Right now the freelance market is crammed with laid off writers, editors and other creative types trying their hand at self employment.

With so much supply, it’s important to stand out. One way to do that is by offering some added value to work you perform for existing and new clients.

What’s added value? It’s some extra bang for the bucks you’re getting paid. It could be as simple as meeting deadlines or being pleasant and easy to work with – OK, sometimes that’s not so simple, but you get the idea.

Added value can be other things too. Here are 5 easy ways to add value to your freelance business – and 1 harder one, in case you’re up to the challenge.

1. Suggest art. Some magazine editors require this, especially if they’re small or trade publications. Beat them to the punch by including suggestions for photos or graphics in your pitch. As you do interviews, ask sources or their PR reps to forward art to you or directly to the editor or art director – they might not use it, but it’s there if they want it.

2. Include art in pitches. Rather than just collect art, offer to provide your own. If you can shoot photos or create charts, graphs or PowerPoint slides, say so in your pitch. And don’t forget to bump up your fee accordingly. Any news operation with a Website is interested in these kinds of extras.

3. Turn things in early. I have a Website client I write stories for every month. Stories as well as pitches for the following month’s work are always due around the 20th of the month. I shoot to file stories a couple days before the deadline and sometimes up to a week before so my editor isn’t slammed with copy she has to deal with at the last minute. Ditto for pitches. I know she appreciates it because even after her freelance budget got cut she’s still sending assignments my way.

4. Accommodate special requests.  Be flexible. Agree to a shorter or longer word counts or deadlines if something on the publication’s end changes. Yes, you may end up making less on an assignment, then again you may end up making more because they’re paying extra for a rush job or because they’ll now remember you as that can-do writer and say “yes” to your next pitch. Two editors at a trade magazine I regularly write for turned to me recently when other freelancers fell through. In one case, the original writer on a story had too many commitments and bailed so the editors offered it to me – I immediately said yes. In the other case, a different freelancer was late filing a piece for a certain section but I’d filed a piece for the same section earlier than my deadline, so they used it first.

5. Treat editors like friends. In some cases they are. In others, I try to cultivate a friendly working relationship so they’ll think of me as being low-maintenance and send work my way. I forward information to editors if I think it’s something they’d be interested in (but never chain email). I write LinkedIn recommendations if they ask – and if I honestly have something good to say. After all, they’re just as anxious as we are about the job market these days.

There are more difficult ways to add value too. With so much work moving online, you can add value to your writing by learning SEO basics, HTML, Photoshop, InDesign, blogging, podcasting or other multimedia skills that add dimension to your storytelling, and your portfolio. This added value is harder to attain because it’s not something you can just do – you may have to take a Webinar or class. But if that’s what it takes to help you stand out in a crowd, it’s worth it.

What are extras you offer clients to set yourself apart from the competition?

In one episode of Sex and the City, Sarah Jessica Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw character lands a freelance assignment for some incredible amount, like $4 a word. As a real-life freelance writer, I’ve never made $4 a word, or even met anybody who does. I’m not sure rates like that exist. Even $2 a word sounds pretty good to me. But the technology and business magazines I write for don’t pay that much. So what I lack in high-paying clients I have to make up for by being super efficient in what and how I write. I shared some of this philosophy recently on the message forums at Freelance Success, a newsletter for professional freelance writers, and a great source for tips on marketing for freelancers.

One of my regular clients is a technology Web site that pays 50 cents a word for 500-word stories. That’s $250 per story – like I said, not a lot of money. However, I’ve been able to make this market work for me by:

• Sticking to my going hourly rate for the amount of time I put into the stories.
• Doing multiple stories around a single topic so I can interview one source for two stories.
• Getting the editor to assign a story and graphics – which pay an additional fee – on the same topic so I can stretch the research even further.
• Focusing on topics that fall within my already established beat, so instead of starting from scratch on every story I have a pool of sources to draw from or know where to go to find them. I’ve always been a beat reporter, so this is standard operating procedure for me.
• Spinning ideas and sources I find for these stories into pitches at other tech outlets I write for.
• Using stories as basis for posts to this blog, which I guess is a different way of stretching my research.

And since I have an ongoing relationship with the client, I get work from them every month, some of which is assigned, some of which is based on my queries, so for very little marketing on my part I have a steady income stream. Multiply this times a few clients and voila, you’ve got a business.

My style of marketing works for me, but it might not suit everyone. Another Freelance Success member who blogs about the business of writing is Eric Sherman. Check out his blog, Erik Sherman’s WriterBiz. I’d love to hear other freelancers’ marketing secrets.