Becoming An Article Writer
Of all the many ways that you can be a freelance writer, article writing is a great way to go. In this job, you are going to be able to write articles for many different companies and they will pay you for your knowledge and for your work. If you want to work form home as an article writer, there are several things that you should know first.
First of all, this job might require you to write many different articles about the same topic. You might have to write lots of articles on one particular topic but each of the articles has to be something different. If you can handle this kind of work, keep reading. Also, you are going to be working mainly on a project by project basis.
If you are very good you might get several projects at once and if you are even better you might get projects that pay more and more. It is a job that you have to work very hard at for a long time before you can begin to make real money, so you should try your best to make sure that you are doing your best work at all times.
Also, it is going to be a hard market to break into as a first time writer. The best thing that you can do for yourself is to get a good portfolio with lots of different articles in it so that you have something to give to potential employers. You are going to find that you might need a lot of help getting started, so its a good idea to check with some people who do this as a job to see what advice they have to offer you.
Remember that this is something that you can do for a while or for a long time, depending on how good you are. The internet is something that is quite large and that handles a lot of different things at once. If you are able to do the kind of work that this work form home job entitles, you might find that you can be very successful in the end.
Of course, there are always going to be things that go wrong and there are always going to be times that you try your best but you just were not chosen for a job. When these things happen, try to keep your head up and remember that there are lots of different jobs out there for freelance article writers, you just have to keep working at them to get them done.
Obinna Heche:
Delivering the best home based business ideas and opportunities so you can work at home successfully..
http://www.homeincomeportal.com/obhmy365/
Freelance Writing Online: Some Hard and Fast Facts
If there is one maxim that has continued to remain true about the Internet it is that “Content is King”. The fact that website owners need fresh and relevant content to keep browsers coming back to their website means that there is a secondary market for content creation.
This of course has created a wonderful opportunity for freelance writers who can spend their time creating content for others and be paid for it. But before you throw in your day jobs, register your profile with Elance or Guru and start banging away on your laptop, let’s look at some of the truisms of the market so that you can enter the opportunity with open eyes.
Firstly, let’s deal with the question of how much money you can make. Will you make a million dollars? No. Only very high profile offline authors make this sort of money. Is it possible to make $80- $100k per year. The answer is yes but like anything it will require some hard work and a dash of entrepreneurial spirit. In fact, to be truly successful you will need to spend nearly as much time marketing yourself as you will creating content. To command this type of income you will also most likely need to augment your writing efforts with some affiliate marketing. This isn’t difficult: you still create content but you will also make sure that you embed some of your own affiliate links in the content that you create.
It also depends on your agenda. If you’re looking to make a full time income then those figures are within your reach. If however, you’re a student for instance and therefore do not have as much time at your disposal, then a $20k per annum secondary income at the upper end would be the more likely scenario.
Do you have to be a good writer to succeed online? No. In fact being a good writer may actually be a hindrance: simply for the fact that your work may not be appreciated and command the price that you feel it’s worth. The nature of the market that you will be dealing with is one that is after fast and relatively cheap content. They’re not after high quality writing so don’t try and be Shakespeare. All you really need is a decent grasp of spelling and punctuation and be able to write in a conversational tone. Easy? You bet.
Do you need to have a subject specialty? Once again the answer is no and if you do specialise then you may be severely denting your income prospects. The secret here is to not put all your eggs in one basket. You want to have multiple sources of income: this means not only a multiplicity of subjects but also a multiplicity off avenues to get your writing out there. Bidding at auction sites such as Guru.com and Elance.com is certainly one way of getting the dollars in but it does not preclude creating monetised blogs or writing and submitting articles with embedded links.
It helps when writing online for a living to think outside the box. You can certainly make a steady income from just writing alone but by tweaking and monetising your approach with affiliate marketing you can put yourself in a position to really explode your income.
Scott is a successful freelance writer who makes the bulk of his income by writing online. To learn how you can create a secondary income through online freelance writing go to http://www.writingforincome.com
Freelance Writing: The Most Practical and Profitable Markets
What you don’t want to be doing as a freelance writer is spending your time flogging your wares in all the wrong places. You don’t want to be fussing around putting your resume on monster.com or other types of job boards. There are very few places that post ads for freelancers on actual job boards. Actually I’ve found that post for jobs on these writing sites usually come to less than five a month.
Because we are looking at a self sustaining system for online writing income we need to get stuck straight into the proven profitable markets, which are:
1. Bidding on the auction sites
2. Selling yourself on the live advice lines and;
3. Self publishing
Consider these 3 areas to be the most recommended and reliable sources of income: by myself and other professional writers.
Auction Sites
As mentioned previously Guru.com and Elance.com are the main players here. They are both outsourcing forums that allow writers to post their profiles and bid on projects that are posted by buyers looking for projects that they want completed. These sites don’t specialise in just writing but all kinds of services that can be outsourced such as graphic design, website design and administrative services.
Both sites have different membership levels which will affect your bidding privileges.
Guru is the bigger of the two and has the cheaper membership rates but they also tend to pay less for jobs and their customer service isn’t as good as that at Elance.
DON’T bother with the free membership option at either site. You will only get access to the lowest paying jobs and will be competing with hundreds of others for work.
Charging For Phone Consulting
Keen.com is one of the largest and oldest live advice sites on the web with the money you make being directly deposited into your bank account every fortnight (or paid by cheque every month for citizens outside of the US).
They will allow you to post four free profiles per three allowed phone numbers which acts as a great business card for your online business. You can get work directly from individuals who call you on keen; they will just assign your over the phone.
Kasamba.com is a site of aggregated service providers that allows you to charge per minute for your own online chat. You can sell advice or consulting services in nay of several categories that relate to writing, of which there are a number.
Self Publishing
Constant-Content.com allows you to upload content for sale on their site. It must be content that you have rights to and you can set whatever price and conditions you want on the sale.
Lulu.com will let you upload ebooks for free and will even convert them into PDF format for you. Your customer has the option of having your book sent to them as hardcover or emailed to them in the PDF format.
Scott is a successful freelance writer who makes the bulk of his income by writing online. To learn how you can create a secondary income through online freelance writing go to http://www.writingforincome.com
Why Your Freelance Writing Talents Are Desperately Needed
You may or may not have heard this before - On the Internet: Content is King. Or to put it another way: the websites that deliver the most up-to-date and relevant content also tend to be the most popular. And if the website(s) in question have a commercial aspect to them, which is most of them; then popularity goes onto equate with increased income for the website owner.
The explosive growth of the Internet and the attendant growth of Internet related commerce has created an unprecedented demand for written content. Now the fact of the matter is that is very rare for webmasters to go about each day creating this content themselves. They simply don’t have the time. What you will find is that they source the content from elsewhere and are happy to pay for it.
You can see where this is going, can’t you? If Webmasters are happy to pay for outsourced content then there is an obvious opportunity for freelance writes to create that content and get paid for it.
It gets better: Not only is there a demand for freelance writing skills but some specific online markets have sprung up that allow freelance writers to present their wares as it were. Webmasters know to go to these markets to secure outsourced content so it really streamlines the process of selling your writing skills.
It gets better still: The constantly evolving nature of the Internet means that new avenues are continually springing up - all of which are in need of new content. If it’s not website owners that need sales copy, then it’ll be bloggers who need fresh content for their blog readers. And if it’s not blog owners that need content, then it’ll be article directories looking for more content so that webmasters keep coming back to them. And so on and so on. If there’s one thing the Internet is not: it is static. Opportunities abound wherever you look and content creation is one of the biggest of them.
Two of the biggest and most popular online auction sites are Elance.com and Guru.com. Webmasters know that they can go to these central resources, create a job description, and then have freelance writers bid to do that work. It works like a dutch auction with the lowest bidder usually, though not always, winning the bid and securing the job. Of course once you’ve done good work for someone once, they may opt to bypass the bidding process the next time around and work with you directly.
The beauty about selling your freelance writing skills these agencies is that not only do they provide an efficient marketplace for you to sell your skills but they also act as a governing body to ensure that your invoice is paid within 30 days or sooner. People that do pay you late on these sites tend to get kicked off. In that respect it is very similar to the eBay auction system except that you are dealing with writing services instead of “shipped goods”.
If you’re a writer looking to make an income by writing online then it behoves you to make yourself visible where the buyers of content all go to shop. Elance.com and Guru.com are the best places to start.
Scott is a successful freelance writer who makes the bulk of his income by writing online. To learn how you can create a secondary income through online freelance writing go to http://www.writingforincome.com
How To Turn Your Articles into Cash
I can imagine what it’s like to be an editor for a magazine. I’m sure the more popular magazines probably get dozens of articles in the mail each day, and these go in the trash.
Ever wonder why?
Most of these articles get rejected, and they get rejected for pretty much the same reasons articles written for promotion get rejected.
First, the article may or may not be targeted to the audience of the publication the writer is submitting to. This should be your first step in getting it right: target your article to the
correct audience.
Second, you need to remember you aren’t writing a sales piece. You’re writing an article. An article is information. The purpose of an article, especially when writing one to promote your business, is to provide enough information to get visitors to want to visit your site.
If your “article” is all about how great your product is, then you’ll get rejected right off the bat. No one wants to read an article that is really nothing more than hype, or worse, just a review about your product.
Some article directories do accept reviews, and if you want to submit a review, then by all means, write one and submit it. Just make sure you read the guidelines for the website, Don’t write a review about your own product. Get someone else to do it. Review others’ products instead. Put the link in your resource box. Don’t clutter your article with links back to the program. It will get rejected.
Third, are you writing an article or an ad? I see this one all the time. I’m not sure what other people are thinking except maybe they are so desperate to promote their products they don’t think about what they are doing when they submit.
If the site asks for articles, submit an article. Don’t submit an ad. Article directory owners provide specific guidelines for what they’re looking for. If you want to submit an ad, then exchange links. Don’t post an ad in article directory.
Have you included the basics, i.e. good writing, good grammar, good spelling? Your article doesn’t have to be perfect, just well written. There are those on the internet who think they are the arbiters of what’s good writing. You’ll get attacked, and sometimes without mercy, if you don’t bother to check your spelling, as well as how your sentences read.
Of course, just remember to take this with a grain of salt. They’re reading you. Not the other way around. Often, the people who do this are lonely and looking to connect with others. I’m not sure why they think being nasty is the way to do it. Maybe it’s their way of making themselves feel superior. Just ignore it.
You can easily correct most of your writing problems simply by using a spell checker, and then reading your article out loud. Reading your article out loud can help you check your punctuation, as well as flow of your article.
Including a solid headline, or title, that makes readers want to read your article will definitely help you.
Finally, always make sure you include your resource box. Your resource box is one of the most important parts of your article. It should be the next logical step for your readers. You want
them to visit your site next. Get them to join your list, buy a product, sign up for a free membership, or something else.
The purpose is to give your readers a reason to visit your site.
Unfortunately, most of the articles I get and have to reject, don’t have a resource box added. I have no idea where the article came from or who wrote it. As a result, some very well written articles I would love to include in my directories get deleted.
Don’t let this happen to you.
Write a good article. Target your market. Include your resource box. You’ll see results, like traffic and sales, from your article in no time.
Jinger Jarrett will show you how to write and promote your articles for free. http://www.101articles.com. Get $3,780 in free writers’ resources, http://www.marketingforwriters.com. Internet Marketing Bookstore: http://www.lulu.com/jingerjarrett
Knowledge Is Power — Get More of Both!
If your parents were like mine, constantly stressing the importance of education, then you know full well that “knowledge is power.” Isn’t it also true that a whole lot of power lies in the hands of the wealthy? And from watching certain reality TV shows about certain real housewives of a certain citrus-y county, you don’t always have to have (ahem) one to have the other. I don’t know about you, but I’d sure like to have a lot of both.
On the knowledge front, I’ve found several ways to learn your craft. Some helpful sites are:
PhantomWriters — They offer free access to all their articles about writing. If you want to learn about any aspect of writing marketing articles, news articles, or sports, you can find it here. Plus, you get the added bonus of as many different perspectives as you want to read: that way you can weed out the nuts if there are any, and pick up on the tips you start hearing over and over again.
Article Marketer University — There is a wealth of free information on the Article Marketer site. Click the AMU link, and you will have free access to live classes with industry experts. You can learn about how to make an effective website, article writing tips, affiliate practices and more. The best part about AMU in my opinion is that I can download them to my iPod and listen anywhere. Pretty cool.
Easy Article Marketing — For a fee of $40, these lovely ladies (and they’re all ladies!) will teach you how to find topics, make writing painless, and optimum length. They’ll also tell you the traps you might be falling into that prevent you from writing! If you’re willing to pay for their audio classes, these girls have got the goods.
Article Writing Tips — Yep, that’s the name of their site. They have lots of free tips on writing articles, plus a whole page full of articles written by experts on this topic. All this is offered free, and they also have a book called “Turn Words Into Traffic,” which you can buy through their site for $39.
The point is: It PAYS to educate yourself. You can also do a Google search for “writing articles” or “writing marketing materials” and come up with a wealth of information that I didn’t list here. When you become confident in your ability to write, you will find writing articles becomes much easier, and even fun!
One of the ways to build that confidence is by reading about other people’s experiences. Have you ever read something and thought, “Boy, I could have written that better myself”? Sure you have, and you can! And it’s okay to look for a little help before you dive right in.
Dana Davalos, graphic designer and online biz whiz, shares her thoughts on internet marketing, design and life in general at www.groovygraphix.blogspot.com. Find great resources for writers at www.articlemarketer.com/write.php
http://www.articlemarketer.com
Your Entire Article Content Is Under Scrutiny From Google
If you are writing articles for the purpose of off page SEO it is time to consider just how swiftly Googles algorithm is changing over a short period off time. We don’t need to concern ourselves too much with the other search engines at this time. You will have heard many times that unique content is King, and it still is, but you must also consider that contextual relevance is now Queen.
The whole way of thinking behind article content is being changed. Semantics, overall page theme, phrase matching, (comparisons with millions of other similar pages in their index to see if phrases are relevant to the topic / theme), and even the use of buzz or niche words - eg woodworkers, surfers, stamp collectors or whatever all have their own specialised words and phrases which would mean nothing to the rest of us. This is just a part of what Google will use to determine how important and relevant your article actually is to them.
This ongoing war between the guys who find a chink in Googles armour and then write software to exploit it will never stop. This is human nature. The thing is that these guys pushing their “latest, most powerful” scripts and PC applications have a good job for life. There are always millions of people who are quick enough to snap up their $97 products if there is a hint they can get to #1 without doing any work.
They have customers for life. As soon as Google addresses an issue then another script is on the market and so the loop continues. The sad thing is that the buyers of these scripts are spending so much time trying to be “smart” they probably never actually build a business.
A similar problem exists with the use of Private Label Rights articles. There is little wrong in principal with using PLR properly, they can give you some great ideas to get started, but the vast majority of users who have downloaded 1000 articles either free or for next to no cost simply load them up and fire them out onto the Net without even looking at them! This, together with spinning software is the cause for the incredible amount of useless and senseless junk on the Internet that Google is determined to deal with. And rightly so.
There is no doubt that the duplicate content issue is presently a huge cause for concern for Google. We all know that there was never any penalty imposed by Google for Duplicates. They simply ignored them. Weight being given to the oldest most relevant content.
It is unlikely that we shall see any penalty against duplicate content as it is quite reasonable to expect more than one version of an article on different websites. What we may see is penalties against what Google determines to be spun, low quality content with no relevance. I will not speculate on these penalties but we may have an issue on exactly what is determined to be sub standard content.
It would seem that the days of us “leading” Google into what our content is all about through the use of titles, keyword density, file names and so on is coming to end. Once the programming is in place it may well be that all we have to do is to write naturally with a certain amount of passion about a theme we have an interest in or have researched well. MMmmmm! Didn’t we use to do this before search engines and algorithms and programmers came on the scene?
Tips and strategies on article marketing and earning a living online.
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Rather Dig Holes Than Write Articles?
You know your business like the back of your hand. Chances are you are pretty well versed in the specifics of your industry as well. You are constantly brainstorming unique ideas and formulating new thoughts on anything and everything related to your business. As a result, coming up with ideas for your article marketing articles will likely come easy to you. It is the writing part that many people find to be not so effortless.
Whether you shudder at the thought of trying to put pen to paper or you just don’t have the time to write, article marketing can still play a central role in your marketing plan. All you have to do is find someone who is willing and able to write for you.
How to Find a Ghostwriter
Ghostwriters are your best bet for getting content written for your article marketing campaign. Ghostwriters are everywhere; you just need to know where to look for them. The Internet is the best place to start. An online search can emit results for writers’ agencies, freelance job boards, and individual freelancer websites.
Once you have made contact with your potential ghostwriter, it is important to make sure they are a good fit for you and your business. Request a resume and writing samples. If you want articles written about more technical subjects, a writer who has primarily written restaurant reviews may be a bad choice.
Conversely, while it is nice to have a writer who knows about the subject for which you want them to write about, it is not necessary. A good writer will be able to take the information you give them and run with it. Even if it is a subject for which they know nothing about, they should be able to create an article that sounds like it is written by an expert.
Upon choosing your perfect ghostwriter, provide them with an outline of ideas for the articles. Brainstorm with the writer and help them come up with a blueprint for the project. Also, explain in detail “who” your target audience is. You want your writer to know how to speak to them. This includes everything from the type of language they use to the tone and voice they create.
How Much Will It Cost?
In general, a good ghostwriter will cost somewhere between $30-$100 per article, depending on the length of the article. While this may sound pricey, keep in mind that they are saving you time by writing for you, and time is money. Investing a little money in your article marketing efforts up front will lead to more site traffic, higher Google rankings, and increased profit. The articles will surely pay for themselves.
Shortcuts to Avoid
PLR (Private Label Rights) articles can be obtained for a fraction of the cost of hiring a ghostwriter. As the saying goes, however, you get what you pay for. These articles tend to be uncreative, low quality, and often times too short. To make matters worse, most publishers can spot these articles from a mile away. They will reject anything that appears to be a PLR article.
If you have already obtained some of those PLR articles, your money hasn’t completely gone to waste. You can still use these articles with some major revisions and additions. As you edit, rewrite PLR articles from your perspective. You are the expert on the subject. Readers want to hear directly from you.
There is no shame in hiring a ghostwriter to set your article marketing plans in motion. Just as you might have to hire a freelance web designer to construct your website, there just aren’t enough hours in the day for you to take care of everything.
Choose a good writer who creates stunning copy and watch your articles bring in business for you. They will likely be one of your most effective sales tools.
Tiva Kelly is an expert at article marketing. She offers advice to authors at www.articlemarketer.com, a highly popular article distribution service. Looking for someone to write articles? Look no further!
http://www.articlemarketer.com
Article Writing: Why Are You Staring At A Blank Screen?
Every writer has been there. You want to write a new article, but find yourself sitting and staring at a blank computer screen. You have no clue where to start. In fact, it does not feel like you could ever have a clue where to start. You have a dreaded case of writer’s block.
Sometimes my kids come to me and say, “Dad, I’m bored. There’s nothing to do.” I smile and say, “How can you be bored with nothing to do in such a wide world full of so many interesting things?”
Writer’s block is really the same thing, when you think about it. How can you have nothing to write an article about in such a wide world full of so many interesting things? And if you have any idea at all, even just a keyword or general topic that you would like to target, how can you not have any ideas for writing your next article when you are sitting at your computer with the immense research power of the Internet at your fingertips?
Okay, I know what you are thinking. It’s not the article writing that is so difficult, it’s coming up with the idea and main points for the article that is difficult.
Here are some article writing tips to help you go from a blank screen — and a blank mind — to the outline of an article.
The first thing to do is start surfing. Google whatever topic or keyword you would like to write an article about. If you don’t even have a keyword or topic in mind and have no idea what you want to write an article about, just start surfing anyway. If you follow the approach below, you will find something to write about.
The very act of using a search engine to search or just to surf can give you many article ideas if you stay alert while you surf from page to page. Have you ever noticed how quickly you decide whether a web site or blog is something you want to explore further? You probably make that decision within seconds. Why is that? It’s because for every Web page you hit, you make a conscious or unconscious decision very quickly: should I go or should I stay? In that decision lies your idea for your next article.
Here’s why…
The article, web page, or blog you are reading either caught your interest and attention or it didn’t. It’s really that simple. But the key to coming up with the idea for your next article is in pondering why a given article did or did not catch your interest.
- What did the article provide that you were looking for?
- What didn’t it provide that you were looking for?
- What is interesting about the article?
- What is not interesting about it, and why isn’t it interesting?
- What questions were you left with?
- What was missing?
- What could have been written more effectively?
- What did you agree with?
- What did you disagree with?
- How would you have written the article?
- What would you have said or done differently?
- What would you have added?
- What would you have left out?
- What examples or stories would you have used to better get any points across?
- How could the article be slanted to a different audience?
The next time you sit down to write an article but find yourself sitting and staring at a blank computer screen, try surfing the Internet with these questions in mind. You should never lack for article writing ideas again!
When Mike Adams is not sitting and staring at a blank screen and trying to remember his own article writing advice, he runs a number of popular websites. Be sure to submit your new articles for publication in his article directory, ElectricText, at: http://www.electrictext.com/
Your Signature Files Significance
When you are trying to promote a new web site one of the best methods to do this is to use signature files. One of the best ways to look at a signature file is to take into account the passive promotion. When going about your business on the net, you still can promote your site. You can find many passive site promotions that you would not even think are signature files to begin with. Newsletters, forums, message boards, and digests all contain signature files for the promotion of the site intended.
It is this almost subliminal feature of the signature file itself that makes it so productive and appealing. It is a non-abrasive and intruding approach to marketing and selling your site on the masses. This is in no way like the dreaded Spam, where people are almost force fed the information, in order for it to be viewed. This is also, very much, a different animal than the banner where there is no mistaking why the banner is there, or what the intention is. People want to view and browse at their leisure not be directed to something or forced into it. This in turn will only spread like wild fire, that this is a site to clearly avoid. If you have e-mail contact lists people will automatically assume that anything you are sending is clearly Spam and will not be viewed, rather just trashed. This is not a way to do business to say the least because you are shooing your target market away.
Considering banners are not easy to design to begin with, why go to all the trouble of making one, only to have it disregarded and bypassed each and every time it is seen? You are always better off going with a subtle and delicate approach, than the guns a blazing method when it comes to marketing strategy. This is the very reason these days are ruled by the true signature file rather than the over aggressive and abrasive banner or Spam content. No one wants to be pushed into viewing what he or she are not interested in. This is not to say that every single banner on the net does not have it’s success, some of the biggest companies on the net have developed tools for showcasing these banners effectively, and making a killing on it. The likelihood of you pulling this off is minimal at best, as you just do not have the clout or finances to hire the best gun in town to make you successful banners that generate traffic and income. This is why the clear answer to the marketing strategy is best left to the signature file for the smaller business. Non-obtrusive and simple nudging goes a long way in the market place.
James M. Lowe writes original blogs, articles, press releases, web sites and ebooks, any subject.
http://www.contenttomarket.com
