How to Make Money From Writing Online

If you love to write, you may have thought about it as a way to make money and have fun at the same time. In this article, I will discuss a few ideas you may want to explore that could earn you some extra cash!

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• The desire to earn money from writing.

1. If you enjoy doing shorter works such as articles, there are now several sites on-line where you can earn money based on how many hits your article receives and the type of topic you write about. Ehow.com is a great site to start with when it comes to How-to articles, and I've had a wonderful experience with them. Two other sites I know are legitimate are Helium.com and Associated Content. All three pay you through PayPal.

2. If you want to set your own price on an article for other sites to buy (exclusive or non-exclusive rights), Constant Content is a good site to consider. Just realize you'll have to be patient and will likely need to produce a bulk amount of material to make regular sales.

3. If you've ever wanted to self-publish a book or e-book, the best site I've found for this is Lulu.com. The great thing about them is they're publishing-on-demand. I've never had to pay anything upfront since I've worked with them, and you only have to make $5 in sales before they send you a royalty, again through PayPal.

4. I'm fairly new in this field, but overall what I've found works is keeping your own rights to your work and giving multiple sites non-exclusive rights to sell or display your work. This way you can do the work once and try it out on different outlets. It's amazing how on one site an article will make you a small amount of money while on another it will make you a lot! It all depends on the topic of the article.

5. Hubpages is a little more complicated to set-up, but it's worth checking out. They don't pay you directly but allow you to set up affiliates including Google Adwords (pays you based on hits to the pages), Amazon's affiliate program, and eBay's affiliate program. I really like them so far.

Tips & Warnings

• Making a decent income by writing on-line takes time, but it is possible to do. Considering the price of gas and other costs involved with most jobs, this is a very viable work-at-home option if you're willing to be patient and do the work. Just realize it may take you a year or two to get it off the ground.
• Check with your tax accountant to find out what you need to keep track of if you want to transition into self-employment (I could tell you, but since I'm not a professional in that area I think it's better to consult them).
• Another fun thing I've found is that when people find out you write for websites, they'll ask you for write content for their business or organizational website. This can get you extra money as well.

Resources

• Writer's Reference Directory and Guide
• Web Writer Central--Has Updated List of Online Writing Outlets
• Index of Patricia Gilliam's Articles (Sorted by Topic)
• Patricia Gilliam's Author's Blog (For Updates/News/Latest Articles)
• Patricia Gilliam's Twitter Page

[nicklet1081]

on 1/2/2010 Excellent sites and excellent information. 5* and a rec.

[knittingscribe]

on 1/2/2010 very informative for writers, thank you for your suggestions 5*

[charlotteh]

on 10/12/2009 Great info on writing as it does takes time and it will pay off in the long run though 5*s

[raleyfamily]

on 7/6/2009 This was great, thank you!!

[ponchomeg]

on 6/4/2009 Good article! Thanks!