If you’re like me you’ve probably read how easy it is to make a great living:
(a) writing articles and selling them on-line;
(b) marketing products created by others (affiliate marketing) to
be paid a great commission; or
(c) creating your own information products (E-books, courses) to
sell on-line.
The truth is that it is easy once you know but “knowing how” is the obstacle.
No-doubt your first step was to do your due-diligence and research using Google and I’m sure that you found yourself confronted with thousands of articles that gave you various tips and thousands of books, courses and site memberships that promised you a guaranteed income of several thousand dollars a month writing articles or doing affiliate marketing.
Like you I read hundreds of these articles and purchased my fair share of the information products available but I found that nothing really helped me the same way as actually trying and failing and then trying again, doing it a different way.
Making A Living By Writing Articles
In relation to article writing I found that you actually can make a good income on-line by becoming known on global work sites such as Elance, Guru and ODesk. These sites post thousands of jobs for writers to write articles, blog posts, newsletters and webpage content. The difficulty is that you will be competing with writers from all over the world including nations such as the Phillipines and India where $2.00 an article constitutes a good rate of pay. This is not the case for writers in say the United States or Australia and to make your writing worthwhile you need to be paid at least $20.00 an article. Because the rate of pay that you want is far higher than many writers who will bid for these writing jobs you will often not be successful. In particular you will generally miss out on all the jobs where quantity of articles not quality of articles is important such as for employers requiring articles to build back-links to their sites to help their Google rankings. Do not give up though! There are many employers who want quality articles for their main websites, or to promote a high commission affiliate product and they are happy to pay for a well researched article that is delivered on time and written in a way that they can use it without amendment. Once you have developed a reputation for this type of writing you will find that there is no shortage of work.
Another option is for you to approach local businesses who do not have a web-site or have no newsletter on their website. You can remind them of:
(a) the sales that they are missing out on if they have no
website because people do not use the Yellow Pages anymore;
and
(b) the repeat business they are missing out on if they have no
Newsletter attached to their existing site to remind their
customers of them and promote new products and services to
them. It is far easier to sell to a happy, existing customer
than it is to a new customer.
You can offer to:
(a) write the web-content for them and then oversee the site
creation though Elance, Guru or Odesk. You become a one-stop-
shop; and
(b) write a monthly Newsletter for them to email to their
customers.
Where Will You Find These Local Businesses?
Once you start looking you will find hundreds of local businesses that need your help from service stations, to hairdressers, to take away food shops. You will find that a high proportion of these local businesses are far too busy to learn what needs to be done to market their business in the 21st century. They will welcome your experience with open arms as you solve their problem.
lcdcristal 