The Best Reference On Writing Sites That Pay For Your Articles

On 12 May 08, I published on hubpages the article entitled “Writing sites that pay for your articles”. I actually wrote it in early May 08. Hence the article is now three months old and so is the information I shared. In this update, I shall review my experience with these writing sites that pay for your articles. I will make it so comprehensive that you would like to save a copy of this article as a general reference, and hence the name of the title. Please kindly put up with the description “Best” as this word is a must to attract readership and there’s no way that you can prove that some good stuff is not the best stuff. Hands up those who want to have a go at writing for these sites that pay for articles. Please blog about, link to, digg, stumbleupon, post on funwall, disseminate in facebook, del.icio.us it, tag it, myspace it, promote this article whichever way you can. You can reproduce the contents freely as long as my name gets mentioned (How I love the sight and sound of my own name). You don’t need to ask me for permission as long as you agree with what I am saying and don’t attempt to distort it. If it isn’t good enough for you, or can be improved or modified in any way, you’d better leave a comment to tell me why and how. You can see that I can’t lose either way. And here we are, the writing sites that pay for your articles, in alphabetical order.

1. Associatedcontent.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 1023)

This was the second site I registered in. I kept at it in spite of my early difficulties (it took them 10 days to approve or decline articles for publication). Near the end of June 08, they also knew their long review times were hurting them and dramatically shorted them to almost instant approval. I doubt it whether there is any review procedure at all if my articles are approved within 3 seconds. Now I have a total of 16 live articles there. My pageview is 611. My estimated performance payment is 92 cents. You can calculate this by multiplying your pageview with 0.15 cents to reach this number yourself. I am not entitled to receive upfront payment as I am not living in the States. This is not too bad as I still have the full rights of these articles. They have also kindly upgraded my clout level from purple (level 1 out of 10) to green (level 3 out of 10). My overall experience is that the site’s potential for freelance on-line writers is there. It also has the advantage of having a close relationship with Google who may have a financial interest in the site (I once googled out some information along those lines). The site is likely to be around for a long time. For non-US residents, the site is not as gratifying as their US counter parts. You will not get paid by having them buy your articles, the way how most writers make their money on this site.

2. eHow.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 677)

I registered with eHow and was welcomed warmly right away by Abigail, their eHow guide. It does make you feel good to have a nice smiling guide offering directions and answers you might have. Unfortunately, shortly after I joined, I also received suspicious phishing messages asking me to offer help to save a jailed heiress to a great fortune by making certain responses. For the unsuspecting philanthropists amongst us, do look out for phishing spams. I like reading the eHow articles when I want quick information about something, as they have to be written in directive steps. I would say I like writing these articles as it feels too much like making notes for my college tutorials, again. Try out for yourself.

3. Helium.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 5046)

Helium.com was the first writing site that I joined. I submitted a total of 16 articles. One of these was submitted for a contest. As my articles were listed according to the rating they received by other members of the site, only a couple of them came up in the first five in their lists of articles with the same topic. I soon stopped writing there and tried the other sites. In these other sites, writers and articles may still be scored. Nonetheless, my articles appeared to have more exposures to receive clicks, rather than go unnoticed within long lists. For the cents-sensitive ones amongst you, my income there three months ago was 13 cents. What were they today? It has grown by 53.8% to 20 cents. The annualized growth rate is calculated to be 595%, the only consolation in this exercise.

4. Hubpages.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 776)

I started here three months ago and the build-up has been steady. The site has great spontaneous response to your input. It shows you other hubbers’ activities which enrich your experience with the site. It shows your statistics clearly and allows you edit your work instantaneously. You may add pictures or advertising capsules (segments) anytime you like. You can also publish duplicated contents here even though this probably does more harm than good. For those who are keen to make a passive income here, they make it easy for you to become affiliates to Google Adsense, Kontera context link, Amazon.com and eBay.com. This is where I publish most of my articles (called hubs in here). In fact, I have just started my personal write-a-thon here, trying to reach a pageview of 50,000 by 1 Oct 2008. The site has so far brought in $15 through Google Adsense, $2 through Kontera and nothing through Amazon. I do see great potential in this site, as my pageviews and the number of fans are constantly climbing. I’m sure this site is much more profitable for more diligent and money-conscious writers who put effort into search engine optimization (SEO) and hub on more profitable Google Adsense Keywords. I shall leave this sub-topic here as this is not the main topic of this current article.

5. Lifetips.com (Alexa traffic ranking 17771)

This site invites writers to sign up as “Gurus” in their particular fields of expertise (from accounting, acupuncture…, to writing and yoga). You can share your “lifetips” and be paid up to $10 per tip, or allow them to compile your tips into an ebook or a printed book. They will market the book and award you your royalty at an agreed percentage. Disclaimer: I haven’t tried this myself.

6. PrintNPost.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 173670)

This was another site I wrote for. It is supported by its contributing community who appear happy to share comments with each other. I may be wrong but the site appeared to be single-handedly run and managed by its owner. Its review time for article approval is surprisingly short considering its limited resources. The owner is also quick in answering questions. You can also expect tons of traffic. As I write mostly health and medicine related articles, I couldn’t help but notice that a lot of the articles under this category are written by the same writer with a byline “Dxxxxxxx”. They are articles, up to 40 in number, with similar contents on the same topic, but written in different words. I strongly suspect that some kind of article-spinner is being tried out. It puts me off somewhat as these articles may upset readers after original contents. Nonetheless, the publishing under other categories appear to be in order. You may want to give this site a go. As you hold your own Google Adsense account with this site, I presume you get most, if not all, the payment from Google Adsense yourself. For me, the Google Adsense income was a total of $10 for the past three months.

7. Squidoo.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 450)

The site is associated with popular blogger Seth Godin who also provides you with a free e-book entitled “Every One Is An Expert” to start you off. It is a great site with lots of well written articles (called a lens, or an individual angle to see things). Unfortunately, for the beginner, the competition is really hot. Unless you do something nice and get recommended by one of the editors, your writing gets lost in the ocean of lenses created every day. Your humble author published one lens to try it out one month ago. Until this morning, my pageview is zero. I could have done something wrong though. There are many other lens producers who will share with you how interesting and addictive publishing at squidoo.com is. I am sure it will turn out great for many of you who try it hard and long enough. Have fun. A note of warning: the site allows publication of adult contents. Don’t assume your child can be left alone safely with this site.

8. Thisisby.us (Alexa traffic ranking: 86565)

I started here three months. I find the site rather unique. It writing community is keen and friendly. Its writers are keen in making comments (probably because you also earn by making comments, on top of by posting articles). However, the site appears to be smaller in scale and scope. New writers may find that it can take them a long time to build up their traffic here. Some of its writers are really prolific, creative and stylish. I find this a good reading site but am very unsure whether the average writer will monetize their articles here. Writers are rewarded by a formula involving pageviews and votes by other writers (termed “goodness”). Your humble author has so far made 4 cents with my few articles. Check this out if you still have time after writing at the other sites.

9. Triond.com (Alexa traffic ranking: 36499)

Even though the triond.com site is ranked 36499, this may not reflect the popularity of the sites posting your articles. Triond.com is the portal that distributes your writing to various sites including healthmad.com (Alexa traffic ranking 64120), socyberty.com (Alexa traffic ranking 45840) authspot.com (Alexa traffic ranking 106518), gomestic.com (Alexa traffic ranking 74957) and others. Triond.com accepts articles on all topics and sorts them out to distribute through the appropriately themed article sites. You can even write in any language of your choice and they’ll find the right place to publish it. They also try to find an image to match your content and attach this to it. I particularly like the healthmad.com as it is a handy place to keep my health and medical articles. However, they are very strict with duplicate contents. You are likely to have your article declined even if it has been partly duplicated somewhere on the internet (or possibly, in print). They are very efficient with paying their authors. I started writing for them in May 08 and they had paid me twice already by paypal. Even with payouts as low as $2.24 (on 15 Jun 08) and $0.56 (on 15 Jul 08), they did not find that an issue. I guess I shall stay with them as well, even though I like hubpages.com more because of the hubpages’ more spontaneous responses and interactive features. I shall update you in the future after trying out how they are with publishing Chinese articles (I have just submitted my first Chinese article to them this morning).

Summary

In this article, I have outlined the different features of the writing sites that pay for your articles. Whenever possible and applicable, I have included my own experience and what I enjoy about these sites. It’s nice to get paid for your work and the time you’ve taken to create it. Nonetheless, my personal experience is that you have to find a site that helps you enjoy your hobby of writing and sustain it. You can never monetize your hobby if it stops being your hobby. You are welcome to share your thoughts on this article and writing on the internet in general.

Please also read Dr Benson Yeung's related hub: How To Reach 50000 Pageviews In 60 Days Chapter 1