Showing posts with label Demand Studios. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Demand Studios. Show all posts

Friday, August 26, 2011

My eHow Divorce...

As some of you know, I started writing for eHow a few years ago. At first it didn't pay anything, since it all has to do with ad-generated revenue, and you have to have traffic to make anything off of that. Anyway, eventually I started making a little money off of the articles there, and even mentioned that I wished I'd written more before the changeover to Demand Studio's new program of only on-staff writers and flat pay rates for articles.

The way they first handled the changeover was that you were still paid off of ad revenue for your initial articles, but had to become a staff writer and accept the new payment terms to have any other articles published on the site. I believe that they made this change to improve the quality of articles published on their site.

They did initially accept me as a staff writer, but I hesitated to accept these new terms and so I never did become a part of their staff. I still received payments for my original six articles though, until early this year when they discontinued even that part of their terms. They offered me a dismal amount of money for the rights to my articles (it wasn't even an amount I'd have accepted for one article, let alone six) and said if I didn't accept the purchase terms, then I would retain the rights, but my articles would be removed from their site. Well, I refused the terms and kept the rights. So, I'm no longer an eHow contributor. Ah, well, life goes on.

I'll be moving those articles I wrote over to HubPages soon. My earnings there have started to increase over the last month or so, and so I have the motivation to get back to work! Now that the kids are back in school, I'm hoping to have more time to write. We shall see.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

e-How Writers change to Demand Studios

I starting writing for e-How last year, and was quite excited about it to begin with. After writing six articles though, and realizing that the only way I would make money off of any of them was if people clicked on the ads displayed on my articles' pages, I quit writing for them. I kept my account open though, and basically forgot about them.

Then, this year, e-How stopped accepting articles through their website and switched everything over to Demand Studios. I received notice that I had been approved to write for them, but the way things worked would be quite different as far as article submission and payment.

For starters, there is now a copy-editor involved. This copy-editor can tell you to rewrite your articles and even outright reject them. That's an intimidating thought, but not a deal-breaker. The fact is, most people could use a copy-editor and I'm no exception. In fact, if I could get one for free right now, I'd have them go over everything I write, so that I don't make myself look like an illiterate idiot with some of the typos I make. Yikes!

But then there's also the way payment works. Apparently it's a flat fee (some say it's only $15 per article). That might not seem too bad for some people at first sight--especially considering I had stopped writing for e-how after only making $12 the first six months on six articles--I must tell you that I now wish I'd written more for e-How before the change-over. Why? Because those articles are still making money and I'm not having to do anything now but watch it happen. Though the amounts are still quite paltry, it's increasing over time and will eventually surpass that $15 flat fee per article. That's what you call passive income.

So, I'm unsure on whether or not I'll follow through with the Demand Studios account. I can't rule it out entirely as a possibility to make money writing. They have a great reputation for paying each friday with a transfer to your paypal account. Dependable income can't be overrated.

I'm sure I don't know all there is to know about this company, so if I discover anything new, I'll let you know.