Should we expect to generate income from our online endeavors by writing focused content and converting visitors into buyers or should we count on systems that pay extra money if our content falls in a certain high ranking from in-house visitors, likes, and a sundry of other little popularity methods? To me the answer is obvious but I’m not sure it is to all writers. Oh sure, it is nice to have our fellow members of a community to come read our articles, leave us a comment, click on the like button, and maybe even link to our article. Is the method of getting inside community traffic in order to get a higher ranking even sustainable and is it the most productive way to earn money? My feeling is that it is not. Too many factors fall into the realm of “out of my control”!
I will admit that three years ago, I fell into the group of thinkers that the inside traffic was all important and I so desperately wanted to make good money. I wanted to have my articles get those high paying tier payments. I played by the rules and was ever so frustrated when I saw people cheating and gaming the system. Stressed about it a lot, I did. One day, while working with a small group of people, a neon sign come on in my head it read: “You will never be able to get ahead by playing a game that is too heavily weighted on inside traffic and activity. It is a waste of your energy.”
Now at that point I could have thrown my hands up in the air and just given up and said, “I’m done!” I did not make that choice, however. I decided to start being more productive with my time and my energy. I decided to quit playing the game, stop worrying about what others were doing and get on with the job at hand…generate a better income for myself.
I began to learn keyword research and then put what I learned into practice. What better way to get outside traffic that is looking for the very thing you are writing about than to use the words they use to search for it? My focus changed from trying to get a lot of community members reading my articles to a lot more people who didn’t know me to not only read my articles but to buy the items I suggested in my article. I stopped worrying about what would make me popular with the community and started working on what would make my articles popular in a search result. I didn’t cheat, I didn’t game any systems, and I stopped worrying. I just wrote the best content that I know how to write with a good combination of keywords. Do you know what happened? I started generating much better income, that is what happened.
How much better income, you ask? 1000% better. I went from generating such a small amount that it wouldn’t even pay my monthly water bill to making enough to treat myself to a very expensive pair of boots with one month’s income. Do I get a lot of tier money in my payouts? No, I really don’t. Most of my income is from sales. Do all of my articles generate income? No, I have some clunkers just like everyone else. The most tier money comes from the Tier 3 articles and we all know those don’t generate much. I might have a few in Tier 2 and occasionally I might have one in Tier 1. So, I have learned not to count on Tier money, it is too unpredictable. The sales income; however, just keeps growing. The best part about my decision three years ago is that I am no longer stressed about what others are doing, instead I am focused on generating a growing income each month.
About Bev Owens
I think we had that light bulb moment around the same time Bev, but for me old habits took a bit longer to be killed off. However, it was around the time that I lost my Dad at the end of 2011, that I realised I did not want to work such long hours at my computer and one of only two New Year’s resolutions for 2012 was to get more productive in less time and I set myself the atrget to increase my 2012 income over my 2011 income by 25%.
I reduced my networking, avoided more activities that were not productive, ignored lots of “stuff” and got on with building my income.
I hit my target recently, feel I am in a much better place and am happier because I am just getting on with it, without some of the less than savory distractions to hinder me.
Of course much of what we are saying actually applies to Squidoo, but it can be applied to any free publishing platform. All the time we are reliant on payouts that are calculated using someone else’s algorithms, we are vulnerable.
Your experience is what happens when someone really understands and puts forth the work necessary to succeed. I am thrilled for you!