Writing Your Way Into Residual Income

Do you like to write? Do you know HTML? Can you upload files? That’s pretty much all it takes to earn residual income on the internet. Any additional skills learned along the way will only be a plus. The internet has a host of information and will teach you everything you need to know to make money and become successful at it.

Let’s take this a step at a time:

THE WRITING PROCESS:

If you like to write, write a few articles. What to write about? Well, here’s my theory. There are four areas to think about to help you begin writing:

1. Write about what you know: In my case, I have over 20 years of commercial insurance experience. I’ve written several articles about insurance. No, it’s not my favorite topic, but it’s what I know and I have earned residual income from that knowledge.
2. Write about what you want to know: I want to know more about health, fitness and healthy eating so I write articles about it. I research, learn and share my knowledge with anyone who is willing to read it.
3. Write about what you do: I’m an at-home mom and freelance writer. I write about what I do. I write about the way I save money and share tips on frugal living and housecleaning and other such topics.
4. Write about what you observe: I write about things I observe/experience. On my site, I have a blog called My take on it where I write about what I observe/experience. Basically it’s a humorous spin on life’s foibles.

THE WEB PROCESS:

Now that you’ve got the writing thing down, next find yourself a free web-hosting site. Don’t get too panicky if you don’t know how to set up a website. Many of the hosting companies have templates you can choose from, or you can learn basic HTML commands by searching the net. I even have a tutorial on my site with HTML basics.

When searching for a free web-hosting site, make sure you select one that allows you to place ads on your site. Here are a couple that I found in doing a preliminary search:

http://quipis.com
www.ctrlalthost.com

I’m not endorsing any of the hosting companies. I suggest you do your own research to make sure you find one that you feel comfortable with.

If the thought of putting together a website has you feeling overwhelmed, start with something easier like a blog. A blog takes minutes to set up and you’ll be up and running in no time. Here are a few free blogger sites:

wwww.blogger.com
www.sixapart.com
www.blogmonster.com

SETTING UP THE INCOME EARNING PROCESS:

The next step after finding your web host and placing your content on the web, is to go to www.google.com/adsense and sign up for a Google Adsense account.

Google Adsense is an advertising program that will display content sensitive ads on your web page. In other words, an article about dogs will render ads relating to dogs and dog products. You have quite a bit of control as to where the ads appear and how they look. When readers click on an ad, Google will be deposit money into your Google Adsense account. The number of visitors to your site is a large factor in determining how much residual income you will make and strategically placing the ads is another factor.

Think about it for a minute. If you get a free web hosting site that allows ads, or a free blogger site, you can place your Google ads and reap in the money at no cost to you. It does, however cost you time in writing articles, or adding quality content. But, if you’re a writer and are honing your skills, you’re going to write anyway. Why not make money while doing it?

INCREASING THE INCOME EARNING PROCESS:

My preference is to create a full-blown website rather than a blog. Aside from the fact that I haven’t quite mastered the blogging schedule, I prefer a website to a blog because of the increased number of pages which in turn increases the likelihood of web exposure and thus residual income. For example, on my site I have 11 sections. Each section has several pertinent articles relating to the section topic. The more articles I add, the greater the likelihood of Google Adsense clicks.

In addition to articles that I’ve written, I’ve added free articles written by other authors. These authors write free articles as a way of increasing their exposure. The only caveat is that you must include their bio and the link to their site. It is a great way to build quality content for a web site. I usually get my articles from e-zinearticles.com

On each page of my site, I have inserted Google Adsense ads in the right hand column. The right-hand ad column fits in well with the site’s design. It may or may not be the most lucrative place to put the ads, but you’ve got to make a decision as to what is more important: Your articles or your ads.

My site, as of this writing, isn’t extremely popular. One has a Google rating of 2/10 (which sure beats the 1/10 it had a few months ago) and the other has a rating of 3/10. Some days my ads hit $4 a day and other days as low as 12 cents. More recently I’ve been averaging $1 to $1.50 per day (This article was originally written in 2006, things have changed quite a bit since then). Very popular sites may average hundreds of dollars a month (something I hope to see).

Here’s a serendipitous side effect. If you’re a freelance writer and you wish to bid for freelance writing jobs, generally you have to show samples of work that you’ve done. If you have your own website, you’ll be able to use your own articles as writing sample.

I landed my first off-line freelance writing job with a national publication that way. I believe that if I had not had my own site with my own articles to use as samples, I might not have gotten the gig.

This is just one person’s thought on making residual income on the internet. You definitely won’t get rich quick, so don’t quit your day job. However, if you’re serious about writing and looking to make a little extra money, you’ve got nothing to lose. Let’s face it, once the article and ads are in place, the major work is done. The rest is getting folks to read your articles. Hopefully they’ll see an ad that interests them. If they do, it’s money in your account.

December 2011 Update: In revamping my site I came across this old article.  I’ve come a long way since then. My residual earnings are averaging a little over $100 a day.  It took a few years to get there, but I’m here and I intend to keep moving  forward. 

Filed in: Freelance Writing