Magazine Writing 101 – Honing Your Writing Skills

Glynnis Whitwer, the editor of Proverbs 31 Magazine, was the teacher of this session at the She Speaks conference. She was good y’all! So good that I can’t get all the notes in one post. I’ll have to make two. So here goes the first set of notes:

The first thing Glynnis talked about was whywould we want to write for a magazine. She talked about how writing magazine articles gives beginning authors more opportunities. And, you have a broader audience with magazine articles than you do with a book. She also mentioned that writing magazine articles help to build your reputation as a writer.

The next question she addressed was what you should write. Then she suggested that we write what we know and asked us to jot down five things that we could write about now, without doing research on the topic. It could be based on life experiences, volunteer positions, paid jobs, hobbies, passions, etc.

She stressed – just like I always do – that we pray for God’s direction before we write. The scripture Psalm 127:1 was used there.

“Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain.” Psalm 127:1

Another great tip: keep a notebook. You never know when an idea for an article or post will pop into your pretty little head so if you keep a notebook handy then you can write it down when it shows up. I also keep a binder full of articles that have prompted other ideas in my mind. For example, I once saw an article on how fast food was something people would love to have in their own home on a regular basis but there was only so much that a microwave could do. Well, when I saw that article I immediately thought of our basket o’ food in the fridge and though I had never thought of it as being “fast food” before, that article made me see it as such. It was an answer to the problem that the article addressed. So I posted about it as “Fast Food That Comes From Home.” Had I not saved that article in my binder and jotted a note as to what kind of post I would like to derive from it, then I never would have remembered to write about that. I really can’t stress enough the importance of keeping a notebook.

If you find things online there is also an online notebook that you can use. It was introduced to me by my friend, Karin and it is such an answer to prayer. The free service is called Evernote. Just make sure before you sign up for it that you have a few hours to spare. You will become addicted and who can blame you? It makes all those bookmarks a thing of the past!

Back to what Glynnis said…

Next she asked the question who is your audience? First she said you should write to yourself. She quoted Cyril Connolly here: “Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.” In addition to writing for yourself, you must know who else it is that you are writing to. You should define them to even the tiniest detail. Is she a mom? a wife? a blogger? etc. Someone else also suggested that you actually tape a picture of someone who fits the bill and tape it to your monitor. Being this focused prevents you from being all over the place with your writing. Your best bet is to write for other women who are struggling in the same areas that you are.

You know what is next don’t you? Where do you begin? Conquer your fears and just start writing. You can also create an outline to give your article focus. It doesn’t matter if you start at the end or the beginning. Just write. One you have your ideas down in a rough draft then you can move into your first draft.

We will cover that in another post. This was a long detailed session and I want to make sure I get it all to you so tune back for the part two of this session!

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