Be Cautious When Writing for eHow

Lately eHow has been going through a number of changes. In an attempt to clean up their site, they have been deleting many contributor's articles.

This wouldn't be that big of a deal, except that it seems that some articles are being deleted for reasons that make little sense, if any.

For instance, an article was deleted for being spam. The only problem was that the article was one that was suggested and approved by eHow staffers. How could it be spam if eHow suggested it?

Some eHow members are also suggesting that eHow is replacing their articles with Demand Studio articles. Demand Studios is eHow's parent company. At Demand Studios, writers get paid a flat fee of $5-$15 to write articles. These articles then get used on sites like eHow to earn residuals for the company. By deleting member articles and replacing them with Demand Studio articles, eHow would be able to make more money in the long run. So it seems to make financial sense for eHow to stock the website with as many Demand Studio articles as possible.

The positive aspects of eHow are that articles are extremely easy and quick to write. However, you have little control over your article once it is published. They can delete it without notice. For this reason, make sure to back up all articles.

Here are the problems I personally have with eHow:

1. Lack of Transparency: It's hard to know eHow's reasoning for many of their decisions. It is also extremely difficult to get answers to questions.
2. No Stability: It seems that things are changing monthly at eHow and a recommended article one day could be deleted the next for being spam.
3. No Control: eHow has dropped memberships with little explanation and I personally don't fully trust that they wouldn't reuse deleted articles for their own financial gain.

Here are the positives to eHow:

1. A place to reach a broad audience.
2. Extremely easy articles to write.

So basically, if you are considering writing for eHow, I would do so with extreme caution. For now, I will not be writing any additional articles for them, but I am happy with keeping the articles I have up and running.

14 Articles in 14 Days: Working the Writing Muscles

Right now I am in the middle of a 14 articles in 14 days challenge for Suite 101. At first I thought this would be relatively easy. I mean, there are days when I can sit down and write 3-5 articles with little problem. 14 in 14 is turning out to be slightly more challenging than I first thought though.

I guess I would liken this challenge to training for a marathon. Training for a marathon requires running every day. Some days are great and you feel like running for miles. Other days, just putting on the tennies is an arduous task. The same is true for writing.

Some days I can crank out 3-5 high-quality articles before lunch. Other days, I could labor away all day just to produce one presentable article. I find that this is the challenge with 14 in 14. Writing one article every day for 14 days challenges you to work the writing muscles even when they're aching and tired.

On the positive side and in keeping with the sports theme, the challenge is instilling a "just do it" or, better yet, "just write it" attitude in me. It is exciting to see my page views dramatically increase and my revenue go up. I'm going to stick with it and push through the writing pain and hopefully I will reap the benefits when I cross the finish line.

100 Articles on eHow! Join Me!

I finally made it to the 100 article milestone on eHow! I was inspired by a posting by fellow freelance writer, Felicia, in which she wrote 100 articles and tracked their progress over the long term. In the same fashion, I intend to track the earnings of my 100 to see how they progress. I may go on to write more articles, but I will just track the earnings of the first 100.

Surprisingly, 100 articles didn't take that long to amass. I found little ways to be more productive with the process as I was going. If you are a fellow SEO writer, I hope that you will join me in trying this experiment yourself. It was actually quite a bit of fun and I'm extremely curious to see how my earnings add up. I will be adding earnings info to this posting at the end of each month for a year.

• Before Aug 17* - 25.22
• Aug 2009 - 27.21
  
• Sept 2009 -33.48
• Oct 2009 - 31.46
• Nov 2009 - 19.87**
• Dec 2009 - 18.09
• Jan 2010 - 21.12
• Feb 2010 - 19.52
• Mar 2010 - 25.97
• April 2010 - 21.96
• May 2010 - 28.48
• June 2010 - 23.34
  

*100th article published on Aug 17th, First article written in April
**Due to eHow's November article sweep, I lost 6 articles, dropping me to 94 total
Total: 296.23

Make $5000 a Month Freelancing

Okay, maybe $5000 a month is shooting for the stars, but it is possible. This week Suite101 sent out a letter to announce that a member made $5000 in residuals over a one month period. As a struggling freelancer, this news is incredibly encouraging. Though I realize that I probably won't be anywhere near this number for a long time, it is great to keep in mind that I could possibly make this much in the future. I would be happy with half of this amount, but I won't be able to get there without consistently adding articles to residual sites.

I think that often times it's easy to start strong as an SEO writer and then fizzle out, but I'm going to focus on frequently adding content to my online sites so that I can one day get to that $5000 mark. If you want to give it a go as well, click on the Suite101 or Bukisa widgets on the side of this blog to join and start writing for residuals.

Be the Tortoise When Writing for Residual Income

Though I have not been writing for residual income for long, I have seen the potential for making money long-term with seo writing. For instance, I have seen my E-how monthly income rise by $5 a month since I started writing. Though this meager amount is nothing to get excited about now, it shows that I can build my residual income over the long run. So in short, slow and steady wins the race and it pays to be the tortoise rather than the hare.

That said, I think it is important to write as many articles as you can when you are starting out. I look at it like banking. The more money you are able to place in savings when you are younger, the more money you will be able to earn through interest. I see the residual writing game in much the same light. Compiling a large collection of articles on many sites early in the game, will help you see your residuals grow more in the long term.

Ofcourse, like any good savings plan, regular deposits are a must. Once you have reached an initial goal of 50-100 articles on any site, start a new minimum goal for each site. You could require yourself to write at least one article a week, or two a month. As long as you are contributing regularly, you can see steady residual growth.

Staying with the savings and banking analogy, make sure to also diversify your deposits. Bank articles in many different residual sites to see money from each. Each site will have its own positives and negatives. Having articles in many online communities and sites will help you establish your online presence and bring in more revenue. Some online residual sites to consider include ehow, bukisa, associated content, suite101 and hub pages. Any of these sites, with the exception of associated content, can be accessed by clicking on the links on the side bar of this page.

Remember that slow and steady wins the race. If you stick with it, you will see returns and growth. Good Luck!

Diversify Without Spreading Yourself Too Thin

Online freelance writers or SEO writers can easily find themselves spread thin trying to write for the many residual and up-front payment sites available. Freelance writing is as much about being a multitasker and time manager as it is about being a skilled writer and researcher. So how do you know where and how to spend your time?

Originally, I thought that I would spend most of my time writing for up-front payment sites like DemandStudios because it seemed like I could make the most money from those sites. After I thought about it though, I realized that they couldn't pay me what they were offering for my articles if they weren't making money off of them. That's when I realized that writing for residual pay had the most potential for long-term money making. That's not to say that I didn't still write an occasional up-front payment article. It's always nice to have immediate money. I just figured that I wasn't going to spend much more time with up-front payment sites than I needed to.

So, I am currently trying to add as much quality content as I can to two residual sites: E-how and Suite101. I think that these two sites have the greatest money-making potential. Suite101 even offers a 10% bonus once you reach 50 articles. I am also slowly sprinkling in articles to sites like Bukisa and Associated Content. I am working hard at producing high-quality articles with optimized keyword usage. By honing the majority of my focus on two specific sites, I am able to be more productive and feel less like I am spreading myself thin.

Why Keywords Will Make or Break Your Earning Potential

Online freelance writing is not like writing for print media. Keywords make a huge impact on your articles' earning potential. Keywords are those words that are most likely to show up in a search engine. The more effective your keywords, the more people will see your articles and the more money you will make.

Suite101 has a great article on picking effective keywords.

For me, I try to think of things that everyone wants to have or know. For instance, most people want to lose weight, look attractive, make more money and have more free time. These are topics that people will always search for. Creating quality articles that address these topics will help to generate larger audiences.

It's also important to find unique angles within the broader topics. For instance, you might compare and contrast running and walking to see which exercise is best for losing weight.

Once you have your topics, check your keywords on the google adwords site. Type in your keywords to see how many similar keywords have been used in searches recently. You can see how many times each of the keywords has been used. You can also see similar keywords. For instance, i searched jewelry and found that many people searched for that topic spelled like this: jewellery. By including each type of spelling, I could double my views.

Bottom line, keyword research will help you to achieve greater hits on your online articles.