Triond Vs. Helium

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Posted on October 28th, 2008 in Online Writing by Paula Mitchell Bentley

I’ve been writing online for the last couple of months. Here are some of my opinions on two writing sites, Triond and Helium.

I started online writing with Triond in August of this year. I love how you can publish pretty much anything that you can come up with. There are some rules and regulations that need to be followed though. Triond has a strict policy of publishing only original material. They will not publish anything that they believe is a duplicate of content posted elsewhere. I’ve got mixed feelings on this. Of course they do not want to plagiarize another writer’s work or infringe on a copyright. However, I’ve found that they are a little too overenthusiastic at times about what is considered “duplicate” work. A couple of times they have rejected my content because it had a similar title to another article out there even though the body of the article was about a completely different subject! I was able to work it out with them through emails back and forth fairly easily though. Triond has been great about keeping up an ongoing communication with me as a writer.

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Another rule of publishing with Triond is that it is not obscene. Their version and my version has differed on occasion though. For instance, when I was publishing an article about quotes of various musicians, I quoted Ozzy Osbourne. As most of you can attest to, Ozzy is very fond of the F word. I thought that putting stars over every letter except the F would be okay. It was rejected. I actually had to put a star over the F as well. I think this is perhaps a bit much. I understand that there are readers and writers of all ages here, my son is one of them. I really think that he could handle just seeing the letter F though.

The final rule of Triond that I’ve had problems with is not producing content that is overly commercial. I had tried to submit an article about a commercial on television. It was about a Zellers commercial where they go through all of the letters of the alphabet with things you can buy from the store. My article was mainly an explanation of all the letters because I couldn’t figure out a couple for quite a long time. I was unable to publish it though because they though it was too promotional or commercial. I was really promoting shopping at Zellers, I was just talking about the commercial itself.

One of the things I really like about publishing with Triond is that you can publish all types of content — anything from text articles to pictures to audio files and videos. I’ve found that readership of text articles is much higher than that of pictures but I love that you can publish in practically any form. From poetry to pictures of your cat to reviews of what you watched on t.v. last night. It definitely helps keep the creative juices flowing.

Triond is an online community of writers. You can make “friends” and “fans” on this site to help you gain a wider readership. Readers will often leave comments too on your articles which can really help you to improve your writing, learn others opinions and come up with ideas for other articles. I really like receiving comments and try to writer comments on other’s work as well even if it’s just a “Great Article” or “Keep up the Good Work”. Sometimes I have more to say than other times but if I write great article you can be sure that I actually mean it.

The best part of publishing with Triond, of course, is the money. You are definitely not going to get rich quick here. I’ve made about $25 in about 3 months. The more you write, the more you make. It may just be pennies at first but those pennies do add up quicker than you’d think. And your articles just keep on making money after they’re published. I’ve found that sometimes articles lose their popularity and sort of fall off of my radar. And then a few weeks later, they are rediscovered and start earning again. It’s the neatest thing to think that I’m actually making money just from my thoughts and writing efforts. Sometimes Triond will publish your article on an outside website. They have done this with one of my articles so far. That article has gotten 13,500 views! My most popular article that was published on a Triond website got about 4,000 views so that’s a huge difference. I’m not sure what the qualifications for your article to be offered to an outside website. I wish I did because then maybe I could be published outside again! It is definitely worth it even though you lose some editorial control.

Helium

Helium is another online writing website. Here they provide the titles for you to write to. They only publish text only articles — you cannot even illustrate your ideas with pictures which I’ve found quite annoying. Once you have written to an article, it is rated by other Helium users. Their rate section has two articles of the same title for the rater to read. You then choose which one is better in your opinion. You can say one is worth slightly more, more, or substantially more than the other article. I do not really understand this process although I’ve been looking at it pretty extensively for the last couple of weeks. I guess how well your article does depends on what other users think of it.

Helium has a “Marketplace” where websites looking for content advertise what they are looking for. Again, you have to write to titles already provided. Each publisher has a list of qualifications for each offer and an amount that you could potentially earn if your article is chosen. I’ve found that the marketplace is not exactly full of offers. At the moment, there are less than ten offers to buy articles there. You could potentially earn quite a bit of money though. I’ve seen offers anywhere from $10 to $160! Of course, the offer for $160 had alot of articles written for it. The content that they are looking for is quite varied so that it is possible for anyone with any skill set to earn some money here.

They also have writing contests that you can write to. These seem to be mostly about topics that have not been written about very much. These submissions are then rated against others in the category. The first place winner gets $60, 2nd gets $40 and 3rd gets $20. There are twenty titles in each category though so it’s pretty tough to get in the top 10, never mind the top 3.

Your articles can be bought by people looking for content and they could get exclusive rights or just the right to use your article. I’m not exactly sure how this process works though. I don’t like that it is vague about how money is earned. It’s nice to know that your efforts are paying off even if it is very slowly. When you write and write and earn nothing, it can be quite discouraging. Especially if you’re not sure why you’re not earning anything or what you could do differently.

I’m going to keep writing for both sites for now. Triond is definitely my favourite at the moment though. Being able to use pictures in the articles is a major plus to Triond. Some things are almost undescribable with words alone. They say a picture is worth a thousand words for a reason. I also like how transparent the money you’re earning at Triond is too. There is never any doubt as to how much you are owed at the end of the month. Helium has more earning potential. But it’s just that, potential. I’ll keep you posted as time goes on and my views on the two sites are updated.

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Tags: articles, content, Earnings, freelance, helium, journalism, money, online, text, triond, write, writer, Writing

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20 Responses to “Triond Vs. Helium”

Lucas Dié
October 28th, 2008 at 4:13 am

now that was worth wile reading – thanks
Hein Marais
October 28th, 2008 at 5:00 am

I definetely enjoy Triond more.
Melody Arcamo Lagrimas
October 28th, 2008 at 5:27 am

I discovered Helium first but due to their policy of at least $25 before you can withdraw,plus the fact that some of my poems have not earned till now, I sort of concentrated on Triond instead when I came upon it about three months ago, and although no much yet, at least all my articles and poems are already earning. Thank you, this article has been very enlightening. God bless.
Nissa Annakindt
October 28th, 2008 at 8:24 am

I have enjoyed writing for Helium for some time now and found out about Triond there. I’ve only just written my first Triond article and intend to write for both.

I thought your article detailing your experiences was very useful and well-written. Thanks so much for writing it.
eddiego65
October 28th, 2008 at 9:43 am

Great post! Very well-balanced article.
Liane Schmidt
October 28th, 2008 at 11:55 am

Great article! I really like your detailed explanations. Keep up the great work, you ARE making all your dreams a reality!

Blessings.

Sincerely,

-Liane Schmidt.
Paula Mitchell Bentley
October 28th, 2008 at 12:12 pm

Thanks for all the kind comments! I really appreciate everyone’s words.
Julie Mauldin
October 28th, 2008 at 3:47 pm

I am really glad you wrote this because I have been writing on this site for nearly six weeks, and the lack of funds has had me really frustrated. I didn’t even know about Helium until reading your article. Thanks for keeping me informed! I really appreciate it.
Ancient Aspie
October 28th, 2008 at 4:07 pm

I tried Helium, and found that, for me, it was a waste of time. I never found anything in the Marketplace that I was willing to write about, and having to compete with everyone else who writes on a subject isn’t my cup of tea. Working forever to get to $25.00 isn’t, either.
Richie Montalbo
October 29th, 2008 at 12:19 am

I got curious when you said “But it’s just that, potential”. I would like to know what you mean.

I think Triond is better than Helium. But if you are hinting on a disadvantage of writing for Triond, I would like to know.
Eunice Tan
October 29th, 2008 at 1:13 am

I didn’t know about Helium and I learn from you. Thanks for sharing
Paula Mitchell Bentley
October 29th, 2008 at 9:34 am

What I meant by Helium having potential is that there is a chance that you can make money quite quickly on Helium. In the marketplace you can write to publisher’s offering anywhere from $10 – $160 ish. You are competing against other writer’s that are writing to the same title. The publisher then picks which article or article(s) that they would like to purchase. Shortly after I wrote this article on Triond, two of my articles on Helium were purchased at $10 each.

Here on Triond, the earnings seem to flow in slowly but steadily. It is very important to keep publishing articles every day to keep that flow coming in. You have to promote your articles and gain your own readership. Where as on Helium, you just write to a title and hope for the best.

I hope that explains it a little better. Thanks for all the comments!
Gijo George
October 29th, 2008 at 7:22 pm

Very good comparison. I found Triond and Helium are different as stated in this article. The rating feature in Helium can provide you some idea about different style of writing as you are reading the articles critically.
John McDonnell
November 14th, 2008 at 8:49 am

Paula, I admire you! I’ve published about 15 articles with Triond so far, and none has come anywhere near 4,000 views, let alone 13,500 that you got for the article that was published on an outside Web site. Good job! I wish I knew your secret.
Paula Mitchell Bentley
November 14th, 2008 at 9:31 am

Oh, thanks John! I really appreciate it. I don’t know if I really have a “secret”. I’ve made a bunch of friends on here so I know that they often read my work because it’s published in their news feeds. I also like Stumble Upon and Digg as promotion tools. I did write an article on how to pick a great topic once. You might want to give that a read. But I think the main thing to remember is just to keep writing. Write what’s interesting to you. Write about things you know about, or things you want to know about. Don’t keep writing the same sort of article over and over — broaden out. Read other people’s work and make useful comments. They might just click on your name and read some of your work. Keep writing and good luck!!!
Paula Mitchell Bentley
November 14th, 2008 at 9:35 am

One other thing that I wanted to point out — you don’t need to be published on a website outside of the “Triond” market to receive tons of views. I recently published an article about personal ads on purple slinky and it’s received almost 18,500 views so far!!! And I only published it 5 days ago. Triond is definitely amazing.
Anastasia Zoldak
December 19th, 2008 at 8:14 am

I’ve written for Triond and Helium. I found on Helium that they do not treat their writers well when there is an issue. I have posted articles on Helium only to find that someone else has used phrasing or even exact sentences from my submission to create a competing article.

In addition, I wrote a PETA article for their debate section and they accused me of plagiarism even after I had a letter from PETA stating that the information I used was considered “free use.” They treated me as if I was an idiot that didn’t understand the definition of plagiarism. I tried to explain to them that PETA encourages use of facts and quotes but they treated me as if I did something wrong even though I had proof (From PETA) that I didn’t. To add insult they refused to pay me what was owed because it hadn’t reached their $25.00 threshold. I would not recommend the use of Helium.
lisa hossain
January 20th, 2009 at 12:56 pm

great article. i just started with triond but wouldnt mind looking into helium as well. thanks for breaking up whats good and bad on both sites. need all the help i can.
Becca Badgett
February 28th, 2009 at 5:26 pm

Hi everyone? Have you tried Associated Content? I published a few articles there, they pay a minute amount upfront sometimes.
Southgate
March 17th, 2009 at 10:01 am

A good comparison of both sites.Now Helium does not permit International writers to write in their site.I am yet to get inured myself with Triond.It will take a few months.But I am at ease with Triond and have decided to stick on with Triond because it gives me more exposure through many sites.Getting published is also not difficult provided your work is original.Thank you for giving an opportunity to have more insight about Triond.