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Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Goldfinch posted:

That's sad to hear - I did pretty well in 2015 at WD and enjoyed the work a decent amount. It did seem like a bad sign when they started putting those weird rules in place about refreshing and whatnot. Maybe like they were a bit desperate to do something since the amount of work was drying up? I haven't done any work for them in 2016; got a non-self-employment part-time job.

I can make it work and still write 100 there per month even with full time employment. Now that I got the format down it's stupid easy.

I am convinced that the refreshing rules were total BS from the sound of what other writers have said they have done without getting a warning.

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Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Fluffdaddy posted:

I am not saying it is fraud in the legal sense, but it sounds shady as poo poo, and I bet their terms and conditions can lead to some really hosed up credit issues down the road when they take their money back once they realize the situation. But I am no expert.

I make my living full time writing from the house, but if I had a "real job", I could probably still clear more than 200 a week from articles. And it would be a lot less icky than signing up for checking accounts all over the city for a few one time payouts.

https://www.reddit.com/r/churning/wiki/index

Eh... read up on it there. I know it is mainly credit cards, but it's the same thing.

I wouldn't risk a hit to my credit score for some potentially free money.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
I wish I could somehow outsource my real job.

Know what we do with all those transcriptions? A producer just took 20 hours worth of interview transcripts in Word, highlighted elements they like, and now want all those highlighted parts pulled out of the audio files for editorial. I'd honestly rather pay someone to do this for me right now because I am bored out of my mind.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

EL BROMANCE posted:

Does anyone use usertesting.com? I'm sure I found that in a blog post rather than this thread, seems like it's fairly good rates for what should be easy work if you like critiquing others' work. Will be signing up this weekend and giving it a try anyway.

I remember signing up for it and never getting into a user test so I dumped it

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Writers Domain just dropped their prices per article.

Standards:

3 Stars - $12.25
4 Stars - $14.75
5 Stars - $15.50

Remember that we were once getting $20 per article 2 years ago.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Nighthand posted:

I'm surprised they're still going. Last I had heard they kept claiming to be dropping hundreds of article assignments but no one ever saw any.

You need to really know the drop schedule to get work there (specific days of the month and times of the day), and the writers that know keep it closely guarded because making it public takes money out of their pocket.

WD is my primary gig though. I can't think of many other places that I can make $30/hr and work when I want whenever I want. It's like a 15% pay cut for me.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Pikestaff posted:

I never could figure out the weird WD standards. Probably because after writing fifty topics about dental implants I just plain ran out of stuff to write that hasn't been written before.

Doesn't really matter... check out the blogs that your articles are posted at and it's the same poo poo over and over again.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Paramemetic posted:

Those textbroker changes might get me to write again for them. I was a 4, ended up dropping to a 3 over a editor who didn't like a turn of phrase I used plus two YouTube comments being rated no higher than the request level, and never managed to climb back up because being level 3 basically blocks you out of everything but SEO garbage.

Maybe I'll write some poo poo for them again. Made some decent money writing how to shop team poo poo for them so maybe I can get back to writing real poo poo and escape the rank 3 hell.

Edit: lmao the only rank 3 article available wants 1200 words about a 400 word article (only use this source!!) for $12 and wants it done within 6 hours of accepting

And I thought Writers Domain was bad with the pay decrease.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Writers Domain is a complete joke now. 6 articles got posted this evening. It's no longer a battle of getting something you want, but anything in general.

Any tips to transitioning to another mill type site or something with a similar 'work when you can' demand schedule? I have a full time job doing something else, so I don't really have time to do something with a dedicated private client.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Iv'e heard good things about Writers Access. Is the OP still accurate?

quote:

Writer Access – An excellent site to work for, and it works just about the same way as Textbroker. There are a few differences that make WA better than TB. First off, if you're tenacious, you can change your rating more easily than on TB, largely through active communication with clients. If you're accepted in at 3 stars, you can pull yourself up to 4 after a couple of articles. It works the same way as TB with the open pool you can claim assignments from, with one major difference: you can only claim one from a given client at first. Once they accept it, you can freely write for that client, but until they do, you're stuck waiting. Once you've gotten initial articles in for a range of common clients (and applied to plenty of casting calls and gotten on some love lists) you'll have a stream of possible assignments to choose from.

Note that the platform is increasingly pushing to have clients post casting calls and not dump orders to the open pool. This makes it hard to get work if you’re not an established writer. On the flip side, new writers are given an hour (ish, unconfirmed) where they see new casting calls before older writers, letting them get applications in first. It’s a mess. If you can get work, WA pay is fantastic for content mills. If you can’t, it’s an exercise in frustration.

The application process is a little long (take your time writing blurbs and fill out as much as you can) and you should be in within a month. Definitely make sure you know the AP stylebook and take your time with the writer's test, since even though you can reach 4 stars with a little work, it takes a while to find that work.

I've heard the pay on Text Broker is so low that it is not even worth my time TBH. I am not doing this as my full time job, so it's not a matter of filling up my 9-5 work day with anything

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

kazmeyer posted:

Unfortunately, writing's gone into the toilet. Google's gotten too good at identifying garbage-tier articles, so content mills are either paying super substandard wages or requiring actual credentials.

My average hourly on WD with the rate adjustment is still $28/hr. I think that's still good considering I don't treat it as a full time job. Before the rate adjustment it was $33/hr.

I don't need a gig that can sustain that 40 hours a week, just enough for 1-2 hours a day as supplimental income. Somrthinthat lets me work when I can rather than having X hours of work with a midweek deadline that I can't guarantee I can do.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Nighthand posted:

Of all the places to do writing, Writer Access is probably the best mill framework. The only big change they've made recently is that they've been transitioning to a more automated system to handle some of their back end stuff, like some kind of internal points system that helps the admins determine when someone qualifies for a star rating change up or down.

Thanks for the insight! I'll look into this

Rupert Buttermilk posted:

Don't forget: https://www.fiverr.com/categories/writing-translation/articles-blogposts/#layout=auto&page=1

I know it all starts at $5, but drat... you can do/get ANYTHING on there.

I know people that do Fiverr, but use it as like a loss leader to get better clients. Charge an upgrade for more words, things like that. I still don't like the idea of having an order come in midweek that I have to do, I like being in control of when I take the work. My day job comes first, and then online writing when I have the time.

It's why WD has worked out so perfectly for the past few years. I could accept an article in the AM, and if I couldn't get to it before it expired no big deal because it didn't affect my status. Same thing for grabbing an evening article when they got posted at like 7/8pm.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Ugh, how do you people translate this stuff for a living?

I have a 45 long phone interview I am doing transcriptions for as part of my normal job, because they want to save money and not have it done professionally. It's non verbatim, just the interviewee responses for a writer to reference.

How much would this cost to have done? Taking me like 2 hours, boring me to death... I'd rather pay somebody to do it and spend that same amount of time making like $60 doing SEO writing instead.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Jedi Knight Luigi posted:

Not to undercut my own company, but Rev would've done it for a dollar a minute.

Ugh... Yeah, I should have just outsoruced my own job. Good to know for the future.

Astro7x fucked around with this message at 21:52 on Aug 31, 2016

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Writers Domain screwing over its workers yet again.

-Started a new type of article format this month, invite only. Pays $27-$30 per article instead of the standard $12.50-$15.50 for the same 400 words.
-Launched a new redesigned website today. You can no longer pick the keyword you want, just the category it is in. So say you pick dentist, well you could get something about dentures, or you could get root canals. When before, you could pick which one you want. It effectively makes pre-writing articles impossible, since who knows if you can get the keyword you want to submit it to.

In addition, glitches have locked me out of writing on their site for 8 hours on the biggest day of the month for available work.

God... what a pathetic loving company. I don't understand the point of doing all these changes other than to upset their entire workforce.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Does anybody write for Writer Access and find that worthwhile?

I need to find some new sites to work for :-( Writers Domain is a complete disaster right now for those that don't have access to the new projects

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Nighthand posted:

I didn't write for WA for long before I snagged some more lucrative work outside of the mills, but many of my writer friends work for them and have found them to be quite good on an ongoing basis. It might be tricky getting started since you always have to shoot for casting calls rather than open orders, but it seems to be one of the best sites for getting a bunch of clients working with you one on one.



On an unrelated note, I had an article sell on constant content the other day. I posted it in early 2014. Talk about some delayed returns.

Interesting, thanks for the insight.

Guess it's slightly concerning that WA is for actual articles ready by actual people, when I am so used to just re-writing the same old thing over and over again for WD.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Domestic Amuse posted:

Aside from Textbroker, Writer Access has proven to be one of most stable and reliable content mills out there. IMHO lucrative work is sparse until you're at 5 or 6 stars and/or build up your Love List with dozens of clients.

I thought WD nuked the category cherry picking so people wouldn't keep bitching about how prewriters were sucking up all of the work. Doesn't seem to have made a difference, though.

I still need to fill out hat massive profile on WA.... good to know though.

You can still prewrites on WD it's just much more difficult. Instead of being able to submit them all within a few minutes, it can take half an hour as people start going through the verticals.

I don't get that community at all... you have people claiming that there are people using bots to submit "thousands" of articles within the first 10 minutes of the day. They are literally just making poo poo up to place blame on someone else for why they can't make money

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Did anybody see this thing where Rev is now offering automatic transcription w/ no human editing for 10 cents per minute?

https://www.temi.com/

I just put a 5 minute interview into it I knew I had a word for word translation exact translation of. Multiple speakers, some with heavy accents (which is what it tells you the service is NOT good for). Ran it through, compared the two docs with Copyscape, and it was 85% accurate on the words. Grammar wise it had periods correct but didn't use a single comma.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
All that hassle for $7?

I feel really lucky being part of Writers Domain

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Balliver Shagnasty posted:

Even Writer's Domain has lost some of its shine. I signed up back when standard articles were $20 a pop and premium articles were $40. A year later, the premium articles went down to $34. Then $23.50. Now you have to write premium onsite blogs that are longer (800 words vs. 600) and have more exacting requirements to get your $40. Standard articles are currently $14.50 and vanish like the wind on most days.

WriterAccess is where it's at, but only if you can bootstrap your way up to 5-star or 6-star status and have a healthy stable of Love List clients.

While the pricing is all true, I will say that the reviews have become A LOT less picky since the $20 for a 400 word standard days. Like, I remember getting pointless revision requests about nitpicky things that would drive me nuts, causing me to spend 45 minutes on a single article so it didn't get sent back or rejected. They also had the cap back then on 80 articles a month, which they lifted.

These days, I can easily write a standard in 15 minutes, cranking out a max of 4 an hour if I am really motivated. Though to be hoenst it's more like 3 an hour at a normal pace. So while the pay has gone down, my earnings have gone up. One month I submitted 230 standard articles for about $3,300. I've found it pointless to write the new On Site Blogs. They are longer, they are more nitpicky about them, require 3 sources... I can honestly crank out two standards in less time than 1 OSB, and make just as much money.

I've heard the similar sentiments said about WriterAccess, but I think I'll ride out Writers Domain until it dies.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Paradoxish posted:

WD is far and away the best money:time ratio since I can usually bang out an article in like 10-20 minutes at most and that ends up working out to a pay of around $45/hour. Coincidentally, I'm usually able to grab three articles in a day so it's also like $45/day, although my average ends up being a little lower than that since I'm not super consistent about waking early to grab the morning article. Pay for my private clients is better from a strict $/word perspective, but a lot worse when it comes to $/hour. Altogether I don't (and couldn't, thanks to my other work) spend more than 20-25 hours per week on this stuff.

edit- So, I guess it depends on what you actually consider a living wage to be. My experience with content mills other than WD was absolutely abysmal and it's hard to imagine any of them really being worth it, but I'm out of that scene entirely other than WD so I don't know the current situation. With WD, you can pretty easily make $10-12k/year working drastically less than even average part time hours. It's great from a pure hourly pay perspective, but terrible in terms of absolute income since you won't be able to scale much beyond that.

Hey fellow WD writer.

Did you get any warnings about renewing articles past the 8 hour time limit? I was doing it pretty regularly until they emailed me and told me to stop doing it. Officially killed my motivation to get articles at 4am and write them in the afternoon.

Some of us think it was to get people to write more On Site Blogs.

I’m averaging about 5 per day over the past 30 days. It’s fantastic income for doing a task that adds absolutely nothing to society in any meaningful way.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
I've been trying to do 4 a day, and have averaged 4.75 per day this year, so most days I am getting 5 or more in.

It's just such stupid easy money, I can't help but feel these article tasks are going to go away sometime soon and I'll miss out on so much easy income. I have looked into Writers Access, but it seems like people actually ready the articles. The at home reviewers on WD get $1 per article reviewed, and last night I had an article reviewed in under a minute from when I submitted it. I doubt people are even really reading what we submit very closely, because they are in a rush to review as much as they can at a dollar an article

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Paradoxish posted:

edit- Honestly, I'm pretty sure the most difficult part of writing for WD is trying to avoid accidental self-plagiarism. Every time I pull a familiar keyword I'm afraid that I'm accidentally writing the same article I did last time.

I have 5,500 articles submitted under the current format, and I've never received a self plagiarism flag. That said, other forums I've visited have members that this is a huge problem with. I don't know what they are doing, but I can base on their forum writing that they are not great writers. So who knows.

What we know is that...
-There is an internal automated check for articles in the queue not yet reviewed against anything submitted. So if you accidentally submitted the same article twice, it will catch and reject it automatically.
-The reviewers get some sort of originality score in their dashboard when they open a task. It looks very similar to what I've seen used on sites like Paper Rater. I think like... one time I've had one of my articles show up with those very basic plagiarism checkers. But these spam blogs with existing work are probably not getting picked up because nobody visits them.
-If the article has a high amount of similar content flagged, they are then supposed to run it through the paid Copyscape to see what comes up. But only if it's flagged internally by the basic checker since it costs them money.

A good tool use use is the Copyscape compare two documents tool

http://www.copyscape.com/compare.php

If you have an article saved with a similar spin, run it through that. Jeremy once said that they are only concerned if there is 10% of similar 4 word phrases. I keep things below 5% and not have any 4 word phrases, and I have never had a problem.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

thylacine posted:

drat I should tried harder at writing I just hate the rejection over dumb poo poo.

Anyways, transcribing 911 calls sure is... a thing that I can say I've unfortunately done.

If you still have a WD account, it's worth looking into again. There are frequent ups and downs with the reviewing process. When the new format started in 2014(?) there was a really rough transition where they rejecting articles over petty things. When new reviewers come in after the school year starts in the fall, you tend to see more 3s and revision requests over stupid poo poo. But for the most part... things go right through these days at 4 stars.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

thylacine posted:

My account expired years ago there unfortunately. At the time I was like, ah, don't really care to renew it. If this current transcription gig holds up and I don't screw it up I should do pretty good. Did 1,000 minutes in a two-week period last month. Of course I've also done 200 in the same period other weeks.

I don't think WD accounts ever expire. They let accounts remain inactive and pick up writing whenever you want.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

KentuckyFriedBonBon posted:

Wait--so is Writer's Domain worthwhile again? I dropped it after the new pricing structure because I'd previously been getting nothing but 5 stars and suddenly any work I managed to get was getting rejected.

Is there a trick to getting work/keywords, or do you just kind of have to check in intermittently and hope for the best?

Did you drop it when it went from the 200 word blogs to the 400 word ones that require some effort in March of 2014? Or when they lowered the price on the 400 word ones?

That 2014 transition was rough, since the reviewers didn't even know what WD wanted. You'd get really lovely revisions back then over nitpicky things. Like writing a How To article and providing a list of tools, but having it rejected for not writing "You can buy any of these items from a local home improvement store", because the fictional reader may be confused about where they can find a hammer. You occasionally get stupid poo poo like that these days, but it's incredibly rare.

Now it is pretty easy going if you know what they are looking for. They changed things up from requiring reviewers give you a detailed review and critique of your articles to stock comments for 3/4/5 stars. Looking at any example of an accepted article is enough to let you know what they want. The at home reviewers are literally getting paid $1 to review your work, and they'll rush through an article in 2-3 minutes so I don't even think they read them carefully. It's not uncommon for clear typos and grammatical errors to get through and still get 4 stars.

You can write articles all day that are like "3 reasons to do X" and then do an intro, three subheads with a paragraph each, and an outro with a call to action to visit a generic contractor for the keyword category.

Here is an example of a really basic article.
http://bpokporealty.com/2018/12/01/are-you-going-out-of-town-this-holiday-season-how-to-decrease-the-chances-of-your-pipes-freezing/
I have no idea why they wrote 489 words when they could have just not written an entire subhead/paragraph to get to 400, but whatever.

Article Drop Times are tricky. There are pretty much two drop times per day at 5am EST and 7pm EST (and this shifts an hour forward when Daylight Saving Time begins in March, so 6am/8pm) . The morning drop time can be very random. Sometimes I log in at 5:15am and they are there all at once, sometimes they trickly in through small batches between 5-6am, sometimes they drop at 5:40am. The evening one is more consistent, but goes faster since people are awake. There are also big drop days on the morning of the 1st and 25th where the article seem to trickle in over the course of an hour. And then you'll notice patterns in how keywords drop each month if you pay attention enough. Like there is a keyword for a video editing/color correction software that I use for my job, and I regularly find it in the evenings during the last few days of the month. The drops seem to be consistent on the same day/time each month. So for example... the evening of the 1st/2nd/3rd usually has barely anything, and you're lucky if you can get a single article, and the mornings on the 26th thru the end of the month don't usually have much at all either. You kind of have to observe each drop time and write down how big or small it is to predict future months.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Spokes posted:

The pay's very nice ($10.50 for 300 words starting), but having to compete with other writers for the jobs is rough since you don't make anything if they don't accept the work or purchase someone else's instead. Lots of the assignments take a decent amount of research too, so there's definitely days where you can sink 4+ hours into writing and get paid literally nothing for it. It's really nice if you write medium+ quality copy quickly and are okay with a decent amount of rejection. I'll have unlocked the longer pieces in a few weeks and once i do that i'll put together a summary and see if it's worth recommending

What the gently caress.... so is this like the 99 Designs of content writing? Put out an order, have a ton of people write different variations, and then let the client pick their favorite and screw over the rest?

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Nighthand posted:

How many of you still do writing? Depending on how quickly this agency grows, we may need to pick up another writer or two to pick up the slack I can't handle all on my own. I'll be sure to post here when that happens, of course, but I'm curious how many of you still do writing versus the usual transcription.

I still primarily do Writers Domain since 2013 when I accidentally stumbled across it during open registration.

People keep telling me I can make more money with Writers Access, but I think I'm doing pretty good. I'm on target to hit 30K this year as supplemental income on top of my normal 9-5 job putting in an extra hour or two per day, and I honestly couldn't fit more writing in at the moment unless I dialed back what I do for Writers Domain. I just have the WD formula so engrained into my brain, and the predictability of the work that pops up means I can pre-write articles when there is no work I can grab at the moment. So whenever I have a free moment, I just write...

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

thylacine posted:

What ya'll know about taxes. I will be making more than $10k this year, not much, but more. So, I didn't pay any taxes yet, I'm hoping I can slide in a bunch of them before the end of the year and not get any penalties. I know this isn't the thing to wishfully think about, so just wondering if anybody has some experience paying your quarterly taxes at the end of the year (I'm bad with money). Also, if I buy some new computer parts and deduct them is it going to make any difference (maybe $300). My deductions for Word I usually take don't add up to much. How much would an accountant cost to sort this poo poo out. I understand medicare/SS taxes are important but goddamn why am I being taxed so much when I make so little money.

I am not 100% sure on all this stuff

You only pay a penalty on your income if you owe over $1,000 in Federal, not sure about state. You may not have to pay a penalty the first year you owe more than that, but you will the second year. That penalty is pro-rated throughout the year based on how much you should have paid each quarter, but it adds up. It's 6% on underpayed tax.

You'll likely never be able to deduct any expenses because the standard deduction is so high you won't cross the threshold, unless you have a bunch of other stuff going on that I am not aware of. The cost of having an accountant work on your taxes for that little of income may be more than what the penalty is.

I don't know what your tax bracket is, but I take that tax bracket of the highest income I make, add 6.2% onto it for self employment taxes, and then use that to figure out how much I owe.

So my additional writing income falls in the 22%, plus 6.2% = 28.6%. If I make $30K in additional income over the year, I set aside $8,580 a year to pay in taxes.
Q1 due April 15th, pay $2,145
Q2 due July 15th, pay $2,145
Q3 due Oct 15th, pay $2,145
Q4 due Jan 15th, pay $2,145

If you work a day job, consider having your job withhold more taxes to go towards that freelance income. I have 0 allowances and am considered Married Filing Single to take the most taxes out. That may cause it to work itself out, or reduce how much you owe at the end of the year. Figure out how much more is taken out per paycheck, multiply that out for the year, reduce how much you pre-pay quarterly from that.

That's what I have done and still somehow manage to owe money every year, but under $1,000 and no penalty

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Nighthand posted:

I don't know if Zerys is still doing anything, and Writer's Domain I know some people still write for but I have no idea if they still hire.

Writers Domain is not actively hiring, but they occasionally approve people. They have a weekly report where every once in a while they say they add a worker or two.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
I'll post this stuff in here that I found on another forum that was recently posted. I cannot vouch for anything though. But since Gologle was looking for an updated OP, this seems very relevant

quote:

I've done a fair bit of research into freelance writing, so I'm going to post some leads on this thread for anyone who wants to use them :) Feel free to post any leads you want to share too!

Job Listings
*I wouldn't haven't tried and generally wouldn't recommend paying for full access to their lists. Also be sure to vet jobs listed anywhere yourself, especially if someone wants you to send them your personal information*


Morning Coffee eNewsletter: https://www.freelancewriting.com/newsletters/morning-coffee-jobs-newsletter/

Freelance Writing Gigs (daily listings): https://www.freelancewritinggigs.com

The No-Fluff Freelance Writing Gigs Newsletter: https://www.alinabradford.com/

Problogger Job Board: http://jobs.problogger.net/

MediaBistro: https://www.mediabistro.com/jobs/openings/

Media Bistro Job Board: https://www.mediabistro.com/jobs/search/

Freelance Writing Job Board:https://www.freelancewriting.com/jobs/

The Editorial: https://editfast.com/subscribe.php

FlexJobs: https://www.flexjobs.com/ *they charge for full access*

Behance Jobs: https://www.behance.net/joblist

BloggingPro Job Board: https://www.bloggingpro.com/jobs/

Freedom With Writing: https://www.freedomwithwriting.com/

Journalism Jobs: https://www.journalismjobs.com/ *can filter for freelance jobs*

Listiller: https://listiller.com/ *Distills various listings into one place so you can find jobs and opportunities faster; free access to some listings*

SimplyHired: https://www.simplyhired.com/ *Can filter for freelance jobs; however, a lot of them are location-specific*

SolidGigs: https://members.solidgigs.com/ *List of freelance jobs, pay a monthly fee; courses and such*

Contena: https://www.contena.co/ *Writing, editing, social; Jobs listed (like job board); apply*

quote:

Freelance Marketplaces
I didn't look into these match because there's not much to compare our stuff to, but here's a list of some marketplaces you may or may not be interested in. Watch out for scammers.

Fiverr; https://www.fiverr.com/
Freelancer; https://www.freelancer.com/
Guru; https://www.guru.com/d/jobs/
HubSpot / HubStaff; https://talent.hubstaff.com/work
Peopleperhour; https://www.peopleperhour.com/site/register/v2#freelancer
UpWork (previously Elance/oDesk); https://www.upwork.com

quote:

Content Agencies/Sites
ClearVoice
https://www.clearvoice.com/freelance-jobs/

Create a CV/profile; have to 100% complete profile before account reviewed;
site takes 25% of your earnings, which seems pretty steep to me

Compose.ly
https://compose.ly/become-a-writer/

I like Compose.ly! Their community coordinator is quite communicative, and the pay tends to be about $75 to $100 per project.

Contently
https://contently.com/register
Get recruited (possibly a year or two after put up portfolio)
Pay is above industry average according to writers, but the pay rate scale is proprietary

quote:

Content Mills/Sites
Constant Content
https://www.constant-content.com/area/registerauthor.htm


Differentiates between usage license, unique license, and full rights license
Take 35% of the profit, which is steep

You can submit articles on whatever to the catalog; this is nice if you have stuff that didn't get accepted elsewhere, but since you're not writing for any particular client, I wouldn't advise just writing for the catalog as a business plan.

After you have five articles accepted to the catalog, you can work on "casting calls," or requested projects that you can bid on.

Pay for articles tends to be around $20 for a blog of around 600 words, but you set the prices, at least for the catalog.

eByline
https://app.ebyline.com/register/publisher
The pay is allegedly high

Lifetips
https://www.lifetips.com/about/become-a-guru.html

$10 per "life tip," plus get the chance to be hired by other clients for projects (I assume rates vary). Also I don't know exactly what a "life tip" is.

PubLoft
https://publoft.com/writers

Not currently accepting applications as of a few months ago (though last I checked you could still submit an application, so be aware of that)

ServiceScape
https://www.servicescape.com/sign-up/professional

Writing, editing, graphic design
Currently have oversupply of labor, at least for editors (but I assume they do for writers too, if they do for editors)

Skyword
https://create.skyword.com/contributorJoin.action

Create a profile, and then they (might) contact you about work.

SmartBrief
https://jobs.silkroad.com/SmartBrief/SmartBriefExternalPortalsmartbriefcareerssilkroadc
Writing and editing
$15 / hour

Openings vary depending on availability; don't always have remote positions available; seem like are regular, remote gigs

Textbroker
https://www.textbroker.com/home
Claim projects that are posted on site

Textbroker is particularly careful about proxies. Textbroker won't let you work with them if you use one, as far as I know. I would guess they're also suspicious of VPNs. (We tend to be too; they can mask fraud attempts.)

Verblio (previously Blog Mutt)
https://www.verblio.com/

As many writers as want to can submit content for the client, who then picks their favorite. I'm not a fan of the whole write-the-thing-before-you-compete-for-the-job model, but you can find perpetually open offers or jobs no one else has bid on in order to increase your chances of selling your work.

Clients can take months to review your work, assuming they accept it, so prepare to wait.

Have a gamified system, so you earn points by writing, thus advancing to the next level, at which you can apply for higher-paying tasks, longer pieces, etc.

WriterAccess
https://www.writeraccess.com

I applied to this site as an editor, and they still haven't evaluated my last test, so I'm guessing they're not hurting for workers.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
So I realized that Writers Domain does post statistics on how many writers they fire/hire on their private forums.

They apparently do bring on more writers, though in small numbers. About 10 people in the past 1 1/2 months.

WD recently changed the way that articles are released in the queue, which essentially means that there are articles almost all day long every single day. It's been really nice

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
Hey writers.

Apparently WD has cleared their backlog of writing applications and have opened registration again for English - North America.

https://www.writersdomain.net/en/register

The queue has been growing bigger by the day, nobody is writing things... there is speculation that a bunch of people are taking unemployment benefits because they are able to and just not working while they get paid to do nothing, and then they'll be back when unemployment is over. But either way... they are opening registration and I would rather recommend some goons take the spots than some randos.

So you'll register, I think right away you'll be offered a grammar test and asked to write a sample article. They'll then review it and manually approve you to start writing. From the sound of it, the admins are not to the point of approving people since they are busy with other tasks, so it may take a few days since its' a Friday at 6pm an they don't work weekends and evenings. I do know they operate on an order in the queue basis when approving writers, so the faster you get your poo poo in the better. They do tend to be cautious with approving a small batch of writers, see how they do, then let more in if they are not doing enough work. The way it was described was they may approve like 50 writers, but then 5 actually end up doing stuff and sticking with it.

If people start getting approved, let me know... I can give you the rundown on the site so you don't waste your time and can get working. I really don't want them to go on a hiring spree because the queue keeps growing an growing. Because it's intimidating to start a new site when you don't want to be banned. And chances are the work is plentiful now, they are going to overhire, and then there will be scraps for more people... but once you're in you're in, and they don't deactivate inactive people unless you go a year without submitting anything.

Astro7x fucked around with this message at 23:12 on Jun 19, 2020

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real
I had a friend that applied Thursday evening that got in today.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Gologle posted:

Thanks for the heads up on this, I tried registering a few months ago but they weren't hiring, I'll try again now.

EDIT: Rejected...ouch...

This was the update they just posted for the week about writers.

Writers Added: 7
Writers Warned: 1
Writers Who Gained Privileges: 3
Writers Who Lost Privileges: 0
Writer Accounts Suspended: 1
Writer Accounts Deactivated: 0

Looks like they did not accept many writers this week.... I wonder why, since the queue is continuing to grow.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

oliveoil posted:

How much do writers for content agencies get paid? Is it a lot better than something like constant content?

I've posted about Writers Domain, and I say I get on average $15 for a 400 word blog spam post that nobody ready that can be knocked out in 15-20 minutes.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Impermanent posted:

I worked for an SEO agency for a year before flaming out because they really, really sucked to work at. We were paid ~32k / yr to write 3,000 words per day, half that if they were 'premium content' which meant the blogs were expected to be read by someone at some point. so that's 375 words an hour, each getting you about 15 bucks. or double that for premium content.

I mean... you can make the same money at a content mill like Writers Domain, but knock that poo poo out in like 3 hours a day instead of 8. I knock out 400 words in 20 minutes and get burned out after about 5 in a row.

Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Longbaugh01 posted:

I'm quite desperate for income at the moment, but stuck with only being able to look for physical location work in a 5 mile radius of me within a smallish suburb in the Midwest. I've used this thread several times in the past, so I already have experience with certain places like Appen and Support.com (ugh), but reading this last page (which goes back to last year) I'm still hoping to hear some current recommendations or opportunities for anything from support work to customer service to transcription to content writing to whatever it is really. I've just seen Focus Forward and Writer's Domain mentioned so I'll check those out, but if there's anything else anyone can tell us about I'd appreciate your time. Thanks.

Writers Domain is not accepting any more writers. Work is not scarce again, but it runs out from time to time. Think they finally found a good balance of writers.

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Astro7x
Aug 4, 2004
Thinks It's All Real

Everett False posted:

Every WFH I've done (including for a university) it was pretty expected that if they gave you a limit, it was a hard ceiling for you to get as close to as possible. As long as you never went over the limit, padding it out was practically encouraged. I always kept a spreadsheet with an approximation of what I got up to on an hourly basis in case anyone asked, but no one ever did.

Yeah... when we give freelancers jobs in GFX design, usually we say there is a max amount of hours, and to check in and let us know how many hours have been used.

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