The Story of My Two Year Online Writing or Hubbing

I have been writing for HubPages since March 2012 under the username ‘sunilkunnoth2012’. So by now, I have completed two years here. On my 1^st anniversary of online writing, I had written an article “Why I Love HubPages-One Year of Successful Hubbing”. The same was well received with a lot of hits and comments from many corners. This is my article on the eve of the 2^nd anniversary of my hubbing experience.

In the article "Why I Love HubPages-One Year of Successful Hubbing", I had written my wish list, I mean some goals, to be achieved by March end, 2014 when I celebrate the 2^nd anniversary of hubbing. It will be interesting to brief you if I achieved the set goals or not. I reproduce below my wishlist (for 2013) and the fate/status of the same is given in bracket.

The Last Year’s Seven Point Agenda

1. Achieve 100,000 hits. (Sure, I did achieve this great milestone on October 30, 2013, five months before the anniversary).
2. Reach author score 90 & above. (Sorry, I didn’t get it. I could gain only 81. It is because of the fact that HP has tightened their ‘author-score policy’. Many good writers’ scores came down from the safe range of 90-95 to 75-85).
3. Numbers of hubs to reach an impressive figure of 100. (Well, it is achieved by 1^st week of March 2014).
4. Try hard to gain Accolade for Level V Commenter /if Possible VI too. (Thank God, I could achieve Level V & Level VI by May 2013 and July 2013 respectively).
5. Gain a total followership of 100. (Achieved on July 5, 2013).
6. 200 questions to be answered. (On March 23, 2014, this target was met joyfully when I got an accolade for 300).
7. Last, but not the least, earn at least 5 $ (yes, five dollars!) as a reward for my hard work. (Here, I am the real winner, as on preparing this article my earnings touched a total figure of $ 205.30). Like hard work, patience also pays!

Thus, I am entering cheerfully into the third season of my online writing or what we call hubbing. I am glad that I had a successful stint here so far. The essential things or dreams of an online writer are a decent traffic and revenue. I think I have got both. By now my viewership is nearly 200,000 (exactly at 198,549) and earnings as already said $ 205.30. So far, I wrote 101 articles (this one is 102^nd), which is 100% as per my scheduled plan. I will hit 200,000 within two days. And that is another happy moment.

So, when I enter the 3^rd season of my online writing, I have set some goals to be achieved. Here is my wishlist for the 3^rd anniversary (to be achieved by March 31, 2015).

• Total followers of 300
• 300 Answers to be created (one accolade)
• 500 Questions (again one accolade)
• Commenter Level VII (If possible VIII too)
• Earnings (payout) to touch $ 600-750
• Reach total hubs 130 (reduced my annual quota to 30 from 50) and
• Try to gain 800,000 viewership (hope to reach 1 million hits within next 18 months!)

As of now, I have written 101 articles, of which five numbers remain not featured due to quality problem. There are three more ‘invisibles’ (read Not Featured) but that is due to low engagement. I am hopeful of making it all back to the featured section within a couple of weeks. I am confident that an accolade for 100 Featured Hubs will soon reach me even though a little more patience, edits, and writings are required for the same.

The Joy of Accomplishment

You will see above that out of my 7-point agenda, I have accomplished 6 clearly. Writing our wish list, working hard to achieve the goals and finally the joy of accomplishment, it is all wonderful and really an enjoyable experience. My dear fellow writers/hubbers let me share with you some of my ideas for a successful landing and staying here.

First of all, you need to set some reasonable goals. Yes, reasonable goals only. Prepare a to-do list for your targets. Write it in a notebook. Do write your wishes as a numbered list or in a bulletin style. Then submit yourself completely for meeting the targets. Later on your accomplishment, you can tick mark the list. It gives you a sort of great feel or relief of achievement as well accomplishment. This will keep your spirit up. Then you feel joy and confident. I did feel it when I tick marked my goal list after it is achieved. Don’t be upset even if you can’t tick mark all your goals. It may be 80% or 50%. Leave it, rearrange your goals with a new time frame. I am hopeful you will get 100% on 2^nd or 3^rd attempt. This must be our New Year resolution. But the valid point is how you devote your time and energy towards the goals!

Keep Two Note Books or Diaries

For hubbing or for any online writing/blogging, keep two notebooks or diaries with you. One for writing articles only. Don’t write anything other than your articles/blogs there. Use the second one exclusively for writing your goals, dreams, achievements, accolades, details related to traffic, earnings and everything related to your online writings. By looking at this book, you can evaluate your progress. You will also get an idea of where you stand at a particular point in time, where you go poorly. Note down the statistics in the weekly report here, which is very much like a progress card. Unfortunately, a lot of people never even read their weekly report. My clear filing of weekly reports has helped me to plan strategies for gaining more. While flipping through the notes, I am amazed to find that my weekly traffic (hub views) was nearly 100 during the initial period of joining HP and now it is around 5000. I look forward to the pleasure of watching it around 7000 a week.

How to Get More Traffic

Hits and earnings may be a great concern for you. But be cool. It will grow eventually. What we need to do is put some drills here. What you have to ensure is establishing your presence here. Attending the forum, asking some questions, answering some questions, read and comment on hubs, share your hubs as well that of your followers, these all will do some wonders. It will reflect in your popularity and finally in traffic and earnings too. You need not be a good SEO expert (I am not at all) for promotional purpose. But do some simple tasks like sharing hubs on some social networks like FB, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. Since HP itself takes some decent efforts to promote our write-ups, we need not care or concern much about traffic.

Care should also be taken for following good hubbers and get in touch with them through comments and fan mails. You can seek help through forum and question sections. When one of my articles stands not featured in spite of my several attempts, I did a trick. I sought the help of a fellow hubber by sending its link. I was happy when I got a reply within hours with some suggestions. I did exactly as my fellow hubber directed and got my hub featured. It will be a thankless mention if I didn’t reveal the hubber’s name here. And this is my justification for revealing that helper’s name here: Marie Flint. Thank you, Mary madam for your support. You were always a supportive hubber.

The Thrill of Earning

Most of the writers work here for earning some bucks. Some earn well and some not at all. Only a few could earn decently and most of the hubbers get a small sum only. Still, people love it just for the reason that gaining even a penny is too a great thing when it comes via writing. Writing is a process of creativity. So whatever earned for the creativity is something special to all.

Though by now I earned above $ 200, I had a time of great struggle here. Since I had narrated that sad story in my last year HP Anniversary article, I don’t wish to explain it anymore. Please read the same. I write these all in detail keeping in mind the struggle and pain of those thousands, who are yet to earn their first payout from HP. It may sometimes boost their confidence. What I advise you be patient and work hard. For me, even to get my ad sense account approved, I had to wait nearly one year. It was rejected three or four times. I again wrote more hubs, worked hard and resubmitted my application. One day when I found that my ad sense account is approved, I was dancing in joy. The excitement was even higher when exactly on 28^th March 2013 when I noticed my first earning registered. It was a mere sum of 0.14 $. There was no end to my thrill then. Then sharply after one year, that is 28^th March 2014, my earnings touched a handsome figure of $ 200.34. What does it mean? Nothing but a simple message: Patience pays! Do your work honestly. Things will come in your favor sooner or later. Be confident and optimistic; success will follow.

Other Benefits

Being a successful hubber/writer is just not making money. It is something more. The first positive thing is a great visibility in the cyber world. I am too delighted with the fact that my username ‘sunilkunnoth2012’ gives me an impressive result when I just give it a Google search. It is not a simple thing. Whatever we do on the net is clearly visible on the search engine. Our write-ups, images, everything is well reflected on the small screen of a PC. Then again we score on other aspects also. Our writing skills, ideas, confidence, friendship, achievements, accolades, traffic, feedbacks, name, fame and everything is showing a healthy growth. It is a fast-forward journey and that too on a positive path.

I have already done a couple of hubs on my online writings, which cover a lot of points, experience, etc., all related to my writing venture. The readers are requested to read all of them as it will give you some vital tips for a successful stay here. I hope by reading the same you can gain some knowledge and it may help you more. I don’t claim I am a great author. I am just an average writer only. I know there are hubbers who write more and earn more. I am satisfied with my humble achievements. What I attempt here is to give you, especially the newcomers, some dose of confidence by sharing my two years' experience. I hope it will benefit you. I will be blessed if it touches you even in a small way.

My love and thanks to all. My prayers to God for making me enable write these lines and more in the coming days.