I had never considered working online as a viable source of income. I considered 90% of everything on the Internet a reinvention of junk mail. Instead of filling my mailbox full of scams and get rich quick schemes, the con artists now filled up my email. But having been unsuccessful at finding a job in my career field I was willing to give it a shot.
I soon realized I was going to have to put some research into the task. The keyword search for potential online jobs resulted in the millions. The top ranked pages and thousands following were obvious scams. I began to consider a proposal requiring websites to have a license and a standard of practice as a novel business idea. Seeing so many others seeking to dupe the public inspires little faith in my fellow man.
I had overheard a few of my college friends mention writing online content for extra income. It had been years since I wrote a proper essay. But I gave it consideration. I gathered a list of sites that seemed legitimate and signed up. I posted a generic article rewritten from one of my college essays. This work had been well vetted by college professors and I knew it to be above average compared to what I had seen posted on the sites. The topic remained relevant and it had no problems getting published on each of the sites. The going rate for a piece of online article content averages about 1/1000 of a penny per page view. I was familiar with the ludicrous sums of money companies invested in advertising. I considered even the supposedly legitimate sites paying fractions of a cent for articles outright criminal. I gave up the notion of sweating out online content for such an insulting return.
A week later, I happened to look into my Paypal account and saw an additional $20.00 from the site I had submitted my article. I returned to the site and checked my account dashboard and was surprised to find my article had received over 20,000 page views. 6 more articles per day of the same quality and relevance performing at the same rate would have earned me $900.00 in a week! Of course I did not expect that sort of return but the outcome had shown me there is money to be made in this business.
For the next month I began writing content and submitting it to various networks. I had gotten lucky with my first article which continued to outperform my other submissions. But my other content was doing okay considering I had not ever written professionally before. But there were some pitfalls I had to overcome to do this well and earn a substantial income to justify the time I put into it.
As I mentioned, it had been years since I had written an essay that required proper grammar and sentence structure. It's surprising to me how little I understood the English language in its written form. My wording and ability to form a colorful descriptive using quality word choice was never an issue. But I employ a raw freestyle method of writing in order to convey my feeling to the reader. This results in some horrid results in grammar and structure that must be meticulously proofread before it can be considered viable for readership. I had to work on breaking these old habits. I still have difficulty with this resulting in much of my content being returned for errors requiring rewrites.
The quality and quantity of articles are the two defining factors in earning well from online content. Continuously rewriting to correct errors reduces the amount of time I have to produce more content. I realized this was greatly affecting my potential income. As well, if an article slips by an editor with such errors it reflects poorly on the network and the author. My literature professor would say, "It's simply poor form, dear fellow."
Writing creatively is a craft. It takes years of practice to do it well. And it takes real talent to place mere words in an arranged order that captivates and holds the readers' attention. No different from a sonnet or concerto, one note off key ruins the entire performance. In this respect, writing becomes more than an effort to earn money. The content is a reflection of the writer. Editors can help but they are only human. The responsibility and dedication to present readers with the best content ultimately lie with the writer.
Resources:
Yahoo Contributor Network
FullofKnowledge.com
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Previously Posted on FullofKnowlege.com
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