Writing for Money: Quantity or Quality?

There are hundreds of different websites that’ll pay you for writing, maybe thousands. And there are even more online articles about those websites. Yep, this is one more. But unlike an article that just lists a handful of sites with a basic descriptor sentences, I’m here to give you my personal experience with writing on 2 different sites: Triond and Factoidz.

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First, let me be completely upfront with my level of experience: I write professionally for my “day job”, but am relatively new to writing online. I’ve been posting on Triond for 5 months and on Factoidz for just over 2 months. I don’t feel a few months of publishing necessarily qualifies me to give advice, but I do have a viewpoint on something I see many people on Triond struggle with. Writers are frustrated by the low skill level of other writers on Triond, and wish they’d receive more feedback on their own work.

Image via Wikipedia

So that leads me to Factoidz. It was an article here on Triond that sent me there. It’s quite different than Triond. First, your Factoidz articles are supposed to be “how to” advice – not just rambling opinions or poems and short stories. Second, Factoidz requires you to write at least 400 words, and often pays you more if it’s longer. And lastly, Factoidz will not publish articles that have problems, and I’m not just talking about grammar.  The site administrators contacted me about an article, informing me my submitted article ended a bit disjointed from the rest of the article. They waited until I fixed the problem before they posted it. And while I’m not getting very high page views on Factoidz, it appears articles have a longer shelf life, with my oldest articles still getting views nearly every day.

But what about the money? I find the payout to be pretty much the same between the two sites. With the higher standards required on Factoidz, I’m publishing only about twice a week there, while I publish on average once a day on Triond. So for the simple fact that I have much more on Triond, I’m making more total money here.

While money may be my main motivator, it’s not my only one. I want to be a good writer, and continue to improve. And that’s where I feel Factoidz steps in. If I have an article of real substance that may prove helpful to someone, I’ll put in the extra work to publish on Factoidz. If I’ve got an idea for a short article or an opinion on some cultural topic then I’ll post that on Triond.

For more information on how to write for Factoidz, click here.