Trying Out Rumble as a Platform For My Audio Dramas (Join Me, Won't You?)

Folks who've been following my work for the past year have probably come across some of the audio dramas I've been making. Most of them are smaller things that only last a few minutes, such as Shining Armor, my story about mech pilots fighting genetically-engineered dragons, or Russian Roulette, a dark little drama about a former hitman taking a deal with a devil to avoid dying, and to get revenge on his former boss. Those appear on the Azukail Games YouTube channel (which you should definitely go follow), but I've wanted to do something bigger, and more involved for a while.

And while I've had a few false starts, I figured that I'd try it over on Rumble. So if what I'm saying in today's post sounds interesting, consider following me at The Literary Mercenary, or signing up using my referral code.

Before we get into the nitty gritty this week, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter to get all my updates right in your inbox. Lastly, to be sure you're following all of my followables, check out my LinkTree!

Lastly, don't forget to check out my Vocal archive for additional fiction, articles, explorations of weird history, and more!

Seeking Alternatives To YouTube

This isn't the first time I've talked about this issue, but I'll sum it up for those who haven't seen me touch on this before. In short, while YouTube is the biggest, most dominant platform on the market, it has a pretty high bar for a lot of folks to actually make money. Until you have 1,000 subscribers, and 4,000 hours of watched content in the past year (or roughly 11.5 hours of watched content every, single day for 365 days), you're not going to see a single cent of the money your content makes. And make no mistake, it is making money, because there's still ads on it... it's just that YouTube puts that money right in their pocket.

Now, making a living off of YouTube even after you're monetized ain't easy either. With so many people using ad blockers, you basically need to drag down hundreds of thousands of views a month just to pay your rent if you're depending on ad revenue. But that steep cliff on top of working for months (or years) just to be allowed to start getting paid is like running a race, but starting several laps behind just to get to the starting line.

However, on top of all of that, YouTube uses Google AdSense to pay its creators. I am not allowed on Google AdSense, so even if I managed to jump through all of those hoops, I'd get nowhere because I couldn't be paid.

And that's... not great.

I've been looking for an alternative platform for a while, and while they do exist, most of them came with other challenges that were deal breakers for me. Some only allowed you to get tipped by viewers, or to sell access to your content, rather than letting you get paid by ad views, meaning that if your audience was broke they couldn't help you pay your bills so you could keep making stuff. Others promised to pay you, but only in cryptocurrency. Last Fall I gave DailyMotion a try, and while it had a much gentler bar of entry, the site turned off a lot of folks due to glitches, format, inability to turn off autoplay, and so on.

It was thanks to A Vox in The Void (who has dramatized several of my Warhammer 40K stories) that I found out about Rumble at all.

In short, YouTube was labeling some of the channel's work as for mature audiences only, but there seemed to be no real rhyme or reason for this decision. Particularly the short story Fangs Out, which is basically Top Gun but with orks, which didn't have any objectionable content... particularly when compared to some of the other, more grotesque stories on the channel that were left alone. Frustrated by the situation, Paul decided to put some of his work over on Rumble to try it out, and I figured I'd do the same just to see what sort of results I'd get. Also, while you're there, follow A Vox in The Void's Rumble page!

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

So, what does Rumble have going for it as a platform for creators?

First off, there's no monetization hoops to jump through. Right out of the gate, your work can start paying you. Once it's reviewed, it gets a Monetization stamp (this can take a few hours or a few days, depending on), and then your traffic starts generating you income. No hoops to jump through, no subscriber count you need to hit, no "proving" you're a real creator, just hit the ground running. Secondly, Rumble is not an exclusive platform. So if you already have a YouTube account, or even a DailyMotion one, you can keep your content on multiple platforms without too much issue. This was an issue for DailyMotion, as YouTube is not an option if your content is hosted on DM, or vice versa.

There is another side to this equation, though.

Chances are that if you're reading this you probably haven't heard of Rumble. YouTube is the biggest game in town, and a lot of folks don't seek out other platforms, assuming that if you're worth watching/listening to that you'll be on the big stage. So you're drawing from a smaller pool of people, and you aren't going to have those algorithms working for you to shuffle people onto your page, holding them face down in your content. For newer and smaller creators, you probably won't be able to tell the difference. However, Rumble is also tougher to market in a lot of places, as some sites have it banned, and even where it is allowed there aren't the large, heavily-populated groups like you'll find for YouTube creators.

So if YouTube isn't an option for you, Rumble might be worth checking out. If you're on YouTube, but either are having trouble getting monetized, or you are monetized and want to double dip, it might be worth trying.

What about the big, dangerous shape in the room?

There is something of an elephant in the room... literally, in this case.

In the interest of full disclosure, Rumble is a platform that lots of people have come to because YouTube was censoring them. Some of those creators, like A Vox in The Void, were just dealing with the difficulties of what words can be said, what topics can be discussed, etc., and those things being inconsistent in a way that hurts their bottom line. However, there are no few creators on Rumble who appear to have been actively kicked off of YouTube, and they were looking for somewhere else to go. Many of these folks are very right wing, and a lot of them wind up on the front page of the site.

You can't always choose the company you keep, and YouTube certainly has its own problems with right wing figures, conspiracies, etc. But when the pond is smaller, the sharks are more visible.

I felt that was worth mentioning, particularly knowing my audience.

Again, if you're looking for an alternative to YouTube, my experiment with the platform has yielded positive results so far. If you want to check out my content, follow me at The Literary Mercenary. And if you want to give it a try yourself, sign up through my referral link so we can both keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Like, Follow, and Stay Tuned!

That's all for this week's Business of Writing!

If you'd like to see more of my work, take a look at my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife as well as my recent collection The Rejects!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

As An Author, Be Realistic About Your Return on Investment

Being an author isn't easy. You need to be able to produce work on a regular basis, market yourself to both employers and an audience, and you need to find some way to carve out a tiny niche for yourself while an army of other writers are out there trying to do the same. It's sort of like being a literary prospector, and if anyone gets close to your claim, that's when the shovels and shotguns come out. In that kind of environment, it's very easy to get used to just saying, "yes," to any project that comes your way.

The next time you're about to agree to a project, though, stop and ask what your return on investment is likely to be.

How many doubloons are supposed to be down there?

Always Think About Your ROI

Think about this scenario, for a moment. A client comes up to you and says, "Hey, I know you're a busy writer, but I really need a 500-word article for my magazine. If I get you all the information, could you get a completed piece to me by the end of the week? I'll pay you $50 for it."

For most of us, that sounds like a pretty sweet deal. All the research is done for us, the word count is pretty reasonable, and we've got a nice, fat price tag attached to it. However, would you do that same project if you had to have it handed in by tomorrow? What if you had to reach a 1,500-word count? Would you do that same article for $10, instead of $50?

Yeah, no, I'm sort of busy with people offering me grown-up prices right now. Best of luck!

It's very easy to get into the habit of just saying yes, especially if you don't have a lot of prospects in your work life. However, if you have a lot of stuff to do, then you might want to start trimming off the ones that aren't giving you back what you put into them.

Be Realistic With Your ROI Expectations

In the above scenario, ROI is pretty easy to figure out. You have a select price for doing the job, and you can easily weigh how much you're going to get out of doing it. If that price isn't enough for all the effort you'd have to put in, then it's time to move on to another job that's more fitting in terms of effort and reward.

However, this can get complicated when we start chucking in royalty shares, pay based on traffic, and a slew of other scenarios.

Go with the sure thing, or roll the dice and hope for the best?

This one can get tricky. For example, you might spend a year writing a novel, and another three years getting it published, only to have it earn no more than a few hundred dollars in sales. Alternatively, you might write a blog post that gets a lot of attention, and which flares up every year or so, giving you steady (if unexpected) influxes of cash and followers for no more than an hour or two's work.

Sadly, the only real way to navigate these waters is experience, and a pessimistic look at prospects.

As an example, let's say that you are contemplating submitting a 10k-word short story for an open submission call. That's a hefty chunk of work for any writer, and you're going to dedicate a lot of effort to getting that piece done. But, assuming your story gets accepted, ask what you're likely to get as a result of that acceptance. Does the publisher have a good track record for sales, or are they small, new, or relatively unknown? Do you have any big names in this collection that will draw eyes from a big fan base? Is the book widely available, or do you have to go to a dark, obscure corner of Amazon to even find the ebook? Are you being offered an advance, or are you and all the other authors just expected to split the royalty sales at the end of the year?

These are all questions you need answers for. Because if this company puts out books that regularly score in the top ten categories for sales, then you might be looking at several years of steady checks. Especially if there's a big-name contributor, like Stephen King, who will get people to pick up the book based on the strength of their brand alone.

*Ahem*

If, on the other hand, this company is just taking whatever stories it can get, splicing them together, and spitting it out onto the market, then you are not likely to get more than a check or two. Worse, those checks are probably going to be too small to get you a cheese burger off the dollar menu. Ditto if the company offers very little support in the way of marketing, reviews, etc., and you don't have the audience strength to make sales on your own.

Spend Your Efforts Wisely

There is more to being an author than money. Sometimes it's about the satisfaction of working on a particular project, the good feeling of doing something for charity, or the street cred that comes with being attached to certain names. However, you're using a very specific kind of alchemy. So ask yourself how much time, effort, and creative juice you're willing to use up on a project before you get too invested. Otherwise you might find yourself writing ad copy for less than a penny a word, and you won't have the time or energy left over for anything else.

That's all for this week's Business of Writing post. It's likely old hat for a lot of folks out there, but a reminder from time to time never goes amiss. For more content by yours truly, check out my Vocal archive, and follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter. Lastly, if you want to support me, head over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page, or click this link to Buy Me A Coffee! There's a free book in it for you, too, as a thank you for your help.

How Much Impact Does AdBlock Have on The Creators You Follow?

Let's be honest, most of you use AdBlock in one form or another. Some of you might not even know that there are usually about 4 ads on a given Literary Mercenary article (two embedded in the right column, and two that comes in from the wings to the left and right). Now, those ads might clutter up the screen a bit, but they don't pop-up over the text, and they aren't sneakily trying to squirm under your mouse. You have to go outside the borders of this post to put your cursor on them.

But I get it. I really do. No one likes ads, and if you can put up a wall that stops you from ever having to look at them, why would you make an exception for just one page?

AdBlock is like a phalanx. One hole, and it crumbles.

Well, if you're not overly concerned with the people who make the content you're enjoying, then there is nothing I could say to convince you to be selective with your AdBlock. However, if you want to support the people who make the things you like (even if it's for the selfish reason that they'll keep making more stuff if they're supported), you might want to consider making an exception or two.

Why? Because I think you sincerely underestimate the number of people who block ads, and how big of an impact that has on creators.

Herd Immunity, and Making Money in The Age of The Internet

Since we all had high school science, we should be familiar with the idea of herd immunity. When you vaccinate an individual, they receive a weakened version of a disease, and it allows the body to fight off the infection by developing antibodies. It is, in a sense, the training wheels for how to fight a particular condition. This stops the person from getting sick when the real version of that disease comes along. Pretty basic stuff.

Of course, some people's bodies cannot deal with vaccines because even the weakened version of the disease will overwhelm them. So those people who cannot be vaccinated depend on all the other members of the herd to get vaccinated, and to act as a barrier for the disease. Because if there's a layer or three of people who won't get a disease, then the vulnerable people behind them will be protected as well.

What about when people stop vaccinating?

Herd immunity only works, of course, if everyone who can vaccinate does it. The fewer people who do, the more gaps you find in your protective barrier. Then diseases can slip through, and run rampant. Which is why there are diseases that had nearly been eradicated in the United States now surging back to prominence (and killing a whole lot of defenseless people who should have been vaccinated).

What does that have to do with the ads on the blogs, videos, and other pieces of content you ingest on a daily basis? Glad you asked!

Picture a constant stream of people flowing into a stadium. Perhaps there's a sporting event taking place, or there's a political rally, or the circus is in town; whatever is going on, people want to see it. What's even better is that there's no cost for admission. All you have to do is walk through the gate, and take a pair of glasses. These glasses don't stop you from enjoying the concert, or hearing the latest rallying cries, but they do allow you to see the ads posted along the walls, and up on the screens. For every person who sees those ads, the arena gets paid a crowd attendance fee. This lets them keep putting on shows without charging anyone for tickets.

Now, one or two people might decide not to take a pair of these glasses. They get the same show as everyone else, but they aren't distracted by all those pesky ads. As long as most people take a pair of the glasses, though, the arena is still going to be able to keep doing its thing. Especially if it's filling seats to capacity. The problem comes when too many people don't take the glasses, and thus aren't counted for the purposes of attendance. They don't see the ads, it's true, but even if you pack the seats, the arena only gets paid as if it had fifty people coming to the show.

That might not be enough attendance to make a profit, and if it keeps up for long enough the arena might have to shutter its doors.

In this metaphor, the arena is the website you're viewing. Putting on the glasses is your willingness to view the ads that actually pay that website's content creators and staff. Because wearing the specs might be inconvenient, but isn't it a small price to pay for getting all this great stuff for what amounts to "free," even while the creators whose work you enjoy are still getting paid, thus allowing them to keep making stuff for your enjoyment?

How Bad Is AdBlock, Really?

Maybe you think I'm exaggerating. After all, there are still plenty of people who don't block ads, so you shouldn't feel obligated to make exceptions in your ad-free life. On the one hand, you're right. Viewing ads is entirely your choice, and if you have the tools not to see them then you have the ability to skip past those annoyances. But choosing to do so is not consequence-free.

Though it might feel like it, from where you're sitting.

As a for instance, one of the ad programs I use is InfoLinks. I get a daily update from the company that tells me how many impressions I've had, and what I've earned in terms of ad revenue. I have two blogs on that account; this one, and my sister blog Improved Initiative.

Now, I've had this ad program for about two years and change now. The problem I kept experiencing was that the traffic Blogger said I was getting did not jive with the numbers I was being given by InfoLinks. We're not talking small discrepancies, either. More than half my traffic was missing from my daily reports. So I set up a Google Analytics account to track it from a third source, hoping it would explain the difference. According to Google, Blogger was right. So why is it that when an article like The Tale of The Black Samurai (Yes, There Really Was One), posted on my other blog, earns over 2,000 views on its own, but my daily views for the entire blog come to barely 560 hits on InfoLinks?

Because that is the number of people who use AdBlock software. Blogger and Google Analytics count how many people came to my blog that day, while InfoLinks only counts the number of people who saw my ads. It isn't just a few people sitting in the stands enjoying a free show; it's the majority of the people who walk through the doors. Because on that day where InfoLinks said about 560 people saw my ads over on Improved Initiative? I had over 3,500 hits that day. So instead of earning a couple bucks, I was given a single, shiny dime.

That was one day. Taken over a year, that kind of traffic would earn me over $600 if everyone was viewing my ads. In reality? It takes me about 15 months to earn $50.

Why Are You Laying All This Guilt On Me Because I Hate Ads?

While it might seem like I'm trying to lay blame on people here, I'm not. If you have the ability not to watch ads, you are welcome to use that ability. However, it is also a fact that by not allowing those ads to stream, you are taking money out of that creator's pocket. By withholding your view, they can't count you when it comes time to settle up with their ad revenue at the end of the month.

And that has an impact.

Judging from the numbers, only about 1 in 6 people who view Improved Initiative actually see my ads. Here on The Literary Mercenary, it's only about 1 in 8 (my most recent post generated about 450 views, but InfoLinks only counted about 55 of them).

Jumping those hurdles is like entering the pole vault, mistakenly thinking you're supposed to do a high jump. It isn't going to happen.

What Are You Comfortable With?

This is one of those times where I ask you, the reader, to look at a situation, and make a serious judgment. Is your comfort more important than the artist you like making a living? Because it's easy to think to yourself, "they don't need my views. There's plenty of other people looking at those ads." Which is a variation on, "I don't need to vaccinate my kids. Everyone else will do it."

Well, they're really not.

Well, what do you want me to do about it?

All I'm asking is for you, and all the readers who come across this post, to ask themselves what they're comfortable with. I, and the hundreds and thousands of other artists and creators across the Internet, depend on you for a paycheck. The reason we put ads on our blogs, or our video channels, or our art pages is because we still need to get paid, but we don't want to beg for money from everyone that passes if we don't have to.

Sadly, we sort of have to.

Now, there may be some readers who are much more comfortable just putting money into a creator's tip jar instead of watching their ads. This allows them to say, directly, that they like this person's work, and they want to see more of it. If you're that kind of person, and you don't want to deal with my ads, then I'd ask you to please stop by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a patron. I don't ask much, and if you pledge at least $1 a month then I'll also give you some sweet swag as a way of saying thank you.

Alternatively, if you're a fan of a creator, you should buy the stuff they put out. I write books, like the steampunk noir short story collection New Avalon: Love and Loss in The City of Steam. I put out new stuff with a fair amount of regularity, too, so you should consider checking my Amazon Author Page if you like my work, and want to support me. Read a book, leave a review, and tell your friends; I wouldn't feel bad at all about someone who chose to do that, but who didn't want to put up with the hassle of my blog's ads.

If you don't want to do those things, though, and you come back to a creator's page to devour all their content with every new update, then it might be time to make an exception for their page on your AdBlock. You don't have to, of course, but if you don't, then what are you going to say when that web comic artist has to start doing one update a month instead of four because she had to get a 9-5 job? Or when that gaming blogger cuts posts from twice a week to once a week to focus on other projects you're not interested in, but which comes with a paycheck attached to it?

It's all about the money, and you're the one holding the purse strings. You get what you pay for... literally, as well as figuratively.

That's all for this week's Business of Writing post. Apologies if it felt like I was taking a truncheon, but this is an issue that still rages online, and it's one a lot of people aren't aware they're participating in every day. If you want to stay on top of all my latest releases, then why not follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter?

Want To Make More Money With Your Blog? Try Sovrn

So, as most of you know, I was a big fan of Yahoo! Voices (once known as Associated Content). I had an archive of about 400 articles on there, and around the time it closed its doors I was finally pulling down triple digit royalties. When that vanished, though, I had to pick up the pieces and find new homes for my old articles. A number of those posts wound up getting reposted in my InfoBarrel archive (which is still trying to make up lost ground), and some of them found new homes on the two blogs I run. Some of them vanished into the ether, never to be seen again.

Trust me, not all of them were worth saving.

It's taken three years or so, but I'm finally getting to the point where the loss of Yahoo! Voices is just a bad limp, instead of a crippling strike to the knee. However, there was something special about that site.

It paid you based on your traffic, not on the number of ad clicks you got.

Getting Seen to Get Paid

Anyone who blogs is likely familiar with the way providers like Google AdSense work. You place their ads on your blog, and then you wait for one of your readers to see an ad they like. The reader clicks the ad, and boom, money in your bank. As systems go, it's fairly simple.

In order for this system to work for you, though, you need to have a colossal amount of traffic. You also need to make sure your traffic doesn't use Ad Block, or a similar program to stop your ads from displaying. Lastly, you need to make sure the people who come to your page see ads for things they actually want. Managing those first two steps is hard enough, but the third one can be nearly impossible.

That was what made Yahoo! Voices such a great site. It provided huge reach, a lot of visibility, and you got paid a set fee for every 1,000 views your articles got. You didn't have to worry about people clicking your ads; they just had to see them. That was particularly useful when I'd put out a new article, and it would get 30,000 views in the first week. These days getting that kind of traffic is rare for me, but even if I did manage it, it wouldn't do me any good.

Until recently, anyway.

What changed, you might ask?

I say this because I recently added Sovrn ads to my blogs. I've used a number of ad services in the past, including Chitika, InfoLinks, Google AdSense, and others, but all of them worked off the same model I mentioned above. If no one actually clicks-through on your links, then it doesn't matter how much traffic you get.

Sovrn is only concerned about your traffic. So if you command a huge audience, or a post goes viral, you get paid for being a billboard.

Now, if you're a blogger like me, that probably sounds pretty sweet. You don't have to wait for the slot machine payout of getting just the right person to come to your blog, who just so happens to be looking for a new set of shoes, or a coat, or a particular book (since most ads will try to display something based on the viewer's search history). You just need to get them to come check out your site. That's it. As long as the ads display, you get paid.

If that sounds good to you, check out Sovrn to get started today. I'm glad I found out about it, so I thought I'd do my part and share it with all of you, too.

Also, if you're not a blogger, but like the idea of earning money off writing articles, you might want to check out an older post Make Money Writing (By Joining InfoBarrel.com).

Thanks for tuning in to this week's Business of Writing post. If you'd like to help support me and my blog so I can keep useful information coming your way, stop by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page. As little as $1 a month can make a big difference, and you get a free gift as well! Lastly, if you haven't followed me on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter yet, why not start today?

Why Patreon is a Lifesaver For Authors (Like Me)

People who look at my resume may wonder why it is I urge people to support me on Patreon so often. After all, I run two blogs, I have an entire archive of work at Vocal, I have a respectable body of fiction on the market, and I'm constantly producing content for game companies. Why do I need you to donate $1 a month to me?

It's pretty simple, actually. None of that other stuff comes anywhere close to paying my bills.

Pennies in the jar add up, but you don't cover your rent that way.

If you'd like to understand why, I'll start at the top, and work my way down.

Ad Revenue (And Why It's A Drop in The Bucket)

First, my two blogs. Both The Literary Mercenary and Improved Initiative have ads on them. You'll see them, if you don't have an ad-block program on. While this blog only nets between a dozen and a few dozen hits a day, my gaming blog tends to fluctuate between 300 and a few thousand hits. Depending on what I've said lately, and whether the Internet has taken offense to it, or not. And that sounds impressive, but when all is said and done, an average day nets me about $0.08. From both my blogs. On days where the social media community has fixated on my latest post, and the flame wars are burning hot, that might get as high as $0.50. One time, I pulled in a whole $1.00!

What I'm saying is that ads earn me next to no revenue. Worse, I need to get that revenue up to at least $50 before it shows up in my bank. So, unless I manage to divert a four-lane highway of traffic onto my blogs (which happens from time to time, but pretty damn rarely), it takes me between a year to a year and a half to get an ad payment.

Isn't there a better investment out there?

But what about Infobarrel? After all, I have a respectable archive, and it's growing every month. Surely with thousands of hits, there's a viable check coming from them?

Yes and no. Infobarrel does pay me more than I make with my blogs' ads, but it's a matter of degree. You see, on an average month, the traffic I net there earns me between $10 and $17. Some months it's been as high as $20, due to total flukes in viewership. Again, though, it has a $50 payout, so I'm getting an average of 4 checks a year from them. While it's true that more content will generate more traffic, the total amount of ad revenue I make between this site, and my blogs, is enough to buy about half a tank of gas.

Would that change if I had more traffic? Absolutely! But if getting more traffic, and more followers, was something I could pull out of a hat I would have gone through my closet and wrecked my haberdashery some time ago.

Royalties

There's just something nice about the word royalties. A sort of ring that you don't get from any other source of income. Despite the size of my Amazon author page, however, it's more like one of those royal families where the name is impressive, but the fortunes are all but nonexistent. Part of that is because most of the books that pay me royalties are anthologies, so an already small percentage of the earnings gets diced into an even smaller amount before it gets handed my way. The other part of it, though, is that I'm really not all that famous.

Most conventions I attend, I'm affectionately referred to as, "who?"

That is not to say that I don't sell books. However, most of my sales are made in-person, where I can talk to readers, and intrigue them with my pitch. While I pick up the occasional random sale online, and get a positive review from the ether every now and again, my personal royalties are so small that if I wanted to pay a bill with them, I'd have to save all year to do so.

Of course, if you'd like to read a free sample of New Avalon: Love and Loss in The City of Steam, you might find it's just the thing for the steampunk noir lover in your life. But if traditional fantasy is more your thing, check out my novel Crier's Knife instead!

What About Freelance Work?

This is the bulk of where I make my income. I write a great deal of content for RPGs, and you'll find my name attached to projects like Feats Reforged IV, The Demonologist, and others. In addition to working for half a dozen RPG publishers at a time, I also ghostwrite and freelance blogs for a lot of clients. On average I write at least 3 freelance blog entries every day, and I tend to put out RPG content at least once every two months. Sometimes faster, unless I find myself up to my elbows in a project with a particularly large word count.

Those of you skilled in pattern recognition likely sense a "but" coming.

The problem with freelance work is that you get paid on acceptance, or in many cases upon publication. So, while I can easily complete a $250 assignment in a weekend (with the proper supply of caffeine and someone to occasionally wipe sweat from my brow), I might not see that check for six months. So, while I do make the bulk of my income from jobs like this, it requires me to have so much content going out that there is always a check from something coming to me. Even if that check is for something I wrote so long ago I completely forgot about the project.

Sometimes that works. Every now and again it works beautifully, and I get a string of projects all clearing at once. There's a lot more famine than there is feast, sad to say.

And That is Why Patreon is So Important

One of the common themes of all the sources of income I've mentioned is that they fluctuate based on my audience. So, while it's possible I could write a blog entry that goes viral, post an article that gets a huge amount of traffic, or become an overnight bestseller, that's the same as saying it's possible to pick the right slot on a roulette wheel. It can be done, and if it makes me a small fortune, so much the better. It hasn't happened yet, though I keep spinning.

Patreon is different, in that it is more reliable. My Patreon payment comes in on the same time every month, and I can easily calculate how much I earn based on the current support level of my patrons. While it can and does fluctuate (new patrons come, and sometimes old ones decide they can no longer afford me), I always get a warning when changes are made.

And then I know when I need to gear up to rob another bank.

This Isn't All About Me, Either

I've been talking a lot about myself in this entry, but that isn't because my situation is special. If anything, it's because my situation is fairly typical. Most creative professionals have to take a similar, patchwork approach if they want to make ends meet. So, if you see someone who makes something you like, and they have a Patreon page, it's because they need your support. Trust me, if we didn't need money, we wouldn't have a tip jar out on the counter.

For all those who liked today's post, let me know in the comments below. Like, share, and if you've got the spare scratch, why not drop by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page? $1 a month makes a huge different, and it gets you a free book! Lastly, if you haven't followed me on Facebook, Tumblr, or Twitter yet, why not start now?

Don't Wait Until You're "Good Enough" To Get Paid

Over the past several years, I've met a lot of people who wanted to build careers as entertainers. Sometimes they were going it alone, and other times they had collected a group of like-minded creatives who wanted to combine their efforts to build something bigger. Almost universally, though, these seemingly very serious people operated under a faulty belief.

That belief is that, in order to build an audience and a career, they had to provide completely free content with no attempts to make money for a certain period of time.

Because otherwise it's prostitution? Or something?

I'm going to repeat that, just to show that it won't make any more sense a second time through. There is a genuine belief among authors, video creators, bloggers, podcasters, and a whole bunch of others who legitimately want to turn their creativity into a career, that they have to operate for an arbitrary amount of time, or collect an arbitrary amount of followers, before they're allowed to make money. As if there's a magical point where you've proven yourself worthy of trying to earn money from your own efforts.

Let that sink in for a moment, and ask yourself if any other self-employed person would even consider embracing this logic. If someone painted houses, would he print up a bunch of flyers, business cards, and buy all of the necessary tools and equipment, then paint houses for free for a year just to prove he's good enough to be paid for it? Would someone running a landscaping business insist on building up a client list of 50 people before asking to be paid for all the work they were doing? No, because not only is that a great way to burn yourself out and dig yourself into a massive hole of debt, but it's stupid. No one would do that much work for no earning potential.

So why do creative professionals think they have to?

If You're Going to Get Paid, Then Get Paid

It's hard enough making money as an independent creative professional without forcing yourself to do it for nothing in the name of paying your dues, or perfecting your skills, or whatever excuse you're giving. If you're going to make a career out of your art, whatever that art happens to be, you need to be just as serious about your money as you are about the things you're creating.

Money isn't something you play around with. You won't have that much of it.

For starters, most of the ways that you get paid as a creative professional either cost your audience nothing, or are totally voluntary. If you put ads on your blog, or if you are included in the Youtube ad program, then that won't get in the way of most reader's experiences (provided, of course, you avoid tiresome pop-ups and ads that make loud noises). If you set up a Patreon page, then it's up to your readers whether or not they want to fund your efforts (incidentally, if you become a patron for The Literary Mercenary before 2016, there's two ebooks in it for you!). Heck, you can even put a tip jar on your blog (instructions here) so that people can toss you a little green when they feel you've done a good job.

Even if you do all of that, though, it's going to take years for you to build up a big enough following to start realizing a profit. Making a real living practically requires you to be struck by viral lightning.

But People Love Free Stuff!

That's true. However, it takes a colossal amount of work and effort to make people realize that art doesn't just grow on trees in the first place. Now try giving people free art for a year, getting them used to getting all that free art, and then asking to be paid. Some people will support you, either by pledging cash, putting up with your ads, or leaving you tips. Others will scoff at you, demanding to know what makes you think you're so special that you should make money doing this?

Chances are good, though, those people would have reacted the same way if you'd asked up-front.

You made it, and you deserve to be paid for it. You put in the time, and the effort, to create content that your audience is consuming. It has value, but giving it away without asking anything in return creates the illusion that there is no value. And it doesn't matter if you try to make money right off the bat, if you wait six months, or if you hold off until you have a thousand followers, the reactions won't be any different. If anything, they'll be worse, because suddenly you went from an artist who selflessly didn't make any money, to someone who now expects to be paid.

If you're going to try to make money later, start doing it now. Waiting does nothing but empty your stomach, and pour cool water on your fire.

All of that said, thanks for stopping by and listening to yet another of my hopefully helpful rants. If you'd like to get your two free ebooks, then become a Patreon patron today! All it takes is $1 a month to keep great content coming your way. Also, if you want to be sure you don't miss any of my updates, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter!

Wil Wheaton is Right: Authors Every Year Die of "Exposure"

Authors, and really creative types in general, are used to be treated like some bizarre kind of second-class citizen when it comes to our work. On the one hand, people love and value what we do, assuming the existence of movie theaters, book stores, art galleries, comic books, and all the other things produced by creative people and devoured by the populace for entertainment are a guide to go by. On the other hand, no one seems to want to pay for it.

This situation flared up again, when the Huffington Post contacted geek demigod Wil Wheaton and asked to republish a piece that he wrote. For exposure. You know, in case you didn't know who he was, or something.

Huffington Post: An Artist's Interpretation

What Happened?

So, here's the way things went down according to Mr. Wheaton's blog post on the subject. An editor from the Huffington Post contacted him, and asked if he would be willing to let them re-publish his article "Seven Things I Did To Reboot My Life". It's a solid piece, it generates lots of traffic, and it makes sense that the Huff Po folks wanted to get in on that. Wil said sure, that sounds great, what sort of payment are we talking about? Huff Po's answer included terms like "unique platform" and "wide reach".

Boiled down, the answer amounted to, "we're not going to pay you for it, but we're going to put it in a place where a lot of people are going to see it, and we'll make a lot of ad revenue from it."

The Literary Mercenary's Post-Engagement Breakdown

I made my feelings known on this issue pretty clearly over two years ago in my entry Professional Rule #1: Never Work For Free. However, because of the nature of this particular incident, I feel that more than a blanket statement about how creators need to pay artists the value of their work is necessary.

Value will vary, based on work.

All right, let's rewind back to the beginning of this sorry situation. We have an article that's been written by Wil Wheaton, who is a celebrity with a known fan base. That's important to mention because when you have someone that's a Name, with a capital-N, that person brings a guaranteed readership to the publication. It's why reality TV personalities and rock stars get book deals with no questions; publishers know they are going to move copies based on that person's name. So, we have the winning combination of a well-received article, and a famous author.

That's a solid one-two punch from Huff Po's perspective. If they can get the go-ahead to reprint this, they're going to see a jump in traffic. More traffic means more advertising, and more advertising means more money for them. In case you were wondering, the Huffington Post is valued at several million dollars. Also, in case you were wondering, they pay exactly $0 of that to their contributors.

Put another way, that's like Random House asking to republish a novel from Stephen King or George R. R. Martin, and then paying the author nothing for either the rights to the book, or royalties from its sales. In short, the Huffington Post is sitting on a mountain of advertising money that comes from the ads on their site, but when it comes time to compensate the people making that money by creating the site's content, the company line is, "you should just be happy we're putting your work in a place where so many people will see it!"

That takes balls.

Not just because you're telling your authors, who are making you money through their sweat, effort, wit, and audience clicks that you can't afford to pay them, even though you're a multi-million-dollar website. Publishers can set up whatever pay structure they want, and if you approach them as an author you're pretty much agreeing to play by their rules. No, this took balls because Huff Po knocked on Wheaton's door, said, "that's an awfully nice blog entry you've got there. Would you be willing to give it to us so we can make money off of it without sharing any with you?"

What Needs to Change

In a nutshell, authors need to get a slice of the pie.

My go-to example here is a platform like Infobarrel (if you're curious about what I write there, here's my archive). While it isn't as big as the Huffington Post, and certainly doesn't have the reach, what it does do is cut its writers in on the site's profits.

Here's how it works. Authors create content, and the content is then posted on the site. Infobarrel tracks the views, ad clicks, and all the other activity that goes on during the month. At the end of the month it splits the money each article made, keeping a portion for itself, and giving the rest to the author who is responsible for the traffic. So, if you join the site, write an article, and your post goes viral, generating millions of hits over the next month, then you are going to have your rent, food, and possibly a small vacation, taken care of. Not only that, but the site is also going to see a big influx of cash. In a situation like this, everyone wins!

There is, of course, no guarantee that using a site like Infobarrel, or Helium, or whichever other sites are still online, is going to mean money in your pockets. After all, there's no guaranteed way to predict whether your latest makeup tutorial, movie review, or explanation of the behind-the-scenes causes of World War I, is going to be a huge success. However, the more content you produce, and the bigger your audience grows, the more likely you are to bring in regular traffic that makes you, and the site, money.

Paying authors will probably cut down on the number of Ocean's 11-style heist plans, if nothing else.

There are, of course, a thousand different discussions branching off this main one. For example, should authors be paid up-front for their work, especially since there's no guarantee it will be a traffic magnet? Should authors with a bigger fan base or following be paid more, regardless of their skill? What, precisely, are we using as the basis for when authors are being taken advantage of?

Actually, I have a simple answer for that last one. If you want to take an author's hard work, and then use it to generate a profit, but you are not willing to pay that author in any way, shape, or form besides allowing them to sign their name to the piece, then you are exploiting that author. Pay them by the word, share your ad revenue, and by all means try to get a good deal on the work, but do not simply swipe it, post it online, and then roll around in the money like some kind of political cartoon.

As always, thanks for stopping in. If you'd like to help support me and my blog, then stop by The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page, and drop a dime in my jar. If you want to make sure you don't miss any of my future updates, the please follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter!

Make Money Writing (By Joining InfoBarrel.com)

When I was in middle school and adults asked me what I wanted to do for a living I told them I wanted to write books. They laughed and told me with an imagination like mine I should have no problem, but that I should have a normal job as well. All writers, or so they assured me, had to be teachers or garbage men or something until they became famous enough to live purely off their books.

This ladies and gentlemen is what we refer to as Grade-A Bullshit.

If there's one thing I know, it's bullshit.

If you want to follow in the footsteps of such luminary authors as Stephen King by becoming an English teacher and writing in the copious amounts of free time you'll have (if you aren't laughing you've clearly never seen how time-consuming teaching actually is) then by all means do so. If you think you've got the drive and sheer balls to hold down a day job and then spend hours a night banging away on a keyboard then I salute you.

This post isn't for you.

This post is for people who want to make money writing interesting articles. It's for people who want to take a chance that the fickle finger of the Internet gods will fall on them and fill their bank accounts to bursting (or failing that at least give them enough money to pay bills with a little cash left over). It's for people whose eyes light up when they hear the word royalties and who see no reason to start earning them years from now instead of right now!

Let Me Tell You About InfoBarrel

Some of you have likely looked into websites that will pay you to write before coming across my blog. HubPages is perhaps the most popular website out there, but its competitors like Triond, Xomba, and even Helium.com are all ready and willing to take your content and publish it for you. The problem with these sites is that if you don't have a Google Adsense account then there's no way you can get paid.

That's what makes InfoBarrel different from other sites.

That, and the fact that they pay you in cash instead of promises.

At a glance InfoBarrel is just like any popular site out there driven by user-created content. You set up an account, and start writing articles. InfoBarrel puts ads on your articles, and based on how well they perform you get paid. Some of the ads need to be clicked by readers, and some of the ads just need to be viewed a certain number of times, but whenever you meet the threshold you have money in the bank.

The site has two ad tiers; Tier 1 which is Google Adsense ads, and Tier 2 which is miscellaneous ads.

I Thought You Said I Didn't Need Google Adsense?

Keep your stockings straight, I'm getting to it.

In case you're not a regular reader I'll give you some background. Up until late 2014 I had a Google AdSense account of my own, and it was tied right to this blog. Then I was kicked out of Google's super-secret clubhouse, and told that I can never have an AdSense account ever again. You can get the full story on that right here. I also had over 400 articles on Yahoo! Voices when that site shuttered its doors in August 2014 (which cut another few hundred bucks out of my monthly earnings), and I needed a place to put them.

I had an InfoBarrel account from several years ago, so I fired it back up and started posting.

For the first two months I received Tier 2 earnings only, which amounted to a little over $5 or so. I went to my user account, agreed to the latest terms and conditions, and then clicked the Advertising Profile tab and enabled First Tier Ad Management.

And then money?

The way Google AdSense works is that Google tracks everything with your account number on it, tabulates your cut of the advertising money, and then kicks it to you on a monthly basis. If you don't have a Google AdSense account then you can't use any website that works with Google to pay its writers. How First Tier Ad Management works is that you are joining a collective AdSense account for all the authors on InfoBarrel that have also clicked that little box. Infobarrel manages the AdSense for all the views on all your pages, and at the end of the month you get your portion deposited into your account.

In this way you can make AdSense money without needing to have your own personal AdSense account.

What Can I Write About?

Anything you damn well please, within reason. When creating your content you need to write about something interesting, which is going to be just as relevant in five years as it is tomorrow, and which has pretty pictures in it (seriously check out the image I used for The Succubus. It's no wonder it pulled over a thousand hits). Whether you're a fan of history or celebrity trivia, cars or life hacks, you can put up articles about anything as long as it doesn't advocate violence, show people how to do something illegal, and wouldn't be considered pornography.

If you're looking for examples check out my InfoBarrel author page and read some of my posts.

How Much Can I Make?

Depends, how many page views can you get?

InfoBarrel is just like any of the aforementioned sites in that you are there to get your ads seen. That means you need to have thousands of hits per month (or per day if you can swing that bat) in order to hit the $60 minimum payout (don't complain, Google AdSense's minimum payout is $100).

It also depends on how creative you get.

There are a lot of ways to start stacking greenbacks in your account. One way is to create a lot of content so that you'll get a huge amount of page views just be sheer weight of numbers (this is kind of how Dean Koontz got rich). Another method is to create very targeted content that will have a lot of appeal to a certain demographic; flower arranging, green energy home solutions, tabletop roleplaying guides, all of these are meant to pull in people who share a narrow interest. Some people just hope they become a viral sensation, bringing in a few hundred thousand hits with nothing more than luck and the power of zeitgeist.

Will you make enough to quit your job? Not for a long while, barring some stunning luck. Will you be able to create an income stream that will help support you and which can win you a bigger audience?

Yeah, you should be able to manage that.

If you'd like to join Infobarrel today just click my referral link!

If you'd like to support the Literary Mercenary then stop by my Patreon page and become a patron today! Seriously, as little as .50 per entry or $1 a month can make a big difference when everyone works together. If you want to make sure you don't miss any of my updates then make sure to follow me on Facebook and Tumblr!