Small Business Blog

It’s 2:00 a.m. You’re awake, wondering when you’re going to get fired. Part of you says it’d be a relief: no more pretending not to notice that Bob Jones is sleeping with his secretary or that Carrie Winstall is sleeping with her secretary. No more eating cake at 10:00 a.m. because it’s some random co-worker’s birthday. No more politics, bureaucracy and, best of all, no more time-sucking meetings that add no value to your productivity.

In today’s economy, it’s quite likely that you are either facing the possibility of getting laid off, or you are disenchanted with corporate America. Maybe you’ve had your 401(k) contributions yanked, your pay frozen or your benefits cut. It’s happening everywhere.

Given these circumstances, it’s more important than ever to learn how to make money on the side. Your goal may be to leave corporate America forever, or it may be to lessen your dependence on that corporate job. Either way, you have to start somewhere. And if you have moderately good communication skills, writing for the web may be your ticket to greater financial freedom.

Know your options

Do me a favor. Type “how to make money online” in a Google search. Spend three hours picking through those search results and write down what you learned. Chances are, the exercise will teach you to be discouraged and confused about what lies ahead. Sorry about that, but there is a point here: learning how to make money online takes practice as well as a little basic knowledge. I can cover the basic knowledge part here, but only you can do the practice part.

Let’s start with the basics. There are several avenues you can pursue to earn money writing for the web. Each of these provides a different type of revenue; you may feel comfortable specializing in one area, but many freelance writers dabble in all of them.

• Self-publishing. Self-publishing involves writing for your own website or blog. You can obtain free templates for sites and blogs from a variety of sources online; your primary cost then will be the hosting. Hosting can be free, but working through a free hosting service may inhibit your ability to put ads on your site–and that’s how you’re going to make your money. As a beginning publisher, you’ll have two options for ads: a service like Google AdSense or affiliate ads. You can obtain affiliate relationships direct through the advertiser (such as NetFlix) or through a third-party company like Commission Junction. The third-party provider gives you access to a larger selection of advertisers, so you can more easily keep your site updated and optimized for your audience. The primary drawback of self-publishing is that it takes time, effort and skill to build a consistent readership.

• Work for hire. You can also obtain project work on sites like Guru.com. Most of these project board sites will allow you to have a free profile, but it might be worth a few hundred bucks to upgrade to a paid profile. Be prepared to bid competitively (i.e., work for very little) until you build your reputation. The disadvantage of focusing on work-for-hire projects is, like self-publishing, it can take a long time to start generating consistent revenue.
• Article sales. If you are prepared to churn out compelling articles, go ahead and set up profiles with Associated Content, Today.com and Constant Content. Associated Content pays you on a per-view basis, and will sometimes also give you an upfront fee for your articles. Today.com has a similar compensation structure, except that you are paid to write posts for a blog on the Today.com network. Constant Content allows you to set your own prices for your content, although the sale is not guaranteed. To maximize your earnings on Associated Content or Today.com, you’ll have to learn how to drive traffic to your articles. You don’t need to do this with Constant Content, but you should familiarize yourself with the different levels of ownership rights; this will help you set articles prices that are appropriate to your level of productivity.
• Revenue sharing. Still other sites, like Xomba.com, will pay you a percentage of the ad revenue generated by your content. You will generally have to set up a Google AdSense account and provide your publisher identification number. You then produce the content that attracts clicks and start making money.

Amp your earnings with referrals

If you’re still reading this, you are now officially my friend. Part of the reason I share this information with you is in the hope that you will return the favor by following my links and advice. In doing so, you will become my referral and I’ll get a little kickback for my troubles. You can then pass on the goodwill to your friends: recruit them, sign them up, have them write to their heart’s content for any website that’ll give you a commission. Generally, the commission comes out of the website’s earnings, not yours and not your friends’. So recruit those friends and, soon enough, they’re making money online, you’re making money online and the website’s making money. Everyone’s happy.

Oh, and about those keywords

I’ll leave you with some final thoughts about keywords. People find the information they need online by searching with keywords. If your content doesn’t contain the keywords that are being used in search, no one will find it. And if no one finds it, your revenue potential is zero, zip and nada. So choose your content topics wisely, and use keywords strategically. You’ll just have to squelch that compulsion for writing opinion pieces about geology. Trust me on this. We’re friends, remember? {sharethis}