Here’s a single thing constant about the Internet: the thirst for content.

Every website requires content– and as much as possible, a consistent supply of fresh information – to keep the visitors going back and to invite the awareness of search engine spiders for improved indexing and better status in search engine results.

Every online businessman requires content as articles for his article advertising movements to build links for his website and to help mark himself as an authority in his arena.

Every online publisher requires content for the information products he is going to sell.

There is always a great demand for content, hence, there is always a great demand for content writers.

Content can be categorized into the subsequent sets:

1. Articles. These are content for web purposes, either as content for the web sites themselves or as articles for article advertising operations.

2. PLR articles. These are content to be readvertised to numerous individuals. They are normally submitted by connection internet sites.

3. Ebooks and special reports. These are news products that are also sold for gain, bargained for free to aid generate mailing directories, or anchors for viral advertising movements.

4. Product evaluations. Frequently used as web content for review pages.

5. Technical explanations. Used as supplementary content for goal explanation of products being offered.

6. Press releases. These are newsworthy and very impartial pieces that are circulated to newswires for pickup by online and offline publishers.

7. Blog accounts.

8. Thread announcements.

As a content writer, you are anticipated to be good in composing any or all of the above-mentioned content kinds.

Content writers earn well with their skill. Native English speakers, for instance, can earn as many as a dollar per word they write, although the standard would range in the 4 to 10 cents per word area.

Best writers – those who are able to write writings which are enlightening, entertaining and flawless – never encounter any troubles when it pertains to sourcing out clients. Clients, in fact, ask them out the moment they are able to build their name and status in the trade.

Subject writers who are just beginning are advised to hunt for free chores in famous freelancing internet sites similar to Elance.com, Guru.com and Rentacoder.com. Webmasters’ threads are also recommended, also DigitalPoint.com and SitePoint.com.

This was so unlike article writing, where I get paid right away as soon as I submit my article – there’s no click-through rate (CTR) condition for my getting paid. And that was when I started to think differently about website copywriting. So what’s the difference?

With articles, you basically write information that would be of value to your readers AND skillfully write the Resource Box so that they’ll click on your link and through your website. On the other hand, website copy is basically the sales person of the website.

Without a good a sales copy on a website, there’s little hope that a product owner is going to be able to sell to anyone. Out here on the Internet where attention spans and TRUST are two of the rarest commodities, website copywriting is hypnotic, magical writing.

While writing articles give your site good backlinks and drives visitors to your site, website copy is what moves people to actually BUY. So, can you see now why website copywriters are paid much higher than article writers?

If you want copywriting training, Maria Veloso, in her book Web Copy That Sells: The Revolutionary Formula for Creating Killer Copy That Grabs Their Attention and Compels Them to Buy, reveals the following tips:

1. Find good models of website copy and write them in your own handwriting

2. Use this five-question blueprint before writing website copy. Ask yourself:

“What is the problem?”,

“Why hasn’t it been solved?”,

“What is possible?”

“What is different now?”, (your product’s Unique Selling Proposition)

“What should you do now?” (Your CTA or Call-To-Action)

3. Use emotional keywords instead of bland ones, like write “buy” instead of “purchase”.

Maria has practically written a training manual with her book. You’ll definitely want to read it if you want to train yourself in copywriting and earn big bucks writing freelance.

These are the most well known sub-industries in freelance writing:

* Academic Writing

Some very good examples of this are thesis papers and the like. It’s basically research writing for scholars.

* Article Writing

This could be about anything and everything. Most articles are written to give information and pre-sell affiliate products.

* Website Copywriting

Website copywriting are sales-oriented writing pieces with the intention of selling to the reader. Just like advertising copy, a website copy gets to the heart of the readers’ emotions and makes them buy stuff.

THE BIG EARNERS

Of all the classes of writers, who do you think earns the most money?

Web copywriters on average earn $125 to $235 per hour, with some writers earning a percentage of website sales. Maria Veloso, author of the book, Web Copy That Sells, is one of the few writers who get also get paid a commission or percentage of website sales.

Freelance academic writers earn at least $24 per 500 words. Article writers, on the other hand, are paid (or at least should be paid) $6 to $12 per 500 words.

Why the big disparity in writing rates? I think it’s primarily because of the difficulty of the work. With article writing, you basically tell people information that they do or don’t yet know. The style is basically straightforward, “write-as-you speak,” so there’s not much effort to it except to check for errors, and making sure that the author resource box has a compelling call to action.

Academic writing is more difficult since you’ll be dealing with research data, apart from the fact that you’re writing for scholars, thus the writing must adhere to a very scholarly style of writing.

With website copywriting, you are basically selling to people, which is a very difficult thing to do especially on the Internet. People who are online are ever more wary of advertisements than they are when watching TV. That said, website copywriting thus becomes part magic and part writing skill.

Don’t believe me? Try writing a website copy and track how many people are buying through your sales page.  Do you see any sales?

Read more: How To Become A Freelance Writer

With the cost of living practically 1/4 or 1/5 cheaper than the United States and Europe, writers who come from India or the Philippines can bid on projects at much lower rates*. But this doesn’t mean it’s a waste of time for native English writers. And it doesn’t mean there’s are fringe benefits that can be gained from bidding on jobs, even if you think it’s peanuts.

* The decent rate for articles is between $6 to 12 for a 500-word article, but some writers are willing to write for as low as $1 to $2 per 500-word article.

Segue Into Internet Marketing

I first started writing articles for ezine articles in 2006 on a part-time basis and became a full-time freelance writer on the Internet towards the end of the 2007. What drew me at first was the thought that I was being paid in dollars. (I’m from Cebu, Philippines.)

But soon I realized after that I was being paid way too low for my efforts, which always includes RESEARCHING and writing articles. Luckily for me, someone asked me to write an article about Internet affiliate marketing and that really opened me up to the possibility of earning passive income.

If you hate how much you’re getting paid for you services, you might want to segue into Internet Marketing. I know there’s too much information going around (and I’ve bought and subscribed to an xxx number of Internet Marketing guides),  but you might want to start out by trying PotPie Girl’s One Week Marketing Guide. Her action plan is simple to implement, and I’ve had sales by simply following her guidance.

Networking Opportunities: Contacts Who Make It Big

Some writers feel you should only do freelance websites if you’re:
(a)    very broke, or
(b)    are just trying to get some good feedback.

What you should know about freelancing is that, as with any business, everyone starts out small, and that ones who are earning big dollars in freelancing have their old clients sending in new clients.

Remember, even low-paying service buyers have friends and contacts whom they might send to you. Or even better, they might just hit it big and will pay you more dollars for you work, you’ll never know. I know that I’ve had clients give me more work by sending me their friends.

Happy bidding.

• GetAFreelancer

• RealWritingJobs

• oDesk

Read more: Freelance Article Writer

If you are like most people but who happens to own website, this can be bad news if you let it. After all, what drives websites to the top of the search engines is content, whether it’s posted on your website or submitted to article directories.

While actual individual statistics may vary, for every twenty articles you submit to article directories, you would typically get 5,000 page views. So the importance of writing content cannot be stressed enough. However, if simply the thought of writing stresses you enough already, there are some things you can do, such as:

* Hire freelance writers

Out on the Internet, there isn’t a shortage of freelance writers who would be willing to write on anything and everything under the WWW sun. The good thing about it is that they’re not that expensive too. Writers from countries like India and the Philippines would typically rewrite articles for $1.5 and write originals for the $3. Take note however, because as with anything else, you only get what you pay for. And you might just be wasting your money with pretenders who are willing to be paid dirt cheap prices.

* Rewrite existing articles

Find articles on your niche and simply rewrite them. Rewriting can be as simple as replacing words with their synonyms or deleting paragraphs. Never make the mistake of copying an entire article and putting it on your website, unless if you want to be penalized by Google for duplicate content. To be considered original, you only need to change about 30% to 40% of the original. Change the title, and spread your changes throughout the entire article.

* Subscribe to or buy intuitive rewriting software

If changing even 30% to 40% of an article is still too much for you, then consider buying article marketing software or subscribing monthly to an article marketing service. A one-off, downloadable article marketing software purchase typically costs HUNDREDS of dollars, while web-based article marketing service typically costs a lot cheaper, less than $30 per month.

In choosing an article writing software, consider how the software works. What you want to work with is something that is intuitive enough to include your most important keywords in articles that still makes sense. So you can happily, albeit automatically, write over and over again.

* Think Of Ego

If I were to sum up writers and their writing, I can put it this way: WRITER+ WRITING= EGO. What this means is that writers are egoistic about their craft. Good writers like to do a good job because it does reflect on them as a professional and, more importantly, as a person. Unlike starving artists, however, writers know the value of their output.

The artistic commodity that is your article can bring in a lot to your sales funnel. You don’t want your writers to write less than their best by undervaluing their writing output. Writers can, and frequently do, change employers as often as website owners and internet companies place advertisements for “good, reliable writers”.

After all is said about the differences in economic status, writers in Asian countries know when they are being paid too low. A word of caution: they can take it personally too. Some writers are not above bashing “cheap” employers in ad posts on Craigslist.

* The $1 Rip-Offs

Going back to $1 Chanel bag, what are the chances that you’re going to get a good deal from it? Chances are, you’re getting a rip-off or a stolen item, which really doesn’t make it a very good deal.

It’s the same with articles. NEVER ever expect a $1 500-word article to be a masterpiece. A $1 500-word article is so-so at best, I know of some website owners who’ve had it worse.

* Everything Can Be Negotiated

Just like everything else, the price for writing services can be negotiated. What you can do is to order a batch of articles and then ask for a discount. Leverage on a steady flow of writing gigs for your writer. Give an incentive to your writer and be creative about it.

When dealing with writers, always remember that respect can do a lot for you.

1. Optimize your articles for keywords.
2. Write headlines that gain attention.
3. Evoke interest in the article body.
4. Call to action (CTA) in the resource box.
5. Get more visitors to visit your article.

There’s a reason why optimization for keywords is the number one step in article marketing. People use keywords to find things on the Internet. And keywords are what you’re going to use to bring your article to your intended audiences.

But of course, delivering the package is only the first step. Keep in mind that so many other competing websites are also fighting for attention, which is why you need to write headlines that grab attention. Headlines are essentially the makers and breakers of articles. If you want people to read your article, then attract them with a very good headline. In article marketing, there are certain types of headlines that grab more attention than others.

Headlines that begin with “The Top 5 Gifts To Give This Valentine” and headlines that ask questions easily grab more attention that others. Other types of headlines that attract attention are commands like, “Learn How To Groom A Dog Now!” and abstract headlines like “What You Should Know About Fluffed Tails and Trimmed Coats.”

It takes a skilled writer to pull off a creative headline. And it also takes writing skills to write exciting content that whets your readers’ appetite enough to make them click the link in the resource box.

When you article has been submitted to the article directories, you need to promote it even further. Keyword optimization within your article will get it ranked in the search engines; however, you need to generate links to your article so that it ranks higher. Thankfully, you can easily do this through social bookmarking. Bookmark your article at sites like Delicious to generate links to it. You can also use resubmit your article to other article directories, but with the link in the resource box changed to the link of the original submission.

If you own a website, you will know that the easiest part of setting up an online business is registering the domain name and associating it with a hosting account. What needs to be done next is something that takes up time, a lot of time: putting content to your website.

What It Takes To Make It Big

The difference between successful websites and crappy ones is great and authoritative content. People will always buy from websites they trust, and you can only create trust with great content.

But without tools for automating certain aspects of content generation, writing itself can become a full-time job. For people who hold full-time jobs and who have families to raise, this is NOT the way to go, because you could end up losing EVERYTHING before making anything on the Internet.

What Takes Times

In writing content, what takes the bulk of your time is the research. Unless if you are already an expert in your field, like a surgeon, there is no way you’ll know which information is valuable in your particular niche, unless if you spend a lot of your time researching. Depending on your research skills and the subject matter, this could take from ten minutes to two hours. Writing a single article takes about 30 to one hour, depending on your writing skills.

While 2 hours is just 1/12 of a 24-hour day, wouldn’t you rather spend it writing your article or doing something else?

You can give yourself more time to do other things by subscribing to paid automated writing tools. They are relatively inexpensive, yet they can save you a lot of time, especially in the research part of writing.

Strangely enough, most article marketing articles found on the Internet rarely, if ever, have that “ah” factor that convinces readers to buy a product or a website. It’s a fact that most Internet users will only pay attention to the top 3 results on search engines like Google and simply scroll down the rest. You’re lucky if your article is indeed on the top 3, but what if you are on the top 4 and downwards?

Think Of Newspaper Headlines

Do you read newspapers? Or do you watch people at a clinic waiting for their appointment with the doctor? The average person will simply scan the headlines until something grabs his attention, then he reads it. Internet users treat search engine results pages (SERP’s) very much like newspapers – they only read the banner headline and scan the headlines of the secondary stories. (Keep this in mind when you feel like simply spinning articles for your article marketing.)

Thus, it is critical to create headlines that grab attention. Like the articles in the newspaper, your headlines will determine if your article is going to be read or not. You won’t get a second chance with your article if you don’t get it and do it right the first time.

Creating The Headlines

In other writing disciplines like copywriting, THE ingredient for success is the writer’s ability to harp on other people’s pain (major, major pain), and offering a solution to ease that pain. This pain-harping ability should show itself first in the headlines. Write headlines from your own experience, specifically, which headlines grab your attention the most?

In general, these are the type of headlines that grab attention in article marketing:

* How-to’s (“How To Win Your Man Back From His Mistress”) * Top 5 or Top 10 lists (Top 5 Things A Woman Can Do To A Cheating Husband) * Headlines that ask questions (Can You Really Live Without Your Man?) * Headlines with a call to action (Fight For Your Man!)

Headlines Are Only The Beginning

Headlines are really just the beginning. You need to support the headline with content that delivers up to its promise of offering a solution to their pain. Give the solution to them freely and repeatedly. For being hogged with information overload, people want something intangible immediately. They won’t be giving you their email address just to get more information.