I think it’s time to take a step back and look at a site where you can write for profit – without requiring any tech, design, or development savvy. I’ll be working on a complete section about Helium, but in the meantime here’s a quick overview.

Writing for Profit – Revenue Sharing

Helium is another online writing site, similar to Associated Content.

The site is a collection of articles – mostly non-fiction, but fiction and poetry are allowed. It generates revenue through advertising based on its traffic. When you post an article on the site, you carve out a portion of that advertising revenue for yourself.

The basic form of profit on the site is revenue sharing. When you article is read, you get a portion of the advertising revenue that the article’s topic generates. Helium hasn’t released specific details about the monetization formula, but basically more page views leads to more money.

Unfortunately, Helium doesn’t report the number of page views your article gets. It’s difficult to gauge, then, whether Helium pays more per page view than other sites (like Associated Content).

I have a little over 80 articles on the site. Many of these are highly rated – which means they appear towards the topic of their category – but many of them aren’t on highly monetized topics. As a result, I earn an average of $5 per month based on these old articles.

Alternate Forms of Income – Contests and Marketplace

One thing that sets Helium apart is the availability of alternate (and more profitable) sources of income.

At any given time, Helium is usually offering a contest or promotion that can net you a lot of cash. One popular contest format is the “Channel Champion” contest.

A list of topics (20-30) is generated for a given category. Everyone is eligible to write articles in that category for the week, and the most popular author at the end of the week wins a prize. In the past, first place has been $75 and second place has been $25. This can be a good way to build up a repertoire of articles for revenue sharing while also possibly earning a nice bonus.

The most profitable – and unique – section of the site is the marketplace. Publishers come to Heilum and request articles on a given topic. You submit an article on that topic. If your article is chosen, you get paid a premium rate for it. It’s essentially a marketplace for freelance writing.

Although some publishers pay poorly (less than $20 per article), there are many premium publishers. I wrote an article that was purchased for $80, and there are offers available for $100+.

A Final Plus – Community

Another reason I prefer Helium to Associated Content is that there is a strong, friendly community.

The Associated Content forums are generally populated by people complaining about problems with the site. There are some decent discussions if you dig deep enough, but I find little reason to frequent them.

Helium, on the other hand, has worked hard to develop a community within their site. The forums have sections for peer review of articles, suggestions for new features, critiques of the site, and general discussions about writing. Helium employees constantly frequent the forums and you can be assured that any issues you have will be noticed.

Check It Out

The bottom line is that you should check it out. Helium is a great place to start building your online writing portfolio, and it can even net you some real freelance gigs.

The revenue sharing isn’t as strong as Associated Content, from my experience, but you can more than make up for that if you participate in contests and the marketplace. The forums are also a great place to meet up with other writers and practice your craft.

If you’re truly interested in developing as a writer on the ‘net or in print, this is a great place to start. Check it out, and check back here later for a more in depth look at writing at Helium.

Is it for everyone? Perhaps not. It’s got some great features, but it certainly has it’s drawbacks.

Start With the Pros – Great Things about AC

Up Front Payment. This is probably the greatest thing about Associated Content. I can write an article that I know will not garnish thousands of page views – and still get $4 for it. Even if your article is relatively popular and gets $0.50 a month in revenue sharing (~333 visitors), you’d have to wait 8 months to get the same payment.

History of Quick Payment. Easily the second best thing is that AC pays quickly and reliably. If you are paid up front for an article, you’ll receive payment via Paypal within two or three days. Performance payments come out on a monthly basis – all you need is $1.50 for the payment to be released. This is a far cry from other places that require you to earn a lot of money before they initiate payment, and then take 30-60 days to actually get the money to you. If I keep writing, I can expect to see my $20-40 show up in my Paypal account every week.

Accept a Range of Topics. At first, I thought AC would only accept articles that are proven to bring in the search engine traffic. Turns out they’ll publish just about anything. They’ve published a lot of my education articles and some musings on sports – none of which brought in a lot of traffic. But I still got paid for it. Sometimes I actually feel a little guilty.

What Are the Drawbacks?

No Categories. One of the keys to making some real dough on AC is to promote your content. While Associated Content makes an RSS feed that you can spread around, it includes all of your articles. Some days I may want to write about sports, others education, and others web design. It would make the RSS feed much more useful if I could organize my articles into categories and promote them that way.

Poor Forums, Community. I was pretty disappointed with the forum community at AC. It’s clearly inferior to Helium, in my opinion. The forum layout is poor, there’s little participation by the AC staff, and there’s isn’t that much productive discussion of writing and generating income. There are a few nice people out there, but I wouldn’t consider it a great overall community.

Inconsistent Page View Updates. Although AC is very consistent in getting payments out, they’re pretty crummy with updating your page view information. For a while, it was done about once a month. Now it seems to have moved up to once a week or so. Without constant updates, it can be difficult to measure how well your content is doing – and whether or not you’re going to meet your income goals. Daily (or immediate) page view updates are a key, missing feature.

Should You Join Associated Content?

There are certainly some drawbacks to the AC method, and there are just as many great features. Should you join? Definitely.

If you like to write and you’re looking to make a buck, there’s really no reason not to join. If you don’t like the process, you can find something else to do – but it’s worth your while to submit a few articles and see how it goes.

I submitted one article just to test out the water, and I was pleasantly surprised when they offered me payment for it. It’s a great feeling, and it never goes away – even those $4 offers make me all warm and fuzzy inside.

So join up, write an article, and see how it goes. You can always head somewhere else next week, but you’ll never know what you could have done on AC if you never try.

At Associated Content, you can.

Great Place to Start Freelance Writing

What is Associated Content? It’s kind of like a home for wayward and beginning freelance writers.

Anyone – with a bit of writing talent and experience – can come in, publish their work, and make a few bucks. No query letters to write, few rejections to worry about. In some cases, instant gratification.

What’s not to like?

They accept a wide variety of work. Informative articles, how-to guides, and product reviews are among the most popular – but local news, fiction, and blog-like musings are also acceptable.

Get Upfront Payment for Your Work – Unlike Other Sites

One of the greatest things about AC is that you can actually get up front payment for your writing. There are plenty of places where you can publish and get a share of the ad revenue, but there are few places where it’s easy to get something published and actually get a paycheck upfront.

I signed up for Associated Content a while ago – September 2007 – and I’ve been submitting work there on and off since then. As long as I’m willing to do some work for it, AC supplies me with some extra spending cash.

Some of the more devoted content producers have earned a pretty good part time wage with their writing. AC is no get-rich-quick scheme, but for the hard worker it is a great opportunity and a good place to start carving out an income niche on the Internet.

Extra Time = Extra Money, If You Spend it Writing

It’s perfect for fledgling freelance writers, college students, stay at home parents, or anybody else that has a good deal of time spent outside the office. All it takes is an hour or less to bang out an article, submit it, and earn some cash.

So if you’re looking for a place to post your writings, head on over to Associated Content and write an article. Or, go on to the next part of this guide – Associated Content, How It Works.