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If you're working at a particular company, chances are good your boss wants you to go to regular training classes to learn more about your position. In doing so, you remain sharp in your work and good at your job. You can send yourself off for your own training sessions as a freelance writer. While practice does help your writing during typical days, there are additional ways to ensure your writing is sharp and your business remains successful.

Take Writing Classes

While grammar rules don't change, it never hurts to make sure you're still following them. By looking into writing classes which focus on composition, you can make sure your writing is crisp and professional. There are a number of great books you can use as well, but classes (whether online or in person) can help you get feedback on your writing as a whole. Try finding one writing class to take for each six months you're writing professionally. This will keep you from getting lazy with your grammar and it can help boost the networking opportunities you have. Also, make sure you're taking new classes each time, rather than simply taking the same class over and over.

Try New Genres of Writing

If you're typically a fiction writer, take on some assignments which focus on writing non-fiction – or vice versa. In order to become the best writer possible, you need to challenge yourself with new writing styles. This will help you spread your writing marketability, plus this can keep you from getting burnt out in one particular genre of writing. Even if you're not sending out this other kind of writing or you're not getting paid to do, take time each month to learn more about another type of writing – and then practice it. For example, you might want to look into poetry if you typically write in longer narratives. This additional writing work doesn't have to take up a lot of your time, but you should try to learn more about new ways you can use the English language as you write.

Attend Writing Retreats and Conferences

Sometimes, you need to get out of the house to keep your writing sharp. About once a year, it's a good idea to go to a writing retreat or a conference to achieve this goal. This way, you can meet with other writers and you can learn more about what they are doing to keep themselves in business. It's also a good idea to attend these types of meetings to learn more about the market as a whole, as writing can change. Sometimes, there are trends in the market that will influence what clients need – but if you don't get out to learn about them, you might not have this information. For example, many clients are looking for more casual writing rather than formal writing. But if you continue to market your stiffer writing style, you might not get the work you want. Writing might be a talent you feel is natural to you, but if you're not spending the time keeping this talent as sharp as possible, you might be missing out on developing into an even more powerful writer.