Hiring other people to write articles for you, is it worth it?

Discussion in 'General Marketing' started by Ken_2011, Mar 29, 2011.

  1. #1
    I know a lot of people outsource their article writing to other people, so they can free up their time to concentrate on other things. But my question is, to anyone who has bought a lot of articles, has it paid off financially for you?

    Let's say for example you pay a third-party to write a 400 word article for you, charging you around $5. This is just a rough estimate on price btw.

    In order to make money from articles (especially if your articles contain affiliate links), I reckon you will need hundreds, if not thousands of articles ranked on Google.

    So that's an outlay of hundreds or even thousands of dollars to get other people to write all these articles, before you make any money for yourself.

    I would like to know to those of you how have bought hundreds or thousands of articles, was it financially worth it for you in the long run? Did your articles eventually start raking in the money and producing a nice passive income for you to repay your initial investment and more?

    Before I spend money paying others to write lots of articles for me, I want to know if it's worth it.

    Thanks,

    Ken.
     
    Ken_2011, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  2. sultanofseo

    sultanofseo Notable Member

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    #2
    article marketing is an effective way of driving traffic and boosting serp ranking these days. dont expect to make money from each article as it doesnt work that way. if you submit in a systematic way, you will surely get ranking boost over time which will generate revenue for you.

    in terms of paying others to write them, you will have to do the math that works for you. if you only want to submit a few articles and just starting up in online marketing, you might write them up yourself. but for me, in need several hundred articles per month for me and my client projects combined and no way in the hell i'm writing them myself.
     
    sultanofseo, Mar 29, 2011 IP
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  3. Dazoond

    Dazoond Peon

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    #3
    As sultanofseo already mentioned, you will have to do the math yourself if it is worth it or not.

    What you probably should also consider is that once you really need hundreds of articles per month you have different options to get your articles a lot cheaper. You could get bulk discounts or outsource it to full / part time VAs as an example.

    If you are just starting out though you might rather write them yourself. If you absolutely can't write, shop around to find something cheap with decent quality. The quality you need again depends on what you plan to do with the articles.
     
    Dazoond, Mar 29, 2011 IP
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  4. om3

    om3 Member

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    #4
    It all depends on the quality of article and your marketing efforts to get ROI :) if you can spare time to write about your niche it would be a better option rather then asking someone to write for you.
     
    om3, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  5. DallasBBQ

    DallasBBQ Peon

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    #5
    I want to find a good VA with a writing background. Any recommendations where I should start looking?
     
    DallasBBQ, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  6. moneyreaper

    moneyreaper Peon

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    #6
    You should know how to seo and do linkbuilding.
     
    moneyreaper, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  7. saicou

    saicou Peon

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    #7
    I also have this headache before, but now I think I may figure out one way to writing article. I remember one Canada friend told me that he sometimes would study Nike or Addidas's sport shoes design for his own safety shoes, it not a kinda 100% copy, but borrow the ideas or trend. If it is not hundreds of articles you need everyday, then I think you can borrow the idea from other authors then you may find it is much more easier to write an article now.
     
    saicou, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  8. Dazoond

    Dazoond Peon

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    #8
    oDesk or elance - wide variety of writers available... professional ghost writer to hobby authors or students.

    The hardest part will be to find the right person for your job. If it is ongoing work it is worth to try multiple writers at the same time and eliminate the worst few. Repeat with the second / thirds assignment until you have only one left :)
     
    Dazoond, Mar 29, 2011 IP
  9. vnsmith

    vnsmith Peon

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    #9
    If you are planning to hire a good article writer you should be picky and make sure that the writer can meet your demands. It is hard to get a good quality writer but there are lots of them that can do that for you. And one more thing is that every article depends on your approval so if you like it then you can approve it, if not then let your writer revised it for you..
     
    vnsmith, Mar 30, 2011 IP
  10. famous2313

    famous2313 Member

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    #10
    You should outsource your articles....if you have the money for it.
    But you don't need hundreds or thousands of articles on the first page of google.

    There is a guy buy the name of David Wood and he has less than 100 articles
    online but he generates over 100 leads per day with articles.

    So you don't need hundreds of articles to make article marketing work for you.
     
    famous2313, Mar 30, 2011 IP
  11. nim84

    nim84 Greenhorn

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    #11
    The answer is it depnds on who you get to outsource to.

    Best thyings is to stick with certain providers who have good rep, if you want cheap then consider phillipino, indian or eastern writers, US/UK writers are much more expesive but are worth it if you need premium quality artcles.

    So i guess the question is what you really want and what you are prepared to pay for it.
     
    nim84, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  12. China_girl

    China_girl Well-Known Member

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    #12
    Mostly everyone who are delivering the articles in large quantity say that most of them are unique and copyscape passed. However when I went for such deals for couple of months articles, 30% of the articles were caught in copyscape :(
     
    China_girl, Mar 31, 2011 IP
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  13. Ace Lasher

    Ace Lasher Peon

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    #13
    For a minute, let's put quality concerns and the fact that Google threw high volume mass and high volume individual publishers a curve aside.

    First, as with any business decision, we ask "Why?".

    Why do we want to use articles?

    Let's assume we'll use articles for advertising.

    Therefore, the costs of articles will come out of our marketing and advertising budget.

    Now we know that we need to capture our marketing and advertising ROI.

    Let's say we know that we want 1,000 unique visitors per month.
    Research in our niche suggests 1 article will yield 5 visitors.
    We'll need 200 articles per month.

    We think we can get decent articles at $5 per piece.
    Our projected marketing and advertising budget for articles is $1,000.

    Next, we need to determine 2 things:

    1. Our break even point
    2. Project our marketing ROI.

    We'll keep our break even point simple. We'll figure out the amount of revenue the articles need to generate to cover the costs of the articles.

    Projecting marketing ROI would be easier if we had the numbers from a previous article marketing campaign. Instead, we'll rely on our research and make an educated guess about the number of sales we expect from each visitor.

    Many affiliate marketing programs track the numbers we need.

    So, we go to CJ, Clickbank, Amazon Associates, Google Affiliates or wherever, and use their numbers to project our article marketing ROI and determine our ROI threshold.

    Then, every morning you play the part of CEO and ask your marketing VP (who is also you) these questions:

    1. Are we breaking even?
    2. Have we hit the marketing threshold?

    Good luck! :)
     
    Ace Lasher, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  14. EvanP

    EvanP Banned

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    #14
    It is beneficial if you do not have the right amount of time to put quality effort into your articles, also if you don't have the best spelling and grammar it's best to get someone else to do them for you. Overall, it's worth it. But if you CAN do it yourself, why not do it? :p
     
    EvanP, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  15. webcontentdiva

    webcontentdiva Peon

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    #15
    As mentioned earlier, it is not a hard ROI when using article marketing as part of your overall marketing plan. When you get articles, you should also be using them in more ways than simply throwing them up on article directories and expecting to get a rush of business from it. Article marketing is about building credibility with your audience, so that over time you build yourself up as the expert in your field or industry. Sharing useful and relevant information with your target audience is what drives traffic to your site, gets your phone ringing and adds the hard return to your business because everyone wants to work with or buy from THE expert.
     
    webcontentdiva, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  16. Ace Lasher

    Ace Lasher Peon

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    #16
    Respectfully, I disagree. You can put a hard ROI on article marketing and marketing and advertising in general.

    This is all true. What you're talking about is branding. The quality of your marketing and advertising affects your brand, however I believe branding and marketing should be thought of as separate tools.

    Which is why I started off with this:

    Marketing is identifying a target or demographic and sending a message (advertising) to them.
    Branding is impressing an image (favorable or otherwise) upon the reader through the message (advertising).

    webcontentdiva, you can project a marketing ROI and you can realize those ROI projections with hard numbers. It's easier to separate substance (like article content) from target identification add delivery costs if you take off your creative hat and toss on your number cruncher hat. :)
     
    Ace Lasher, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  17. eamo

    eamo Peon

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    #17
    Article marketing is so tedious doing it yourself, so better to get a VA if you can afford it. I like the post earlier about calculating visitors to your site per article. It's hard work, but if you believe in your product, it's worth it.
     
    eamo, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  18. kb24

    kb24 Well-Known Member

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    #18
    It all depends on what you want those articles to do. Do you want to get them syndicated? Make sales? If you outsource your article writing there is no gauantee that those articles will make you sales. All the writer can do is write the articles for you..I would look for plr articles in your niche and rewrite them.. make sure they are good quality though.. at least 400 words..
     
    kb24, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  19. HuuLeon

    HuuLeon Peon

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    #19
    Write good content in your articles. Use good keywords. Make sure you find writers with some knowledge with your topics or niches. I often pay people to write my articles for 5-10 dollars/article. I often edit them to increase the quality of the content. Good Luck
     
    HuuLeon, Mar 31, 2011 IP
  20. affilorama

    affilorama Active Member

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    #20
    If you are a struggling writer or do not have the time to write original content for your website and article submissions, then it is worth it to have someone do it for you on a regular basis.

    There are plenty of options open for this type of service too. You can hire a part-time VA who will write articles, submit them for you and handle your SEO in general. You can also hire someone to write original articles for you for a certain price, then spin those articles, thus increasing the number of articles you can submit.
     
    affilorama, Mar 31, 2011 IP