Update!

Hi guys,

I haven't had much time to update the blog over the past few months due to work demands, but if you are searching for a content writer, please don't hesitate to contact me through the contact form. Strangely enough, money is a great motivator for getting writing done!

Signing out for now.

Constant Content review

 

Constantcontent is a little like a market for articles. You, the writer get to set up a profile and submit articles to be listed on your profile. The submission process involves Constantcontent editors reviewing your article for typos, grammar and overall article cohesiveness. It can take an article or two to get used to the house style. You may have to resubmit your early articles once or twice with the help of feedback from the editors.

 

 

Advantages and disadvantages

 

 

Constant Content offers a number of advantages over other article writing websites, the main one being you can set your own prices. One disadvantage is closely tied to this advantage, in that if everyone sets their prices for their articles a lot of writers soon try undercutting their competition by lowering their article prices. If a client wants to buy an article they will in all likelihood choose the cheaper content over something that may appear identical in terms of quality. This practice is only useful in the short term, in the long term it leads clients to expect reduced prices for articles, driving prices down to what you might expect to earn on a website like Textbroker. That's not good. Luckily, Constantcontent seem to be aware of this danger. They offer guidelines on how to competitively price your articles while not underselling yourself.

 

 

Once your article is given the all clear it is available for clients to see on your profile. Here comes the second disadvantage, you don't write to order, instead you write what you hope will be bought. It can be difficult to judge what will be a popular topic and what will remain gathering cobwebs in your author profile until the internet itself falls apart.

 

 

Active community forum

 

There is a fairly active community forum attached to the website where new members can find a wealth of advice by going back through the threads. It's a good idea to look through these forums before uploading any articles. It helped me a lot because I avoided a lot of the beginner mistakes people often make.

 

 

Surprise money in your inbox!

 

Constant Content is a great way to earn money for your writing, but it is hard to find the best approach to it. A while ago, I hadn't written an article for two months or so but made a sale out of the blue. I got an email announcing I would be receiving 30 Euro into my paypal within the month. That's a nice new message to find in your inbox. It's just a pity you can't guarantee each article will be sold.

 

 

 

Postponed Constent Contant review

So, I had written out a full review of Constant Content and then my laptop battery died. Please enjoy this picture of two sinister monkey as a place holder until I rewrite the review.

Work at home with Clickworker: a review

Clickworker is very different to Textbroker. For starters it seems to be run by a German company and when you google the website, the subtitle that comes after the title is human grid. Think about that for a second. A human grid, that's us, the writers. Writers in a great big grid writing tiny articles for corporations.

It's not as bad as it sounds actually. It is, once again, an SEO content provider. Clickworker essentially mediates between the big boys like Groupon and the little guys like us.

Another writer typing away at his old typewriter.

The sign up process

Writing from the heart

For many writers, especially those new to writing, every word you create feels like an extension of yourself. Those words feel important, like have some mythical quality, it often feels like might reveal something about you that nobody knows. And that's fine once you decide you aren't going to show anybody your work. This is a phase almost every writer goes through, and for many this stage occurs at one of the most awkward stages of life: adolescence. I have piles of awful poetry and stories, written in my formative years, hidden away.

They're hidden in a cave just like this. 

Textbroker review

If you have spent any time in the Online freelance writing business, you are sure to have heard about Textbroker, although, what you may have heard about the site certainly varies from forum to forum. It is often referred to as a content mill.

Textbroker, is that you?

For anyone who isn't sure what exactly that entails- think of a water mill, as seen in the pretty pastoral image above, then replace the water with content. Yeah, it's not a pretty image, because instead of whirling cogs and wheels you have writers furiously pumping out content.

Making money as a writer: short stories

 How do you make money by writing? What are you supposed to write? I suppose the easy answer is to write a New York Times Bestseller. But that's easier said than done, right? There's no harm in having it as a goal and working towards that goal, but it's a good idea to make some smaller more achievable writing goals along the way. Over the next few posts I'll be talking about way to make that swag, that moolah (Dollars, Euros, Pounds, whatever you call it, it does the same thing the world over) with your words.

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote and sold short stories
to pay for his and Zelda's extravagant lifestyle.

Short Stories

This is a tough market to break into. As with all markets there is a sliding scale of pay rates: magazines like the New Yorker pay a months rent or more for a story, while many webzines pay nothing. If you write short stories, a good directory to find stats on a huge variety of magazines is Duotropes Digest. You can search by pay rate, genre, and story length as well as other parameters.

As with any writing job, the key is being able to write grammatically sound sentences and perseverance. You will be rejected. The trauma of your teenage years is nothing compared to the countless rejections you will receive. Because so many rejections are sent out, most magazines employ a standard rejection. When editors receive more promising stories that they are still going to reject, they often add a personal touch to encourage you to submit in the future. A strange thing happens, where you begin analysing your rejections for even the slightest hint of a human behind the email. In the past, when the Internet was still a science fiction fantasy, writers use their rejection slips to devious ends. Some even papered their bathrooms with the slips!

A good idea is to join a writer's group. You can support each other when you get rejected, and help each other to improve your writing skills. You'll also make some writer friends who you can discuss literary gossip with!