Jake's Outdoors

Writing Sites…

Recently, I posted about writing articles for various sites on the internet. Arthur, from over at Simply Outdoors, asked how I got started in that endeavor, and I never got around to answering him. So, I thought I would take a couple of minutes today to tell you about my writing.

First, it is something that is easy to do. I currently write for 3 different sites. I’ll show you the ones i use, though a couple of them are not producing a lot for me yet. I started writing for these sites to try to earn a little extra money. There is not much in any of these sites, but I enjoy the writing, and it gives me a bit of money for my efforts. The other great advantage is that the internet can always use some more positive outdoor stories!

The first site, and the most profitable for me, is Associated Content. The great benefit of this site is that you can write articles about anything that you want, and then receive offers from the company for an upfront payment. I have made between about $3.50 to $10 for articles. I know some other folks that have made a bit more for some of their work, but this seems to be typical. I make about $5, on average, per article. As you can see, you aren’t going to get rich off of this, but if you enjoy the writing anyway, you might as well give it a try. You will also receive a page view bonus for your work. Each article earns $1.50 per 1000 page views. This has been adding up to a few dollars per month on my account. One thing you should be aware of is that it can take up to 2 weeks to receive an offer on your work. And, they do occasionally reject articles for payment, but you can still publish them for free. Typically, I will make changes, and resubmit the articles with different titles. I’ve never had one rejected twice.

The second site that I write for is Helium. Helium will not pay you upfront for articles, but you can write for contests that they run each week. Winners of the contests will win $75, but it takes a lot of articles to be able to compete. You will receive a page view bonus for all of your articles, much like with Associated Content. However, the model is not so well defined, so that you will not know what you are being paid per view. Unless you are writing for the contests, it is probably better, at least in my opinion, to scan this site for article suggestions, and then publish on Associated Content.  If you do want to join Helium, you can do it from the site.  However, I do get a bit of credit for referring writers, so if you would like, leave me a note, and I will get your email address off of your comment, and send you an invitation.

The third site I have not been writing for very long. It is called Suite 101. Again, this site does not pay upfront for articles, but it also asks for shorter articles. Basically, they want you to try for about 600 words. One of the biggest problems with this site is that they require you to give them exclusive rights for 1 year to any work that you publish. They pay based on a revenue sharing model. Basically, you get a portion of all money that the site receives from Google Ads, based on how many clicks actually came off of your articles. This site has an application process that you must go through before they will publish any articles, but I didn’t find it too problematic.  I have not really been writing for this site long enough to be able to say what profit may come from it.  I tend to hold my better articles out for Associated Content, since they do not require exclusive publishing rights.

Well, that is about it.  These are the sites I use.  Feel free to follow all the links, and poke around a bit.  Look up my articles and click on ads (if you see anything that interests you), and you will help me continue to fund this site!  Thanks!