Thought I’d offer some slightly more constructive advice than usual today, for anyone looking to make money from home with their favourite hobby or interest. And it’s not me offering to pay so you don’t need to worry about bouncing cheques.
There are now apparently well over 150 million websites on the internet, the vast majority of which are a load of old rubbish, but that still leaves a lot that are active and interesting sites. Approximately 100,000 – 500,000 would be a reasonable estimate.
One of the big challenges for website owners is keeping their sites up to date with interesting features and content – and a site that never changes or gets updated sooner or later ends up in googles great internet dustbin, never to be seen again.
Some owners work away themselves on their own websites, but a large number subcontract, or buy in articles, to be used on their site. The goal for many a site owner is to have a site that costs £xx a day to keep updated, but makes twice that much back in revenue each day, with no effort on their part.
As an example, someone might have a website about digital photography that also reviews and sells digital cameras. The site might sell 10 cameras a day, profit £200, and be very happy to pay £100 per day for interesting articles about photography – because these keep visitors coming to their site, and buying more cameras.
You can see the general idea. There are a large number of website owners that are actively looking to buy articles on a regular basis, that are well written and interesting for their site visitors.
This is where you come in, if you are looking to make some extra money from home. There are sites on the internet that bring together writers and owners, enabling ‘stay at home moms’ (and pops) to generate some extra income.
Pretty much everyone has a hobby or interest of some kind – health, diet, a particular sport, technology, growing vegetables, babies…if you have an interest and can write about it in a captivating way then chances are good that someone is just waiting to pay for your articles!
They save you the effort of having to track down individual customers, which would be very laborious. One such site is constant-content.com but there are lots of others if you look around.
The way it works varies according to the site. Broadly, you join the site and submit your tip-top quality articles, along with the price that you hope to sell it for. $50 per 1000 words is a reasonable starting point, more when you have established a reputation – often up to $100-$150 per 1000 words. I dare say the sky is the limit if National Geographic come knocking but that can come later.
If the article-broker site can find a buyer for your article you will get about 65% of the sale price.
People looking for articles will also submit requests for what they need, and you can write an article in response. If they buy it, good, if they don’t it sits there until someone else does. Of course, if your articles are overpriced and poorly written you won’t be getting rich too soon. To see a ‘typical’ standard take a look at this journey through Cote d’Or or this visit to Carcassonne Cité article.
Before getting to work you should do do a bit of research – what kinds of articles sell well; what style of writing (apparently it’s best to start with the punchline and work down from that rather than start with a boring introduction and get more exciting as you go); how to lay out your article (hint: people love articles with numbers in the title eg ‘Top 10 beaches in Alaska’ or ‘14 ways to hook the man of your dreams’. Etc etc. It’s all information available on the internet.
Worth a go during a wet week in winter? Let me know how it goes.
Why Insure?
For 9 years I have owned my house in the Charente, and in May on arriving back to France I found a “catastrophe” as they say in France. During the cold snap in January I suffered two burst pipes, the damage quite extensive. Which was more than a surprise as I had turned the off water supply and drained down the system myself before leaving the property before winter.
When I arrived to find such damage I checked the stop cock to find the meter reader open and the tap was only a half turn ‘on’. We notified our insurers and they acted immediately BUT as I instructed my new insurers to take over at the end of my previous insurance the claim had to be send to the previous insurance company. This is where the problem lies my previous insurer miffed at my moving on “for a better cheaper deal” has now refused to pay out for the damage. They state I left the water on so I was negligent. I now have to fight them through the courts.
But the delay in their getting an “expert” to the property has made the damage worse, I now have dry rot which is spreading and in a bid to save my house I have to act quickly. Sadly I didn’t move my insurance sooner as my new insurers would have dealt with the claim immediately. I will be publishing a press release shortly as a warning to other expats who may have insurance with the company concerned.