Earn Money by Writing articles – Is iWriter an Option? Or Should You Stay Far Away?

There are two ways to earn money by writing articles:

• The good way (as passive income)
• The bad way (one time payment)
• The not so good or not so bad way (oops, that was THREE ways…)

Let me be more clear: The best way to earn money by writing articles is to write once and get paid many times.

But that is not always an option.

So let’s look at when it’s better to get a one time payment for an article, and if it’s worth your time to try your luck at iWriter.

Sara Young Recommends iWriter – Why?

Nobody had told me anything about iWriter, before I received an email from Sara Young that said:

“Can I Hire You to Write for Me?”

Normally, I don’t want to write articles for others, because they might choose topics that I find it boring to write about, and I don’t want to waste my time doing boring stuff. (If I wanted that, I would have kept my day job.)

But the headline sounded intriguing, so I opened up the email and read:

“I’m looking to hire people that can write simple 150–500 word articles for me…

with a dream service you can use anytime you want to earn extra cash.

And there are about 2,400 additional clients who are looking for articles as well.

We’ll pay you for every single article you write. There’s no limit to how much we’ll pay you. Write as much as you can, and make as much as you can.

I figured I’d rather give the work to you than to people I don’t know.”

A few days later, Sara also sent out an email where she invited marketers to use iWriter to get their articles written.

I joined iWriter the same day, but I didn’t write any articles before later. Actually, I wasn’t very impressed by the prices, I saw. “As low as $2 for an article” is written with large, friendly letters on the front page.

Well, I’m not spending my precious time writing for as low as $2, that’s for sure.

Tiffany Dow Doesn’t Recommend iWriter – Why Not?

Tiffany Dow is an internet marketer that I follow and trust. She never hides her opinion about anything, and one day, I noticed a blog post she’d written about iWriter. The title was:

“iWriter – Why Marketers and Freelancers Alike Should Avoid It”

Oh? The place I joined? (At that moment, I’d already written more than 30 articles for them and made a nice amount of money from it. I’ll tell you shortly, why I changed my mind.)

Tiffany Dow doesn’t like that iWriter promotes the site by saying that people can buy “dirt cheap” articles there.

Tiffany was approached by Brad Callen (the owner of iWriter), who wanted her to write a review of the site. Tiffany refused because of the low prices. Then she continues:

“But apparently yesterday they send out an email to the WRITERS on the site (an error perhaps?) and boy did it piss off the people who had signed up to freelance there! (reading on the WAHM forum looks like a lot of people had the same reaction).

The title of the email said, “Where I buy all of my articles and content. Dirt cheap.” Well that’s the way to motivate more freelancers to get onboard, don’tcha think?”

Yes, and no, because as somebody pointed out in the comments to the above mentioned blog post, the prices could go a lot higher.

What This Young Man Said About iWriter – At First – And After He Became an Author There

A young man, who had read some of my posts at the Warrior Forum, approached me on Skype. He asked politely, if I wanted to buy articles from him, because he wanted to make money writing to support his family.

I said, no, I preferred to write my own articles, but I would help him get into contact with marketers.

Shortly after, I heard about iWriter and told him that he could write articles there and make money.

At first, he said no, because he didn’t want to sell his articles for less than $1 per 100 words (which is a fair price).

When I started to write there myself one day, I didn’t really have other plans, I quickly found out that the prices could get a lot more interesting.

• If you became a Premium or Elite writer, you would get access to higher paid requests.
• If somebody requested articles from you directly, you would earn more.
• If you became a Premium or Elite writer, the percentage you earn is higher.

My first articles were about Rift, and they were short 300 word articles. They took me less than 10 minutes each to write, so even though the price wasn’t that high ($2-something), my hourly pay was okay.

Then I wrote an article about internet marketing, and I noticed an interesting request: Somebody wanted an outline for a report.

If there’s one thing I’m good at, it’s outlines. I’ve been writing them since … well, since high school, but in a professional context since 1998. So I wrote it, and he loved it, and he made a personal request for more than 20 outlines.

I began to see new and higher paid requests appear, when I logged in, so I took a screen dump and showed it to my young Skype friend.

He joined.

Shortly after, he thanked me and told me that he’d become an Elite Writer. He was very happy to sell his articles at iWriter.

If you want to read more about how to obtain the best price for your articles at iWriter, read this blog post: iWriter Strategy – Work Smarter, Not Harder.

My Thoughts About iWriter

At first, I found the prices way too low. Some of them still are.

But the thing about iWriter that I like is that if you don’t have other ways right now to make money, you can always go there and see, if there are some interesting requests. If there are, and if you have the time, why not write an article and make some money?

Years ago, I joined services as Elance and all the others, and I often get direct bid requests (notice: BID requests) from people who want 100 500 word articles written by tomorrow at noon, in perfect English, without spelling or grammar errors, and for less than $1 per article, of course.

No, thank you.

I can say no, yes, but one in a while there happens to be an interesting BID request. I go there, waste my time bidding, and then somebody (who wanted less for their time) wins the bid war.

No, thank you.

At iWriter, if I see an interesting request, I can click: Write Aricle, and nobody else but me can write it.

If I do my job well, I sell my article. No haggling over the price. On the contrary – the requester can even offer you a tip, if he really likes your article.

Would I make this my main income source? Absolutely no! It is still to exchange my time with money, and I much prefer to make passive income.

But at the moment, I spend 5 hours in school every day, do my home work afterwards (1–2 hours), go to evening school twice a week (2 x 3 hours), so there is not much time left for creating products.

On the other hand, if I have a free 15 – 45 minutes, I can write one or several articles, depending on their length.

Your Thoughts About iWriter

Now it’s your turn. What do you think about iWriter? Would you use it? Why? Or why not?

Tell me in the comments.