I've been working as an online writer for a year and a half, and I've had over a hundred articles published online. In that time, I've started to notice a dramatic shift in my thinking about my work as a freelance writer. In my early days writing online, I was just so happy to have an article published that I jumped for joy when a few pennies went into my account as payment for my efforts.
But as I swing into year number two as an online writer, I find myself bristling at the idea of writing for pennies, and feeling sometimes like I practically give away my work by publishing on some websites that pay next to nothing for my articles. At first I was alarmed by this recent shift in my thinking. After all, as a creative writer, shouldn't artistic expression and having a place to publish my work and get my stories in front of the public be my main objective for writing articles? Is it wrong to also want to be paid a fair income for my ideas and all the time and effort I've put into my stories?
Recently, I was reading a book about how to break into magazine writing, and it urged writers not to give away their work or settle for low wages. The whole tone of the book encouraged writers to pursue financial as well as creative success as a freelance writer for magazines and websites. Reading this book and others like it that talk about writing as an art and a business, I realized that I'm not off base to want to make a decent living while being creatively fulfilled as a full time freelance writer.
One thing I've noticed about writing for sites that pay revenues for page views on articles and photos: the author's share of money for page views is usually quite low. That fact has started to bother me more and more as I've continued my work as an online writer. Unless a writer generates huge traffic to their work through social bookmarking and other means of article promotion, or publishes a lot of content, or can manage to produce popular content that hooks a ton of readers, earnings can be dismally small.
Revenues at sites like this can be so inadequate that writers are often frustrated and they consider abandoning their writing dreams. I see this time and time again, as fellow writers leave comments on my articles about writing. I receive emails saying they've done everything they can to raise their writing revenues, and they're very disheartened and thinking about giving up on trying to achieve their heart's desire of becoming a freelance writer.
I always encourage people to keep going, keep writing, even if revenues are small, as my thinking is that it takes a long time to build an income as an online writer, and success writing online is not just achieved in dollars and cents. Although my revenues at certain sites I write for has dipped a bit lately, I still feel like a success as an online writer. I strive to write quality articles, my articles are of interest to my readers, and I always try to do my best with each story. My name has popped up as one of the most popular writers on Writinghood.com and Telewatcher.com, and I've hit the Hot Content list on Triond. On top of all that, I'm part of a warm, wonderful community on Triond and have made many friends on the site.
It makes me feel successful when other writers tell me my articles about how to write content and find freelance writing jobs have been helpful for them. I always feel that one of the goals of a creative artist in any medium is to uplift, entertain, inform and inspire other people, and other artists. So if I have achieved that, if my work has in any way been inspirational, entertaining, or has added value to the world, I feel like I've been successful as a writer.
Writing as an Art and a Business
I feel successful in my work writing online, but I still have this nagging feeling lately that my share of revenues earned from sites that pay for page views is too low, and if I focus my time on them exclusively, I'll never achieve my goal of becoming a self supporting freelance writer. This was really a hard, sad realization for me, because I love the work I do on these sites, and I enjoy spending time at these writing communities.
For writers who have full time day jobs that support them and are publishing articles online without much thought to their earnings as an online writer, discussions of low pay for articles published online might seem vulgar or offensive, implying that commercialism is more important than artistic expression. I notice that writers who are content in their full time professions and just seek a place to publish their writing are sometimes not that concerned about the often discouraging rates of pay for online writers.
