Summer Writing Update | Brief eHow Review

Summer Writing & Brief eHow Review

Update 04/05/2010: Due to a hugely unpopular move by eHow and parent company Demand Studios, there no longer is an eHow writing program open to writers. If you're looking for other ways to break into writing online, I suggest having a look at my Constant-Content Review or Demand Studios Review (which may also need updating depending how this all goes down). Avoid Helium.com, and keep hacking away at the dream. It may have gotten a little bit harder as yet another employer chose not to respect their writers, but keep at it.

Original freelance writing blog post & original eHow review
First of all, thanks to everyone who has left comments or sent encouraging e-mails. It always feels great to know people are reading your writing, that you're getting some great positive support, and that you're making a difference and helping out. I also want to congratulate those of you who have been doing very well on Constant-Content - an extra few hundred a month is nothing to sneeze at and one of you just cleared $500 in about 4 weeks. Very impressive.

For those of you who haven't read the last post, or caught wind of it elsewhere, I'm in the middle of a major writing marathon. I'm trying to really push for a shift from conventional freelance writing to more of a passive income/residual income mode of making a living writing. I have AdSense blogs, affiliate sales, etc. helping in this pursuit, but I'm naturally a writer first, and so a lot of my focus is trying to really build my online writing in places where it can earn me a good residual income.

So far in 9 days (not counting today because I'm still working) I've wrote 36 articles on eHow, which is right on schedule for my 3.5/day average to make my summer goals, 10 hubs for HubPages for the challenge (putting me behind my ideal schedule), as well as several miscellaneous articles and about a grand in freelance work that's above and beyond my normal weekly projects. Between trying to prepare for a move and everything else going on in the personal life, it's not a bad effort.

Which brings me to a brief review of the eHow website, which I haven't given a thorough look at yet on this blog. After spending long enough writing on this site to give it a fair shake, I have to say this: I'm a Big fan.

One of the things I immediately like about eHow is that it allows you to build a passive or residual income, something that is much more difficult to do with many other online writing websites. In other words, if you write a good article that continues to get traffic, then that article is going to continue earning money for you long after you've finished writing it. It has taken me a few months, sped up by buying and studying (the then available WriterGig's ebook on improving eHow freelance writing earnings) I strongly recommend buying a copy for anyone interested in making a serious passive income with eHow. It's worth the buy - especially since the advice in there had me recoup my investment in one month, so there's not a lot of risk.

Another thing I love about freelance writing for eHow: it's a very easy format. Since the "how to" set up of the website sets up the template for every article, it's very easy to whip up an article in 15-20 minutes if you know what you're talking about. For writers like me, this format helps organize my thoughts, which is not always my strength. For writers who really like step by step formats, they're just going to thrive.

Another plus for eHow is that it can be considered its own income stream for individuals who are also working towards the full time residual income online. What's this mean? The income you get from your articles is from splitting any advertising revenue your articles generate. But you don't use your own AdSense account. This means that your AdSense earnings and eHow earnings are completely separate streams of income. Just as with anything else, diversifying is the key, so having eHow as an income stream is very helpful in the overall writing goals.

Another giant plus is that eHow has a really active and good online community. There are a lot of helpful people here, and you find out pretty quickly that making a lot of money on eHow isn't a random thing: there are several hard working writers on this site who make a very good monthly pay out, and also are often more than willing to share advice with newer less established writers.

Finally, I really enjoy eHow because I've seen solid gains in earnings every single month I have wrote articles for them, and eHow is an authority site. What does this mean? It means Google sees eHow as a trustworthy site, so articles you write for them are more likely to show up high in the search rankings, which brings more traffic, more exposure, and more income. When you're learning about Internet Marketing, AdSense, or how search engines work, you'll learn why this is such a huge deal.

Anyway, this is a semi-brief update because things are still crazy here. Thanks again to everyone reading, and I can't recommend eHow enough. It's a fantastic place to write for a long term passive income. Best of luck to everyone, and keep writing through the recession. Freelance writing is a long term endeavor, but it's worth it.

Making Money with Adsense: Freelance Writers Beware the Smart Pricing Mark!

Passive Income for Writers: Some AdSense Warnings

Freelance writing takes some time and effort to break into, and for most of the last three years and change the majority of writing for money that I've done has been the "normal" type where you write, get paid, and that's more or less it. A lot of this has been online writing and ghost writing because there's an extremely high demand for both, and anyone who knows my story, from near bankruptcy to the car accident that busted both my legs to some periods of homelessness (or near to it) can see why sometimes I worked for less because I needed cash now. Somewhere in the middle of all that mess I figured out how to become a great freelance writer (enough to make a living writing) and returned to and finished grad school despite a really negative environment, considering my situation.

There is another type of freelance writing that online writers can do to make money, and that's earning passive income. While writers can make passive income with some more traditional writing at websites like ehow and Associated Content, but this doesn't offer the same level of passive income that more Internet marketing based writing can make. The one program that is almost the definition of passive income is Google AdSense.

The early disclaimer: I've been getting into AdSense part time for only a few months. So I'm nowhere near a Guru or Expert level, but I've followed the advice of some of the AdSense/SEO experts who share their secrets and make a full time living with AdSense (I'll include their links later in this post) and even with the relatively little time I've been at it, I've seen their strategies work first hand and the percentages for me shooting up like crazy.

Many people give up on AdSense after a few months, and online forums are littered with "I only made $1 in a month" or "I made only $5 in four months," stories of people quitting, thinking there was some magic bullet to passive income. AdSense, and most of what it takes to build actual automated income, is going to fall more under Internet Marketing as opposed to Freelance Writing. Part of the reason is people have unrealistic expectations early on. Check out this great blog post about quick easy ways to make money to really get a good sense of how the beginning process of making money online takes place.

Does a freelance writer have an advantage? I think yes, if he/she knows who to learn from and can adapt quickly to the style needed to maximize writing earnings. If a person refuses to learn how online search engines, traffic, and Internet Marketing works, then $1 a month only, or $5 a year might be all that a person can make from AdSense.

As part of the agreement to be part of Google AdSense, there are a lot of stats I can't reveal, but I can give you a look at monthly earnings:

• May - $0.00 (didn't even have traffic every day - I was a total noob)
• June - $1.21
• July - $3.99 (pathetic, but sadly more than many make)
• Aug- $12.40
• Sept- $22.95
• Oct- $28.52

Now before anyone starts scoffing: I did virtually no gathering of back links until recently, until September it was all from one blog I barely wrote any posts for, and a lot of the later stuff was from joining Hub Pages, which splits impressions and clicks. How much time do I spend on this passive income? Not nearly enough. Maybe 1-3 hours a week, and after doing a lot of reading, I realize most of what I've done the past few months is wrong. But this is encouraging, because I'm just short of averaging a dollar a day, and that's if I don't do anything.

Unless I Get Smart Priced.

"Smart Pricing" is when you fall below a certain percentage of clicks per impressions. Based on conversations I've had with friends and other online sources, the general consensus seems to be that the smart price line is probably around 2.00%. This is the point where instead of being worth 25, 58, or 70 cents (and yes, I was a newbie starting out, so I chose areas where the pay outs aren't as good as they could be) a click, they're suddenly worth 3, 4, or 7 cents a click. Not good.

Smart priced, I'd only be looking at $6-12 a month if I never did anything and never improved my stats. Without smart pricing, I should be able to earn $35 or more in automated income. For never doing any work, and having yet to come close to dominating a niche, this isn't bad. Knowing what Justin, Vic, and Grizz teach, I know how to go about doing this.

The problem is, let's say hypothetically Mr. MD has sites that are getting more and more traffic, but for some reason the click numbers are declining at the same time. Even though Mr. MD's total history with Google he is still above that hypothetical 2% line to get the better compensated clicks, there are a lot of people noticing, like Mr. MD, that if at the beginning of a month there are a few bad days to pull you down below 2%, then you get smart priced.

That means a really bad start to the month can badly dent the earnings numbers.

As far as I can tell, aside from a few very out of the way forums, no one has talked about smart pricing as a monthly thing. This is something to keep in mind, especially when trying to start from the beginning. This is the quick note to new freelance writers looking for passive income: be aware of this stumbling block, and don't let it get you down, and don't let it scare you off.

If anyone knows of other "hypothetical experiences" detailing this same finding for the month, let me know in the comments about other things you've "heard." As far as my hypothetical friend Mr. MD, he's going to keep plugging away and applying the lessons learned from the experts to figure out what he's doing wrong and fix it. Hundreds or even thousands of people make a full time living out of AdSense, so he knows he can, too!

That's an update on another potential nugget of knowledge that could help you if you decide to go into the Google AdSense program. Best of luck, and here are the links to these guys' blogs:

Grizz's Make Money with AdSense Blog

Vic's Make Money with Niche Stores

Justin's Make Money Online Site

If you want to learn how to make money online with AdSense, blogs, affiliate marketing, and niche stores, these are the guys you need to learn from.

Next time: Helium.com review, and a possible stay of execution. I'll get more into their recent announcements and why that might barely be enough to keep me from blasting their site to the netherworld of the Internet...maybe.

Constant Content Review | More on Freelance Writing for Constant Content

More Thoughts on Constant Content Freelance Writing Review

In a recent freelance writing post I went over my full review of Constant Content. If you haven't read my Constant Content review yet, go ahead and click on the link to have a look. I tried to answer as many questions freelance writers would have about the site there. Learning how to become a freelance writer can be hard and intimidating, and I kept that in mind with my Constant Content review, hoping to help you all avoid the mistakes I've made and to give you enough information to make you confident in signing up and getting started.

I'm happy with the first Constant Content review, and it gives enough information to be more than enough for freelance writers just starting out to take advantage and start writing with confidence. That said, there are a few more thoughts and experiences I'd like to share, since my original Constant Content review was pretty long, and a shorter post that's more of a several points summary might be really helpful for some writers.

10 Tips to Succeed at Constant Content

Constant Content Writing Tip #1: Proof read. Writers can charge a lot more for their articles on Constant Content because buyers know to expect really high quality articles when they make a purchase from CC.

Constant Content Writing Tip #2: Don't under charge for your work. This is a classic mistake, and one I made early on. Don't charge $7 for usage on a 400 word article. Even charging $14 is on the very low side of acceptable. In fact, don't be surprised if you sell more articles once you mark up your prices to more competitive levels.

Constant Content Writing Tip #3: Think evergreen. "Evergreen Content" when referring to freelance writing is content that could be desired over and over. Top 10 lists are good evergreen content, as are how to articles. An article about the 2008 election, on the other hand, might get you a sale in 2008, but that's probably it. A Top 10 list of the best vampire movies, however, is a freelance article that could sell over and over again, especially near Halloween every year.

Constant Content Writing Tip #4: Know your strategy. Selling only usage rights does make it easier to set up a passive income stream, but full rights articles sell for a lot more money and are in much higher demand. Depending on your immediate and long term goals, this can affect the prices you set and even what type of rights you're wiling (or not) to sell.

Constant Content Writing Tip #5: Don't be afraid to experiment with high prices. Does charging $59 for full rights for a good 450 word article that required 45 minutes of your time sound like too much? Not every article is worth that, but many are, especially if you're writing on a topic that requires special knowledge (like a solid poker player talking about poker, or a mechanic writing about automotive how to). Experiment to see what works. I thought $150 full rights for a "Worst Video Games" ever list I wrote was a ridiculous amount to charge, until someone bought it the very next day.

Constant Content Writing Tip #6: Write for requests that interest you. Not only are these articles already in demand, but if one person wants them, most likely others do, too. Many of my best sales were requested articles that the original requester didn't buy, but someone else did later.

Constant Content Writing Tip #7: Add the commission into your sales prices. If you want to bring home $20 for an article, don't place a price tag of $20 on the article and concede the 35% to Constant Content. As I said earlier in my Constant Content review, figure the % into your price. If you want to bring home $20, charge $30. Your work is worth it, and you might be surprised how often buyers are willing to pay extra.

Constant Content Writing Tip #8: Decide how you feel about "Best Offer." You have the option of also allowing buyers to make a best offer price. I have mixed feelings. On one hand, you might get to make more sales, especially with "use rights" articles that you have sold several times before. On the other hand, you might get bid down a lot more, which kind of somewhat dulls the point of authors being able to set their own prices.

Constant Content Writing Tip #9: Pay attention to trends and news. With the current economic downturn it's a safe bet that economics, mortgage, budgeting, and other similar financial articles will probably be in demand. Holiday articles may only be good for one part of the year, but if you sell the usage rights then you can re-sell the same articles to new people every year.

Constant Content Writing Tip #10: I've found that movie reviews of recent movies (as in just released in theatres) do very well, and so do movie list articles. Book reviews have done okay for me, as well, but not nearly the same level as the movies.

Those are 10 tips to writing for Constant Content and I hope this secondary Constant Content review has helped answer any remaining questions. So sign up and get cracking!