Work from Home as a Freelance Critic

Many of us would consider ourselves experts in something, would we not? I consider myself an expert in online marketing and web content creation, but you may consider yourself an expert in baking, online education, parenting, or whatever. With all that expertise floating around in your head, why not monetize your credentials and start a local critic blog. You could critique anything you wanted, as long as you got the chops to back it up. For example, with my expertise in online marketing and content creation, I could review sites like AssociatedContent.com, HubPages.com, or Factoidz.com, just to name a few.

The secret to succeeding as a critic is honesty. Whether reviewing the local bakery, pet groomer, or cool new product to hit the shelves, make sure to keep your reviews honest. Some bloggers make money by reviewing products for money, except the person buying the review usually only buys good reviews. I avoid these types of arrangements because they just seem kind of deceiving to readers, but in most cases buying favorable reviews is pretty much legal. The only bad thing is that these sites eventually get revealed to be the scams that they really are, once readers realize that everything their writer types seems to be wrong or misguided.

You don't have to sell good reviews just to make a few bucks. There are plenty of ad revenue platforms, like Google's Adsense and AdBrite, that pay site owners (like you, once you get your critic site online) to post ads relevant to the content of the page. For example, if the content of your page focuses on computers (since you're a computer critic), the ads that appear on your page after joining an ad network like the ones listed above will be only computer related. Site owners usually have the option of also being able to accept all sorts of ads on their site, not just ones that are related to the subject of the site. Ads may appear as banners surrounding the text of your critiques, or, if you wish, you can also include contextual advertisements, which appear as sponsored hot links in your text.

Whatever the subject of your critiques, be sure to keep thee frequency of critiques fairly regular...with a new critique at least once a week, if possible. Your readers will enjoy being able to look forward to your next critique if they know when to expect it.

Drum up support for your page by looking for readers on the various social networks, like FaceBook and MySpace, which allows members to connect based on interest in specially designed virtual groups of like minded individuals. Just find the appropriate group for the subject of your critiques and spread your link around to a few members at a time. Be careful not to do this more than a couple of times a day, since many social networks may consider sending constant friend requests to be spam.

To get started, simply conduct a web search for free site or blog hosting platforms that will let you earn money from the ads posted on your site. Blogger and Weebly are two that I can think of just off the top of my head, but there are many more out there.

Generating any serious revenue will take time, since your revenue will depend on the amount of readers who visit your pages. Don't forget to spend time distributing links to your site to keep your readership up. The more links you distribute, the more potential readers you're creating for your site.

If you remember nothing else about starting as a freelance critic, remember these two things: Never stop marketing your site and keep your site honest.