This is a message to all of the writers on this forum

This is just a few tips to all of you who are placing advertisements on here offering your services and those of you who constantly spam the boards with job applications yet cannot write. This is not to the DP members who actually can string a sentence together and are true “writers” in the sense of the word. It may offend the rest of you but if you are bright enough you may think about some of these tips and act on them.

1. Do not say you are a writer if you cannot write. Say you are a good researcher, or say you can write an article full of grammatical errors that will need a complete edit but that it will be done at a cheap price.

2. Don’t say you will offer a full refund if the buyer is not happy with your work if you don’t mean it. Going by over half of the “please hire me” ads on here, almost every buyer will want their money back.

3. Don’t say you are a native English writer if you’re not – Ballack/Charlie Harper this applies to you too. Native English speakers aren’t stupid and if they hire you to work for them and you are not what you claim to be they will know. I can write French to an intermediate level but there’s no way I would apply for a French writing job when I know my writing is not up to par.

4. Don’t post on the message board underneath the post “Dear Sir. I sent PM. Waiting your reply”. Not only do you sound desperate but you are also spamming… and the ‘Dear Sir’ is a clear indication of which country you are from.

5. If you are applying for a job advertised on here take the time to read it. If the employer only wants a US writer, don’t think that because you are from India and can string a sentence together that they will somehow change their guidelines for you. I am a British writer and if a job says for US writers only – it means for US WRITERS ONLY!

6. Don’t agree to all of the employer’s demands if you cannot meet them. If an employer needs four perfectly written articles in four hours but you know you cannot do this, do not apply for the job. Missed deadlines are one of the most annoying things that can happen in this business and aside from gaining bad feedback you could be ruining someone’s livelihood.

7. And finally – if you really want to be a good writer, learn how to write. There are some great non-native English writers out there but most of them have taken the time to actually read English books, write articles for free to practice their English and speak to English people to learn the language properly. Just because you learnt English at high school does not suddenly make you a good writer. It takes time, effort and a lot of practice.

 

Its always good to read through such guidelines.

 

I swear these threads pop up every couple of months.

The thing is that two people offer their services for a writing job. One person offers $0.005 per word and the other writer offers $0.015 per word.

The cheap writer cannot write to save his life and the comparatively expensive writer is a great writer.

The person who posted the job picks the cheap writer 9 times out of 10 even though he receives broken English and an abundance of errors.

This becomes the norm and the only way to compete with these dirt cheap writers is to offer the same rates.

You then get people who want content only accepting the cheap prices because that's the norm and anyone offering high prices are pushed out.

Then you get a frustrated writer who creates a thread like this, nothing happens and the cheap writers win again.

Unless the owners of DP implement a minimum rate per word of say at least $0.01 per word, nothing will happen and nothing will improve.

 

I agree with you. But you know even if someone is not good enough, he wants to write and the job.
That's why he writes "i'm a good writer"

 

I'm not a writer struggling in this market (even with my supposedly high prices) but I am a writer who is frustrated with constantly reading the "dear sir, i send pm" posts and all the other crap that appears on these boards. I have found some excellent employers on here and it is a great place to sell pre-written articles but if all of the lets call them half-writers would actually look at themselves and what they are doing and work on improving themselves it would not only help them but also stop a lot of the crap that is constantly posted on these boards.

To all of you good writers I say stick with your prices, even if they are "high" compared to the other crap on here. There are some great employers out here, and not every employer will opt for price over quality!

 

Nice points. I agree to ALL.

 

What i find hilarious about these posts is that the people that write dear sir check - you know what - etc - actually will get banned for the infractions they accrue - i myslef received a number before i read the rules.
The problem is if people need cheap content then they are still going to go for that even if they then have to ahve it re-written for an extra 5 bucks or what have you. The key i find is to provide incredible content that people know is going to keep visitors on their pages.

 

Or not. I got so sick of reading one person's 'Dear Sir' post on every thread that I started reporting every post. One week later, and he is short of 100 posts but still very much active on this forum still spouting his 'Dear Sir' crap wherever he can. I feel sorry for the mods - just reading his posts frustrated me - they have to put up with this crap on a daily basis!

Yeah the problem with content is I agree with you - employers would rather pay ridiculous rates that I personally would rather make no money than work for. There are some good employers though that respect good writers and pay them a decent wage - it's just a matter of finding them. I feel sorry for them too though - writing an ad and then getting bombarded by people that don't even read the post. If there was a way to remove every so called writer that cannot write from this forum, it would be a much better place. Short of a miracle though it's not going to happen.

 

Really Well Written Tips and Suggestions for young lads,

I want this thread to be up every week at the top.

All Notations he mentioned above are true and he just putted up the real Mess Happen here

Thanks Bro For Finding Time to Write This up.

Regards

 

@ OP: heads up for writing this thread!

Almost all the points you have covered in first thread are valid and the way you have put them together makes it even more interesting to read

I think one such solution to cut down crap is; if DP going to introduce some grammar test or any other English test
which is a must have to apply for jobs posted under specific forums such as "C0ntent creation"

 

Dear Sir. I sent PM. Waiting for reply.

Yeah those guys are annoying, but they are just trying to eat. The fault is not theirs, but instead the blame lies on the heads of all the people settling for junk content at junk prices. People have bought so much of this crap and litter the internet with it. There is nothing more annoying than doing a search online for something and the first 3 pages are just junk landing pages filled with broken English and grammatical errors.

I just wanted to say nice thread and that I agree with you.

 

Thanks for your response OP - I find that really annoying as i p have 5 infractions - that i pretty much deserved but can't believe someone like that won't get banned. Also forgot to mention - I love the ballack/charlie harper reference - this guy has to be one of the biggest idiots running around on DP and I'm glad that enough of the good writers are finally realising this. If this thread gets kept alive we should use it to post updates on who to work with and who to avoid which often will give a better rating than ITrader

 

A basic English test is the bare minimum that should be done if you want to advertise or post in the content creation sub-forum. But you'll soon see people selling approved Digital Point accounts on Fiverr etc to people who can barely spell.

 

@roughoutline - I like this idea would give us a good way of turning a quick extra buck Maybe we could band together and start a writing school for online writers - three week course $100 a pop

 

By the state of some of the posts on here, I would be charging a lot more... and you'd need to extend the course to nearer six months

 

great find thank you so much!

 

Hi guys,

I absolutely love this thread. Firstly, I have the same frustrations as to whatever have been mentioned. Secondly, it's the ballack/charlie harper reference - he is in fact one the biggest scums loitering in the respected hall of DP who tries to earn off decent writers. If he operates honestly, I have no qualms about that. But he lies and lies and worse of all, he doesn't make payments!

One thing is his trademark - he pretends to be offline when he doesn't want to make payment - if all fails, he will go somewhere, log on and get another username on DP and start spreading the rot on DP again. Why! Why do we writers have to deal with these, I love DP so much but with these unscrupulous people around, DP is slowly losing its appeal. I am so grateful for some fantastic content buyers here that still respect quality by matching it in payment. I just wish more content buyers can stop looking for "cheap buys" - save yourself the trouble of editing the work and also getting high quality articles right from the start.

I myself have been a victim of the scams ballack/Michael Scholfied/charlie harper/Shivam Shekhar (He's probably got more aliases than this) have put up. I really don't know how he can face himself in the mirror everyday by being an "article parasite". This is the real truth, if you want to see his real identity, some of us have found this: http://www.facebook.com/editprofile.php?sk=eduwork#!/profile.php?id=713211327

Easter is coming, guys, chins up and we will unite together to make DP a better place to work in!

 

@MagicMonkey: I will start the rating system rolling.

Users to avoid working with:

Charlie03/Shivam Shekhar - Basically a con artist. Enough said.

MarianCvrta - Hires people but owes payment for more than 3 months. He claims he doesn't have the money to pay for the hire. Desperately trying to get Google News to add his site in and is a confused child on whether to sell the site or not. But main point is - he doesn't pay! Check his itraders - they give people the chills!

 

Now come on Chad, we all know that Shivam speaks better American English than you and better British English than me. He is one of the most honest members on these forums, and an article parasite spray definitely doesn't need to be created for him After all there are so many people that he is yet to meet on here...

Oh and I'll add BeerJacket to your list - Scottish dude who orders articles for his blogs, uses them, then doesn't pay.

It's a good job that a writer's life is full of highs too otherwise I'm sure we'd all be standing on the edge of a cliff right now!

 

Oh yes, Crimebuster, he is definitely a refined gentleman in the writing world, he doesn't need a spray, he probably needs a net for vermins - oops, sorry did I say vermin? And his claim about knowing the difference between American English and British English - totally laughable, I tell you - he is probably a professor at that only that perhaps he is too lazy to recall so he goes around asking people "What's the difference UK/US difference between practise and pratice? Well, if you catch the ball here, these two terms have nothing to do with UK/US English difference!

Most likely, he will think "favorite" is a wrong spelling or "labor" is unrecognizable - after all, he is brought up a fine gentleman under the UK's ex-colony. Oh did I mention our chap here is a college student passing himself off as someone from Princeton? I feel so sorry for you, Princeton!