assignment by now. But since he chose course #2 (and my writer friend also didn’t know the name of the new editor), he wasted three weeks, still has zero information, and will need to either contact yet another writer from the masthead or simply give up.

The writers who win assignments are those who are willing to show a little initiative and research ability to get them — that is, the ability to look up information online and pick up the phone. For example, a few months ago I wanted to pitch a custom health publication I saw at a friend’s house. The only contact information listed on the masthead was the editor-in-chief’s phone number. I called her and introduced myself, and she asked for clips, which I sent. I forgot all about this exchange, and then last week the editor called out of the blue to offer me a $1,000 assignment. All because I had picked up the phone. Would I have gotten an assignment if I had relied on other people to hand me the information I needed (and ignored the clues they did provide)?

Now, I’m not saying you should never ask other writers for editors’ contact information, but it should be a last resort after you used your research skills to try to find that information yourself. I know that it’s scary to call an editor or a magazine’s editorial department, but for us writers who have something to sell, the ability to fight the fear and go after the sale is a worthwhile skill to develop.

C’mon, fess up — are you a lazy writer? Or have you had a run-in with someone who is? Let us know in the Comments section below. [lf]