Recycle Articles for Maximum Profit

Many experienced writers will argue until no end as to whether a beginning writer should work for little or no upfront pay. While both sides may have valid points, the facts remains that everyone has to start somewhere. A new writer may sell their first submission for a few hundred dollars and not sell another one (at an equal or similar amount) for another three to five years. Another newbie may sell numerous articles online (and maybe to a couple of paying print markets) for low upfront payments and continue this way for years as it can be comfortable for some. There is a possibility that they can make the same amount of money as the first writer in the same amount of time.

If you go the latter route, this method works best if your articles for submission are diversified. This gives you the opportunity to flex your writing muscles in other markets and network with others who may help your writing career.

Now some of those experienced writers who look their nose down at beginners taking on low-paying assignments fail to acknowledge that the print market is slowly dying. Anyone can count magazines that have gone belly-up in recent on one hand. If you keep track of the print industry itself, there are many others headed to the periodical graveyard or, like Rolling Stone, have literally trimmed down. Now this is not to discredit the new publications entering the market but chances are they do not have the budget to pay a new writer's rent. Between blogs and other social networking sites, it can be hard for them to compensate the way publications like TIME, People or Women's Day can.

Let's say you've been writing online content for some time and make a decent side income. You probably are writing for companies like Associated Content who have the option to pay upfront or pay by the views your article has received. There are also companies who pay upfront only and pay on a more frequent basis but the downside is not only do they own the rights to your work but the writer does not receive a byline (name credit).

There is a way to make your work earn more for you without creating a conflict of interest with another party.

1. Keep all copy of all drafts and notes on disc. In the case of submissions where a byline is not given, a link to your work online cannot be found so this way, it will always be within your reach.
2. Get a thesaurus or synonym template. Prebuilt templates that come with word processing programs are helpful but when it comes to re-writes, more is better
3. Re-tool your writing for different formats. An essay about women's rights or modern farming can be converted into a how-to and vice versa. Incorporate research you have done for past articles into new ones.
4. Social networking sites such as Yahoo Answers can be utilized for ideas or even creating a poll for statistical data, it does not have to be serious (i.e. what is your favorite ice cream or pizza)
5. Submit previously published works to content writing sites that accept such. There are quite a few of these and keep the ones that pay-per-click as priority. There are some, like Booksie, that do not pay upfront but will accept links and bring traffic to your articles on Associated Content, which result in payment and exposure. These usually require that you have a PayPal account or a Google AdSense ID number (these are easy to get, set up and monitor).

In this economy, everyone is looking to make a few extra dollars but for new or online writers, remember that exposure can add up to payment if you market your work correctly, pay attention to keyword density as well as creating works that are easy for the average web surfer to comprehend at first glance.