Webupon

The secret of making cash out of writing for the web is following a formula for success.

Building your articles to a template is the foundation you need to build on.

Technique is important. Short, sharp, sentences and alluring alliteration are the tools of the trade.

Quotes and analogies are good, too, so let’s take our first step on the yellow brick road to wealth and happiness.

Here are a few building blocks as a base for your template:

Unlocking keywords

Take some time to find out what’s hot and what’s not on the web by checking out search engines and blog sites like StumbleUpon and Reddit.

Note the keywords and construct your articles around them – webmasters want topical articles that raise their site’s profile. If you’re weaving keywords in to your copy, then your article is going to show higher up web searches than those by other writers.

Keeping your head in the clouds

Tag clouds are like keywords, the larger the type of a word floating in the cloud, the more visitors to the site are searching the term.  Tag clouds are another version of keywords that site owners helpfully stick to give ideas to jobbing writers.

Staying away from copying like the plague

Plagiarism is taboo and sooner or later, anyone who copies someone else’s hard work gets rumbled. Writers who plagiarize lose work, respect and their livelihood.

Banking your articles

One article is not going to make you a fortune. The secret is to build a bank of articles and put them out there for syndication. If you can write two or three articles a day for a few months, looking after the pennies they earn means the dollars look after themselves.

Looking for inspiration

Finding topical subjects to write about is not easy. The web and media is a huge black hole sucking in huge amounts of information every day.

Keep on checking your key words and tag clouds and just sit , write and don’t worry about rejection.
Rejection does not mean you’re a bad writer, it just means that you’re missing your market and need to sharpen your skills.

Writing to length

Most people don’t like to read articles the length of War and Peace on their computer. Have something to say and keep it short and to the point. Somewhere between 400 – 600 words is ideal. Be ruthless and cut out those superfluous adjectives.

Keeping tense

Don’t write about what happened but what’s happening….keep to the present tense. It’s easier to read and is more relevant to the webmasters picking copy for their sites.

Spelling out some basic rules

Editors like an easy life. If you submit well-formatted, spell-checked copy that needs little or no work from them, then you are far more likely to have your work published than some sloppy Joe.

Don’t give up the day job

If you follow the template, you will succeed but you need to be determined and prepared to put in some serious keyboard time.

Few writers make a fortune but a lot make a comfortable living.