Relay Publishing is looking for a Blurb Reviewer with marketing and advertising experience who wants to earn a competitive, reliable income in a fun online working environment.
Job Outline
We want to work with people who are creative, passionate, and conscientious on an ongoing basis. As a virtual office, communication is key, we like to work with individuals who can meet deadlines and communicate clearly and efficiently to keep project coordinators up to date with your progress.
As a Blurb Reviewer, you will be strengthening the text that our blurb writers have crafted, improving the emotional and intellectual hooks to create effective blurbs that should give a reader a taste of the conflict and characters, compelling them to want more. The blurbs will be written from a manuscript outline that you will be able to reference, but will not necessarily be working from – the focus is to succinctly and accurately identify elements that are engaging to our readers across our range of romance and non-romance genres including YA Fantasy, Fantasy Romance, Post Apocalyptic, Legal Thrillers, Psychological Thrillers and YA Dystopian/ Sci Fi.
Necessary Skills & Experience
- Understanding of SEO and know-how to incorporate keywords into copy
- Extensive experience as a copy editor/marketing content writer
- Prior experience with blurb writing or editing for fiction novels
- Ability to identify key phrases/elements of interest for a fiction reader without divulging a story or giving plot details
- Understand the role of blurbs in providing a hook, not a review
- Ability to select which details to include and which to filter out to retain the shape and feel of the novel
- Excellent communication and analytical skills
- Time management and prioritization
- Technologically savvy in order to work with our project management software and Word!
About You
Candidates will understand that a good blurb is essential to readers moving from browsing to buying. You have the ability to identify a story’s essence and understand the tropes, syntax and tone of the genre.
You enjoy a challenge and using your analytical skills to search for the perfect word or phrase that will refine a compelling hook for readers. You have an eye for detail and ensure that your work is of a high standard at all times, with a solid foundation of spelling, grammar, and punctuation. You are a person who enjoys the brainstorming process and high-level collaborative creation, a content specialist who can cater to your target audience, and works well with deadlines.
What’s in it for You?
An amazing freelance, online, remote working environment with a real collaborative virtual office that fosters teamwork, development and open communication. We are passionate about creating an online workplace that really works! We use an online project management software that helps us keep an open, collaborative approach to all our projects. Just because we work remote, doesn’t mean we have to be remote! We want to nurture our team and work with a consistent group of professionals to be part of the company as it continues to grow. We use an online project management system to run our projects which integrate seamlessly with your emails.
We thoroughly believe in long-term collaborative relationships and that is reflected in our approach to all our projects. We offer competitive rates, clear briefs & expectations, and friendly and fun communication throughout. Flexibility is one of our core work principles: as long as the work gets done, you can do it whenever it suits you. Unlike a traditional office we don’t require you to be at your desk 9-5—you pick your own schedule. If you’re serious about writing or editing for a living, we’d love to hear from you.
We are always open to ideas. We like to have brainstorming sessions and offer incentives for participation. Whether that’s a new book or business venture, a change to processes and workflow. No matter what your role, you are part of the team and your voice counts.
We have grown dramatically over the last couple years and we plan on growing more, come along for the ride!
Next Steps:
We’d love to see a sample of your blurb editing on a sample blurb that we’ll provide.
- Please download either this SEAL Romance blurb from here or this Post Apocalyptic blurb from here (according to your previous experience and genre preference) and save as a word document to be uploaded as an edited version (with tracked changes) when prompted in the application form. Please do not edit the google document linked.
- The wordcount for the blurb should be no more than 200 words and there should be a tagline (you can see examples of this on our website here). We’re also looking for the edits to highlight key story hooks, introduce characters in an engaging manner and clearly demonstrate the genre. Please note that we are not asking for the blurb to be re-written – just reviewed and edited where needed for improvement.
- Please also attach one or more example blurbs of your own so that we can review these alongside. You will be prompted to do this in the application form.