PureBlogging

One of the easiest ways to break into blogging is to start publishing your work on a site that pays you only in revenue. This allows you to develop an online portfolio of your work which can then be used to gain pay-per-post blog jobs in the future. Blogging for these types of sites generally requires little-to-no experience, is easy to begin doing and lets you test out your voice as a blogger. It also allows you to start gaining exposure for your work without requiring quite as much self-promotion as your own blog would require. Finally, blogging for revenue through these types of platforms lets you start earning ad money for your work without requiring you to know much about inserting ads into your site.

So where do you go to sign up and start blogging for revenue? Here are a few of the sites that are popular among bloggers:

• HubPages. This is the blogging network with which I am most familiar and one which I strongly recommend to others. You can read a whole essay on why that is here but the basic reason is that it’s user-friendly, results in a decent amount of ad money and has a strong community on the site. It’s simple to start earning money on HubPages through Google AdSense as well as through both Amazon Affiliates and eBay Affiliates. Money is paid out monthly through those programs and I’ve never had a problem getting automatically paid for my work.
• eHow. There are some bloggers who love working for this site and the main reason seems to be that they can establish themselves as an expert in a particular topic. eHow has a very specific format to follow for your writing so it’s not a particularly creative outlet and all of the articles you publish here are going to be “how to” articles. The ad revenue is minimal unless you actively promote your own work on the site. However, they do pay out steadily and money is earned in an ongoing system so you can always promote old work to get new income. People who want to get work in a particular area of writing, such as mobile phone reviews, can write a series of related “how to” articles on this site to establish their expertise in the field and will be able to earn some ad revenue at the same time.
• Triond. I am not too familiar with this relatively new site but it seems to be set up in the same manner as HubPages. The people I know who have used this site as a platform seem to be relatively happy with it although I don’t have a lot of details on the way that it works. A cursory glance reveals that it seems to be highly user-friendly with a great interface and therefore has a lot of potential for new bloggers. I plan to check this out in more detail in the coming months.
• Squidoo. There is a major factor on this site that is different from other sites which is that you can donate your earnings on the site to charity. This is great because it encourages people to support your work, may be used as a tax write-off and is just a good thing to do with your extra money. People who want to write about a specific social cause will find this to be the best outlet. It has more publishing requirements (such as article length) than some of the other sites but it’s not hard to meet those requirements.
• Gather. This program seems complicated to me although I know people who have used this site successfully as a way to earn money. It’s easy to publish articles on this site but it seems that you need to be highly, highly active on the site itself in order to earn money through their Gather CashProgram. Like with Squidoo, you can donate your money to charity instead of keeping it for yourself. The writing requirements are minimal compared with Squidoo but the earnings may be less as well. It seems to be best suited to people who really enjoy social networking and who will want to spend a lot of time on Gather doing not just article writing but also engaging in networking.
• Helium. The main benefit to Helium is that they have a marketplace where people who are seeking specific articles can offer to pay you for your work. By writing general articles for Helium, you establish credibility and a portfolio of work on the site. This makes you a better candidate for these paying article jobs. Additionally, you do earn some revenue for the work that you publish on the site.

There are a few things that should be noted when it comes to blogging for any of these platforms. To earn money on them, you need to publish a large amount of content and it needs to really be quality content. As you start to get more experience as a blogger, you may find that you would rather not give a portion of your revenue to these types of platforms when you could be keeping it all for yourself through your own blog. However, there is a community on each of these sites which can be greatly helpful in getting you started earning money as a blogger.

Question of the Day: What pros and cons have you experienced in using any of these sites?

Related links: HubPages, A Better Squidoo?, Helium.com: Is It Worth It?, Write and Get Paid: A Look at 4 Writing Opportunities, and Make Money Writing for eHow