An Update

Just a heads up, I have a few reviews to get caught up with so those will be coming soon. I had hoped to get caught up over my holiday break from school but I ended up being sick most of the time! Why does that always happen??

I thought I would start out the year with an update on how I am doing with some of the writing places I posted about in 2010.

Demand Studios: Was doing great with them for awhile, had writing assignments to work on every day. Despite the sometimes annoying editor attitudes, I was making money on a regular basis. A few months ago, all of the good titles suddenly disappeared. I was sorting through hundreds and hundreds of mundane titles that I had no interest or knowledge in. The titles are categorized by computers and the computer has not been doing a good job. I search through "health" articles and am flooded with titles about how to fix a car, or fix a plumbing problem. Now, come on, how many auto mechanics do you know that work as freelance writers? Hmmm? I search through animal health and come across topics regarding cat tow motors.. not cats as in felines. I was having a very difficult time finding any article to write about. I would look through the list throughout the day and it was always the same. I couldn't go without making money, so I would end up turning to textbroker or suite 101 to make up for it. I have written only a few articles for Demand over the past few months. I've been very disappointed with them. I suppose I could pick random articles, but I just don't feel comfortable writing about a topic that I don't know a thing about.

Text Broker: Like I mentioned in the above paragraph, I go back to writing for textbroker when I am desperate. Their articles are very low paying, however most of them are 200-300 words and are very easy to write. They don't always have a wide range of articles to choose from, unfortunately and only pay +a month, but they are great for someone just dabbling in freelance writing.

Suite 101: I have 24 articles on Suite 101 so far. I focused most of my time on Demand Studios because I was making immediate money with them, however I think I will start dedicating more time to Suite. I have made payout with them 4 times so far, and each time, the payout has been a little bigger. I know with time to add more articles, this could be a great money earner for me.

Hubpages: I really haven't put a lot of time into hubpages. You really have to find a niche to make money with this website just because it is all based on adsense and amazon earnings. I think people do better with this site if they write articles around a specific item and then link to specific items on amazon. I see a slow increase in my adsense account, but I'm still a long way from payout.

I do have a few new writing places to post about soon, so keep your eyes open and don't forget to subscribe so that you are notified every time I post something new!

Here's to wishing everyone a prosperous 2011!

The Best of The Year...

Since the end of the year is approaching, I thought that maybe it would be nice to end it with a sort of “best of” of blog posts. This post will be a trip down memory lane as I go over some of my best posts of the year. I hope you enjoy and that you stick around to see what I have in store for 2011!

For the writers out there, I wrote a post back in April about eHow switching to Demand Studios and hubpages being the new eHow. I’m still writing for them and am enjoying it. They have made it easy to add amazon products and links to your articles. http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/04/goodbye-ehow-hello-hubpages.html

Suite 101. This is a post about writing for Suite 101. So far, I am having some good luck with them and have made payout for the past few months. I’m sure with every article I add, I will also add to my earnings. http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/05/suite101-for-writers.html

This is a post I wrote back in June on various ways to promote your articles, blogs, and websites. Lots of great marketing information here. http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/06/promoting-your-articles-or-blog.html

For those of you who use Twitter, this post has information on ways that you can make money via your twitter account. These are legit ways that won’t just waste your time. http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/10/making-money-with-twitter-is-it.html

This post from back in August gives information on how you can offer various services online to earn money. These are tried and true websites that you can really earn from.  http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/08/offer-your-services-for-few-bux.html

For those of you looking to network with other freelancers, offer your services, or find new clients, this post gives you the lowdown on doing this. http://crazedmama.blogspot.com/2010/08/networking-with-potential.html

Ehow switching to Demand Studios?

An email just went out a few days ago stating that ehow is switching over to Demand Studios. Kind of ironic that these two companies are the ones I have recently been posting about!

I'm not sure exactly how this is going to work with ehow, but from what I have read and heard, some of you who have an ehow account have been automatically accepted to demand studios, while others haven't? Ehow articles will now be written and posted via the Demand Studios platform. The bad thing is, those of you who have not been accepted to Demand will not be able to write for ehow any longer.

This change could be a good thing, or a bad thing. From what I have read, Demand Studios will be able to generate more traffic, and additional revenue than what the ehow website had. The bad thing is the dreaded Demand Studios' editors. I have conflicting opinions on the Demand editors. None of them follow the same guidelines, and they all have their opinion on what is right and what is wrong. One editor may tell you to do something one way, then another editor will tell you to do something completely different, so you have no way of knowing whether you will make the editor happy, or not, since there are thousands of editors throughout Demand. Plus, you only get one chance to fix the problems in the article. Some editors will be very vague in their suggestions and there is no way to communicate with the editor. If you misunderstand something, or simply don't know what they are wanting, you only have one chance to guess and if you did not read their mind correctly, the article will be rejected. Once it is rejected you are out that time, work, and money. Even if you appeal it, and win the appeal, you still wont get that money, or work back. Doesn't really sound fair, does it? The only good thing is that you can use that rejected article somewhere else such as suite101, ehow, constant content..etc.. That is my only complaint with demand; there should be a way to communicate with the editor to verify what they are wanting.

Another thing with Demand is that they require references and citations for everything, even something that may be common knowledge. Ehow has not required that in the past, so I don't know if demand will require it for all ehow articles from now on. To be honest, I wrote for ehow when I wanted to get a break from Demand. I will be trying out the new ehow publishing in the next few days to find out exactly how it is going to work.

On other note, if you currently have articles on ehow, you will not lose them, and you will continue receiving the same revenue sharing as before. I think the deadline is April 13 for having the ability to publish new articles through the ehow website, after that it will be strictly through Demand. I would love to hear everyone's opinion on this change, or if you have any extra advice or insight, feel free to leave a comment and tell us!

And now, my MARCH 2010 earnings:

Demand Studios: $307.50
Text Broker: $188.26

For a monthly total of: $495.75