It's not much of a choice, is it?
I cannot remember when last, if ever, I received $3.23 for a week of viewing. I have $49.10 owing to me from last month and the month before, and some $13 earned this month.
Compare this with something like $17,000 made in the last 3 weeks through my writing. You will forgive me, therefore, If I just deleted all but two of my articles from Hubpages. I will leave those two here as a service to those tourists who need to know about the transport services available in Cape Town, South Africa.
I also confess to feeling some embarrassment at the ads that dominate my article. I am a serious writer, focusing on ethics and intellectual issues. The last thing I want to do is appear in something that looks like a tabloid.
At the risk of getting chucked off Hubpages, I will say that I don't think my writing is going to be doing much good here anyway. That wouldn't be because it isn't being read. I can see from the poll figures that my articles are being read. Nope, it's because I think that the parent company is increasingly going to be paying writers less and less, and if I was desperate, maybe I would stay. But I'm not desperate. I'm earning enough to live.
Anyway, just thought I'd say my bit.
$3.23 in 7 days? Wow. There was a time that for the same articles a few years ago, I was earning 3 figures.
It does seem to be about time that TAG and its affiliates felt some much-needed backlash for their poor operations decisions.
I agree wholeheartedly with your assessment, Tess, and I'm equally as concerned. Let's see how it all plays out.
Congrats to you; those earnings are remarkable. With 12 million views here, that's probably as much as I have earned in10 years.
Medium has a different method for writers to earn. One can sell through affiliate marketing, but I only do a bit of that. Mostly, I earn through Medium directly, plus through patrons 'donating' to me every month. I have a bunch of people who donate money to me every month - some up to $100 and others making one off donations of a few thousand. Then, I have my books which sell rather better than they used to because I've written about them on Medium, and that drives people to buy my books.
I do want to point out that I write in a very specific niche, and the kind of people who read what I write are a small demographic. It's just that most people don't write for that demographic, and it tends to be well educated and moneyed, so that comes my way. I am deeply humbled by it all.
Sounds like a good move Tess. I too have been complaining about all these intrusive adverts splattered all over my pieces - even with the ads switched off! I was advised by Hub support to "get an ad blocker"!
All the best, DM
What is the use of an ad blocker? One doesn't look at one's own stories. This is for readers out there who come to one's stories and then go away because there is too much intrusion.
Your analysis of your earnings is just a tad misleading. When someone says that they earned X amount from their writing, they are usually talking about earnings directly from articles they have written.
Earnings from Patreon and Kofi are not usually counted as "writing" earnings because those earnings are subscription earnings that result in a monthly income whether you are actually writing or not.
So you might more accurately say that you earn 3 figures with the occasional 1k month from your actual writing and thousands from subscriptions on Patreon and Kofi.
The reason that I bring this up, is that people looking for places to earn from they writing see that you say that you earn thousands and may not delve into the details you provide in the breakdown of your earnings.
I''m not quite sure what you're saying. I'm not selling subscriptions. I don't write newsletters. There are certainly people on Ko-fi who are doing, but I am not.
I write on Medium. I have a note on the bottom asking for patrons - either on Ko-fi or Patreon. I give absolutely nothing in return other than I write most days on Medium.
People gift me because they like what I wrote.
I was very clear about how I earned what I did, and make no mistake, people will not give you once off donations or monthly donations if they don't like what you write.Or if you stop writing. So your point that they pay you whether you write or not is mute. They will just stop their payments if you stop writing. Why does it matter if people chose to pay you a monthly fee because they enjoy your writing?
I'm just curious why you think that I'm not being paid for my writing. Of course, I'm being paid for my writing. Just in different ways. I'm also sure that lots of people don't care how they paid, so long as they are paid.
Actually, I did not write my reply for you. It was to clarify what you wrote to the people reading this thread. I don't want them to join Medium thinking that they are going to earn $17k a month and then when they earn pennies as most Medium writers do, wonder what they did wrong.
They need to understand that you earn $17k a month from subscriptions to your Patreon and Kofi. You only earn a few hundred dollars a month from your actual articles on Medium which is still much better than most Medium writers but a far cry from $17k.
No, I don't earn $17K a month from my subscriptions. I said that so far this month, I had received that much. I have had one-off donations for about $14.5K (these are not recurring), monthly donations payments on Patreon for $370, monthly payments on Ko-fi for $120.
My subscriptions are, then about $500 per month. That's it. It's the one off donations that are the bulk of what I receive.
That said, there are people on Patreon who are earning $25,000 per month writing fictional web series. i'm going to be starting that, and I have every confidence I will do well. I am, after all, primarily a fiction writer.
As soon as I've settled into my new home, I have ever intention of writing a novel and of doing a web series. I feel confident that while I have always had the skill to do these things, I have lacked the platform. Now I have it.
Caren, you are right about one thing. This is not something that happens to everybody. I've just been very lucky these past six months. That's it. It could happen to anybody, but it seldom does.
My point is that I see no reason to write on Hubpages if my takings are $3.23 for a week when I am taking some so much elsewhere. Add to that, the uncertainty of the platform, and I would hesitate to put any effort into it.
With regard to my articles on Medium, I won't stay on the platform forever. I'm determined to branch into fiction. It doesn't have the sort of come backs I've had to endure for years.
All of these things are educated guessed, calculated bets. I think I have a 75% chance of achieving what I set out to do. I know it might not come off, but I have the funds to do the marketing, so I'll try.
When they are too embarrassed, unconcerned or ignorant to tell us how we are paid, then it is time to consider alternatives.
It leaves one to wonder, are the pageviews and impressions being reported legitimate.
Sad.
I have questioned that for a few years now.
Agree that earnings here are dismal at the moment but that's amazing to hear you're earning well as a writer! If you don't mind me asking, can you share what avenues are earning you so much elsewhere?
The best way for writers to earn now is by offering something that patrons would like to support. If you recall, in the 19th century, artists had patrons. That has now become an accepted idea by the general public as a way of supporting artists.
I use Ko-fi and Patreon. On it, I have people who will pay me as little as $1 per month, while some pay me $100 per month. Still others (very few, but they are there) will donate once off 4-figure amounts.
That's where about 70% to 80% of my income comes from. The next biggest section comes from people reading my articles on Medium. Medium earnings have gone down for most people, and mine hover between the 3 figures and 4 figures. Last month I hit 4-figures, and as I'm on $936 or something this month so far, I think I'll probably finish on about $1200.
Other than that, affiliate marketing and my books bring in a small regular amount.
Thank you for sharing your experiences of writing on different platforms. It is an eye opener and has given me the wake up call to spend less time writing articles and more time researching the best places to write them on.
Wow thats mean even medium is paying its writers well than HP. I dont know why HP is doing this. My earnings are getting lesser and lesser with each month. I think its the time to think for medium.
Remember you need to write regularly on Medium to earn (depending on topic, if it's popular it may be re-read/shared). Also you don't earn from external, non-member traffic.
Yes, but you can earn through other means - which hubpages does not allow.
I don't think that Medium is necessarily paying its writers better. It is giving them more opportunity to earn in different ways. They can use affiliate marketing (to a degree). They can sell courses or promote themselves. They can add links to sites where artists and writers can ask for patronage, etc.
As with all writing sites, a few writers float to the top of the earning tree and tend to earn most of the pennies.
Thank you so much for taking the time to share, Tess. It sounds like you've worked very hard to build your base.
I have in one way - that I kept on writing. I also tried different platforms and different mehods. I've had some people with me for 14 years, and they have followed me from platform to platform, so I know that once readers like what you write, they do follow you.
Interestingly, GA shows no drop in views from UK readers visiting my articles, even though they haven't been shown ads for the last 4 days or so. Possibly though GA still registers views for readers that back out within the first few seconds. I think slow image loading on mobile devices and page responsiveness might be more of an issue. The orange line in the graph below is the UK traffic. Most people probably use ad blockers too. Impressions should be several times higher than views because as I understand it, an impression is when someone sees an ad. If there's lots of ads on a page, there should be multiple impressions per view. For me however, impressions are about 60% to 80% of views.
Those are good points. Do you think that the use of ad blockers is higher now than it was 2 or 5 or 10 years ago?
I don't know. Chrome has a blocker built in I think. I don't know whether it's on by default.
Its not on by default. 2021 they estimated that 27% of users have ad blocking software turned on. 50% of those users are in the 16-24 year old age group. So if you write on mature subjects up to senior topics you should have a 15% of your pageviews as an ad blocking user group. Your earlier comment about impressions is a good question. My impressions are half of my pageviews. That is impossible, unless slow ad load speed means no impressions.
Ads can be very slow to load. On my phone it can take 10 seconds or more. So if I user doesn't stay on a page for long, the view may be registered, but there could be no impressions and that would bring down the overall average impression/view ratio to less than 100%.
Over on the post i made about what is our share of ad $$$ i made a formula. Take a look at it. It assumes only 25% of readers make it 3/4 of the way through the article. With all the ads and vudeo crammed in there we should still make double the impressions sfter the old split. Try putting your numbers in there. I believe i am earning the 34% of impressions they bragged about in the press release about reducing partner revenue share.
Here's another stat, time on page versus date for UK readers. No ads, but they're not staying any longer.
That's interesting. So would that mean that readers are reading (or not reading) the text just as much, but the readership is going up and down (which it always does)?
If so, what is causing the drop in earnings?
This is odd.
The same parameters, but extending back further in time. Maybe these are just anomalies? Or is it due to someone viewing a page and leaving their browser open on an article for hours at a time and then eventually leaving the page?
by billabongbob 11 years ago
I was wondering if there are many writers earning more than $100 a week? Consistently.Some people just write for their own pleasure, but others write in order to earn money. There are different ways to get your work out there, some pay whilst others do not.What are your experiences with being paid...
by Poppy 4 years ago
It's disheartening to work so hard only to see your earnings drop to lowest than they've been in a long time. For the past two days, they've been about half what I was earning daily in 2017 and even lower than they were in January! Has this happened to anyone else and will it pick up soon?
by Filip Stojkovski 5 years ago
Hi everyone. I've been putting some work in writing quality articles the last few months, all my articles are approved as featured but earnings are still pretty low. I have earned a total of $1+ in two months, and with that speed it will take years to reach checkout. I have both Hubpages and...
by Janis Leslie Evans 14 months ago
Hey fellow writers, I finally did it. I can now say I write on two platforms: HubPages and Medium! I published my first article today. I've been getting the daily articles for about 2 years but never made the time to become a writing member. I'm glad to be in the company of those who encouraged me...
by getitall 13 years ago
Hey guys (and gals LOL),I don't mean to lurk into your bank accounts, but may be you can help me to get my head around things?I have a day job, which i love, surprisingly LOL, but signed up with Hubpages to create some residual income...But I don't have too much time on my hands and...
by Liz Elias 4 years ago
I'm extremely under-impressed since the **Maven** takeover. Yes, I regard it as a hostile takeover, and not a friendly merger!My earnings and traffic are WAY, WAY DOWN compared to last year at this same time, when they were way, way UP!!While I am still making payout each month, I am seeing a...
Copyright © 2023 The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers on this website. HubPages® is a registered trademark of The Arena Platform, Inc. Other product and company names shown may be trademarks of their respective owners. The Arena Media Brands, LLC and respective content providers to this website may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website.
Copyright © 2023 Maven Media Brands, LLC and respective owners.
As a user in the EEA, your approval is needed on a few things. To provide a better website experience, hubpages.com uses cookies (and other similar technologies) and may collect, process, and share personal data. Please choose which areas of our service you consent to our doing so.
For more information on managing or withdrawing consents and how we handle data, visit our Privacy Policy at: https://corp.maven.io/privacy-policy
Show DetailsNecessary | |
---|---|
HubPages Device ID | This is used to identify particular browsers or devices when the access the service, and is used for security reasons. |
Login | This is necessary to sign in to the HubPages Service. |
Google Recaptcha | This is used to prevent bots and spam. (Privacy Policy) |
Akismet | This is used to detect comment spam. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Google Analytics | This is used to provide data on traffic to our website, all personally identifyable data is anonymized. (Privacy Policy) |
HubPages Traffic Pixel | This is used to collect data on traffic to articles and other pages on our site. Unless you are signed in to a HubPages account, all personally identifiable information is anonymized. |
Amazon Web Services | This is a cloud services platform that we used to host our service. (Privacy Policy) |
Cloudflare | This is a cloud CDN service that we use to efficiently deliver files required for our service to operate such as javascript, cascading style sheets, images, and videos. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Hosted Libraries | Javascript software libraries such as jQuery are loaded at endpoints on the googleapis.com or gstatic.com domains, for performance and efficiency reasons. (Privacy Policy) |
Features | |
---|---|
Google Custom Search | This is feature allows you to search the site. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Maps | Some articles have Google Maps embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Google Charts | This is used to display charts and graphs on articles and the author center. (Privacy Policy) |
Google AdSense Host API | This service allows you to sign up for or associate a Google AdSense account with HubPages, so that you can earn money from ads on your articles. No data is shared unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Google YouTube | Some articles have YouTube videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Vimeo | Some articles have Vimeo videos embedded in them. (Privacy Policy) |
Paypal | This is used for a registered author who enrolls in the HubPages Earnings program and requests to be paid via PayPal. No data is shared with Paypal unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Login | You can use this to streamline signing up for, or signing in to your Hubpages account. No data is shared with Facebook unless you engage with this feature. (Privacy Policy) |
Maven | This supports the Maven widget and search functionality. (Privacy Policy) |
Marketing | |
---|---|
Google AdSense | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Google DoubleClick | Google provides ad serving technology and runs an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Index Exchange | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Sovrn | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Facebook Ads | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Unified Ad Marketplace | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
AppNexus | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Openx | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Rubicon Project | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
TripleLift | This is an ad network. (Privacy Policy) |
Say Media | We partner with Say Media to deliver ad campaigns on our sites. (Privacy Policy) |
Remarketing Pixels | We may use remarketing pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to advertise the HubPages Service to people that have visited our sites. |
Conversion Tracking Pixels | We may use conversion tracking pixels from advertising networks such as Google AdWords, Bing Ads, and Facebook in order to identify when an advertisement has successfully resulted in the desired action, such as signing up for the HubPages Service or publishing an article on the HubPages Service. |
Statistics | |
---|---|
Author Google Analytics | This is used to provide traffic data and reports to the authors of articles on the HubPages Service. (Privacy Policy) |
Comscore | ComScore is a media measurement and analytics company providing marketing data and analytics to enterprises, media and advertising agencies, and publishers. Non-consent will result in ComScore only processing obfuscated personal data. (Privacy Policy) |
Amazon Tracking Pixel | Some articles display amazon products as part of the Amazon Affiliate program, this pixel provides traffic statistics for those products (Privacy Policy) |
Clicksco | This is a data management platform studying reader behavior (Privacy Policy) |