Being a freelance writer means you’re an Internet entrepreneur.

It means you can decide when to work, what time to work, and whom to work for. Being a writer means you are your own boss … the manager of your own business.

There are many ways freelancers get writing jobs: offline – through their local institutions, organizations, and businesses. What every serious freelancer does is to make themselves known in the community that they belong. The moment they let the community know what they do for a living, by marketing themselves through sharing their business cards, they’re open for business.

I get at least 3 to 5 writing projects offline in a month mostly from students (those delivering speeches in their respective institutions), and local politicians (who use a lot of words to get things done. I double their rates) J

I really love offline jobs – they’re not only simple to complete, but fun to do.

Also, freelance writers source their jobs online. That’s where 80% of my writing jobs come from. This is so because the Internet is the latest medium of communication in today’s modern world.

On Facebook alone, there are over a billion users. “He [Mark Zuckerberg] created a social entity almost twice as large as the US,”  Time Magazine’s Lev Grossman said in a compelling article titled “Person of the Year 2010: Mark Zuckerberg,” detailing who Mark is and how influential “the Facebook entity” is to our lives. “If Facebook were a country, it would be the third largest, behind only China and India.”

There are a million numbers of corporations, organizations, institutions, and small and big businesses on the web as well. And as I discussed in my last article, that of all the activities going online, content is the driven force that tunes the engine of the Internet machine. More than 27 million pieces of content is shared by Internet users every day, according to the AOL Inc. report.

So, yes, we source most of our writing jobs online, because there is writing market there. Not only that, there are a number of freelance marketplaces on the Internet.

If you want to make money writing (and who doesn’t at this point?) just get some writing training (if you don’t have the skills already), and register on one or two of the following marketplaces:

1. Elance

More than 500, 000 thousand companies outsource writing jobs from elance.com. More than a hundred writing jobs of different categories is listed on the site every day. And more than a million registered freelance writers are available on the platform.

If you can horn your craft, face the competition in the writing market, and remain patient, you can make decent money writing on elance.

How can you make money from elance?

1. Register on the site for free (you need a valid I.D)
2. Browse through the many job posts on the site
3. Bid (by writing a winning proposal)
4. Follow the instructions and write high quality articles
5. Get paid (through the system) and enjoy

As a Nigerian, you only have two choices to withdraw your funds from the elance system to your bank account: either you use Payoneer Master Card or International Wire Transfer. The Payoneer Master Card is cheaper in terms of charges. You’re only charged when you check your balance or withdraw from your local ATM. And the charges are low – just about $5.

It’s cool, right? I thought so.

Or you can withdraw using a bank wire transfer service. Guaranty Trust Bank is the best bank for that – I use it often, and never experienced any hitch. The only problem with elance bank wire is that it charges a whopping fee of $25 per transfer.

2. oDesk

This is another freelance marketplace which you can register to write and make money. It’s one of the most popular online writing markets, and ranked on the Inc. 500 as the fastest growing marketplaces on the Internet.

It works just like elance.

There are some 500, 000 clients on the site looking for freelancers to take their writing projects. You can get registered on the site, whenever you’re ready, and start earning money doing what you love.

3. iWriter

This is one of the best freelance writing marketplaces.

Once you get registered on iWriter, you’ll be ranked as a “standard writer,” and start picking on jobs that you can handle well. As a standard writer, you can earn $1.62 for a 300-word article; $2.43 for a 500-word.

After you accomplish some projects and get positive feedback from requesters, you can elevate to “elite writer” status, where you can earn $15 per article. The only problem with iWriter, especially for Nigerians, is that the system only uses PayPal as its mode of transaction.

Although there are many solutions offered on the Internet on how one can use PayPal from Nigeria, but since the system doesn’t do business with us, I stay away from using any method – they seem sleazy.

4. Freelancer

Freelancer is another marketplace for writers. It works same as elance and oDesk. Clients post jobs and freelancers bid, get hired, and get paid.

On freelancer, most clients are looking for large quantity of work – there is job for almost everyone on the site. But be prepared for some competition: there are more than 8 million freelancers on the site. And that’s why you need to perfect your skills and improve the quality of your portfolio so you can attract those clients.

Once you can write a good proposal and deliver quality work, you’ll earn a lot of money on the marketplace.

5. WriteLearnEarn

This is my new writer project that’s going to be launched on January 1, 2014. It’s not like elance or freelancer; it’s simpler, easier, funnier … and it’s design specifically for Nigerians.

The program is created for the newbie writers to horn their writing skills and continuously put money in their pockets.

How does the WriteLearnEarn work?

• Write on any topic you like
• Can’t find a good topic? We’ll suggest one for you!
• We review your article
• We fix your headline, perfect the structure, and enhance the flow
• We send your article back, so you can make the necessary changes
• We keep reviewing and you keep correcting until it’s high-quality work
• Then we buy the article from you
• We pay you directly to your bank account right here in Nigeria!

Anyone with a passion for writing and earning money can join. And you don’t have to own a fancy computer or some fast Internet connection to join the program. All what you need is a simple Smartphone (that has word processor), an email address, and a bank account which we can use to pay you.

The program was built for you – the Nigerian writer – to relieve you of the stressed involved in the competitive writing market.

Sign up for the January membership here for just N1, 200. You’ll be coached by the experts, enjoy a golden opportunity to become a prolific, professional writer, and escape the hassles of rejections and client criticism … until you’re ready to face the world.

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Suhaib Mohammed is a professional freelance writer. He’s the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Haibtext. Sign up for his WriteLearnEarn program here: http://haibtext.com to write and learn as you earn. Connect with him on Twitter – @Haibtext and Facebook – http://facebook.com/haibtext