How to Be a Ghostwriter

Video Transcript

"REBECCA SATO: Hi. I'm Rebecca Sato with ExpertVillage.com, and we've been talking about the different markets for writing. And we've mentioned copywriting which is where you're a writing copy to sell products or services, and now we're going to talk about ghostwriting. Ghostwriting is kind of a paradox because it's hard to build a sample portfolio of ghostwriting that you've done, because you always ghostwrite under anonymous terms. So let me explain. You know all these books out there by really busy celebrities? Do you really think that all of them took the time to write a really great book in between shooting three films and two TV series? Well, the truth is they probably didn't write it. It's probably written by a ghostwriter who may have gotten some input from the name on the book and some notes and such. So the content of that book might be from that person but it's the ghostwriter that does all the actual writing, the nitty-gritty, sentence after sentence. So what you have to know is if you want to do ghostwriting, which I think is a lot of fun, but you have to realize it's not going to necessarily further your career and you're not necessarily going to get any credit for it. Sometimes, if you do ghostwriting, you do actually get partial credit and then it's not really like ghostwriting. It will be the author's name with your name, and that's nice because then you can it as a sample in the future. But just be aware that ghostwriting can--it is a great thing to do if you like to write novels and you want to practice, but you don't have the big name to sell it. So it's a good way to get into the market and to learn how to improve your skills and make some good money. Ghostwriting usually pays quite well. So that is what that is all about. And if that's what you're doing, then it's the same as anywhere else. You can find those ghostwriting projects like we've talked about earlier on those different Web sites or Writer's Market and different things like that, and a lot of times through word of mouth."