Is this normal?

1. 75

   jauthorposted 10 months ago

   Hi,
   
   I've been publishing articles here for a year now. I understand that it takes a long time to get paid but something has been bothering me. Basically, it's the fact that the most I've made in a month is $1, even though all of my articles have been featured on the "niche sites". For this to happen, the article has to be well-written, right? Also, my Hub Score is consistently high. I'm proud of myself, don't get me wrong.
   
   It's not the fact I haven't hit $50 yet but the fact I've only hit $1. That seems terrible to me! Don't get me wrong—I enjoy writing articles. But it's a bit of a bummer that that's the highest I've achieved. I kind of assumed it would slowly increase the more articles I posted.

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   1. 99

      Gregory DeVictorposted 10 months agoin reply to this

      First, are you sure that you have not somehow "disabled" adverts from appearing on your articles? I suggest that you check each of your articles to make sure that all of them "enable" advertising.
      
      To do this, go to a specific article and click on EDIT. Then, scroll down to "Display Options." There is a drop-down bar on "Display Options" where you can turn advertising on or off. Just make sure that you have "enabled" adverts for each article.
      
      You have one article, probably your most recent one, that is still on HubPages.com. Ads will not show there by default. I also checked four of your articles that are on Discover. Ads are showing "aplenty" there.
      
      Remember, if the advertising is disabled on even one of your highest-traffic articles, it could potentially make a marked difference in your daily, weekly, and monthly earnings.
      
      You also need to remember that it can take a considerable amount of time, sometimes a couple of years or even longer, to begin reaching the $50 payout threshold every month. (Since the CPMs here have been quite low for quite a number of months, it could take even more time than ever to reach the venerable $50 amount.)
      
      In addition, make sure that you are sharing each of your articles on Facebook, X, Pinterest, etc. Over time, you can receive significant amounts of traffic from these sites. Occasionally, you might even receive a 24-48 hour "surge" in traffic from one of them.
      
      Social media traffic is fine, but your most reliable source of page views will be "organic traffic" from Google, Bing, etc. Yes, Bing can be a great source of traffic too. I receive thousands of page views every week from Bing alone.
      
      Just keep writing high-quality articles that can be moved to one of the niche sites. It appears that you are now building a "brand" in your portfolio of articles. I've done the very same here too, and so have other HP writers. So keep on writing and never get discouraged.
      
      Good luck to you.

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      1. 93

         Kenna McHughposted 10 months agoin reply to this

         Nice advice, Greg!

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         1. 99

            Gregory DeVictorposted 10 months agoin reply to this

            Thanks, Kenna!

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   2. 91

      WriterJanisposted 10 months agoin reply to this

      As well as your articles are written and although you are featured on niche sites,( in your case Levelskip, ) it doesn't mean that your articles are ranking high on Google. Perhaps there are too many other articles that rank higher than yours on the same subject or perhaps your titles are too similar to other articles that rank higher.
      
      I have articles that initially did well on niche sites, that now get 0-2 views a day. The competition on Google is fierce.

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   3. 89

      theraggededgeposted 10 months agoin reply to this

      What are your view numbers like?
      
      That's the key; you won't earn much unless your traffic is sufficient. You need around a thousand per day to earn roughly $5.

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   4. 85

      Jan Stepanposted 10 months agoin reply to this

      You've been here for only 13 months. To earn more than 1$ per month, you need to publish more articles and try to edit the articles you have written to make them appear higher in search engines (if they're not picking up any traffic at all).
      
      Give it time and continue with what you're doing. It's tough to earn here, and it's significantly harder to rank well on Google and other search engines than it once was. So have that in mind, and don't expect any miracles.

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   5. 41

      Khanmaria12posted 10 months agoin reply to this

      Congratulations on reaching $1. I am still waiting,Lol

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      1. 91

         WriterJanisposted 10 months agoin reply to this

         Miss khan,
         I checked out a few of your articles and you have some good information, (and tasty dessert ideas!) However, you're not following the proper guidelines to write a successful hub that will get you on the niche sites with the exception of Letterpile which doesn't follow the same guidelines. Please check out the learning center. I think it would be a great help to you and a way you can start earning more money.

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         1. 41

            Khanmaria12posted 10 months agoin reply to this

            Thanks, I am aware of this fact too. Need to do hard work. However I recently edited and changed the titles too. Have noticed some traffic from Google now,hope it make difference

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            1. 96

               PaulGoodman67posted 10 months agoin reply to this

               The brutal truth is that you won't earn much on here with lots of articles in Discover and a few in Letterpile (which is for things like poems, fiction, and blog-style opinion pieces and not generally good for earning).
               
               You need to get as much as you can into the subject niches. No matter how much material you have in Discover and Letterpile, you're unlikely to ever earn much.

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               1. 41

                  Khanmaria12posted 10 months agoin reply to this

                  Yes, you are right. I got it

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   6. 92

      SerenityHaloposted 10 months agoin reply to this

      I love Final Fantasy! Before you write your next article, ask yourself ballpark-wise how many people you think are searching for that exact thing right now. Articles do better when they answer a popular question but in a unique way. You may have great content but will it connect with an audience--how big of an audience?
      
      Things that everyone has to deal with make for great hubs. I've written many things that I thought were awesome, but they didn't really have a large group looking for them. 
      
      Also, people are right that things are harder on here right now. HP has had some serious traffic issues for the past couple of years. In fact, this has been one of the worst years on record for me.

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2. 96

   PaulGoodman67posted 10 months ago

   Hub Score doesn't matter. It's views that count if you're after earnings.
   
   You need to get as many of your articles as possible into Level Skip or other niches, hubpages.com and Discover won't help you much.
   
   The main way to get lots of earnings is to get your articles to rank highly with Google.
   
   There's no guarantee that you'll earn a lot here. It's challenging.

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3. 93

   jansharesposted 10 months ago

   It's a difficult time to earn here, even if you're doing everything right. For context, when things were way better 10 years ago, it took me a month to make 48 cents and nine months to reach payout with 20 something articles. Patience and good luck!

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4. 99

   EricDockettposted 10 months ago

   Are you doing keyword research before you write your articles? Have you taken the time to learn how to optimize your content for search? Are you doing everything you can to answer your reader's search query so that when they land on your page they are satisfied?
   
   With the quick look I took at a couple of your articles, it seems you could be doing a better job with all of those things.
   
   Many new writers don't like to hear this, but just writing isn't enough. Gaming is a popular niche, but it is also very competitive. To give yourself the best shot at success you need to put in the time and learn this stuff.

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5. 96

   PaulGoodman67posted 10 months ago

   Yes, as Eric says above, gaming is a popular but competitive field.
   
   The HP Help section details all the things you need to consider, including the technical stuff regarding SEO etc. Most writers ignore this stuff so you have a competitive advantage if you make your articles search engine friendly.

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   1. 96

      PaulGoodman67posted 10 months agoin reply to this

      There are other things you could do to demonstrate gaming expertise too. For instance, your two sentence About Section is way too brief and general. The About Sections is an opportunity to tell people why they should value and trust your gaming advice.
      
      It's the internet, so you're competing with ever other writer on the topic in the world. Pretty much everything related to your writing has to be as perfect as possible.

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6. 75

   jauthorposted 10 months ago

   Thanks for the responses.
   
   I checked to see if ads were disabled on a few of my articles (I didn't even know you could do that!) and they weren't. I'll have to check more later.
   
   I created a Pinterest account just for this site but I don't have any followers yet. I've never been a fan of Twitter so I've never bothered with it. Do you think it's vital that I have an account? I get okay views from Facebook.
   
   As for my views: I definitely don't get 1000 a day! In fact, 1000 is the highest I've gotten for a single article. Overall, I have 7000 views. Two of my articles were randomly popular for a time and I still don't know why. I have another article that consistently gets views unlike those.
   
   I did edit a few of my articles a while back. I'll continue to do it in the future.
   
   I've done some research on SEO and my most recent article is based on what I found so hopefully that will do well. I've heard that it's better to write articles that answer questions? And I'll make sure to edit my About Section, too.
   
   Thanks for the help.

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   1. 96

      PaulGoodman67posted 10 months agoin reply to this

      If earnings are important to you then the aim for every article should be to get it into the top 5 for Google searches, the higher the ranking the better.
      
      That may sound like a high bar but that's what's needed. Most writers on here earn cents rather than dollars.
      
      It's tough at the moment, though, as the site generally has not been doing well for the past two years due to Google algorithm updates.
      
      There's also far more competition nowadays than there used to be, it was easier ten years ago.

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7. 90

   Jan Saintsposted 10 months ago

   There is also an issue to do with CPM. Gaming usually has a low CPM, but you can always write more and aim to get more views to compensate for that. You also don't have to stick with one topic here, you can try other topics with better CPM.

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8. 95

   Abby Slutskyposted 10 months ago

   It is normal and can take a long time to get a payout here. You just have to get lucky that an article or two gets high views, As it turns out, my most viewed article is one that another hubber tikd me was unlikely to attract interest. Of course, volume of articles also helps.

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