Often, the hardest part of writing an essay is choosing your topic, and the angle you are going to take on it.  Not only do you have to choose a subject, but you need to decide which side of an argument to take, or whether to stay unbiased.  You may also need to offer a new, fresh perspective on a subject which may have been covered hundreds of times before.

Once you have figured out the basics on how to write your essay you will then need to look at the structure of your essay.

The structure of an essay is incredibly important when you are learning how to write an essay.  The people who mark an essay will have to read hundreds of essays, so you have to make yours not only interesting, but easy to read, and mark!

Always write a thesis statement for your essay, attach this to the front of your work.  The thesis statement should give an overview of the subject, your angle (For, against, unbiased), and any other information a reader may find useful before reading your essay.  The thesis statement is the perfect way to inform the reader or examiner about the enclosed essay.

Write an essay outline.  This does not need to be included with your essay, although a cut down version as an index may not hurt.  You should always do this before you begin writing.

Your essay outline should show you how you will structure your essay, show you what you will need to research, and will make it easier to alter the structure of your essay.  When you create your outline first do a thematic outline then detail it with a structural outline.

The thematic outline gives you the general order of your essay.  The structural outline will help you organise your paragraphs and research notes.  By organising your writing here, it could save you hours of rewriting later on.

The essay outline is a great way to organise both your page structure and your research to help you write your essay and successfully build a readable, fact filled, interesting document.

While it is easy to lump research in to the essay outline, it is important to emphasise just how important this is.  Your research should not just be note taking, but a learning experience.  By learning the facts on your chosen subject you will write more smoothly, fluently, and interestingly on your subject.  A well researched article is a confident article, and that will shine through when it is read by others.

How to Write an Essay

When you start your essay you should always include a detailed introduction to your essay. This may be similar to your thesis statement, but where your thesis statement told the examiner exactly what you tried to achieve, your introduction should introduce the topic from your own viewpoint.  The essay could be a paragraph or a page, either way, it should give the tone, angle, and overall objective of your essay.

When you are looking to write the introduction to your essay you must spend some time ensuring it gives a good solid grounding for what the essay will be about.  You need to give a quick overview of the subject and how you perceive it.  Be careful not to ramble in the introduction, as it will quickly put off anyone who has to read it!

Once you have completed the introduction you must build the body of your essay, this varies greatly depending on the subject and how you portray it.  Some may include an argument and counter argument, others may need to structure a single argument in to several well built sections, each with their own reasoning and evidence.  When you build the body remember to keep it well structured (Your essay outline should be useful here), factual, and interesting.

The biggest problem with essays are rambling sentences.  Keep your mind on the subject when writing, and most importantly read through every paragraph to ensure that each sentence you write has a clear concise point to it.  If you write an essay filled with pointless sentences or even paragraphs you will lose your reader, or examiners interest.

The conclusion to your essay should generally be short and sweet. You have already covered your topics and probably your results, so here you just need to summarize.  While repetition is bad, a general overview of what you have covered does not hurt here.  Be careful to include not just your findings, but what they mean and how they affect your view on the subject.  The few paragraphs that make up your conclusion should not just summarize your research, but prove how it supports your essay’s viewpoint.

Follow these simple guidelines and you should find yourself with a well written, well structured, and most importantly, well received essay.  Keep your mind focused, avoid repetition and rambling. But most importantly research the subject well to ensure it’s accuracy and validity!

How to Write the Perfect Invitation

It is not really something you ever think about, but writing an invitation can be a daunting task.  You have to consider a huge range of aspects to get the feel, the formality and the content of your invitation across.

In this guide on how to write the perfect invitation we won’t be going over the technical creative details, instead we will be going over the actual content that you will write in to your invitation, and how it will convey the theme of your event to the readers.

So without further ado, lets start on how to write the perfect invitation!

First things first, when you are writing the perfect invitation you have to focus both the design and the style around the event. Likewise, the content you write should vary form a dinner party and a wedding.

If you are having a formal dinner party, keep the writing fairly formal, but relax it a little in parts, to convey this will be a party.  If you are younger and having a less formal dinner party then your language should be levelled at exactly the amount of drinking you intend to happen, and whether it will be wine tasting or beer guzzling!  If you are writing a Wedding invitation then there are a whole set of rules, which will be included in our how to write a wedding invitation guide, coming soon!.

But lets consider the first thing on the invitation, how do you address an invitation to a recipient?

For a formal party you would usually use the persons prefix followed by last name, for instance

Dear Dr Anderson % Mrs Anderson

This is however not required if you are inviting a few friends over, in which case it would simply be the first names.  You can decide whether to prefix this with the word ‘dear’ at your own discrestion.

The content of your invitation is crucial. You need to look at how to write your invitation so that it conveys not only the information about the party, but gives conotations as to the feel of the event.

For example, an invitation to a casual wine tasting evening may go as follows

Dear John and Sarah,

I would like to invite you to an evenings wine tasting on the evening of the 15th of February.  We will be providing some staple wines, but would be grateful if you could bring a bottle which you have discovered since the last event.  To begin the evening we will be tasting the different wines, before settling down to a small meal, with the remaining tipple.

Note how I maintained the formal tone, but gave it a casual finish to show that this would not be a snobby event, and teh wine would be more than tasted!

After the first paragraph I could include further information on the event, and in the last paragraph I would say where it is being held.

The final section nearly always includes to things.  The first is an RSVP, especially useful if you are stocking up on food and drink beforehand. The second is the farewell.

When writing an RSVP on an invitation it is important not to come across as rude.  You can ensure this by requesting a response, and being careful not to demand one.

ie. ‘We would be grateful if you could inform us if you will be able to attend the Wine Tasting on the evening of…’

Not ‘Please RSVP’ or ‘Please inform us if you can attend the….’

This may seem obvious, but you would be surprised how many disputes have arisen because of a snobby sounding RSVP request!

When signing off your invitation you can use several methods, from ‘Yours Sincerely’ and ‘Kindest Regards’, down to ‘See You Soon!’ or ‘See you There!’

If your invitation is formal you should keep your send off as such, Yours sincerely can often seem inappropriate for an invitation, in which case Kindest/Warmest Regards makes an ideal substitute.

Follow these steps and you should have written the perfect invitation with this how to guide!

Become a Freelance Writer

Thousands of people set out to make money on the Internet every week, and yet thousands fail.  In this simple guide I plan to show you how to become a freelance writer on the Internet, and earn enough of an income doing it.

The first thing you need to consider is how to spread your work over several different areas to give you a constant income, even if one source of work dries up.  Below I will show you how to write freelance on the Internet and still make a good income while doing so!

Create your own websites.  They can be about anything you want, but update each one at least once a day. Place adverts all over the site, I suggest using Google Adsense, who are a safe and reliable advertising choice.

Once you have your own websites up and running keep checking out forums such as Digital Point of Digital Sale Forum.  Sites like these can have a huge variety of work available, and they often pay more than the sites which I will go in to next!  You can also advertise your services on these websites, so people can find you, and offer you freelance writing jobs!

You can also join sites such as E-Lance, these let you bid on jobs, don’t be discouraged by huge numbers of low bids. The buyers will undoubtedly be looking at quality as well as price.  If you are going to sell your services on these sites, remember to spend a lot of time writing up your sales copy for your bids.

The final area you should look in to is the set fee freelance writing job websites.  Textbroker is probably one of the easiest sites to use in this catagory, the pay is very low, but there is a lot of work available.

Now that you have signed up to these services and set up your own websites I will show you how to make money freelance writing.  First off you have to remember two key aspects of being a freelance writer that will ensure your success.  These are Quality and Quantity.  You have to get to the stage where you can produce both of these on a daily basis.

Quality is key.  The only way you can make money as a freelance writer is to provide a higher quality service than the thousands of Indian freelance writers.

Quantity is also important.  In your own websites you need to keep the content up to keep visitors coming in.  On other websites you need to keep up the quantity to get your name well known, and your income coming in!

My final tip on how to become a freelance writer is, DON’T GIVE UP HOPE!

Thousands of people trying to take up the freelance career path fail each day, not because of their skill, but because they give in.  It takes time to become noticed, but if you can write well, you will succeed!