In today's economic climate, many people are looking for ways to supplement their income, and one of the most appealing methods for earning money is through the use of free online writing sites.
These types of sites are commonly referred to as "Web 2.0" sites, because they specialize in offering what's known as "user-generated content", which means that they provide a platform for people to publish their own articles.
The advantage of these types of sites is that they usually rank well in the search engines, providing contributors with a wide range of exposure for their work, as well as income-earning potential based on the amount of traffic and advertising revenue that each article receives.
The two most popular and established free online writing sites are HubPages and Wizzley. These sites have become veritable giants in the online world, with each of them offering hundreds of thousands of pages covering an extensive variety of topics.
Both of these sites allow writers to earn money off the content they create by way of various revenue-sharing programs including Google AdSense, eBay Partner Network and the Amazon Associates Program.
The finer details will vary based on which site you choose, but the basic premise is that contributors earn a certain percentage of the advertising revenue generated by each page of content they create. This advertising revenue is largely based on the amount of page impressions that a given article receives, so if an author can develop the skill of driving targeted traffic to their articles, they can earn a substantial income through using any one of these four platforms.
So which site is the best one to use? Each one of them have their merits and strong points, and many people choose to utilize all three platforms to maximize their earning potential. Let's take a look at the two sites in a little more detail.
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Which Is Your Favorite Free Online Writing Site?
I am not sure I have a favorite any more... I have published articles on two other sites that closed down, so am reluctant to get emotionally 'attached' to yet another one. In spite of that, I am beginning to develop more optimism about Wizzley with each new article published. I sure do like the quality control here!
I have been with Hub Pages for 3 years, and deleting hubs. Right now, I get a lot more traffic at Wizzley than I do at Hub pages. The only thing I like better at HP is the HP ads earnings program. We earn from HP and separately from Adsense. Wizzley does not have this program. The revenue sharing is from sales only. I will lose some income, but I am seeing HP getting worse instead of getting better. I wlll give Wizzley a chance for awhile, it can't be any worse than at HP right now. I also like the fact that Wizzley provides keyword information, module information when it comes to clicks on products, and which article is getting them. HP does not do this.
I really believe in Wizzley, so I'll stay here for now. I did find interesting things on Squidoo through Google searches, so I appreciate the work there as well. Hope more of those writers continue to come to Wizzley ;-).
I also like blogging, and it works well to promote stuff from Wizzley and Zazzle.
I was writing on Squidoo pretty much exclusively for years but I now feel that diversification is important and now I am building on Wizzley and Hubpages too.
@cazort I think that's a very reasonable summary of the challenges that Squidoo is currently facing and their users are experiencing. For me I will continue to maintain published material there and look forward to working more and more on other sites.
I personally have a much more positive feeling towards Squidoo than towards HubPages. I tried out both sites, starting with HubPages...that was a long time ago, but my experience with HubPages was very poor. I found Squidoo to have a more positive, encouraging community, and I found the pages there to get more traffic on their own without the need for constant boosts from me (like sharing and resharing on social media).
My experience though is that Squidoo is in a rough period and I don't trust that it's going to stay a usable site. Yes, I still get traffic and earn money there, but I've had to put considerable effort in just to keep my pages getting a similar amount of traffic as 6 months ago...and Alexa shows the traffic for the site as a whole steeply declining.
I've also run up against agonizing automated spam filters, which catch things like keyword density but without telling you what's catching them, so you need to fidget with editing and re-editing until it goes through the filter. All my works are 100% my own original writing so it's frustrating. Yet then I have seen overt, egregious spam pages left up for months on end--after me reporting them multiple times. We're talking, spammy "make money online" things packed with affiliate and referral links to scammy programs. This, and the complete failure of the site admins to ever respond to even ONE of my emails reporting these lenses or expressing frustration that my lenses are being caught in the filters but these aren't being taken down, has made me stop publishing there.
I think Wizzley is a much better site. It may be smaller and I've found the traffic here can be a bit unstable, but I think that in the end, better sites will win out. I have seen Squidoo in a rough, unstable decline for the past 6 months. The team there seems overworked and unable to keep up on their spam problem. They seem to be trying hard but I just don't seem them able to handle the problems they're currently facing.
@Tolovaj Thanks for taking the time to comment. Just picking up on your specific comments:
1. What I actually said was "but some experts argue that subdomains give you more authority in the search engines than subdirectories." That authority (as opposed to authorship) is not an instant thing but as your subdomain gains credence over a period of time it can gain authority as an independent entity. A collection of subdirectories will never gain that level of authority.
2. Yes Squidoo does allow one to insert one's own affiliate links and retain all the earnings using such things as SquidTools or even simple text links. I suspect that will be shortlived given the changes occuring there.
@selecteddee Absolutely - for me doing nothing is never an option
I am still on Squidoo, it is still my number one, but with all the changes going on I don't rush making new lenses.
I have to add two things:
1.You mentioned subdomains on Hubpages. Subdomain can help your authorship, not authority. Authority is something to be earned and new subdomain don't have any authority. siteDOTcom has it based on age, backlinks etc., subdomainDOTsiteDOTcom can't have it from the beginning (no age, no backlinks etc.) I hope I presented that case clear. Technically every subdomain is new site and SE don't like new sites until they have a reason to trust them (with great content for instance).
2. You and JoHarrington discussed the earnings through Amazon on Squidoo. At the moment affiliate links are still allowed there, so somebody who is able to sell a lot of items can easily get more than 4 percent commission and keep 100 percent of that, what is better than half of 8 percent coming through the Amazon module. So you can choose: 4 percent what is more than beginners get or more.
I hope I helped a bit to clarify these two issues. Anyway - I have seen too many people relying only on one source of income which was never in their control, so splitting is always best solution.
While I have been considering Hubpages, and did in fact sign up there quite some time ago, I am discouraged by recent happenings at Squidoo and am therefore reluctant to go through the same thing on another site. Of course, if I do nothing, then although I won't have to go through any more roller coaster rides, I also won't be able to expand.