Looking for writing jobs on Craigslist: a caution

Apologies for the lack of update last week. Illness and work conspired to prevent a new strip.

This week's blog entry ties in with why I've decided to move the focus of Inkygirl away from regular job listings. Part of the reason is lack of time; I don't get paid to research the job boards, and I no longer comb them regularly for myself anymore since I have enough work without them. There are also plenty of blogs existing nowadays which already do a great job at posting job listings, like Deborah Ng's Freelance Job Listings blog.

But another reason is because I've been discouraged by the quality of jobs offered on Craigslist, which was one of my main source of freelance listings. Although Craiglist conveniently has a separately category of Writing/Editing Jobs for each city, I've found the pay to be low overall. Often pay isn't offered at all, but this isn't made clear in the listing.

Listings tend to be poorly written, riddled with grammatical errors and typos. Yes, this means that the company or individual needs writers...but it also reflects negatively on the reliability of the listing and the company.

I've also noticed a tendency of some companies to post their job listing in multiple city boards, sometimes ALL of them. As a result, they get inundated with applications and questions (especially if they pay anything), which helps explain why many don't bother replying to any of the applicants except for the one they want.

After compiling job listings for Inkygirl for a couple of years, I have some advice for those combing free online job boards like Craigslist:

- Only apply for those positions for which you are absolutely qualified. It'll be a waste of time otherwise, since chances are excellent that at least several people will be applying who WILL have all the qualifications.

- Avoid job boards that don't have a posting date for each listing. You'll have no idea of how long a listing has been online otherwise.

- The "telecommuting" option in the search engine of Craigslist is not reliable. Sometimes it picks up listings that specifically say "NO telecommuting" in the description. Sometimes it misses jobs that are telecommuting. Your best bet is to look for jobs that have potential and then read the listing details.

I'm going to be combing through my Job/market resource list in Inkygirl as well as other job listing sources and provide some updated, detailed reviews. If you have experience using any of the paid job listing resources for writers, I'd be very interested in hearing about it. Please send me e-mail or post below...thanks!