How much is your writing worth? A penny a word? Five cents? Twenty five cents a word?
As writers, especially as freelancers, we often tend to think in these terms. We write something to sell it, hopefully for a price that translates into a high enough dollars-per-hour number that we can eke out a decent living. And once that piece is sold, that’s it: in all likelihood, we’ve given away the rights to it, and we can’t sell it again. Oh, we may be able to use the basic information again to create a new article, saving us a bit of research time, but we can never get paid again for that particular article.
But that’s okay as long as you’ve been paid a reasonable amount. Isn’t it?
Hm…
What if, instead of being given a one time payment of $25 for your article, you could get paid a penny every time someone looked at it?
You’ve probably heard the little story that explains the “Power of the Penny.” You know, the one where a teacher asks her class whether the students would rather have $100,000 today or a penny which doubles every day for a month.
Naturally, most of us would be tempted to take the $100,000 today (a tidy sum for sure!), but if you’ve heard the story before (or you’re a whiz at math), you know you should go for the penny, since those doublings add up quickly, and that original penny turns into millions of dollars by the end of the month.
Now, most of us aren’t going to make millions of dollars from one article, but the power of the penny can come into play in the world of writing, and it is possible to make a lot more from an article over time than you’d make by giving away the rights in exchange for even a lucrative one time payment.
No, you don’t have to stand out on a busy street corner asking everyone who passes by to give you a penny to read your article. Fortunately, the Internet makes things a lot easier, and thanks to the world of advertising, you don’t really have to “charge” anyone anything. As long as visitors are coming to your website, blog, etc. (the location of your article), those advertisers will be eager to rent a little piece of nearby “web estate” where they can display their ads. And they’ll keep renting ad space as long as you keep getting visitors to your site reading your articles.
This is one way you can get paid again and again for your writing.
This is how I’m able to make thousands of dollars a month, even though I do relatively little work each day. Articles I wrote three years ago continue to make me money today.
Looking back, I can definitely say it’s been more lucrative for me to keep all the rights to my work, display my articles on my own sites, grow the traffic to those sites, and charge advertisers for those pennies month after month.
And in many niches, you’ll find that visitors are worth a lot more than a penny!
9 responses so far ↓
1 Mary Emma Allen // Jul 7, 2008 at 5:39 am
Great article, Lindasy. I find what you’re doing intriguing. I have many blogs started but haven’t known how to go ahead and monetize them.
Also, thanks for visiting Home Biz Notes and commenting. That’s how I discovered your great site.
2 Opal @ Addicted to Writing // Jul 7, 2008 at 12:13 pm
I make money with some of my websites that way and it’s great.
I haven’t updated one of my websites since December 2007 and it still brings in a nice income every month. I’m planning to start adding content to that website later this month.
I saw you at Get Paid To Write Online, your avatar caught my attention mainly because I’ve played WOW and yes one of my alts is an elf with pink hair.
3 Writing for Money // Jul 7, 2008 at 1:53 pm
@Mary Emma — Thanks for stopping by! It’s definitely a bit of an art form to monetizing content sites, and I’m looking forward to sharing what I’ve learned in future posts.
@Opal — WoW? Me? Never! I’d never spend time that should go towards writing for my websites on games… no, no, never that. *innocent wink*
4 Joel Falconer // Jul 7, 2008 at 5:31 pm
Enjoyed your post and totally agree with the principle of passive income being far better than trading your time for money. Great to see Writing for Your Wealth join the blogosphere!
5 Becca // Jul 9, 2008 at 5:33 am
Lindsay, thanks for your comment on my post at Becca’s Byline. I’ve been catching up here with your new blog – thanks for sharing this very interesting information. I’ll continue reading in hopes of learning more
6 Michele // Jul 9, 2008 at 5:37 am
Thousands a month? Wow… definitely gives us something to think about, eh? Great post, Lindsay!
*smiles*
Michele
P.S. Thanks for your kind response on my other comment (on another post). I would have said this over there, but couldn’t get the comments to cooperate with me. Maybe it’s too early in the morning.
I’ll do my best to let everyone know when the ebooks are ready. I have so many ideas dancing in my head!
7 Alex the Freelance Twin // Jul 15, 2008 at 9:57 am
So does this mean you don’t use article directories or article marketing in any way (since you like to retain all the rights to your work)? If so, what are some of the better methods you’ve used to promote your articles and websites?
8 Rick // Jul 15, 2008 at 12:08 pm
I would love to hear what your favorite monetization tools are. I’m always looking for ideas, especially from someone who has been there. Keep up the great work!
Rick
9 Lindsay // Jul 15, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Alex, I do submit articles to ezinearticles and a couple others to get back links. I think you still own the rights to your work when you do that (feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), but in any case, I tend to think of those as throwaway articles. I base them on research I already did and whip them out pretty quickly.
Rick, right now Adsense is my biggest earner (I love the no-customer-service aspect of it), though I’m planning to do more with direct sales of links. I’m also exploring the idea of creating my own product (probably a book in my case) to earn from the sale of that. We’ll see!
Thanks for stopping by, all!
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