I started writing for eHow in early September. For those of you who do not know, eHow is a website where members can earn money from publishing “how to” articles. Basically, you do the work and eHow will share the revenue that is generated from your articles.
Many experienced internet marketers would rather drop dead than to share one penny of their hard-earned income with someone else. The argument has been made, that when you post articles on your own blog, you would earn more adsense revenue than you could by publishing these same articles on eHow. I would agree that this is true for most established sites.
The problem is that most newer sites, experimentalblogging included, do not generate the kind of traffic necessary to make any meaningful money. It takes months and months of writing just to earn the minimum amount needed for Google to actually pay you (if you ever reach that magical number). In this regard, I must disagree with my friend at OnlineDividends (awesome site by the way - you should check it out).
Additionally, writing for eHow has numerous benefits, as pointed out at Smart Passive Income. The writing interface is extremely easy to use, the articles are Google friendly, and I can write about anything that I want. If I have five minutes, and want to write about How to Become Debt Free, I can… And it only takes a few minutes. Once I have published the article, I never have to think about it again, if that is what I want to do. Personally, I try and do a small amount of linking to market my article.
How have I been doing?
My first month (September) I made an amazing $4.52. I realized that it was going to be harder than I thought so I bit the bullet a bought Maria’s book. I am glad that I did. I used the tips found within and made a few minor adjustments to my previous articles, and have subsequently written 15 new articles. In October, I earned $18.40 (quite a big jump if you ask me). So far in November I am on pace to make around $25.
I never really thought about trying to push myself and create new articles each day. I must say that I was fascinated with Pat’s attempt to create 5 new articles a day for an entire year. Too bad it now looks like he will be only doing that (on eHow) until the end of December; then he will join the rest of the more technologically capable internet marketers and will create his own niche site. It would have been amazing to watch someone else actually pull off such an amazing experiment.
In my attempt to develop additional passive income streams, I am going to try a little experiment of my own (Yes I know writing is NOT truly passive). I am going to write 1 article a day on eHow, and one article a day here. This experiment will start on November 18th, and will continue until May 18, 2009. After 6 months, I should be able to see a clear winner. Any articles that were written prior to tonight will be excluded from eHow’s totals. This should be fun and should encourage me to write more often. There is no penalty for skipping a day, but if I skip a day publishing on eHow, I will skip a day publishing here (and vice versa).
What do you think? Where will I earn more money and why (all things considered)? Can you think of any other rules I should implement?
Please consider subscribing and following along with my little eHow experiment.
