How to Create Freelance Writing Samples for Your Portfolio

Learn how to create freelance writing samples for your portfolio, how long they should be, and how to display and email them.

To become a freelance writer, you need to show potential clients that you can write — that’s where writing samples come in.

In the beginning, they’re everything you have to prove your worth as a writer.

Don’t overlook this step!

The time you’ll spend creating awesome samples, in the beginning, will pay dividends in the future.

That’s why I created this guide. I wanted to gather every bit of information you need to write your samples in one place.

Here, you can learn why content writing samples are important, how to create them, where and how to display them, the ideal length, how to send them to clients, and more.

What Are Writing Samples?

A freelance writing sample is a document that shows a client your writing skills, writing style, and expertise on a topic.

You should create a sample tailored to the type of freelance writing service you’re offering, be it blog posts, social media content, marketing emails, case studies, copy, or another.

You need to make sure your writing samples are as high-quality and relevant as possible.

When you’re just getting started, those samples are the only asset you have to prove to potential clients you can write.

What Can I Submit as a Writing Sample?

What you can submit as a writing sample depends on your niche and the services you provide, but here are some examples:

• A link to a PDF document you uploaded to Google Drive — never send PDFs as attachments!
• A blog post or page on your website
• A Medium story — extra points if it was accepted to a Medium publication
• A guest post
• Posts from your own social media accounts, if you offer social media writing services
• Your previously published work

Why You Need Writing Samples for Freelance Writing

When you’re new and have no published work, you need to prove to clients that you can write. People won’t hire you without seeing a single piece of written work from you.

By providing samples, clients can see right away whether or not you do the skills they’re looking for, how you format your content, if your writing tone fits their brand, whether you back your claims with research or not, and more.

Regardless of the type of sample you create and send, you should have a freelance writer website with a portfolio section where you display those samples — this is the best way to show clients you’re serious about freelance writing.

The next best option is having a Contently portfolio (it’s free).

⚠️ Pro tip: if you already have writing samples and a client asks you to write a free sample piece for them, you should refuse in most cases.

That’s what your portfolio and previous samples are for. If they want a trial piece it should be paid (you could do it for a discounted price, though).

How to Create Freelance Writing Samples for Your Portfolio

This is what you came here to learn — how to create freelance writing samples for your precious portfolio.

I’ll teach you five different ways: creating PDF documents, posting content on your website, writing on Medium or LinkedIn, and guest posting.

Keep in mind that the key to creating great freelance writing samples is writing something that matches the content your ideal clients usually publish.

➡️ Here’s an example: let’s say you want to become a fashion blog writer, you could write 1,000-word blog posts titled “What To Wear To A Winter Wedding” and “9 Closet Essentials For Effortless Style This Fall” as samples.

If you wanted to be a fashion social media writer, you could use the same topics to create a Twitter thread and two Instagram posts, for example.

Let’s get started!

1. Create a PDF Document

Let’s start with the easiest and most obvious option.

Simply create your samples on Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or another word-processing tool, and save them as PDFs.

Then, upload them to Google Drive, create shareable links, and send them to your prospects.

Here’s how you create shareable links:

1. Right-click your sample, and choose “Get link.”

2. Then, change it from “Restricted” to “Anyone with the link.”

3. And, finally, make sure it’s set to “Viewer,” so that people can’t edit your document, and click “Copy link” to get your shareable sample.

This is definitely the fastest way to do it but also the least professional-looking. You may have to take a couple of low-paying gigs first (on Upwork, for example).

Once these simple samples get you your first clients, use your newly published work as samples to land better opportunities.

2. Write Samples & Publish Them on Your Website

Here are some types of content you can create and publish on your website:

• Blog posts
• Landing page or sales page copy
• Lead magnet landing pages
• Sample “About” pages
• Case studies
• White papers

⚠️ Pro tip: you can set these pages as “no index” so that Google doesn’t index and display them on search. You can also not link those pages in your website menu and footer. Just keep them as “secret pages” to send clients and include them in your portfolio.

For some of these options (i.e. all types of pages), you’d also need website design skills. Wow! That seems way too hard.

It’s actually super easy if you use Divi’s pre-made themes and layouts. Then, all you have to do is the writing part!

I can’t teach you how to write all those content types in this post, but here are the key components of a blog post:

1. Headline: It should be descriptive and enticing — you can use CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer to help you craft the perfect title.
2. Introduction: Show what the reader can learn from the post.
3. Body: Write everything on the topic, dividing it into headers and subheaders.
4. Conclusion: Summarize the blog post, list key takeaways, and/or draw conclusions.
5. Call to action (CTA): Tell the reader what to do next — share the post, comment below, download a lead magnet, purchase a product, or another CTA. Choose only one, though!

Then, use Grammarly to edit your post, so there are no spelling or grammar mistakes. You can get the Chrome extension or install it on Word for free.

I wrote a very comprehensive guide on how to write SEO-friendly blog posts, check it out if you need more help writing your samples.

You can also download my SEO blog post checklist to follow my step-by-step process. It’ll save you a lot of time! 😄👇

Besides creating blog post samples, you can regularly write and post on your blog and share your content on social media.

You’ll get an audience of your own and create an online presence that’ll bring clients to you in the long run — but this is a topic for another time!

Let’s get back to your freelance writer samples.

3. Guest Post on Other Blogs & Websites

Guest posting comes with a set of advantages unmatched by any other option on this list:

• You’ll get published samples with a by-line and get your name out there.
• The connections you’ll make could lead to work, collaborations, and referrals in the future.
• You’ll get some outreach practice.
• You’ll get a backlink to your website (if you have one), which is good for SEO.
• You’ll potentially get feedback on your writing.

But it’s also the hardest and most time-consuming option. You’ll might also need at least one writing sample to send with your guest post pitches.

It’ll take quite some time to research blogs you can guest post on, email them, wait for a response (they may never respond), follow up on your pitch, create content, and wait for it to be published — but it’s worth it.

So, here’s how you go about it:

1. Search for websites in your niche that accept guest posts.
2. Read a few posts on their blog to understand the type of content they’re looking for and how you can contribute.
3. Brainstorm one to three possible topics and make sure they weren’t covered yet.
4. Email the blog owner asking to guest post — be polite and thoughtful, address them by their first name, give them everything they need to make a decision, and keep it short.
5. If you don’t get an answer from them, wait at least a week before sending a follow-up email.
6. Once your guest post pitch is accepted, go above and beyond to create great content and stick to the deadline.

You can download my cold pitching and guest posting spreadsheet to organize your outreach campaign 👇

4. Publish Stories on Medium

Medium is a great place for you to publish your samples. It’s a blogging platform — I consider it a social media platform for writers.

Posts are called “stories” on Medium. They can be as long or as short as you want and any topic goes — you can find anything from 50-word poems to 3,000-word, in-depth marketing guides there.

One advantage of this platform is that it comes with a built-in audience.

You can comment on other writers’ stories, mention them in yours, and apply to Medium publications to submit your stories — this makes it easy to get people to read your content and get feedback on your writing immediately.

If you were blogging, it’d take a long time to build an audience. By submitting your stories to Medium publications, they’ll be shared with everyone who already follows those publications.

Even if you don’t want to submit to publications or don’t get accepted, you can add categories and tags to your stories. They’ll be seen by people who follow those tags.

You can follow tags, publications, and other writers — and people can follow you, too.

Once you have 100 followers, you can apply to the Medium Partner Program and start making money from the time people spend reading your stories.

Now that you know the basics about Medium, here’s how you create samples there:

1. Create a free profile on Medium

You don’t need the paid version if you’re just going to publish samples to send to clients — you can also read three stories per month with the free plan. I’ll talk about the paid plan shortly.

2. Click the “Write” button on the bottom left side of your Medium homepage.

3. Write your sample. Here’s a super serious visual guide to writing on Medium:

4. Click the three-dot button at the top right corner to change some settings.

The “change topics” button is the most important one. That’s where you add tags and categories so that your story is seen by more people.

You can also add your story to a publication you were accepted to, select the featured image, change the display title and subtitle if you want it to be different from your title and subtitle, and more.

5. Publish your story!

Hit the publish button at the top right corner and you’re done!

If you added your story to a publication, the button will say “submit” instead of “publish.”

Now, about the paid plan. It costs $5/month and allows you to read as many stories as you want. You’ll get a $10 discount if you buy the yearly plan instead of paying monthly.

I love Medium. I love learning from other writers, reading about their experiences growing their businesses, and getting feedback on my writing. If you want to get the Medium subscription, you can sign up through my link.

5. Publish Articles on LinkedIn

Did you know you can write articles on LinkedIn?

No, I’m not talking about creating LinkedIn posts, you can create actual articles there — they even rank on Google, just like blog posts!

LinkedIn is basically your online resume. It’s one of the best ways to show off your skills and market your services to clients.

If you want to keep everything in the same place for clients to see, get on LinkedIn and write your samples there.

TL;DR — How to Get Writing Samples

To get writing samples, you can:

• Create a PDF document
• Publish blog posts or pages on your website
• Guest post
• Post stories on Medium
• Post articles on LinkedIn

How Long Should Writing Samples Be?

Your writing samples should be around the same length as the service you’re providing.

If you want to get hired to write long-form blog posts, write a long-form blog post — ideally, 2,000+ words.

If you want to get hired to write Twitter content, prove that you can stick to their character limit both with single tweets and threads.

The same goes for product descriptions, marketing emails, sales page copy, and all other content types.

I’ll give you some concrete examples. If your writing type isn’t included, do a quick Google search to find out the ideal length.

• Blog posts: 800 to 1,500 words
• Long-form blog posts: >2,000 words
• Emails: <500 words
• eBooks: >10,000 words
• Case studies: 500 to 10,000 words, depending on the topic (but if you’re just writing a sample, aim for a short one — 2,500 words max.)
• White papers: 5 to 8 pages (but they can be shorter or longer depending on the topic — again, aim for a shorter one)

There’s an exception to this, though.

Let’s say you already have some samples and some work published but you want to write for a new niche — you may get away with showing your previous work and just writing a small 300 to 500-word sample to show you can write about that new topic.

How Many Writing Samples in a Portfolio?

Your freelance writer portfolio should have at least one sample for each type of writing service you offer.

Aim to start with at least three samples in your portfolio and, then, replace them or add more as you get published in more reputable sites or write better pieces.

How to Email Writing Samples

There are two ways you can email your writing samples:

• Send a link to your portfolio.

It’s ok to simply send a link to your portfolio if you only have three to five samples. But, generally speaking, it’s not the best option.

• Write the title of the samples and hyperlink it to the sample themselves.

This is the best way to do it.

You should always do your best to not “waste your prospect’s time.” Give them everything they need to decide whether or not they want to hire you — make it as easy as possible!

It’s even more important to do it this way if you have lots of samples on your portfolio that prospects would have to browse through.

Here’s another example of why you should do it this way: let’s say you’re applying for a job to write about email marketing.

The three samples you have on your portfolio are about digital marketing, SEO, and social media marketing.

But you happen to have a published article about growing an email list and another about effective email copy — these are super relevant to the job you’re applying for (they’re about email marketing!).

So, instead of sending your portfolio or the samples you have on your portfolio, you should send these two to show your prospect you’re knowledgeable about the topic they want you to write about.

⚠️ Pro tip: never ever send your samples as a PDF attachment! Upload them to Google Drive, create a shareable link, and send that link.

How Many Writing Samples Should I Send?

You should send two to three relevant samples with each of your cold pitches or freelance writing job applications.

How to Create Freelance Writing Samples — Key Takeaways

💡 The key to creating great writing samples is to understand your niche and what your ideal clients are looking for.

Take time to thoroughly research your industry, read a lot of content similar to the one you’re offering, and strategically plan the samples you’ll create.

Then, craft the best sample you can, considering what length and format better fit your niche.

You got this! 💪

Ready to kickstart your freelance writing career? Get started today 👇