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WritersNotes.Net: Helping Writers Follow Their Dreams Through Information, Inspiration, and Encouragement!
Smorty, for My Australian Readers--and Everyone Else!
Since I've decided to add some carefully selected sponsored posts to my blog, in the interest of survival for myself and value for my readers, I thought I'd try Smorty, which is an Australian blog advertising site, and which, as such, might tend to offer products and services that my Aussie readers would really be able to relate to. (Of course, I'm sure that Smorty's advertisers' products and services have widespread appeal!)
An Opportunity to Get Paid for Blogging
I'm glad to have this opportunity to get paid for blogging. (After all, I already blog and love it!) This will be just one more way to help insure that I'll be able to continue bringing my readers as many great writing tips, techniques, and resources as possible.
Let's face it; financial realities confront each one of us, every day. Few of us are strangers to the need to earn a living. But, I have no intention of belaboring the point, because I see my new relationship with Smorty as a great thing! I feel it has a lot to offer both me and my readers, and I intend to do my best to choose opportunities that are relevant to you, as writers; though I have to confess that I may occasionally just happen to choose a few that seem intriguing to me--and remember, I, too, am a writer--whether or not they relate to writing directly. (After all, writers have lives, too--outside of writing, that is--though at times it may not always seem that way!)
A Few Words About Smorty
At Smorty, as with most other sites where writers blog for money, advertisers pay bloggers to write opinion posts with links back to the advertiser's site. While this is great for us bloggers, who get paid to blog, it's also obviously beneficial to the businesses that advertise on blogs. This mutual benefit is the basis of every truly successful business transaction--and, for the writer, this includes the sale of our writing in any other venue. After all, this is what free enterprise is all about!
As I see it, if we bloggers pick and choose our advertising opportunities with care, our relationship with Smorty--or with any other blog advertising network--should not only benefit the company, the advertiser, and the blogger, but also the blog's readers, as well.
Here's to the Future--With Smorty and My Readers!
I look forward to a great relationship with the people at Smorty, as well as with their advertisers! And I also look forward to a continuation of the excellent relationship I currently enjoy with my readers and fellow bloggers. You are very important to me, and I promise, you, my readers, that I will not knowingly post inaccurate information or reviews and certainly will not intentionally mislead you about any product, service, or company, for the sake of money.
How About You?
Should you be interested in pursuing your own opportunity to blog for money, I'll be placing my Smorty affiliate badge into my sidebar very soon. If you'd like, you may use it to get more information about how you can get paid to blog at Smorty. (In the meantime, feel free to use the link found in the first paragraph of this post.)
Thanks for your support!
Jeanne
This post sponsored by Smorty.
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If you're looking for a site with tons of valuable information for freelance writers, you'll want to check out Writers-Editors Network. This site is also the home of Cassell Network of Writers (CNW) and Florida Freelance Writers Association (FFWA).
While both of the aforementioned writers associations charge varying fees for membership, the Writers-Editors Network website contains a great deal of free information, in the form of articles filled with advice on writing, getting writing assignments, negotiating fees for your work, and many other aspects of freelancing.
In addition, the site offers a Contest Tip Sheet, with great advice that can help you become "a contender" in any writing contest you may decide to enter. They also offer a list of current writing contests, as well as info on their own contest, and an FAQ page which answers many questions that writers may have about the writing/marketing process. They also list a few job opportunities, as well as "Talks, Seminars, and Conferences of Interest" to writers and/or editors.
If you are serious about writing--and about selling your writing--there's a lot of great information here that would undoubtedly be worthy of your time. So, check it out, and see if you don't find something here that will help you along the road to writing success.
Here's to your success!
Jeanne
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I learned, a few days ago, from reading my friend Yvonne Russell's Grow Your Writing Business blog, that WritersWeekly.Com is raising the rates it pays writers for their work. According to an article, written by Angela Hoy and reproduced in its entirety (with permission) by Yvonne, WritersWeekly is raising its rates 20% for features and 33% for success stories. This is great news for freelancers!
According to Ms. Hoy's article, the 20% increase for feature articles figures to "$60 for around 600 words for non-exclusive electronic rights only," and she adds, "For freelance success stories, we now pay $40 for around 300 words."
Her article is exceptionally interesting reading for freelancers, as it also contains an explanation of the payment history of several other major online publishers of freelance material, as well as several print publishers, giving us a glimpse into their going rates, and letting us know just how long it's been since each has raised its own rates.
Check out this great article on Yvonne's site! You'll find it in her post, entitled, Freelance Writing Rates. The article, entitled, We're Raising Our Freelance Rates, by Angela Hoy, is also posted on the WritersWeekly website.
Thanks, Yvonne for this fascinating and thoroughly helpful info! We can only hope that all the other publishers of freelance material will follow WritersWeekly.Com's shining example of adopting fairer freelance payment rates and thereby engaging in more responsible business practices!
Happy writing!
Jeanne
P.S. You'll want to visit Yvonne's blog often! Through it, she provides lots of great info and many helpful resources for writers! For your convenience, a link to Grow Your Writing Business can always be found in my blog's sidebar in the Helpful Sites for Writers list.
You'll also want to visit WritersWeekly.Com. Their site is packed with articles, market listings, and other resources that will help you reach your writing goals!
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If you're looking for a website where you can earn more for your work than at many other sites, give Constant-Content a try. Constant-Content doesn't actually buy your work; instead they sell it for you--in effect, acting as your online literary agent.
This site attracts many different people who are in the market for writing--much of it content for their websites or blogs--though, at times, you will even come across individuals who are looking to purchase writing for publication in various types of print media. At this site, the deal is simple: You provide the written material; they provide the customers. What could be easier? It's the proverbial 'marriage made in heaven'! With this arrangement, everybody wins! The writer earns money, Constant-Content earns money, and the customer gets the desired written material for his or her website or other project. Everybody's happy!
At Constant-Content, you, the writer, are the one who sets the price for your work. Of the price you charge, you will receive 65% each time your article is sold. (C-C receives 10% and their affiliates receive 25%.)
If you sell "usage'" rights, the buyer will be allowed to purchase your writing for a one-time use, which means you'll be free to sell and resell it over and over again. (If your work has appeared elsewhere in print or online, "usage" rights are the only rights Constant-Content will allow you to sell on their site, since they guarantee their customers that any work for which they sell "unique" or "full" rights has not previously appeared anywhere other than the Constant-Content website.)
"Unique" rights means that, after your article is sold, C-C will remove it from their site, because buyers who purchase unique rights want work that will appear only on their website. You will, however retain the rights to your work, and, as with 'usage' rights it will contain your byline (as long as you put your name on the article itself before submitting.)
When you sell "full" rights, which are often referred to in publishing as "all" rights, your work is likewise removed from the site, and the buyer may do whatever he or she desires with your piece--including modifying it, reselling it, and even removing your byline from it and taking credit for writing it.
Of course, depending on which rights you're planning to sell, you'll want to price your work accordingly. You'll also want to charge a reasonable amount for your articles, based on their quality, complexity, length, and nature--and possibly also on your writing and publishing experience, your expertise or credentials in your subject area, and/or your popularity as an author. Obviously, if you charge much more than the average buyer is willing to pay, you might very easily price yourself right out of the market, which will not help you to sell your work. (Of course, there's always the chance that you'll find just the right buyer who loves your writing so much that he or she will be willing to pay a higher price for it--but it may be just as likely that this individual will continue browsing the site for lower-priced content.)
Constant-Content pays authors at the beginning of each month for work sold during the previous month, and payment is made through PayPal. There is a $50 payment threshhold, however, which means that you will only be paid for work sold in the previous month(s) if, as of the date of payment, (generally the first of the month,) your balance has reached or exceeded $50.
The new site is great, and you'll find it very easy to input your work into their templates. (One nice feature of the new site is that you can go back and edit your articles after uploading right up until the time they've been posted to the site for sale. If you find any errors after that, you'll need to contact C-C's editors.)
If you haven't checked out Constant-Content now that their new site is up and running, drop by for a visit. You'll be pleased with the improvements they've made to the site! And if you've never visited Constant-Content, check them out. They're a first-rate marketplace for your work!
Good luck!
Jeanne
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Last time, I gave you four great websites where you can get your work published: Creative-Poems.com, MoonTownCafe.com, Helium.com, and AssociatedContent.com. A few helpful hints about each of these will make your experiences with them more pleasant, more productive, and less frustrating. In this post, we'll cover some of the idiosyncracies of Creative-Poems.com.
The Creative-Poems website is a wonderful site, where you can receive recognition for your work through member comments, weekly Featured Poetry Awards, and monthly Poetry Contests. They do not pay for the poems they post, though they do offer prizes in their monthly Poetry Contest.
At Creative-Poems, non-premium (free) members--as well as trial members--are allowed to place up to five posts on their site in a 24-hour period. (Premium members are allowed eight.) This is somewhat misleading, though, and requires a bit of clarification.
At first glance, it would appear that you'd be able to post up to five--or eight--poems to the site every 24 hours--and this can, indeed, be the case, provided you are very careful not to leave any typos or other errors in your poem, which might require its modification after it's been posted! The reason for this is that, should your poem require editing after posting, you will be resubmitting it after making your corrections--just as if it were a new poem--and thus you will be using another of the finite number of posts you are allowed daily. (This can be a bit frustrating.)
If you're anything like me, you could use an infinite number of posts to edit, modify, correct, and improve your poems to your satisfaction before final submission! But, alas, this is the real world, and every website is set up differently. So, always preview your work before submitting, to be sure your formatting is the way you want it and your work contains no typos. (Occasionally, you'll miss something and need to resubmit--we're all human--but at least you'll know that you aren't wasting most of your posts simply correcting errors!)
Another important point about formatting, while we're on the subject: At Creative-Poems, the default setting--for both poetry submissions and member comments--is centered. So, if you want your poem or comment to be left-margin justified (which is generally my personal preference) you'll need to select your text--if it's already been entered--and click the appropriate icon. (You can also simply click this icon before entering your text with the same effect.) Both regular and premium members may save, for later posting, up to five drafts in addition to the five--or eight--poems they may post in a 24-hour period, in case they aren't quite ready to post their work when they must leave the site.)
With a little prior knowledge of the workings of this great site and the obstacles you might encounter there, you can be well on your way to a long and fulfilling relationship with a dedicated group of site administrators and moderators who are friendly, helpful, responsive, and eager to showcase your work!
Creative-Poems.com is a fabulous forum for your work and a great community of friendly poets, who will help encourage you along the path of self-expression through that most magical of mediums: Poetry! (A very small word with a very big meaning!)*
If you are a poet and haven't yet visited this site, I would definitely--and without reservation--recommend that you check it out!
You'll be glad you did!
Till next time,
Jeanne
*I've written a short article on exactly this subject entitled "Why is Poetry So Difficult to Define?" Why not drop by AC and take a look?
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