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Whether it is the allure and promise of making money or the chance to hone one’s writing skills, online writing sites have become increasingly popular these days. These sites are easy to join and within minutes on some sites your essay, poem, video, or even photo is available for public consumption and the chance to start earning some cold, hard cash. However, how serious and lucrative are these sites in terms of the money that can be made as well as the chance for writers to hone their skills and get constructive feedback on their writing?

It’s been almost two years since a former colleague of mine told me about This Is By Us (TIBU), a writing site that went under this past year. I was some reluctant to join at first because I was worried about copyright infringement, plagiarizing as well as publishing my material again. Nonetheless, I joined, posted a few pieces, and waited for the dollars to start rolling in. They didn’t and nor did comments or even people clicking on “like.” After a month, my interest waned and I stopped posting.

I wouldn’t be surprised if most people who join these sites go through something similar. You’ve written something you and your friends or family thinks is good, but when you post it, it is sometimes a rude awakening when only a few people even bother to read, comment, or even “like” what you posted. Maybe making money is not as easy as you were led to believe when sites like Craig’s List sent you to the website, or even worse, maybe you are not as good a writer as you thought you were.

That’s when you start doubting yourself and the site and give up or try another one and go through the same trials and tribulations.

In my case, I gave TIBU a second chance and realized that if you wanted to make money you had to network-in other words, you had to comment on other’s people writing and quite regularly. TIBU awarded you goodness points so the more you commented and the more comments you made, the more pennies you racked up.

Additionally, the site was good for feedback; however, some people don’t take too kindly to feedback if they don’t know the person well enough and some Internet Trolls viciously attacked some writers.

I had a good experience on it, made a lot of friends that I am still in contact with and in the end made a whopping $75.00.

When the site announced it was going to cease operation in February of this year, some people recommended Triond, Helium, Hub Pages, and Associated Content, and later Bukisa.

Helium has been around for awhile and has marketed itself as a serious writing site with contests, writing opportunities as well as site where “stewards” will sometimes send you an email telling you that they had read your latest post and encourage you to keep on posting. It is a tougher writing market to crack in that one can only post to existing titles or come up with a title. Once you’ve written a poem about falling leaves under the autumn poetry title, you cannot post another one.

There is a preponderance of more specialized articles that require more effort from writers, but they tend to be the big moneymakers. The biggest downfall for writing on Helium is that articles are voted on anonymously. Fair enough, but what a teenager likes compared to what an adult are quite different and as such the voting doesn’t seem fair to accurately and creatively evaluate someone’s writing ability.

In the one year that I have been at Helium, I have made $65.00 with 112 posts still making pennies for me.

Although I have posted at Associated Content, Bukisa, and Hub Pages, I gave up on them. The income potential just wasn’t as good in my assessment.

Then there’s Triond. In many ways, Triond is like TIBU, but it has been a much harder market to crack in terms of the money I have earned even though there is more freedom in posting as well as uploading videos and photos.

Like TIBU, if you want to increase your income potential you have to market your writing by acquiring a large fan base (and making certain to comment on their posts) as well as marketing yourself on Reddit, Stumble Upon, and even Facebook. Every once in awhile you’ll read a post from a writer about another surefire method for attracting more readers like posting a link on your blog or a third-party site like Red Gage. It really comes down to the number of views you get in the end for how much money you can make.

For the most part I have been satisfied with the way that Triond works, but I wish there was more of a human element involved as far as the powers that might be is concerned. It would be nice to get an honest answer to questions about how is hot content chosen. The lack of a human element or face to Triond makes it a little cold, even though it tends to be more of social networking site along with the writing-unlike the other sites. In other words, there seems to be more potential for feedback from other writers and readers.

As for the income potential, it does come down to the articles that one writes. A haiku about autumn might make you a few pennies; whereas an in-depth article about something controversial might make you a few more pennies (I will be interested to see how many of those cyber pennies I will make with this essay).

In the one year I have been at Triond I have posted nearly 300 essays, poems, and photos and have made a whopping $16.88.

Don’t worry, with the money I have made from writing on all three of these sites I don’t plan to quit my day job.

Oh yes, and one more thing, I have never made the hot content list.

If it was about the money I would have quit a long time ago-not my job, but this online writing. For me, it is just the chance to write and keep on honing my skills; try out some new ideas and see what kind of response I get. I do not publish my more serious writing projects here because I am saving them for future publication. I do not need to have my ego massaged either. It is fun to log onto to Triond to read some writers that I have become quite fond of here and to share my writing. I write because it is what I enjoy doing most.

No one should ever be discouraged if they don’t make a lot of money on these sites or if only a few people read their stuff. My advice to anyone new to Triond is to write and comment as much as you can. In the past few weeks I have noticed that more people have been commenting on my posts because I try very hard to comment on as many posts as I can.

Triond is as serious writing site as you make it and if doesn’t pay dividends in your pocketbook or wallet, it does pay dividends in having the chance to share your writing and hone you writing skills.