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Writing Articles on Fiverr for Money
Getting Started
If you're looking for some very entry level online freelance work, then writing articles on Fiverr is actually a good way to start off. This assumes you can write good English as people are looking for proper grammar and spelling. I've actually done this, so I'll give you a quick run down of what it's like here. To get started on Fiverr is very simple. You've got to put up a gig which will consist of writing a title, description, and uploading a thumbnail - Ideal size 682 x 459 in JPEG/JPG format. I'd recommend using Gimp or Photoshop to make the thumbnail. It doesn't take a masterpiece to attract prospective clients to your page. The most important things are that you have a good title and that the thumbnail uses space to highlight the benefits of choosing you.
What's a Fiverr Writing Gig Like?
If you are from America or another English speaking country then it's probably a good idea to highlight the fact that your English is actually good. The average person writing generic articles on Fiverr will say they'll write 500 words for the $5 gig. If you go ahead and advertise the same then more then likely you will get a fair share of clients, and I've got away with actually offering 400 word articles for the same price. As far as gig extras go in writing, most clients will just completely ignore them. You can set it up so that you can charge an extra $5 for SEO, or do the article(s) in 24 hours or less for $5 more but people will just contact you expecting those things as defaults half the time. On a site like Fiverr, people are expecting super budget and since they know that others will claim the same thing like 24 hours or less with SEO, they will not readily spring for the extra money. It's up to you on how picky you want to be.
The Realities
Do you tell the clients they have to pay the extra money if they want you to do the article in 24 hours or do you just go ahead and do it? Do keep in mind though that in exchange for using their platform, Fiverr takes a significant 20% cut of everything you make. In reality, that means you're only getting $4 a gig without gig extras. Pretty ironic considering the site's name is Fiverr isn't it? Many professionals have the backbone and portfolio to charge more because of their reputation. However, on Fiverr it's hard to leverage reputation. The Fiverr company wants you to do business strictly through Fiverr, so they let you register a username and chat through the website as your way of interacting with clients. Even If you could link to outside sites I'm not sure that you'd want to anyway since once people already know you'll write articles for just about nothing they have no reason to use your prestigious contact form that a professional blogger might use. The amount of money you actually make doing these writing gigs is maybe around American minimum wage if you are a highly efficient writer.
So Why Use Fiverr?
Now that brings me to why you should use Fiverr over other sites. As I mentioned, a fast writer might make around American minimum wage and that is actually really good money for most of the world. Since people in places like India and South America can freelance online, you can bet your butt that they'll undercut you to get the client. On most other freelancing sites, you generally have to be the one to initiate contact with a prospective client by sending in cover letters. Unless you're looking into big projects, this is really time inefficient as there will be, at a minimum, dozens of other people sending in their requests for work. If you're spending half an hour or longer to find every article to write, then in my opinion it's not worth it even if you are desperate for money. You might as well go work for McDonalds at that point since they will pay you hour after hour. The advantage to Fiverr is that clients often search inside Fiverr and find you first. If your gig is well written, it will show up in peoples searches and you will get contacted.
More on What to Expect
If you're really looking to get more clients on Fiverr then I would start branching out into some other gigs. You can really do just about anything on Fiverr just as long as you have a way of delivering the product or service to the client in the end. As for what kinds of articles you can expect to be writing on Fiverr - Expect a lot of news articles and niche site content. People are paying you because they want to fill their own sites with content that will generate search engine traffic for them in the long run. As a result, a lot of the content is impersonal and will require a little bit of research. It's not the most exciting thing in the world but it's not too bad either and the fact you get to start working when you feel like it is pretty awesome. Fiverr is good place to start and hone your writing skills since most clients are actually very reasonable as long as you deliver.
See what other people are succeeding at before you dedicate
What About Fiverr Clones?
Fiverr became successful so as is per the rules of the internet, 50 other clones sprung up to compete in the same market.
Are they a good or better option?
In most cases no. These clones are not well known like Fiverr is to people looking for workers and the requirements of someone posting their gigs online are even less stringent. On most of these sites you'll get hordes of people making absolutely absurd claims about what they will offer which flood the pages of the site. I found it to not be quite so easy to find work on these other sites but perhaps things could be different for you.
The one place I think may be worthy is Freelancer.com. Although their main business runs on a totally different freelancer model, they cloned Fiverr's gig offerings on that site. Freelancer is likely more respectable than the other wannabe clones.
To this day, have you found the level of success making money online that you wanted?
Points to Take Away from This Article
- Fiverr Writing is an accessible way that anyone with an internet connection and English skills can use to make money
- You won't make a huge amount of money doing it but it's pretty relaxed work.
- There are tons of other possibilities than writing. It's only one option.
- Fiverr does take a 20% cut which hurts but their site is more respectable than the clones that sprung up around it.
- Expect to be doing a lot of copywriting. The people who usually need a writing service are businesses trying to setup their web pages or have well written SEO content that hits keywords related to their business.
- It's a starting place and not necessarily an ending place. Hopefully you'll be inspired to go forward with bigger and better operations as you continue. Good luck!