2009 June

Jun

So here’s the scoop on Demand Studios in a nutshell. (I don’t have a full website post about it yet)

They do NOT allow you to keep any rights to your work. At all. When you write the article, and submit it to them, it is theirs. You need to know that upfront.

Having said that – Demand Studios can be a really good way to make a set amount of immediate money. When our renters flaked out on us and we NEEDED to make X amount of money to cover the mortgage (granted – it was our fault for relying on that rent money and we’ve definitely learned our lesson) Demand Studios saved us.

Here’s How Demand Studios Pays

If you take one of the articles they have listed you will get paid $15. Search for titles you can do quickly and easily. Some of them are totally off the wall – like “How to Build a Solar Powered Robot Dog” or some crazy weird thing like that. The best way I’ve found it so find a cluster of article titles around a similar theme. “How Dolphins Use Echolocation”, “About Dolphins” “Why are Dolphins Mammals” “How do Dolphins Behave” – I can use one bundle of research to crank out five or six articles on a similar topic and get them written rather quickly.

If you SUGGEST a title you will only get paid $5. I do not recommend doing it often. $5 is hardly worth the trouble – better to search for a topic title you think you can do relatively easy. Especially when you consider that last year on Suite101 I averaged $15-$16 per article for the entire year. And I’m still getting paid for those articles this year as well.

They apparently have added some kind of revenue share program but my understanding is that it is rather a small amount of payment per 1000 pv’s. Anything under $2/1000 page views is rather too low in my opinion. I average about $3 per 1000 page views at Suite101 and prefer to write any “extra” articles there.

But, like I said. When I HAD TO HAVE $300 that month to make up the difference it was very easy to say “$300 divided by $15 = 20 articles”.

Demand Studios pays once a week directly into your Paypal account. You will recieve a W2 at the end of the year for payments. My profile with a list of articles I’ve written there – http://www.ehow.com/members/ds_angela10540.html

Jun

Making Money Online – Upfront vs Residual vs Affiliate Pay

By AngEngland | Making Money

5 Comments

Photo by Dani Simmonds

So – there are different types of payments when it comes to writing for the web.

Upfront Payment for Making Money Writing Online

You write an article and get paid X amount of money and that is that. If you want more money, you must write another article. On the other hand, you know that if you need a certain amount of money, you must write a certain number of articles.

Let’s say you need to make $150 extra each month. Demand Studios pays $15 for assigned articles and $5 for submitted titles if approved. So you can say, “OK – I have to write 10 articles each month in order to make $150″, write 10 articles, and get $150 bucks.

The downside to writing for upfront payment is that if you want $150 again the next month, you must write 10 articles again. And the month after that. And the month after that. Because you got all your money upfront.

Demand Studios and Associated Content are just a couple of the many sites that pays writers upfront – other blog posts will cover other sites.

Residual Pay for Writing Online

Residual pay or revenue sharing type payment models mean that you write the article, it gets published, and you slowly collect a share of the revenue the article creates for the website. So if you write an article for Suite101.com you might only get paid $.26 that first month. But each article you write, you continue to increase your payment. You also continue to collect money on that first article – the first ten articles – the first twenty articles.

So while you will not get rich from only having 10 articles in place, you will continue to collect every single month for any revenue that comes in. At Suite101.com, I now make enough to pay the mortgage payment every month. And when I took a month off to have a baby I STILL made enough to pay the mortgage. Because I didn’t just get $15 upfront and then never make another cent…I made a few pennies one month, a few more the next, and the next, and the next. I actually average between $1-4 per article per month on Suite101. Every month. Whether I write a million new articles or not. I no longer average 10 articles a month there, as I did at one time, but still make a healthy income.

Most of the sites I write for are residual pay or revenue share model websites including Type-A-Mom, Examiner.com and Suite101.com

Affiliate Pay on Blog Posts and Articles

Affiliate payment is when you share income not with the website, but with retailers. One of the most familiar affiliate programs out there is Amazon.com. For example when I reviewed the book “On Writing Well” you will see a little ad to buy the book from Amazon.com. When someone clicks “MY” special link and makes a purchase, Amazon can see the buyer came in from my referral link and will give me a small (very) percentage.

Many – MANY companies have affiliate programs, and web writers should ask whether a website will allow affiliate links or not. Some, like Suite101, do not. Others, like Examiner, or Hubpages do. So many posts on Examiner.com include affiliate links – last month I made $30 from a single post because the swine flu scare had people purchasing some herbal remedies. Even though the post was written for Examiner.com, and I made money from Examiner for the article, I also got paid from Mountain Rose Herbs Company from the affiliate sales.

Hope this makes sense. If you have any other questions, let me know. Yes, there are more ways to make money from your website, but these are the three main ways most people I know choose monetize their online writing efforts.