eHow writers who have any articles on the site have some choices to make right now. If you were accepted to write for Demand Studios and you want ot move your articles under their control, there is a new set of rules that you must accept. Among them is this: Demand Studios has the right to stop paying you at any time. That's right- for no reason, they can simply stop paying you.
For now, eHow staff members are telling us that you will retain the rights to WCP articles, even after they go to the control of Demand Studios. This will give you the right to publish them elsewhere, but it will not necessarily give you the right to remove your articles from the eHow site once the articles make the migration. And, Demand Studios will retain the right to republish the articles anytime during the next six months.
The alternative is to take your articles down right now. Apparently, you can't do that right now without asking their permission. And, once you ask for permission, they have 10 days to remove the articles.
If you choose to take your articles and run, you have to ask to resign from the WCP and ask them to remove everything. If you haven't been accepted into Demand, I really am not sure what your options are. I think you can leave them under Demand Studios control and continue earning or you can resign.
Personally, I'm unsure what to do. I want NO part of the new guidelines whatsoever. They have even removed the five-year cap on the Demand Studios revenue share articles, apparently after we agreed to five years of royalties from the articles. The new unlimited cap is touted as being "royalties forever," but it really just means that they can stop paying for those if they choose to. I wrote the rev share articles through Demand because I was afraid they'd do something like this at eHow. I'm seeing a pattern here.
*All of this is coming from my reading and rereading the new guidelines. The entire thing is convoluted and difficult to get through and various eHow staff are clarifying it by the hour. And on top of that, all of this is subject to change at any moment and it probably will because that's how this company rolls.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Monday, April 5, 2010
eHow Ending WCP
After several years and a lot of writers finding their SEO footing, eHow is now ending the Writer's Compensation Program. A lot of eHow writers did see this coming, but like a lot of people, I didn't see it coming so quickly. It looks to me like a poorly-written NYT article got to the owners and made them feel self conscious about a lot of the bad WCP articles that were out there.
Here's what this means if you are an eHow writer:
If you have draft articles, you can finish them right now and still get them published. Some people are reporting that they can still create new articles, complete with new titles, and that they are going through. That might be possible for another couple of days. But, if you have draft articles, get them done in a hurry. You have seven days from today.
Your articles will still earn you money. Your articles will stay on the site, and you will still be paid for them.
You will no longer own your articles. If the articles are now being run through Demand Studios, you will no longer retain the rights to them. They haven't clarified this yet, but trust me. It's coming. All Demand Studios articles are bought outright, and their rev share articles are no different.
If you were accepted to write for Demand Studios and haven't written for them before, congratulations. They are sought after by a lot of Web writers because they pay quickly and there is as much work as you want. Here is a look at what it's like to write for them. Actually, this is more accurate, but there are some positives. The pay is twice a week, and you can decide between up-front pay and rev shares. If you write a good number of both, you have money coming in quite often and can buy tons of Cheetos.
Here's what this means if you are an eHow writer:
If you have draft articles, you can finish them right now and still get them published. Some people are reporting that they can still create new articles, complete with new titles, and that they are going through. That might be possible for another couple of days. But, if you have draft articles, get them done in a hurry. You have seven days from today.
Your articles will still earn you money. Your articles will stay on the site, and you will still be paid for them.
You will no longer own your articles. If the articles are now being run through Demand Studios, you will no longer retain the rights to them. They haven't clarified this yet, but trust me. It's coming. All Demand Studios articles are bought outright, and their rev share articles are no different.
If you were accepted to write for Demand Studios and haven't written for them before, congratulations. They are sought after by a lot of Web writers because they pay quickly and there is as much work as you want. Here is a look at what it's like to write for them. Actually, this is more accurate, but there are some positives. The pay is twice a week, and you can decide between up-front pay and rev shares. If you write a good number of both, you have money coming in quite often and can buy tons of Cheetos.
Sunday, February 14, 2010
More About the eHow U.K. Situation
If you talk to anyone who writes articles for eHow, you will undoubtedly hear about the U.K. eHow situation. If you haven't heard much about it, here is the perfect wrap-up of the entire situation. It really is as bad as the article describes. I was happy to get a small payment this month that was to compensate me for the U.K. traffic that stole traffic away from my U.S. eHow articles, but that appreciation lasted only a few minutes.
Based on the last revenue from the site, I believe that a more accurate amount would have been roughly seven times what they paid. Technically, they didn't have to even offer the small amount they did. Or did they?
There are loud cries of eHow fraud and it looks like a class action lawsuit is building. I don't know if it's all just talk, but there's a pretty good case being made in the court of public opinion for bad faith and fraud. I'm not happy with revenue dropping and I'm not happy with the site refusing to answer questions for such a long time.
To top that off, I've had an article stuck in limbo for five days. The "10 minutes" it takes them to approve an article has been stuck at about 24 hours for several weeks now. But, five days? Why should we wait so long? I have one more draft article that I intended to do, and then I think that's it for me for now. eHow will have to seriously clean up its act for me to ever write for them again beyond that article.
If you still like rev share sites and still do well with them, here's an article that I wrote about various revenue share sites and how they work. I recommend all of them except for Bukisa. All of them send me a monthly payment for work that was done long ago- some of them for work that was done four years ago. That's what revenue share sites are all about.
Based on the last revenue from the site, I believe that a more accurate amount would have been roughly seven times what they paid. Technically, they didn't have to even offer the small amount they did. Or did they?
There are loud cries of eHow fraud and it looks like a class action lawsuit is building. I don't know if it's all just talk, but there's a pretty good case being made in the court of public opinion for bad faith and fraud. I'm not happy with revenue dropping and I'm not happy with the site refusing to answer questions for such a long time.
To top that off, I've had an article stuck in limbo for five days. The "10 minutes" it takes them to approve an article has been stuck at about 24 hours for several weeks now. But, five days? Why should we wait so long? I have one more draft article that I intended to do, and then I think that's it for me for now. eHow will have to seriously clean up its act for me to ever write for them again beyond that article.
If you still like rev share sites and still do well with them, here's an article that I wrote about various revenue share sites and how they work. I recommend all of them except for Bukisa. All of them send me a monthly payment for work that was done long ago- some of them for work that was done four years ago. That's what revenue share sites are all about.
Tuesday, February 9, 2010
No Affiliate Links in New eHow Articles
If you have ever used affiliate links to make money online through your eHow articles, the rules just changed. Starting yesterday, no more affiliate links are allowed in new eHow articles. You don't have to take out the old links, and you won't have your old articles deleted for having affiliate links, but no new articles can have them.
Here is the ruling on using affiliate links. The actual rule is the one at the very bottom in tiny print. So, not only is the new rule one that can get your article deleted from the site, it wasn't even brought to the attention of eHow writers. It wasn't emailed to us, and I only heard about it, a day later, from someone else who happened to see it. This is coming on the heels of the whole eHow U.K. fiasco, which I am now hearing is not yet resolved. My eHow payments are actually lower this month, per day, than they were last month when the problem was supposed to have been solved.
The infrastructure problems, the deletions, the U.K. problems and the lack of communication are tempting me to turn away from a site that used to be a fairly fun little money maker. I am still undecided, though. If revenues go back up to what they were pre-U.K., continuing to write for them may end up being worth it.
What are your eHow payments like now? Have they gone back up, or are they tanking like mine are?
Here is the ruling on using affiliate links. The actual rule is the one at the very bottom in tiny print. So, not only is the new rule one that can get your article deleted from the site, it wasn't even brought to the attention of eHow writers. It wasn't emailed to us, and I only heard about it, a day later, from someone else who happened to see it. This is coming on the heels of the whole eHow U.K. fiasco, which I am now hearing is not yet resolved. My eHow payments are actually lower this month, per day, than they were last month when the problem was supposed to have been solved.
The infrastructure problems, the deletions, the U.K. problems and the lack of communication are tempting me to turn away from a site that used to be a fairly fun little money maker. I am still undecided, though. If revenues go back up to what they were pre-U.K., continuing to write for them may end up being worth it.
What are your eHow payments like now? Have they gone back up, or are they tanking like mine are?
Monday, January 11, 2010
U.K. eHow to Take Down U.S. Articles
If you're an eHow writer, you may know that the mirror site, the eHow U.K., has been posting our U.S. articles over there and would not answer the question about whether U.S. writers under the Writer's Compensation Plan would be paid for the U.K. views and clicks. Today, that questions was answered.
It was announced on eHow this afternoon that U.S. eHow writers under the WCP do not get any revenue from their articles that are posted on the U.K. site. Unfortunately, the U.K. site is currently ranking better than the U.S. site in search engine results because it is growing rapidly with mirrored content. It's growing faster, so it's ranking better, taking revenue away from all U.S. WCP writers.
However, with the announcement that we were not receiving any off that revenue came the announcement that eHow will be taking our articles down from the U.K. site. This is extremely welcome news for the many, many eHow writers who had abandoned eHow. Many had actually taken their articles off the site and put them on sites like Bukisa and Infobarrel.
The articles are being taken down incrementally because of the huge number of articles that have been republished there. All of them are supposed to be gone within the next few weeks.
It was announced on eHow this afternoon that U.S. eHow writers under the WCP do not get any revenue from their articles that are posted on the U.K. site. Unfortunately, the U.K. site is currently ranking better than the U.S. site in search engine results because it is growing rapidly with mirrored content. It's growing faster, so it's ranking better, taking revenue away from all U.S. WCP writers.
However, with the announcement that we were not receiving any off that revenue came the announcement that eHow will be taking our articles down from the U.K. site. This is extremely welcome news for the many, many eHow writers who had abandoned eHow. Many had actually taken their articles off the site and put them on sites like Bukisa and Infobarrel.
The articles are being taken down incrementally because of the huge number of articles that have been republished there. All of them are supposed to be gone within the next few weeks.
Friday, January 8, 2010
eHow U.K. and Earnings
As you may know, eHow started a U.K. site, which is a great thing for U.K. writers. But, as it turns out, it may not be so good for us. I am getting Google alerts nearly daily saying that eHow is cloning my articles for the U.K. site. And, as many eHow writers are discovering, the U.K. site is getting a higher page rank than the U.S. site.
How is this bad for us? Well, we aren't actually being paid for our articles that are being put onto the U.K. site. That's right- our articles are being taken and cloned for a site with better page rank and we aren't seeing a dime for it. This is prompting a lot of eHow writers to take their business elsewhere, and I don't really blame them. My revenues have been down slightly since this has been going on, but I will stay put for now. I am making almost as much as before from them.
However, if revenues from eHow fall any further, I may transfer some of my articles to Infobarrel. This is a site that is supposed to give you 75 percent of the Adsense revenue plus Chitika revenue. The site is getting good reviews from freelance writers, though I don't have much experience with it yet. I'm trying out a few articles with them this week to see how they stack up with eHow. If it's better, I'll report back. If it isn't, well, I'll still report back.
How is this bad for us? Well, we aren't actually being paid for our articles that are being put onto the U.K. site. That's right- our articles are being taken and cloned for a site with better page rank and we aren't seeing a dime for it. This is prompting a lot of eHow writers to take their business elsewhere, and I don't really blame them. My revenues have been down slightly since this has been going on, but I will stay put for now. I am making almost as much as before from them.
However, if revenues from eHow fall any further, I may transfer some of my articles to Infobarrel. This is a site that is supposed to give you 75 percent of the Adsense revenue plus Chitika revenue. The site is getting good reviews from freelance writers, though I don't have much experience with it yet. I'm trying out a few articles with them this week to see how they stack up with eHow. If it's better, I'll report back. If it isn't, well, I'll still report back.
Monday, December 21, 2009
Blog Carnival Started for eHow Writers
One lovely eHow writer has started an eHow blog carnival, something that I wish I had thought to do a year ago. I plan on hosting it as well at some point. I missed the Sunday deadline for the next one (oops!), but there are supposed to be plenty more after the next one.
Getting involved in blog carnivals is a good way to build a few links, and it may even bring in a few readers. I have been participating in a writing blog carnival for some time, and my writing blog has pretty good search engine placement, though I don't know that it has brought in many readers through the links alone. If you are already bookmarking to get links, consider finding a blog carnival to get more free links as well as to talk to other eHow writers.
Getting involved in blog carnivals is a good way to build a few links, and it may even bring in a few readers. I have been participating in a writing blog carnival for some time, and my writing blog has pretty good search engine placement, though I don't know that it has brought in many readers through the links alone. If you are already bookmarking to get links, consider finding a blog carnival to get more free links as well as to talk to other eHow writers.
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