Quantity Counts

During my first couple of weeks on Triond, a lot of other Triond writers told me in messages or in the forums that I shouldn’t post a lot of articles every day. They suggested that by posting so many articles my stories would be competing with each other and dilute the overall number of hits I would get. After a month of being on Triond, I have to disagree. During my first two weeks I averaged about 7 or 8 stories published per day, and at the end of those two weeks I had earned a little more than $5. I decided to experiment a little, so during my second two weeks I intentionally only wrote about 2 stories a day; my earnings after those two weeks have been about $4. The difference isn’t much, only about a dollar, but I feel it’s enough to show me that quantity does count to some extent. I’m not planning to go back to writing 7 or more stories a day, mainly because I’ve recently become involved in other writing projects, but I’m at the least going to write those 2 articles a day.

Quality, Not So Much

I’ve written a few of what I felt were solid Triond articles, pieces I’d be happy to publish in many professional publications. I’ve also written a good number of Triond articles that were slapped together quickly from knowledge I already knew. The outcome? Generally those slapped together articles are bringing me a lot more hits (and more money) than those planned, well-thought-out articles. Go figure. I’ll probably keep doing a mix of both.

How To Get Those Readers

I’ve come to the conclusion a lot of it is luck. There are things you can do to increase the number of hits you get for your stories, mainly to do a little publicizing and networking on marketing and interactive social Web sites, but from there a lot of it is out of your hands. Twitter and StumbleUpon net me a fair amount of daily hits, and Reddit isn’t too bad, but I get the majority of my hits either from Triond or from other people’s blogs and Web sites. The key here is that nearly all of those people who placed a link to one of my Triond stories on their Web pages first learned of my Triond article(s) through one of the interactive sites, usually Twitter. That tells me that networking might not pay off immediately, but it does pay off dividends if I’m patient at least a few days, sometimes longer.

Publishing Elsewhere

While Triond is the main publishing site I’m writing for, I’ve also of late been duplicating my Triond stories onto Bukisa, a site quite similar to Triond. I’m copying most of my stories pretty much verbatim. Some might scream that this is a disservice to the readers, but the main reason I joined Bukisa was just to have a backup for my Triond stories. However, I’ve learned that Bukisa is paying me pretty well. In fact, on a day per day basis, Bukisa is paying me better than Triond. The reason I continue to publish my stories on Triond first is because Triond will not publish stories that have already appeared elsewhere, though Bukisa does allow for this. So, it seems to me that any writer will be doing themselves a favor by publishing on more than one site.

It’s hard to keep up with others

There are so many articles on Triond, and so many interesting writers, that it’s difficult to keep up with all of them, even the ones you label as “Friends.” I try to space it out a little bit and go to a few pages each day, but pages from different people every day. That’s unless I see some article that really sparks my interest, then I read it right away. I wish I could read everyone’s articles and click the “Like It” buttons and give everyone hits, but it’s just not realistic. I try to be fair about it and spread it around a bit.

Find a niche, or a few niches

I think one thing that can help any writer on Triond to find success is to pick a particular niche, or several niches, and stick to them for the most part. This not only helps your regular readers know somewhat what to expect from you, but it also keeps you focused as a writer. I’ve found the most success in writing about writing, but that’s probably because writing has been part of my profession for nearly 20 years. I’ve also had some success writing about ’80s nostalgia, video games and the like, and I’ve been getting pretty regular hits on my stories that provide tips for domestic life, such as ways to clean with white vinegar and tips for caring for leather shoes. But that’s just me. You’ll likely find success in writing about other things.

Related links

• My First Week on Triond: An Evaluation
• My Second Week on Triond: An Evaluation