Invest in your writing future and create a portfolio of quality writing samples
- Write eight quality writing samples for your portfolio
- Work 1:1 with an experienced writing mentor
- Stay motivated and accountable
- Gain new skills (and polish the skills you have)
- Use your samples to get paid work
- Feel more confident when you apply for writing jobs
- Showcase your diverse writing abilities.
Helped me enhance my writing skills and approach my freelance business with more focus and confidence
“Michelle is a wonderful person, a great teacher, mentor, and listener. You will see this reflected in the course content and interactions with her. She helped me narrow down my niche, improve my website and LinkedIn profile, and create my portfolio. Her comments and feedback helped me enhance my writing skills and approach my freelance business with more focus and confidence. If you are looking for a mentor or looking to improve your writing skills and create a portfolio, I highly recommend Michelle’s Masterclass.”
Krithika Muthukumaran, PhD, Canada
Who is this masterclass for?
Build Your Portfolio Masterclass is perfect for you if:
- You don’t have any published writing
- You want to build a strong portfolio but don’t know how to start
- You’d prefer to work 1:1 with a mentor instead of taking a group course
- You are serious about committing to your writing future
- You are ready to write (a lot).
What will you write?
Together, we develop an writing program tailored to your interests, experience and career goals. Common writing styles you can work on include:
- Health news articles – concise pieces that demonstrate you can write about research and complex topics for a general public audience
- Patient handouts – educational content that shows you can write engaging web copy for physicians, health professionals, hospitals, non-profits and associations
- Health feature articles – excellent general pieces that showcase your writing skills and illustrate you can write about a wide variety of health topics
- Health blogs – creative, engaging pieces that demonstrate your unique writing personality, storytelling skills and ability to advocate for a cause or health issue
- eBooks – longer pieces that show you can write detailed pieces about health topics
- White papers – specialty pieces that illustrate your B2B and corporate writing skills.
Coaching calls to help you achieve your goals faster
In this masterclass, you’ll do more than write. Importantly, you’ll also plan your next steps and determine how to use your new portfolio to find paid work. In our fortnightly coaching sessions, we’ll focus on your:
- LinkedIn page and strategy
- Email pitches and processes
- Freelance writing website
- Marketing strategy
- Career goals.
What will you learn?
Build Your Portfolio Masterclass is a 1:1 mentoring program, designed to help you create eight quality health & medical writing samples for your writing portfolio.
- Define your niche and target clients or employers
- Determine your writing styles
- Workshop topics and ideas for health & medical content for your portfolio
- Plan your writing program
- Workshop your tasks until they are industry standard
- Learn how to leverage your portfolio to find work.
After you complete the masterclass, you will have eight portfolio pieces to show prospective clients, editors and employers.
In other words, you’ll have proof that you ARE a writer!
How does it work?
Here’s what you can expect.
Build Your Portfolio Masterclass runs for four months. You also get on-demand access to either Introduction to Health Writing OR How to Become a Freelance Health Writer.
During the four-month course period, you will have fortnightly calls with Michelle, your mentor, and review your chosen course in your own time.
You’ll work on your portfolio writing tasks between calls and receive ongoing feedback for the duration of the program.
This feedback will empower you to improve your skills, identify any bad habits and achieve industry standards.
Your masterclass is a journey. You’ll probably find that your first few writing tasks take a long time to complete, which is normal. As time goes on, you’ll feel more confident and get less feedback as you become comfortable with the writing process. The transformation is pretty incredible, to be honest!
At the end of the masterclass, you’ll have eight excellent health writing samples for your portfolio.
Masterclass outline
Your guide to a quality portfolio of health & medical writing samples.
Week 1: Introductions and planning
We begin with a career coaching session and a comprehensive overview of the health writing industry. Determining your focus, we will discuss your niche, ideal clients or employers and the type of writing services you want to offer.
Week 2: Setting your writing tasks
After identifying your vision for your health & medical writing career, we will create your portfolio program for the next 12 weeks. We’ll be creating portfolio items that you can use to get paid work.
Weeks 3-14: Writing and workshopping
The next 12 weeks are all about writing. You will write your tasks, receive feedback on your tasks, address any edits and re-submit your tasks until your mentor is confident that your work is at the right standard to show clients and editors.
Weeks 15-16: Next steps, industry guidance, pitching advice
We wrap up your masterclass by putting an action plan into place, identifying your next steps, and setting a series of short and long-term goals for your future writing career.
Extras: COVID-19 and healthcare communication (new)
With the pandemic showing no signs of slowing down, there’s never been a more significant time to learn about effective health communication. Communicating about COVID-19 is a topic that ALL health writers need to know about, as it will be a feature of health communication for years to come. To help you learn more about COVID-19 and responsible health communication, I’ve developed a dedicated resources page, updated regularly, which is included in your course.
BONUS CONTENT!
FREE access to the Health Writer Hub Alumni Webinar Library
- 14 webinars with new webinars released every few months
- Watch on-demand with lifetime access
- 10+ hours of online learning included for free
- Learn about freelance writing, finding work and writing tips – webinar topics include quoting for jobs, finding clients, CV writing, finding employed work, website essentials, subcontracting, marketing, and more!
Join a supportive group of like-minded writers
When you join the Build Your Portfolio Masterclass, you become a member of the Health Writer Hub Alumni – a smart, diverse and friendly community of 800+ health writers from around the world. Alumni benefits include:
- Loyalty discounts – 30% off any other Health Writer Hub course
- Weekly challenges – goals to keep you motivated and accountable
- Student interviews – learn the ropes from experienced students
- Extra group calls – monthly group chats with other Alumni
- Global networking – connect with health writers from around the world
- A supportive network of health writers – ask questions, and share advice
- Immediate access – join the group as soon as you sign up.
Student success story
Feedback and alumni success.
Mary Oppenheim is a Dublin doctor who took Build Your Portfolio Masterclass to develop more confidence and launch her health writing career. One month into the masterclass, Mary sent one of her portfolio articles to the editor of an online newspaper. Mary says: “He wrote back straight away saying he loved the idea! I can’t really believe it! It’s already been published – and he asked could I write regularly for them! I honestly don’t know how to thank you enough – this course is so amazing.”
Your teacher
Who I am, and why I want to help you succeed.
Hi – I’m Michelle Guillemard, creator of Health Writer Hub (you can read more about me here).
When I launched Health Writer Hub in 2014, my aim was to create a best-practice resource to empower health writers to develop their skills, grow their careers and improve the quality of health content on the web.
Over the years, I’ve helped hundreds of health writers to improve their skills through personalised feedback and mentoring.
Some prefer the flexibility of a group course. Others want extensive individual support and coaching that can only come from working 1:1 with a mentor. That’s why I created the Build Your Portfolio Masterclass – a tailored mentoring program that helps new writers like you create high-quality writing samples that you can use to get paid work.
If you want to kickstart your health & medical writing career with a strong portfolio of industry-leading content, then my Build Your Portfolio Masterclass is the program for you.