Do you want to be a writer but just don’t think there’s any money to be made. Granted, it isn’t easy to establish yourself in the writing world, but it can be done and YOU can be successful!
Years ago I worked the nine to five grind and I hated it. I’m guessing if you’re reading this you are in the same boat right now. Perhaps you’ve given up on the hectic business workplace and aren’t even working.
What is better than building your own business and being your own boss? Just thinking about all the times I spent driving to work in the rain or snow and having a pounding headache to show for it, is enough to make me thankful that I now work from home.
Those days of fighting the traffic and business politics are over for me. When I realized I could work from home and spend all my extra time with my grandchildren I knew I’d made the right decision.
The internet has opened up a wide variety of opportunities for anyone who has the determination to grab them. More and more websites are launched daily along with more and more opportunity for writers to take advantage of all the needed content and that demand is growing daily.
Entering the Freelance Writing World
By taking advantage of the internet you earn a relatively fast income as a freelance writer or blogger. This can literally change your life overnight.
FULL TIME OR PART TIME — IT’S EASIER THAN YOU THINK.
Before the internet existed, writers had to have extensive credits just to get accepted for writing positions at a newspaper or magazine. But now all that’s changed. In fact, some of the most successful writers online have no formal training at all. They have basic writing skills and, armed with a keyboard and internet connection, they are finding ways to earn enough to quit their full time jobs or earn extra money for that family vacation they’ve been dreaming about.
Now you can start making money from home with simple writing assignments. So what really qualifies me to provide you with this information? I’m an internet marketer and writer but I’m also an entrepreneur that has struggled with ways to earn money online and struggled to find writing jobs that pay real money.
Finding writing jobs on my own was often futile as I was competing against so many others, some of whom were willing to work for half the price I knew I was worth. Because of my many experiences finding work out on the internet, I can pass along the best tips to you so that you won’t make the same mistakes I did.
WOLVES IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING
Unfortunately, with every good opportunity available on the internet there comes along the ones that are really worthless and time consuming. It’s difficult for the normal person to discern which of the websites are good opportunities and which ones are total scams. It’s really frustrating sometimes. You get to the point where you feel like you’re on “information overload”. Aspiring writers just feel like they’re going in a circle with no end in sight and very little money to show for their trouble.
That’s where I come in. I’d like to be your guide along your journey. I’d like to pass along all the good things I’ve found and all the information I’ve gleaned on making money online. Hopefully it will put you on solid footing so that you too can spend your days working from home.
SOUNDS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE?
You might be thinking that you’ve tried everything and nothing works. Well I’m here to tell you that persistence works! So let me give you some valuable resources and you take it from there.
LET’S TALK ABOUT CONTENT MILLS & WHAT ARE THEY?
This is one of the first places available online for you to earn quick cash by writing today and having money in the bank by next week. Content mills can set you on the right road to success in a super easy way. If you’re looking for fast cash, they’re the way to go BUT don’t think it’s a easy ride.
Content mills hire freelancers to write for their clients’ online needs. Writers generate large amounts of content and earn fast cash doing it. The content mill is like the middle man in the whole process. You can go into Google and query under Freelance Writing and you’ll be blown away by the stuff that comes up. Be careful and don’t spend all your time writing for pennies when you can build your own business and have great success. Getting starting and practicing your skills, however, can be done by using the simple content mills.
Content mills can actually work and have the following benefits:
Earn Fast cash
Teach you how to follow specific forms
Help you learn to meet deadlines
Increase your knowledge of the marketplace
Give you experience in various types of projects
Flexible working hours
Get hired without an extensive portfolio
BUT ARE ALL CONTENT MILLS CREATED EQUAL?
Unfortunately, no. They all have different guidelines and writing requirements. Some require you to write a sample for them and others may ask you to take a test to demonstrate your aptitude or get assurance that you know basic writing skills and are proficient in English.
A reputable content mill will provide you fees and writing guidelines upfront. If this does not happen you’ll want to look elsewhere.
Just take a look at two of the easier ones:
Textbroker asks you to submit a writing sample before you begin and gives you a rating between two to five stars. As your stars increase, your money does also. You usually will receive acceptance within 12 hours of applying and will be given a star rating. You then can claim articles at your star level or below.
Textbroker is proactive and will continually increase your star level as you provide high standard material for them.
Textbroker also offers “DirectOrder” and “TeamOrder” which greatly increases your rates and earning potential in each star category.
I know it doesn’t sound like much money but most writers end up at level 4 on Textbroker. That translates into 1.4 cents per word.
Most articles on Textbroker are 500 words = 500 X 1.4 cents = $7.00. If you want to write one article an hour for 6 hours, that’s $42.00 a day X 5 days = $210.00 for the week, part-time, working from home.
What if you wrote quickly? You could easily double your hourly rate to $14.00 an hour by writing two articles an hour. Now, for the same amount of time, you are earning $420.00 for 30 hours of work. Not too shabby. You are working in the comfort of your own surroundings without a boss breathing down your neck.
Payday is every Friday. Whatever was completed and accepted by midnight on Thursday, you will receive through PayPal on Friday
iWriter is a content writing site with a large community of writers and publishers. There isn’t any limit on the amount of articles you can write, and similar to Textbroker, you get paid through PayPal.
They are different than Textbroker, as your payment is sent in one of four time periods: weekly, bi-monthly, or on the fifth or twenty-fifth of each month.
Writers get paid 81% of the price that the client is paying for the article you’re writing.
After PayPal and Copyscape fees (this ensures your article is unique and genuine), it works out to this pay scale:
.300-word article – $1.62+
.500-word article – $2.43+
.700-word article – $4.05+
.“Elite” writers earn $15+ per article
Not much, right? Don’t worry. There is good news with iWriter. Once you’ve written 30 articles with this company and you have earned a rating of 4 stars, you move to the Premium level.
If you keep turning out excellent articles, you will move up even further. Once you hit 4.6 stars, you are now in the “Elite” tier. Now you can apply for the $15-per-article gigs.
iWriter is a bit more lenient with editing although the editors will correct you at times. Their main concern is unique content and if they discover you have plagiarized anything, they will probably ban you from writing with them.
WHAT ARE THE PROS AND CONS OF CONTENT MILLS?
You can use these samples on your website, Facebook page, LinkedIn page and anywhere you are asked to show your writing. Good writing samples and a strong portfolio are the backbone of every successful freelance writer.
You can run up against an editor that you will give you great advice about your writing or style. This gives you an opportunity to learn and grow as a writer.
On the flip side, sometimes they will ask you to rewrite the article, which can cost you valuable time and money. Sometimes an editor will not see things the way you do and will ask you to add a comma here or there and then turn around and say the sentence doesn’t’ read correctly. This can be a major irritation sometimes.
When I was working for content mills, if the editor asked for more than I was able to do, I would put the job back into the job pool and let someone else do it. It’s just not worth spending a lot of valuable time to make a small amount of money
The other frustration with content mills is that you are essentially a ghost writer. You have no byline for any of your hard work and that can be a real bummer.
The real downside to content mills is of course the pay scale. It’s a nugget and not a gold mine.
Many people will say you are crazy for even considering it, but if you are inexperienced it is a great way to build your writing skill and knowledge.
Some people think it’s best to concentrate on one content mill company. Yet others have applied to all of them and found themselves swamped with work. If you only apply to one content mill, you are limiting yourself because the amount of work that is accessible to you will be much less.
Before you apply to any content mill, set up a PayPal account. Every application will ask you for your PayPal information so you want to be armed and ready.
After all, getting paid is what this is all about, right?
NEXT STOP AFTER CONTENT MILLS; DIRECT CLIENTS
Working directly with clients instead of the content mill middleman creates many exciting opportunities and some great advantages.
You make a LOT more money
You have direct communication with the client
Set your own rates
Set your own deadlines
Less work because you’re earning more per project
Build writing portfolio
Able to bid on many jobs at the same time
Recurring work with the same client is possible
Just looking at the list you can see there’s tons of kudos on the plus side to working for yourself with your own clients. You are no longer just a number and your work counts. You can become a desirable writer with an impressive clientele and a bright future. You have repeat business and you no longer have to write for peanuts.
One huge plus is that you are no longer limited to writing just articles. You can also write:
Blog Posts
Website Content
Sales Writing
Press Releases
eBooks
Ghost Writing
Report Writing
Newsletters
Manuals
Academic Writing
Speeches
Editing
Proofreading
However, there is STILL one problem. A big one!
Finding direct clients can be seriously time consuming. As a new writer, you can spent most of my day seeking out potential clients, approaching them and negotiating prices. Sometimes it seemed like a full-time sales and marketing job rather than a writing job.
This is why its so important to find a way to build your own business and set your own rates.
How do you start?
Find a writing niche that is important to you and you will easily get followers by appealing to their interests.
Build your own website and add affiliate marketing to bring in some extra cash.
Write every day — something — anything; even if you write an opinion piece and place it somewhere like Hub Pages. You will find a way to get noticed.
Register yourself on freelance websites that aren’t necessarily content mills but are places where you can build a portfolio and bid on the jobs you wish to take. An example would be Freelanced.com which is an excellent way to connect with writer’s and designers. Great PR always helps.
Easy peesy; lemon squeezy – not a chance! But putting a little elbow grease into it, you will be surprised at what can happen.
I wish you all the success in the world,
In case you need to discover your writing technique and need some help along the way, my FREE Resource Guide below and it may point you in the right direction.
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