Writing for Triond?

Triond is a site that will publish articles for freelance writers. Triond publishes your content on a network of websites rather than in one central location. The topic of your article will determine which website will publish your article.

Some freelancers choose not to devote much time to Triond. Others prefer Triond to any other site online. The only way you'll know which category fits you is to try Triond for yourself.

This article, Not Making Money on Triond? Heres Why, provides some useful tips on increasing Triond earnings. The tips for your Triond articles can also be applied to Associated Content, Helium, or any other content publishing site you write for.

Just as I have suggested with the other content publishing sites, I'd suggest that you don't invest a lot of time in Triond to begin with. Write about 10 articles and see how they do for you. Compare the results with articles you've written on other sites and go from there.

Before you publish your work on Triond, here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Triond does not offer upfront payment. Your articles will only earn performance payments. Once published on Triond, your article may not be eligible for upfront payment on some sites.
• When you publish an article on Triond, you keep rights to the article. You can delete it and publish it elsewhere if you like. However, even if the article has been deleted, you can not claim that it has not been published elsewhere.
• If you are not satisfied with the article's performance on Triond, try publishing for display only on Associated Content. I republished one of my Triond articles on Associated Content for display only. After only a week, the article had made more on Associated Content than it had made in several months on Triond.

The career of an online freelance writer involves much experimentation and exploration. If there is a site out there that will publish your work, what can it hurt to give it a try? Every writer has their own preferences and will have success with different markets. So, get out there and get your work published. Write, write, and write some more.

Start Your Own Blog

Anytime is a good time to start your first blog. As a beginning freelance writer, your first blog (and your second, and third) will be a valuable learning experience.

First, choose where to start your first blog. Blogger is a good home for your first blog because it is very user friendly for beginners.

What should your blog be about? Whatever your favorite thing to DO would be a great topic for your first blog. A hobby you enjoy, a sport you enjoy playing or watching, technical skills you have, or anything you enjoy DOING. You want it to be something you enjoy because you don't want to get bored. Pick something you could talk about all day.

Go through the process of setting up your blog. You'll have to choose your blog title and url. Your title and url should use keywords that are relevant to your topic. A blog about fishing should include the word "fishing" in the title and url.

Finally, start posting to your blog. Keep posting to your blog. If you are think of something you could post to your blog, post it.

Why is it so important to start your own blog? Your blog is your baby. You will grow your blog from infancy. You will watch your blog grow. Your blog must be nurtured and never neglected. You will learn from your blogging mistakes and your blogging accomplishments. Everything you learn from your blog will help you develop your web writing skills.

Commenting is Important

When is the last time you read something that you found informative, interesting, or humorous on the web? Did you let the author know that you enjoyed their work?

Follow the golden rule. You know, Do unto others.....

Do you enjoy receiving comments on your work? Do you like being told when someone enjoys what you have written? Why not let someone know that you have enjoyed what they have written? You may even find that they will often visit your writings and comment as well.

Write4Money: The One Year Plan for Beginning Freelance Writers

Write4Money: The One Year Plan for Beginning Freelance Writers

What to Write?

There are times when you already know what you are going to write about. Then there are those times when we sit down to write and have no idea what to write.

How can you get ideas to write when suffering from writer's block? What's in the news? Skimming the newspaper, watching CNN, or skimming through the news on the web can spark that creative fire of ideas of what to write about.

What are the celebrities doing? Who got arrested? Who had a baby? Who's dating who? Celebrities are often topics that will generate a lot of traffic to articles.

What have you already written about? Often, going back through your notes will give ideas for what to write. Several articles can often be spawned from past notes. Using research and notes to create more than one article is a good time saving technique that a lot of writers practice.

The One Year Plan for Beginning Freelance Writers

In the beginning, think of your freelance writing as a part time job (Don't quit your day job yet). You are the boss. As the boss you need a plan of action. If you are a seasoned writer who has already published your work and got paid for it, your plan will likely be different. However, if you are a beginning freelancer on the web, this plan will familiarize you with the online writing market.

The One Year Plan
First, Start off with Associated Content. You can also use Helium, but the upfront payments on Associated Content are typically higher. Write a few articles and submit them for upfront payment. You may get an offer, you may not. At this point that is not important. If you get an offer, accept it. If you don't, submit it for display only.

• DO NOT spend a lot of time researching these articles. These sites do not pay very well and you will be wasting your time. These articles that you write will simply be to familiarize yourself with the process and you can make A LITTLE money from the page views.
• Write about things you know. The easiest articles to write will be about topics you know well.
• DO NOT spend a lot of time writing these articles. Of course, you should proof read them and not submit garbage. Everything you write says something about you as a writer. The first articles you write may take a bit of time. However, you don't want to spend too much time on articles that will not pay you what your time is worth. Write short, not more than 600 words, articles on topics you already know.
• Make each article about something different. As you see which articles get pageviews and which ones don't you will be able to see which topics are most profitable.
• Write articles about seasonal topics. At least once a month, write an article about something seasonal. In December you can write an article (or articles) about Christmas. These type of articles will get large amounts of pageviews around that time each year. This is a good way to get a little boost to your passive income from Associated Content each month.

Don't spend a lot of time writing for Associated Content and Helium. Remember, this is a part time gig. Write a few articles each month but you need to leave yourself time to do some exploring and possibly writing elsewhere.

Search the web for other freelance writing jobs. There are many blogs about freelance writing. Read them. Take the time to learn about marketing yourself and your work. Start your own blog. Do everything you can to learn more about freelance writing on the web and how to be successful.

Follow the plan for a year. That's right, an entire year. After one year, you should have a good idea of what type of freelance writing you want to do and what markets will provide the best compensation for your time and efforts.

Spell Check, Word Count, and Keyword Density

The most important things all web writers must pay particular attention to are spelling, word count, and keyword density. Many times your work will be rejected if it contains too many typos or the word count does not meet the publisher's guidelines.

This Free Spell Check Tool makes it quick and simple to check your spelling before submitting your articles for publication. Of course the spell check will not catch everything and you should physically read over your writing or have someone else proofread it for you.

Textalyzer will take care of your word count and keyword density. Even if you prefer to write naturally without paying particular attention to which keywords are used, try pasting your writing into textalyzer just for fun. You might be surprised which words you frequently use to express yourself.

Simply cut and paste your writing into Textalyzer and the Spell Check tool. The tools do all of the hard work for you.

Seasonal Topics for October

Halloween, Carving pumpkins, Halloween costumes, Pumpkin recipes, Halloween Candy, Scarry Movies,

Seasonal Topics for November

Thanksgiving, turkey, recipes, Family

Seasonal Topics for December

Winter Weather, Christmas, New Years Eve, Best (whatever) of (the year), Religion,

Seasonal Topics for July

Independence Day, Hot weather safety, fireworks, patriotism

Seasonal Topics for February

Valentine's Day, romance, Winter Weather, Skiing, Black History Month, Groundhog's Day, Charles Dickens, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, US Presidents, Leap Year, Susan B Anthony,

Seasonal Topics for January

Winter Weather, Winterizing your Car, Cold weather safety, Marting Luther King, National Blood Donor Month, Football, Superbowl, Birth Defects Month, Inauguration Day, New Year's Resolutions

Seasonal Topics for April

Spring, Baseball, Soccer, Easter, Thunderstorms, Gardening, Autism Awareness, Stress Awareness, Leonardo Da Vinci, Paul Revere, Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day, Child Abuse Prevention, April Fool's Day, Arbor Day, Earth Day, IRS

Seasonal Topics for March

What are good topics to write about in March?
Spring, Easter, Baseball, Tornados, St. Patrick's Day, Passover, Women's History Month, Irish Heritage, Ireland, Barbie's Birthday, Ides of March, Passover, Good Friday, Ash Wednesday, Einstein, Johnny Appleseed, Francis Scott Key, Dr. Seuss

Seasonal Topics

To make passive income from your writings, the articles need endure the test of time. One strategy that is effective to gain passive income is to spend your first year writing seasonal topics.
This is not to suggest that you write nothing but seasonal topics. Writing seasonal articles should be only one piece of the puzzle you are putting together.
Seasonal topics are topics that will be popular at certain times of the year. These topics may not get pageviews throughout the year, but they will be popular at a certain time every year.
Seasonal topics can be about different holidays, sports, and seasons. Some examples of seasonal topics could be Halloween costumes, Christmas ornaments, and Mother's Day Gifts.
If you spend a year consistently writing on the topics that are popular at that time, by the end of your first year you will have 12 months of popular articles.

Ready for a Break?

Are ya ready for a break from searching for writing jobs, social networking, and sorting through the pollution on the web to find something you actually want to read? Check out Talker 96's Blog. Here you will see what a blog should be. Informative, entertaining, and appealing.
Warning: You might not want to visit Talker 96's Blog if you are easily offended.
Otherwise, enjoy!

Do You Twitter?

I recently registered with Twitter. I'd heard it mentioned many times on different blogs. However, I really had no idea what it was or how it worked. Just that it was some sort of social networking tool.

After looking around a bit, gaining some followers, and getting followed, I have found that it is likely one of the most useful and practical resources for receiving and disseminating information. So, How can Twitter benefit your freelance writing career?

I could answer this for you, but I'll direct you to the article that really explained it to me. Check out How To Use Twitter, The Smart Way.

Assessing Differences Between Helium and Associated Content

Assessing the Differences Between Helium and Associated Content
Helium and Associated Content both offer writers the opportunity to make money from articles submitted to the sites. Although the sites are very similar, they have differences that set them apart.
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/1590071/assessing_the_differences_between_helium.html

$200 for Real Estate Articles

Helium currently has 48 titles available for $200 each. The titles are related to real estate and are to be written about different states and regions. So, if you know a bit about real estate or are willing to do a little research, this could be a great opportunity for you.

It is important to note that in the Helium Marketplace, several writers will write to the same topic. The article that the publisher picks will receive the prize. With theses particular titles, the publisher is also offering $5 for the top 50 articles in each title.

If you would like to see the available titles and get more details, visit the Helium Marketplace and check it out. The deadline is March 30th. Keep in mind that the Helium Marketplace uses GMT time.

Create a Lens at Squidoo

Your lens at Squidoo will be the easiest web page you ever make. You can make a lens (webpage) about anything you want to. You can make as many lenses as you wish. It only takes a few minutes to register. After you register you can start building your first lens. You can build your first lens in a matter of minutes. No Joking! When I say minutes, I mean less than five minutes.

After you build your lens you can continue to edit and improve your lens. Squidoo has plenty of fun stuff you can add to your lens.

After you have created your first lens, you can create your second. You can create as many pages as you have ideas for. What will your first lens be about? I just created this lens, what do you think?

What is Copyscape?

As you browse for freelance writing gigs, you will frequently come across the term Copyscape. Many clients will require that your writing "passes copyscape". So, What exactly is Copyscape?

Copyscape is software that is used to check the originality of your content. The client who purchases your writing wants to make sure that it is not plagiarised. They want to make sure that you haven't just altered content from elsewhere on the web and tried to pass it as your own.

What does this mean to you? Don't steal someone else's work and you should be ok. As long as the content you produce is your own, you should have no problem passing Copyscape.

Finding Clients for Your Freelance Writing

Finding clients for your freelance writing may be easier than you think! There are many job posting boards on the Internet where you can search for freelance writing jobs. Many of these sites require that you bid on jobs and some clients want to interview you before they hire you.

Some job posting sites are listed in my sidebar. Getafreelancer.com is a decent site for beginning freelancers if you can show some examples of your work. Articles you write for Associated Content, Helium articles, and your blog can serve as samples of your writing. You can sometimes send samples of your writing to the potential client.

When you use job posting sites to find freelance writing work, don't sell yourself short. Don't accept jobs that pay less than you'd make publishing your content elsewhere. You can usually make at least $3 off an article on Associated Content and also earn performance pay. So, why would you produce an article for someone for only $1? If you don't think the money is worth the work, don't accept the job.

You'll also want to keep in mind that these sites usually charge a set fee or a percentage of what you earn. Be sure to bid an ammount that takes this into consideration.

Start Creating Multiple Streams of Income

I say start, because this can be a long tedious process. You have to start somewhere and some time. Now is as good of a time as any.

Chances are that you already have some form of income. How do you start creating multiple streams of income?

1. Associated Content and Helium are good places to start. The articles you write on these sites will continue to earn performance payments. So, not only will you earn when you write, but you will also be creating passive income.
2. Start writing a blog. Starting early will give you time to slowly build up your blog or blogs. If you later decide to monetize your blog you will already have content rich blogs and the process will be easier and more profitable.
3. Social Networking. Joining social networking sites, such as myspace, twitter, and mylot will put you in contact with others who are trying to make some money through freelancing. Find out what they are doing to make money. The friends you meet will also likely be some of your traffic to your articles and blogs.
4. Find other freelance gigs. Once you have some friends, some passive income, and an idea of what kind of writing you want to do it is time to find some other writing gigs. You can find many links to freelance boards in my side bar. You can also explore other areas such as magazines and newspapers.

Start A Blog

Have you started your own blog yet? If not, why not? There are many free blog sites out there that will host your blog without you ever paying a dime. Check out some of the free blog hosts in my sidebar. Heck, why not try them all?

I like blogger but many writers swear by wordpress. They're all free so take your pick.

Blogging gives us the opportunity to write about anything we want to write without conforming to any writing standards. There is no word count minimum and dissatisfied customers (except maybe your readers). You won't have to go back and revise anything unless you want to.

You can use your blog to try out topics and experiment with different writing styles and techniques. Play with your layout, make friends, and gain readers. You can even write articles for your blog and then publish them on ad revenue sharing sites and make money off the page views. What do you have to lose?

Passive Income

Who wouldn't like to just sit back and let the money roll in? Problem is, nothing in life is free. If you want to make some passive income from your freelance writing, the first thing you have to do is write.

The trick is to write and write regularly. Successful freelance writers are disciplined and committed. Whether writing for clients, blogs, or article submission sites, writing regularly is the key to success. When and how does the passive income come in?

Passive income will start rolling in after you take the time to build up your blog, submit a lot of articles, and/or fill your website with a lot of fresh content. Passive income is the payout for your commitment and perseverance as a freelance writer.

Free Keyword Tool

Keywords are an important part of SEO. You not only need the right keyword density but you also need the right keywords. There are many services that you can pay for to assist you in finding popular keywords, but why pay for what you can get for free?

Wordtracker offers a free keyword suggestion tool that allows you to type in a word and get many keyword suggestions in return. Along with keyword suggestions, you will get an estimate of how often those words will be searched for within a 24 hour period.

You can use these keyword suggestions to choose the keywords for your writing. Knowing which keywords are most popular for your topic will also assist you in choosing titles for your content.

Your First Article for Associated Content

The first articles a writer writes for Associated Content have the potential to make or break the writing spirit of a new freelancer. There are many writers on Associated Content who have produced just a few articles and stopped writing. Some writers have written only one article and stopped writing. It could be that they never really intended to keep writing in the first place or maybe their first articles did not do well and the writers were quickly discouraged. Either way, the first articles you write on Associated Content will greatly influence your feelings about the site.

So, what should your first article be about? Read More...

What Does SEO Stand For?

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization. Basically, SEO is the use of certain techniques that writers use to get their sites viewed first in search engine queries. Higher ranking with the search engines drives in more traffic. So, as a beginning freelancer, what should SEO mean to you?

SEO can be quite complex for many webmasters, as the algorithms used by search engines change frequently. However, for the beginning freelancer SEO can be as simple as using the right keywords frequently. If you are starting out submitting articles to ad revenue sharing sites, most of the more complex SEO work has been done for you.

Ad revenue sites such as Helium and Associated Content already have a decent page ranking with search engines. This allows beginning freelancers to develop their SEO skills in the content they write without worrying about SEO techniques for the entire site.

What do you need to know about SEO when writing articles? Read more...

Pros and Cons of Helium Writing Contests

Helium has writing contests for different topics each week. Each topic has several titles for freelancers to write to. The top 3 writers with the most points for a particular topic at the end of the contest win cash prizes. The writing contests on Helium are a great way to make some extra money (if you win). However, there are some pros and cons that should be considered before you decide to participate in Helium's writing contests. Read more...

Associated Content Updates Page Views Daily

One of the bad things about Associated Content has been that they did not update the page views on a daily basis. Typically, they would update your page views and earnings about twice a week. The days that your page views would be updated would vary.

If you wanted to know how your articles were performing, you would have to just keep checking your profile and it would eventually be updated and even then the updates were already a couple of days old.

This is no longer the case. Associated Content announced today that they will now be updating page view information on a daily basis. This will give content producers more useful information when tracking the performance and trends of their articles on Associated Content.

Associated Content has listened to its members and honored the wishes of many with this new practice of updating the page views of articles every day. Maybe Helium will follow suit and start showing the page views with their articles rather than just showing the money earned off each article?

Starting Your Freelance Writing Portfolio

Freelance writers who are seeking work need a portfolio. It can be difficult to build a portfolio as a beginning freelance writer since many clients do not want to hire a freelance writer without seeing several examples of their work.

Freelance writers without a portfolio may think it is necessary to accept jobs that pay very little just to get some experience and build a portfolio. Some writers will write for as little as 50 cents per article. If you have any doubt about this, you can visit one of the many sites where writers bid on freelance jobs such as Get A Freelancer.

The problem with these bid sites for a beginning freelancer is not only that they pay inexperienced writers very little, but you will usually lose all rights to your work. Once the rights are sold, it can't be used to build your portfolio.

How can a new freelancer build their portfolio and get higher paying writing gigs? Read more...

Adsense Tips for Your Blog

I just stumbled acrossed a site that gives tips on using adsense on your blogs. I really enjoyed the site and thought it provided some good information for anyone who is new at blogging and has considered or is already using adsense.

How to be Successful Using Google Adsense provides some really good information for someone who does not understand how Google Adsense works. For the beginning blogger, this is a must read. Even if you do not plan on making money from your blog, the information that makes adsense successful will also prove useful in increasing traffic to your blog.

Writing Web Content: Choosing a Title

Writing for the web can be a bit different than the writing your are used to. When people search the web there is a plethora of information to sort through. Articles on the web are usually scanned by readers for information they feel is interesting or useful. If they do not find anything they want to read quickly, they will simply move onto the next article.

Think about the last time you did a Google search. Did you start from the top and click on each link? Did you read each and every page and article from the pages that you did click on? Likely, you scanned through the titles and descriptions looking for the ones that you felt matched what you were looking for. If the title didn't grab your attention it didn't get a second glance.

Without even thinking about it, you were able to quickly eliminate several of the pages that came up, solely based on the title. The title tells us everything. Amazingly, even though we quickly sort through the results of our queries based on the title, we often don't realize how important it is that the title is straight-forward and describes the information in our content.

Everything is in the title. When deciding on the title for your articles, pick a title that clearly states what your article is about. When you are choosing a title for your articles, ask yourself if you would click on that title if it came up in a search query or would you skip over it?

Starting a Blog

The time comes in any freelancer's career when they consider starting a blog. Many people have blogs on the net. The topics of blogs vary greatly. Some are used for making money through programs like adsense. Some are used to promote a company or product. Some blogs are used more as a personal diary.

Whatever your reason for wanting to start a blog, there are many resources available. If you are new to blogging, I suggest using a free blog service. I always suggest starting off your new ventures with free resources before taking the leap by paying for anything. This removes any feeling of regret in the long run.

There are many free resources for someone who wants to begin writing a blog. Blogger is one of my favorites. Wordpress is another free site for bloggers that gives you the opportunity to blog for free before you decide to pay a server. Blogger is also one of the easiest sites to monetize your blog if you so chose in the future.

If you wish to start a blog http://rohitbhargava.typepad.com/weblog/2008/10/how-to-launch-a.html provides good guidelines that you can follow for the first 90 days of your blog's life.

Starting a free blog is a way to get an idea of the time it will take to keep up with a blog. You will have the opportunity to hone your writing skills and learn how to gain readers and followers.

Make Money for Free

One mistake that many people make when starting their freelance career is taking money out of their own pocket to get started. There are many legitimate freelance sites that charge, but why pay for what you can get for free. This is especially true for the beginning freelancer.

Everyone knows the saying. "You have to have money to make money." While you can pay to make money, you don't have to. The better alternative for a beginning freelancer is to start off writing for free content sites that share revenues. They don't charge you for submissions because they will make money off of your work.

So, how can these sites publish your work for free? When you publish articles with these sites, they will place ads along with your content. There are many companies out there with products they wish to sell. They will place ads through programs like adsense. Every time someone reads your article, they are a potential customer for the companies who have ads placed along with your content. When the readers of your articles click on these ads, the site makes money. Then the site shares their profits with you.

Some sites call this revenue sharing, some call it royalties, some call it performance payments. It all boils down to the same thing. They make money off ads placed with your content. Then they share this money with you. Without you and other content producers, they would not have a way to place ads. So, basically, everybody wins. You provide the content they need and they pay you part of what your content earns through the ads.

Eventually, you will probably realize that you can cut out the middle man. You can write content for yourself and start your own web page. Then you can use programs like adsense or find your own affiliates and not share your earnings.

Free content sites give you the opportunity to see what works for you. What do you enjoy writing about? What can you write about continuously? What articles earn the most money? Through experimentation, all of these things can be learned by starting off with these free content sites.

I would suggest starting off with free sites like Associated Content and Helium. Both of these sites not only share revenues but they offer upfront payments for your work. You will never have to pay anyone to produce content on these sites.

Once you start making money through sites like these, then you can begin looking into starting your own websites or blogs and you can actually finance your venture with money you have already made with your freelance writing.

Of course, nothing in life is completely free. You will have to put some time and efforts into your work. But if you're looking for ways to make money without spending money, they are out there. You just have to be willing to invest your time.

SEO Tool for Beginning Freelancers

Content writing is a good way for beginning freelancers to start their career. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the key to being a successful content writer.

Content for the Internet must be easily found and indexed by search engines. This means that content must be rich in the appropriate key words. It can take some time to master the art of placing key words into articles and keep it flowing naturally. It can also take a lot of time to figure out if your content has an appropriate amount of key words. This is where SEO tools, such as Textalyzer, can be very useful.

How frequently words are used in your content will tell a search engine what the article is about. You might be surprised how the over use of certain words can lead a search engine to categorize the article much differently than intended by the author. SEO will help to have the article read by the audience you are hoping to target.

Textalyzer is a text analysis tool that can be invaluable to a SEO content writer. It is simple to use and provides much information about the article. You can either cut and paste the content into the box on the Textalyzer webpage, or insert the address of the webpage and have the entire page analyzed by Textalyzer.

Textalyzer will tell how frequently words are used in the text. This will allow you to edit the article and ensure that it is rich in the key words that you want in the article. It will also check the spelling of the analyzed text.

SEO can be a much simpler process with the use of text analyzing tools such as Textalyzer. You may find yourself wondering how you ever wrote anything without it.

Writing for Triond

Triond is another good content site for beginning freelancers to publish articles and receive royalties. The articles you submit to Triond, if approved, will be published on an appropriate site depending on the topic of your article. Triond takes care of the publishing of your submitted articles. Then you receive 50% of the royalties from your articles.

Triond offers low payout to members using paypal. You can offer receive payment through western union or you can choose to receive a paper check via snail mail. Though payout for these options is significantly higher.

How fast you reach payout will depend on how many articles you publish with Triond and how popular they are. Triond does not offer upfront payments but it is a good way to gain exposure. All of the articles you publish through Triond will have your byline.

Triond also offers new freelancers a friendly and helpful community to assist you on your way through your freelance career.

Why Write for Associated Content?

Associated Content is a freelance writing site that pays its members based on how their articles perform. The more page views an article gets the more money the article will make. There are other sites that are similar to Associated Content. So, why write for Associated Content?

Straight-forward Payment Policy

Associated Content pays $1.50 per 1000 page views for beginning authors. This may not sound like much, but through time it will likely prove more profitable than many freelance sites that are available for beginners. There are sites where freelancers can bid on writing jobs. It is not uncommon for these jobs to pay a mere 50 cents per article.

On Associated Content is is easy to see which articles perform well. Each article has it's page views listed along with its earnings. You will be able to see the lifetime earnings of the article and the earnings since your last payout. This also allows you to see when an article performs well. Some articles are seasonal. They may get more page views at certain times of the year.

Low Payout

One of the benefits of Associated Content is that the payout is very low. You only need to earn $1.50 to receive payout. Upfront payments are also paid out quickly. Once an offer for upfront payment is accepted, the money will be deposited into your paypal account within a few days. Other sites add upfront payment to your balance and require that you wait until your total balance reaches a preset amount before you receive any payment.

Creative Freedom

On Associated Content you can write about anything that you please. This is a great way for beginning freelance writers, and even those that have been writing for a while, to hone their writing skills. Some writing jobs may require that you write about topics that you don't know much about. It is easier to remain productive and enthusiastic about your freelance career if you have a place to write about what you know.

With Associated Content's straight-forward payment policy, low payouts, and freedom to write about whatever you choose, it is easy to see why many beginning freelancers have chosen to write for Associated Content. It is also easy to see why so many content producers on Associated Content have found success with their freelance careers.

Upfront Payment: Helium vs. Associated Content

Helium and Associated Content are both sites that new freelancers can publish their articles. Each site pays their members based on the performance of their articles. They also both offer authors upfront payments for their articles, though each site's version of upfront payments don't have much in common. Read more...

Freelance Sites for Beginners

With so many sites on the Internet for freelance writers, it can be difficult to decide which sites are the best ones for a beginning freelancer. Helium and Associated Content are two great sites for beginning freelancers because they allow you to publish articles on any topic that you choose, they pay you for your efforts, and they are free to join.

Many sites on the net provide an opportunity for freelancers to view jobs that have been posted by people in need of a freelance writer. These sites can be a good opportunity, but if the site charges for membership, it may not be the best place to start. If you begin your freelance career by paying money to these sites, you may find yourself quickly discouraged. There is no reason to pay when there are so many free opportunities available to freelancers.

Helium and Associated Content are both free to join and are ideal for the beginning freelancer. Both sites allow you to write about any topic you desire are ideal for the beginning freelancer. You can write about any topic you choose. It is often easier to begin writing about what you know well. This will allow you to develop your writing skills.

Helium and Associated Content will pay you for your work depending on how often your article is viewed and even offer upfront payment for your articles. Receiving upfront payment for your efforts may encourage you to keep writing. Seeing how much you make from page views will allow you to see which articles are profitable and which topics bring in the most page views.

Associated Content is a great place for a beginning freelancer to test the waters. Associated content offers upfront payment for articles (between $3 and $20) and also performance payments (based on how many times your article is viewed). Jump right in and start writing. Some say that you should pick one topic that you know well and stick with it. I like to take a different approach. Write about anything and everything you can think of. Don't just stick to one topic. Try writing about any topic that you know about. This will let you to experiment with different topics and see which topics perform well for you. You may be surprised at which articles do well and which ones don't. As you experiment with different topics, you will be able to see what type of articles are popular.

Helium is another good site for beginning freelancers. Helium offers upfront payment, performance payments, and also has a marketplace. In the Helium marketplace, you can find writing jobs that offer more significant payment. Some articles will pay $8 and some will go up to $60 or more. Helium is a great place to start if you have difficulty coming up with writing ideas. In Helium the topics are picked for you. Many members of Helium write articles about the same topics and the articles compete against each other.

Associated Content and Helium are great places to get started writing for the beginning freelancer. It will give you the opportunity to write, write, and write some more. Once you get comfortable writing with these sites, you will find it easier to explore the other opportunities for freelancers on the net.

Mylot

Mylot is a site that pays for its members to start discussions and respond to discussions. You can start a discussion for just about anything and other members have the opportunity to participate in your discussion.

The site doesn't pay much and I wouldn't recommend it as a regular source of income. It is a great place to take a break from your work and to meet others with similar interests.

Minimum payout on the site is $10.00. Depending on how much time you spend on the site, it may take quite some time to reach minimum payout. There are some people who spend quite a bit of time on mylot and are able to make payout each month. If you are merely on the site to make money, you will likely be disappointed and quickly feel that it is not worth your time. You would get much more compensation for your time elsewhere.

Sites like http://www.helium.com/ and http://www.associatedcontent.com/ will probably offer the best payout for your time investment for a beginning Internet writer. http://www.mylot.com/ would better serve as a site to start discussions on a topic and get some feedback before you write an article for another site.

Mylot is a great place to meet people, practice your writing, get a feel for a topic before you begin writing, and a place to just relax with a supportive group of friends.