AaronTurpen.com

This is a little different than my usual posts about the business of writing, but it clearly falls into the overall subject matter here.  Most people in the business of selling words understand that a publisher’s primary job is not printing material, but selling (marketing) it.  The writer creates the work, but the publisher finds people who will pay to read it.  Thus the writer and publisher are often two halves of the same grapefruit, so to speak.

According to the Wall Street Journal, however, the profits for publishers are dwindling fast.  Even in books and magazines, where traditional media seemed to have been holding its own (whereas newspapers are faltering).  Ron Adner and William Vincent at the WSJ say that the future of books, especially electronic books, will include advertising because publishers have little to no profit margin in these mediums.

Of course, this is not really all that new.  I have a small collection of pulp novels from the 70s, 80s, and 90s that all have advertising inserts at their centers.  Collectors know, by the way, that these are worth more if they include the adverts rather than if those have been torn out.  Mine aren’t worth anything, really, except that I enjoy the mindless reading once in a while.  I confess to a small horde of Destroyer and Executioner novels.  I especially enjoy the Destroyer series for its humor and surprising philosophic mysticism.

Books today don’t generally have advertisements in them for a simple reason: it’s hard to sell adverts in most books and the ones that could draw advertising dollars are probably selling too well to bother the reader with it.  Those authors, and I’m talking about the big names like Stephen King and Michael Crichton, usually retain a large measure of artistic control over their work and would likely veto any ad attempts regardless.

Electronic books are a new medium that, while it has relatively low costs associated with it, also has a low profit margins to match.  With outlets like Amazon.com selling ebooks at less than paperback prices, it’s no wonder publishers are a little worried.

Ebook reading (thanks primarily, I think, to readers like the Kindle and iPhone) is gaining ground fast as more and more people latch onto this method of absorbing literature.  The market for electronic books has been growing quickly for the past few years.

Some readers, like myself (a confessed bibliophile), will probably never enjoy reading from a screen.  We are, however, becoming a minority as the percentage of Americans who read regularly is migrating more and more towards electronic delivery.

How will this change the printed word?

To be honest, I don’t think it will change it all that much.  Some methods of advertising, such as “push” or forced adverts, will probably create a backlash amongst readers when it inevitably appears in books.  Currently, for instance, I boycott all Disney films on DVD because they force the viewer to sit through their previews despite having paid for the movie on the disc and not the previews that are an advertising bonus (in my mind) to the studio.   Forcing ads between chapters, at page turns, or when loading a book to read would be comparable to that and unacceptable.

On the other hand, having an ad appear tastefully within the text or come up during the book loading (with the ability to skip it immediately) is not so bad.  While it will require some getting used to, I think most people would understand that the price of a cheaper ebook is seeing those ads.  Smart publishers will probably charge a premium for ad-free copies.

In the mean time, those in traditional print media will continue their doom drum beating, telling us all how the world will end because the newspaper and news magazine are on their death beds.  Like any business, publishers have to adapt as times change.  Today, the Internet and instant proliferation of information is quickly replacing the old print-and-distribute method.  A few publishers are or will adapt and continue to operate.  Others will fail.

That’s the biz, sweetheart.

There are basically three general perceptions on the concept of article marketing in general, which apply to you whether you’re using it as a strategy to promote a business or a writing career.  These three thoughts are:

1. It stinks and is a total waste of time and will only earn you a bad name.
2. It’s awesome and is the best way to promote your business for free.
3. A mixture of both 1 and 2.

Personally, I’m a proponent of the third school of thought.  I have used article marketing in the past as an effective marketing method and I have been told that I’m a “spammer” by prospective clients because of my article marketing.  The trouble here is not the articles themselves or even the concept of article marketing, it’s the perception people have of it and some of the less-reputable venues out there that are promoting it.

For the professional writer (or writer-to-be), I can think of no more effective way to showcase your abilities than to write articles for distribution.  After all, if you’re going to make a business and career out of writing, you should focus on promoting your writing itself.  Right?

Article marketing is simply writing an article on a given subject and then giving it away for free reprint in online venues (websites, newsletters, and so forth) in return for having your byline (author’s bio) and link included with the article when it’s published.  There are literally hundreds of thousands of article marketing websites out there and the concept has been around since the early days of the World Wide Web.

How I’ve Used Article Marketing in the Past

I began article marketing in 2000 as a way of promoting my then-fledgling Web design and development business.  When I took the business full time in 2001, most of my clients were found via a mixture of article marketing and freelance job sites.

My article marketing at that time, more importantly than the indirect marketing afforded by the articles for reprint, became a road towards creating my first newsletter in 2002: the Aaronz WebWorkz Weekly Newsletter, focused on small business concerns on the Web.  That newsletter grew to almost 10,000 subscribers over two years’ time and spawned a second newsletter, which was more popular: Aaronz eBay PowerSellers Newsletter.  Those two newsletters had over 20,000 subscribers combined and were published weekly for about three years.

I was writing two or three articles weekly for them, still focused on Web design and development (as well as eBay sales and marketing).  I would publish my written articles in my own newsletters first, then submit them about a week later to various article distribution sites around the Web.  Usually at about the same time the email-published newsletter was published online.

This allowed me to have unique content for the search engines for about a week, establishing me as the originator of the article, and then distribute it for re-use by others.  Today, this model may not work as well with Search Engine Optimization methods, but at the time I was doing it, it was considered cutting edge marketing.

How I Use Article Marketing Today

To be honest, I rarely use free reprint sites or distribution points any longer.  They’re time-consuming, give little measurable payoff, and are over-populated with the latest spammers: article spinners.  These are people who take an original free reprint article (or hire someone to write one), add alternate words/phrases, and send it through software that makes “unique” articles by the dozens out of one written article.  This passes search engine muster to be considered unique (and thus new), even though the article itself is definitely not unique or new.

Article distribution sites are packed with these spinned articles and are therefore generally useless.  Any actual, unique content submitted to the site will be lost very quickly in the crowd.  Even if your content is of higher quality, it’s not likely to get seen by those searching through the reprint site.

So today, while I rarely use article marketing in that sense, I do use blogging on a large scale.  I am the owner of over a dozen blogs currently and am writing regularly for 6 of them.  With the others, I am either paying someone else to write for them or (more often), I am reprinting content from the other blogs I’m writing original content for.

I have also participated in several “content swaps” with other blog owners.  Both myself and the other blog owner will write something original and give it to each other for first publish rights.  I will publish his or her article on one of my blogs (with attribution and link-back, of course) and they do the same with mine.  Then, about a week later, we reprint our own articles from the other person’s site with full link-back attribution.  This creates unique linkage between the sites, fresh content, and great cross-promotion to our respective blog readers.

Paid Article Marketing

Another venue for article marketing that is still legitimate and not crowded with spammers is paid article distribution.  In this model, either you the author pays to have your article listed or (more often), those wishing to publish your article must pay a fee to gain access rights to do so.

The payments screen out nearly all of the spammers and most of these sites have paid editors and reviewers who put human eyes to articles for editorial acceptance before offering them for sale.  I have used two or three of these sites in the past (and continue to do so, occasionally) and have residual sales of articles that were originally written five, six, even ten years ago.

While the income isn’t great (at the scale I use it), I do know of some professional writers who make a huge portion of their regular income through this model.  It’s an easy way to sell articles without hunting down publishers, since they effectively look for you.  Payment per article is not always high (some of mine sell for as little as $1), but unless you’re selling full ownership rights, that payment can compound over time as several publishers purchase publishing rights.

So article marketing is alive and well, but like everything else on the Internet, it has evolved and changed with time.

Once you’ve committed yourself to becoming a freelance writer and have set up your business practices (a plan and your financial bookkeeping), you’ll need to find work so you can begin to generate an income.  Your primary source of new clients and jobs will depend on the type of writing you’re focused on and whether you’re brand new to the business or have already established some connections.

The Newcomer to Writing

I’ll start with the newcomer.  All of us started at this point sometime and most of us made a lot of mistakes as we stumbled through the process of building a writing career.  Just remember that as a writer, you have two assets: your name and your reputation.

The more well known you are in your chosen field of writing, the higher your rates can be and the easier it will be to find new work.  The better your reputation is, the more likely you are to find people seeking you out directly as opposed to having to find new work yourself.

The best advice I can give the new writer is to always remember that your name and reputation are paramount, so always proceed accordingly. Finish the job and do the best work you can every time, no matter what.  Whether the job pays $10,000, $100, or is being done gratis, do your best work.

Here is what you’ll learn as a new writer: this business requires a lot of work.  I mean a lot of it.  Expect to make $1-$5 an hour on average while you’re establishing yourself.  That could take a month or a year or several years, depending on your chosen genre and abilities.  Once you’ve begun to establish yourself, expect the hours to stay grueling, but the money to begin to increase.

There are several avenues for the beginning writer to find publication, but many of them will pay little or nothing at all.  These jobs will usually establish your name and reputation, however, and are a good way to build a portfolio.  To find these jobs, first set up your online profile.

Head to LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and other places on the Web and build your profile there.  Start your own blog, if you have a specific area of interest you’d like to write in.  For instance, to help establish myself as a writer on environmental and eco-technology subjects, I started a blog on Blogger.com (for free) and eventually built a website with its own domain and hosting as the blog became popular and I became more well-known.  You can view Aaron’s EnvironMental Corner to see what I’ve done, if you’d like.  Blogging puts you out there regularly and allows you to flex some creative muscles that you might not get to do with paid projects for other people.

To find places to get published and begin building your name, start with blogs, non-profit groups in your area of expertise, and your local newspaper.  There are thousands of publications out there that are struggling to get established or are on a very low budget who will be more than happy to use your writing if it doesn’t cost them much.  These usually “pay” by giving you a link-back in a small author’s bio.  To utilize that, make sure you have a website, a LinkedIn or Facebook profile, etc.  Twitter is best used to promote your writing once it’s published.

On of my early biographies to appear on articles I wrote for small publications looked like this:

Aaron Turpen is a freelance writer living in Wyoming, USA. He writes on several subjects including the environment, alternative-fuel vehicles, and politics. You can find him on his website at www.AaronTurpen.com.

Note that while the bio is simple, it contains enough information to tell people who I am and what I write about without appearing to be a sales pitch.  Shorter biographical blurbs are more likely to be used by editors than are long, wordy ones.

Once you’ve begun building a portfolio, you should begin looking for paying jobs.  We’ll get to that next.

The Established Writer

If you’ve already established connections in the writing/publishing business, you can probably leverage those towards more work.  Most of my work, for instance, is by referral and from repeat clients.  Even those of us who’ve been doing this long enough to have connections, however, will need to sometimes find new business.

As an established writer, you should have already done the things I’ve outlined in the above section for new writers.  If you don’t have any networking set up online, you should start right now.  It’s amazing how often otherwise unrelated links between one or another of your social networking profiles can end up panning out.

Not long ago, I was working for a guy in California and had a hole in my schedule to fill and make some extra money.  I mentioned this to the client, who put it on his Facebook Wall.  Someone in his network saw it and clicked over to my Facebook profile.  She sent me a private message and asked if I would be interested in writing a short series of articles on a particular subject.  I took the job.

Without social networking, I would never have linked up with this woman and gotten that job.  Since then, I’ve had people approach me through both Facebook and Twitter and, in fact, one of my steadiest sources of traffic to my personal and professional blogs is from Twitter.

Next week, we’ll look at how to find work when your network and connections aren’t paying off or if you’re new to the game and haven’t established a robust network of contacts and colleagues.