Freelance Grant Writing: What Is It and Seeing If A Grant Writing Career Is Right For You?

Here's a video blog I did today! Grab a seat, and I will share with you some insights about freelance grant writing and what it's all about. Enjoy!

• Let's Talk About Freelancing
• A Day In The Life Of A Grant Writer
• Picking Profitable Writing Niches

Hey, guys, Rodney Walker here, and today I want to share with you and talk to you about what is freelance grant writing. You know, I talked to a lot of people that are interested in breaking into this field and they're interested in doing grant writing and they're really interested in learning what it takes to really become a freelancer. So I want to talk to you a little bit more about that today, and I want to share some insight with you that can help you on your journey so that you can do this freelance grant writing thing and begin to take it to some new levels and really be able to have an enjoyable career if you choose to do that in this area. So let's just grab a seat. I'm going to get something to drink, if you don't mind, and give me a little water over here.

And as I get some water, we'll grab a seat. And what I'll do is just unfold to you some information that may be able to help you as you do your freelance grant writing. You may be, listen. I don't know where you're at. You may be at the very beginning stages. Maybe you are just starting out and you may be completely new to grant writing, and you want to hangout? This freelance writing thing work?

Well, what I'm going to do is I'm going to unfold it to you. I'm going to share some insight with you and look at the whole kind of comprehensive system of what it takes to do this. So let's just grab a seat.

Let's Talk About Freelancing

And let's talk about this thing, and I think the first thing is going to be really important for us to look at, is what is freelance grant writing? OK. Let's just this is talking about that for a second. And let's look at it and see what the difference is between freelance grant writing and some of the other types of grant writing. So here's the thing, when we're talking about freelance grant writing, freelance grant writing is, first of all, grant writing, but it's grant writing that's done across the landscape.

So it's like it's freelancing. This is not free. Hopefully, we don't want to make it free forever, OK. But freelancing is this working and doing grant writing across the landscape of the various nonprofit or governmental agencies that are out there that may hire you to actually write a grant proposal for them.

It's different in that you don't work for any one organization, whereas the traditional way that a lot of people have done grant writing is they've worked for one organization and that one organization hires them as a part are a fulltime grant writer where they write grants for them and they help them to get funded. 

So the difference is when you're doing freelance grant work, you're working with multiple nonprofit organizations, typically our governmental agencies, and you are on a contract basis with them either doing it on a project base or on an hourly basis or whatever you choose to do in terms of your setup. But you're working with multiple organizations to help them secure funding. So freelancing is something. And I want to tell you about what's happening in our current landscape.

Now, right now, doing freelance grant writing it may be a great opportunity and a great time to kind of start doing it. It is predicted and estimated by the year 2027 that they're going to be more people doing freelance work than are currently doing it. And it's going to exceed the current workforce that is currently working with just one job. So by 2027, they're going to be more people on the freelance side of things than are in the traditional side of things right now. So here's what we've got to look at. 

A Day In The Life Of A Grant Writer

If you're thinking about doing great writing and do a freelance writing, you get ready to go into space that really has been designed over the last several years to kind of start going more in that direction anyway. 

What do you mean, Rodney? Well, I tell you. Before the Internet came along, people were doing mostly grant writing in their area. Then when the Internet came along, it started changing thing. The world became smaller. And so because it became smaller, no longer did a grant writer have to simply be in that same city that most of their business was coming from. So what happens, blew that off the wall and then the landscape for the freelancer literally became all across our nation. And I even know grant writers that are doing grant writing for organizations and they're in other countries. They're on one side of the world and they're doing grant writing for organizations on the other side of the world. 

OK, so that's what's happened. That's how our societies change. And that's what we think about freelancing, that you're not limited to just your city to doing grant writing in there. Now, here's the thing. When you're thinking about doing this, there are a number of factors and other elements and things that we want to think about. It may not be a bad idea to do grant writing in your area. That's your niche, but we'll get to that later. But for just right now, just know that when we talk about freelance grant writing, the essence of what we're talking about is writing for multiple organizations and not being bound or obligated to working solely for any one. 

Picking Profitable Writing Niches

OK, what's happening with a lot of organizations and people that are doing like freelance grant writing? A lot of freelance grant writers have chosen some to work in specific niches. Others have chose to say more general and they work and do grant writing. Sometimes they may be working on an art project. Others may be working later on a health project. Others may be and come back and work on a veterans project or an agricultural project. But some has said, okay, great, I'm just going to stay in this lane and do grant writing in this one particular area. 

That's up to you. You don't have to decide that. But the big picture is that freelancing allows you to work in many different areas if you choose to. And some people like the challenge of that. Some people like the diversity of that. Some people feel too constrained when they're working on a niche and a niche area. And there are advantages and disadvantages really to both work and even the same way.

When we start talking about doing freelancing, freelancing has some advantages and some disadvantages versus the traditional way, okay? so it really depends on where you're at and what you're wanting to do. Now, let's talk about for a second or to just this whole freelance thing, and let's look at it from the standpoint of really, are you cut out to do freelance grant writing? 

And let's talk about that for a second, because everybody is not really wired for it. Some people are more wired for it. So when we look at freelancing, here's some things to consider. Number one, freelancers have to be ready to get their names out there by marketing and they have to really connect with people and be really willing to network and make connections with several different organizations, because, again, you're not obligated to working with anyone, OK?

You have to be wired to do that. And you have to be ready to do that. And you have to be prepared to start doing marketing and getting your name out there and working with several organizations. You have to be willing to take a risk, OK? Some people are averse to risk and they feel more secure knowing, hey, great, every month, this is what's going to happen with this one company that is paying me, OK. So you've got to ask yourself, hey and I what's my risk level? Am I willing to take a risk in doing this? You may have a job or you're working right now and this may just be part of your side hustle where you're doing this on a side.

OK, so you have the benefit of keeping your job while also doing some grant writing on the side. That's another thing you want to consider. The another thing that you might want to consider is, is workload. You know, can you if you're working with the job right now, does this allow you to maintain and do good work there as well as take on additional things that may take up is difficult, take up some of your time. So those are some things you've got to kind of think through as you think about freelancing.

Freelancing also provides you the opportunity to bring in that additional income if this is not your main gig. So, a lot of things that kind of think about but the biggest thing is looking at it and seeing do you think you're wired for it in terms of being able and being committed to putting your name out there to garnering, learning marketing, networking and getting business.

That's the big thing! And if you are, then this field could really be an exciting field for you because it has a lot of opportunity and a lot of ways to grow and connect and help a lot of nonprofit organizations to do a much better job in securing funding. Now, that's all the time that I have for you in this video. In the next one, I'm going to go deeper and going to share some more insight to help you and your freelance grant writing efforts. All the best. Be brave, Be bold. Be brilliant. Never forget. Take charge.

Rodney Walker is today’s leading expert in Grant Development Systems™ and President of Grant Central USA - Grant Writers Association. Learn more about his online grant writing courses today.