Publishing Your Own Blog vs. Writing for Paid Writing Sites

I used to think that writing for paid writing sites is more advantageous than creating content for your own website or blog site. Owning a website means buying a domain name and leasing for a hosting service, both of which involve cost. To an independent publisher and author like me, that is something I would want to avoid. Besides, I am not a web developer and hiring one entails more expenses than just buying and leasing.

Now, if you compare that to writing for a "paid" writing site, those hassles are all at the bottom of the bin. You just register for an account, similar to what you would do when creating a web-based email and, "Voila!" You can now write your content and get paid via the pageviews (so they claim).

Also, publishing your own blog demands patience. What do I mean by that? Well, if you intend to earn revenue from your own content, then that means placing ads on your webpages. The thing is, ad networks will require you to wait because they will need to review your site and content before approving your application to place their ads on your pages. Mind you, such gestation is not just about days and weeks, but months and years even.

So, I started my online writing stint by penning articles for writing sites that promised revenue sharing by the amount of views your content would be getting. Some of the veteran bloggers and online publishers out there might say that, in blogging, money should not be your primary purpose – otherwise, you will just be frustrated. The thing is, if there is no money out of it then it will just be a unpurposeful hobby – a waste of time and mind effort. As a former employer of mine taught me about business ventures, "You have to distinguish a profitable endeavor from just an exciting but expensive hobby."

My keyboard pounding adventure with writing sites went well for a few months. Eventually, some of them closed down; the site owners realized that they could not sustain their business model. While some others, decided to change their rules on how to cascade revenue to their writers, making it impossible (at least for me) to get paid by the number of readers my articles were getting. Thus, my quest to earn some bucks by putting my ideas into readable content went stale.

So there it goes. Should I stop my online writing stint right there and there? Or should I continue? Surely, you must know now that there has to be something rewarding to fortify my resolve to scribble words into sensible essays and narratives. Without it, I would more or less find another hobby that looks more fruitful than blogging.

As I said, buying my own site domain and leasing the service of a hosting provider are not an option for me as they involve expenses. There are a quite a few hosting and blogging channels out there that allow users to blog and upload content for free, but only Google's Blogger allows for revenue generation. This obviously puts all of my choices down to one.

So here I am blogging about the many pesky miseries of daily living with the attempt to squeeze inspiring stories out of them (you should read the About page, if you are doubtful about it). As you can see along the articles of this site, there are ads in them. Albeit I needed to wait for the ad networks to approve of my site, I can say it was worth it. Besides, it did not take years but just a few months (lucky me). :)

Suffice to say, I realize that publishing my articles in my own blog site is more beneficial than submitting them to paid writing sites. I am not subject to any editor review because I am my own editor. Most especially, I get my revenue solely as my own.

Unless they deliberately ask me to write for their websites with a reasonable fee, I guess I am going to stick to writing for my own blog site and earn my fair share of money from the Web.