How Not to be Disappointed with Triond

When I first joined Triond in June last year, my first reason is earn money because it looks like a very good platform for Internet earnings and second to have an avenue for my stories since Ive already left the newspaper I was working with. I had high expectations with Triond because of the hype created by a lot of reviewers and I thought its gonna be a good source of income. Unfortunately after few months of laboring and putting so much effort in writing my articles, I lost interest because of a lot of factors. It took me a while to go back to writing at Triond and when I did came back, I decided to write just for the sheer pleasure of writing rather than for the extra bucks that I can earn for it. Why was I disappointed and how did I overcome it? Here’s some pointer.

1. Money and Earning - Like I said, I was expecting big bucks to pour but was disappointed big time instead. For 22 articles I posted in the web in June, I only earned a measly sum of .79 cents. Now how much disappointing can that be? And mind you, these are  not run-of-the-mill articles like list of things, how to or the likes but real stories that are newspaper styled. I was shocked and lost the interest to write some more.

But then again, I realized that Triond is not really something you would like to replace your day job with. It takes more than one month and more than one year to have a steady flow of income. Until now, almost one year to Triond, the highest Ive had is 2.29 dollars. So if you’re expecting, quick big bucks, this is not the place for you.

2. Quality – This sealed my lost of interest few months after I started writing for Triond. I am the type of writer who puts quality first instead of quantity. My articles are carefully written, I make sure the grammar is correct if not perfect and the flow of thoughts are clear.

Surprisingly, it didn’t yield as much visits as I was expecting. Instead I discovered that works like, the largest this, the biggest that, the funniest, the most stupid etc etc etc gains more visits than regular, well structured articles. And it doesn’t have to be well written at all, just a couple of sentences with Wikipedia facts and big pictures and the article is on its way to the Hot Content list. I even read articles that are very poor in terms of grammar and spelling (thank God Triond has the dictionary feature for them). So I thought, is this site more for the mediocre content rather for good quality articles.

Then it struck me that people wants to read easy to read articles, entertaining rather than intellectually stimulating and laden with pictures which they can look over and over instead of reading the whole stuff. So from then on, I made some how to and list articles. I still maintained the quality of my work because that’s whats more important to me than visit stats, but Ive learned to exert less effort with it than I usually do. I’m sorry to say that its not worth the effort at all.

3. Readership  and Comments – I love flattery more than anything else (OK that’s an exaggeration) and reading comments from people I do not know really makes my heart swell with pride. Unfortunately, my Triond readership come like trickles of water from a broken ceiling.

I was heart broken but then I realized, to get comments, you need to give some. I am not really all too willing to give my flattery unless an article is really deserving of it so I stick to my principles. Giving return comments just for the sake of getting some in return is not my style so when I give comments its really because the article is good.

4. Topic – I tell you now, poetry doesnt earn in Triond. Maybe after one year and if you have tons of friends but poetry and creative writing are not the best articles for Triond. I learned that the hard way.

Instead write articles that are easy to read like List articles (list all the things that can be listed and put a lot of picture on it), How To’s, definitely a winner here, The Ugly, The Bad and the Outrageous (they sell even in Hollywood), Money-Making articles (yes we all love them) and timely articles (because they can easily be pick up by search engines).

Keep it short, simple, direct to the point, without too many high falutin words because that’s the only way that you can have a piece of the rather short-attention span readers.

But more the enjoyment of it, write articles that you can relate, that you find interesting and that you have an idea of what you are talking about. It will reflect on your words, believe me as well as on the quality of your work.

5. Friend and Fans – Honestly I like it when people add me as friend that means more fans. But to have a lasting relationship with folks in Triond, you must add them as friends as well so you can exchange thoughts in each others writing. That is the best way to take advantage of this website, make friends and make many of them.

6. Forums – Ok I am the one who joins forum discussions because some of them are plain bullshits. But there are quality discussion which can help improve your Triond performance and market your articles as well. More talk more readership.

7. Marketing your articles – Digg It, Stumble Upon, Twitter, etc etc. I’m no Internet savvy and I don’t use these avenues. First because I don’t know how and second because I don’t have the luxury of time to tinker around the Internet to find out about this things. I want to concentrate on giving quality contents rather than spend more time trying to increase my readership. I believe that if you’re content is good, people would come back to read more of your stuff.

I’m not saying that you don’t need to market your articles its not just for me. But if you want more readership, more bucks for that matter, take advantage of these services.

There it is, I wrote this in 10 minutes just to get it off my chest. Hope this helps the newbies. Keep writing but write well. After all, your readers are spending precious time on your article, make it worth it.