Speaker 1: Good afternoon, my name is Zulie Ray and I am a freelance blogger and content creator and this video is about five writing platforms that pay beginners to write. I'm going to divide them up into three that are like, kind of like social media platforms, you post stuff and based on how many views you get, you get paid. And I'm also going to mention two writing platforms that pay that are more like writing boards where you accept jobs from clients. In this video, I'll break down each of the pros and cons, how it all works. I'll talk about how much money I've made. If that's helpful, let's just jump right in. Let's start with the platforms that pay by audience. We're going to start with my, my all time favorite writing platform medium.com medium.com works like this. It's kind of like if a social media platform like Twitter and a blogging platform like WordPress had a baby. And, um, then every time you post it on that baby, you got paid. So the analogy breaks down a little bit, but the great part is you post stuff. Um, people on medium who don't follow you, but are already on medium because it's a great platform. We'll see your stuff. And every time a paying media member reads one of your posts, you earn a small portion of that membership fee. So from the writer perspective, you're basically trying to write stuff. That's going to be popular, well-received, well-liked. From the reader perspective, you get two free stories a month to read. And if you want to read more of the awesome content on medium, you are invited to pay $5 a month and not $5 is where the writer money comes from. The reason I love this platform is because there's no, no ads. It's all between the relationship between the writers and the readers. You write great stuff. You get read, you get rewarded for creating engaging content. And it's just like, it's a fantastic platform. So you get views. And then at the end of the month, as a writer, you get paid through Stripe. I have made, I've lost count. Um, I'll do the math and I'll post the number here when I'm editing this video, but definitely upwards of 50,000, potentially coming up to a hundred thousand, a hundred thousand dollars writing on medium. Now I'm definitely in the upper percentile, but I know a lot of people who have written on medium and started earning money pretty quickly. So, um, I think it's a great platform for reference. I typically see people getting paid around 2 cents per view, or about $20 per thousand views. If you don't feel like doing the math at home, let's talk about how to get started. So to get started on medium, all you have to do is sign up with your email, create a profile and just start writing. That's a really great thing about medium. The bar is super low. You can create a profile and publish your first story today. To get paid is a little harder. There is a boundary of 100 followers. So you have to get 100 followers before you can start getting paid. This can be, it can take a while to get. Um, if you're really keen on growing quickly, I really recommend engaging with the community, leave thoughtful comments on other people's work, follow other people who's writing you enjoy, um, post a lot in different publications and really try to expand your reach that way. I don't recommend doing follow for follow because if you're really that desperate for followers, you're probably not going to be writing, you're not going to be earning that much money anyway. I find it better to naturally gain about 100 followers and go from there. Pros of medium as a writing platform. You can write about whatever you want. So this is the nice thing about audience paid writing. Um, you can write about, I've written about cats, I've written about travel, um, I've seen other people write about fiction, they've written about poetry, they've written about self-help, psychology, feminism, um, anything under the sun. There are so many readers on medium that you can find an audience for any topic. And like I said, it's easy to get started. I've created a ton of tutorials on how to get started. So definitely check out my channel. If you want more info, if you want to know, if you really want a detailed step-by-step for how to get started on medium, I really recommend signing up for my medium starter kit. It is a free downloadable PDF. It gives you a guide for what you should be doing on each of your first five days on medium. And you also get a free email course that comes with that delivered right to your inbox with every single step along the way. Cons of medium. You do need 100 followers to start earning money and that can take some time to get, so it's not like a get-rich-quick situation. But none of these are going to be a get-rich-quick situation. Um, you, and then again, like, the downside of being an audience paid platform is what other people want to read typically matters more than what you want to write if you want to earn money. So you can write about anything and you can earn money writing about anything, but you'll find that health, wealth, and love are the evergreen topics that tend to perform best. The third downside. Medium pays through Stripe, as I mentioned earlier. Stripe only partners with, I think, about 40 countries. So if you're in the 150 countries in the world that are not partnered with Stripe, medium has no way of paying you, which is a huge shame. I think it's really unfortunate. I hope both medium and Stripe change their policy soon. In the meantime, if you're in one of those countries, I recommend signing up and creating a profile and getting started anyway. Even if you can't get paid through the medium partner program, I have still found freelance clients through medium using it as a portfolio. I have found, um, I've built my own audience there, so I think it's still worth trying even if you can't get paid through the medium partner program purely as a portfolio website. Platform number two. Let's talk about Simile. Simile is a really new, interesting one. So on Simile, um, for context, I've earned, I think, $1.64 through Simile. I'll include a screenshot here. Um, but this is the really great thing about it. It's for creative writing specifically. So you know how I was saying on medium, you typically don't earn money, you don't earn as much money if you write about stuff, um, like creative writing. Um, the audience just isn't there on medium for that. They like tutorials, they like more think piece-y things. Um, creative writing is not a huge earner. Simile is the home for getting paid for creative writing, and at the moment they're paying two cents per view, similar to medium. So if you get a thousand views on medium, you get $20, and that's for, you can write about like, um, you can post your fiction stuff there, you can post your short stories, creative non-fiction, personal essays, anything you want. How does it work? Really similar to medium. You join, you create a profile, you get started, and I think you, there's no gate. You can just publish your first post right out the gate, um, and start earning money on views immediately. The pros of Simile. It's, it's, like I said, very, very easy to get started, very beginner-friendly. Um, it's also for creative writing. There are not a lot of places to get paid for writing fiction on the internet, and I think it's amazing that the creators of Simile have decided that that's what they're, that's the niche that they're going to fill. They're going to fulfill writing for people who want to read creative writing. I also really like that it's a, it's a set amount of money. It's two cents per view. Uh, you know exactly how much you're going to earn at the end of the month based on the number of views that you have. It's, it's very straightforward, and I really appreciate that. Cons. I have no idea how, how stories get promoted to readers. I have no idea how readers find my stories. I don't know if it's chronological. I don't know if there's an algorithm in there somewhere. Literally not a clue. Um, they're not super upfront about that, so you might get a lot of stories read. You might not, and I, I don't exactly know how. Um, you do need to hit a $10 minimum for the payout, so that means you need to get at least 500 views before you earn any money. And, um, the business model I think is temporary, so they make a big point of saying like, oh, while we're getting started, we definitely want to, um, give writers, you know, two cents per view, but they also make it pretty clear that they could change that at any point. That's the pros and cons. So if you're, basically, if you're a fiction writer and maybe if you already have, like, some people who might be interested in reading your post or you just want to test out an idea, a fiction idea or a creative writing idea, Simile is definitely the place for that. Writing platform number three is Vogel, and then after this we're going to go to the two job board ones. Vogel is a weird one. It's kind of like a mix between Simile and Medium. It's not as creative writing friendly as Simile, but definitely more so than Medium. So the way it works is you create an account, you start writing, you publish stories, and again, you get paid on views. I think Vogel is more based on ad revenue, so you're not getting paid from members, you're getting paid if anybody views your story. That's, there are pros and cons to that. I think the rate is six, six dollars per 1,000 views, so a lot lower than Medium and Simile, and that's only if you're part of the Vogel Plus program, which costs ten dollars a month. Um, if you're not part of that, then the rate is even lower, I think closer to like three or four dollars a month. Not amazing. But they do have another way of getting paid, and this is what makes Vogel unique. They host writing challenges. So the way the challenges work, they just post basically a prompt, you write for the prompt, they'll have a minimum word count, they'll have some guidelines. The prizes have been really high in the past. I've seen people earn twenty thousand dollars for winning a Vogel challenge, so it's very real money. Pros of Vogel, super easy for beginners to join. There is a little bit more of a submission process, so on Vogel, unlike Medium and Simile, you do have to submit a story and then once Vogel checks it for plagiarism, they'll check it for, like, to make sure it's not like a naughty story or anything like that, then they'll publish it. So there is like sometimes a 10 to 12 hour delay between hitting submit and actually getting your story live. It's also nice that there are other options to earn money beyond just, like, views, and you also, again, unlike Medium, you get paid for non-member views. So on Medium, you only get paid for a view if it's a paying Medium member because it's a revenue share program. On Vogel, because it's more ad-sustained, you get paid no matter who looks at your story. You don't get paid very much, so into the cons. You don't get paid very much. You get paid about a third per view compared to Simile and Vogel. Sorry, compared to Simile and Medium. I also find I've heard feedback that the rubric for winning challenges can sometimes be confusing or sometimes there'll be winners who didn't adhere to the rubric who still won. I also don't love Vogel Plus as a concept. I don't like the idea that you have to pay money in order to make money. That seems just a little strange to me. Okay, so those were three writing platforms that pay through audience. The basic gist of all three, you post something, you get views, you earn money. All three of them do have a threshold, so for Vogel, you have to hit $35 before you're allowed to pay out, and for Medium and Simile, it's $10. However, ultimately, if you know your audience on there, you can write and get an income through people reading your stuff, which is pretty cool. Now let's talk about a different kind of writing platform that pays beginners, the humble job board. So we're going to cover two. The first one I want to talk about is one called Scripted. I recently applied to Scripted and I'm really excited to talk about it with you. So with Scripted, it's simple. It works the same as any job board. You have to apply to Scripted. Scripted will look at your application and say, yeah, okay, we'll let you join our pool of writers, or no, we're not going to let you join our pool of writers. Once you're in, you'll then have access to a selection of jobs that clients upload from their end. Let's break down each of those steps. So first you have to apply and be accepted at Scripted. Scripted says that they only let 5% of applicants in roughly. So one in every 20 people is the acceptance rate. There's no good way to say this. I took the test and I thought it was really easy and I'm not a flawless writer by any means, but I found it was a lot of really grammar, like there, there, there, it's, it's, stuff like that. 15 questions of really grammar heavy stuff. I thought about posting the answer key on this video and I decided not to, because I think if you genuinely can't pass the test, then it's likely that you're not going to be writing at a high enough rate, a high enough quality to make their clients happy and they'll probably boot you off the platform anyway. So I recommend taking the test, really take your time. Feel free to Google stuff during the test. That's what I did. And I did get some answers that way. And they also upload resources to help you just ace that test. So take your time, do some research and fingers crossed. Once you get accepted, they prompt you to fill out your portfolio. I recommend doing this as thoroughly as possible because this is how you get assigned to jobs. So they'll ask you to upload some writing samples. They'll ask you to talk a little bit about, you know, what you write about. If you don't yet have a portfolio, I recommend writing not a lot, maybe like two or three articles that are geared to industries that you think you'd like to write for, like healthcare or pets or finance, anything like that. And upload them to a place like Medium, which works as a, as a free portfolio. Once you fill out your profile, you will then have three ways to earn money on this writing platform. Way number one, smart match job invites. The way this works is the client will upload a brief to Scripted and Scripted will say, okay, based on the portfolios that our writers have filled out, we're going to send this out to those writers based on like a smart match, right? Let's, I think it's done by AI probably. That gets sent to your inbox. It's sent to a small group of writers. If you are the first one to reply to that email, so if you're the first one to hit accept, you get the job. The job is yours guaranteed. If not, you are out of luck and you have to be fast. You have to be rapid. I once waited two minutes before hitting accept and I was too late. I, somebody else had beat me to it. So, um, yeah, just, uh, just jump in. That one also, the client sets the rate. So it tends to be a little lower, but it is guaranteed. Method number two is a job invite. So it's, it's similar, but a little different. A client will say, hey, we want to write about this thing. Um, who do you think is going to be a good fit? Scripted sends out that job invite to a group of like 10 or 20 writers. We then have the option to send a proposal back to the back to the client and the client will look at the first five proposals. And then they have two weeks to reply. So it's very like, it's a very hurry up and wait kind of situation afterwards. They'll let you know if you get accepted. Um, you do have a chance to set your own rate here along with your proposal. And third, it's just like a regular job board. There will be jobs uploaded, um, to the site. You can then make an application or like propose how you would handle certain pitches, certain, certain briefs that the clients have uploaded. What I really like about scripted, there was a floor clients can't pay less than like, I think it's 7 cents a word that is rare. That is valuable. That is incredible. I love that. 7 cents still isn't a lot, but compared to something like tax broker, I mean, come on. You also have access to a lot of different work opportunities. So clients about all kinds of different sectors, no matter what your interest is, you're bound to find something you like. And I like the fact that there are good clients. I've seen clients on scripted that have been with the platform for like 5 years, 10 years. So that to me speaks to the fact that scripted has a good relationship with writers and a good relationship with clients. That's good. That's valuable. Cons. Apparently it's hard to get accepted. Um, again, not to like brag or anything, but, um, if they're only accepting 1 in 20 writers, that's tough. That's a high bar. I also find the timing can be a little whiplashy. Like you either have like 120 seconds to hit accept to a job. But then once you apply to a job, you then have to wait two weeks to hear back. Like, come on. Um, I wish they would put some more pressure on the client side to get us some faster answers. You also will need to do for a lot of these jobs. You'll need to do upfront work. You'll need to like create a proposal for a client and there's not a, there's a small chance, you know, or you'll create this proposal and there's a chance that you won't make money. So you'll have to do work, not necessarily get paid. And you also need to have at least a couple of articles that can serve as a portfolio. So in short, Scripted, I think is a really good platform for beginners to start getting paid. You don't need a wide portfolio. You just need something that's targeted. And I really liked it, but they seem to have a focus on making sure that writers get paid fairly, which is fantastic. Textbroker. Textbroker. This is, this is not the first time I've reviewed Textbroker. Textbroker's video is, is, is option number five. In my past video, I kind of trashed Textbroker, which I stand by. Um, I thought that their website was super janky. Their application was not very clear for writers. It was hard to understand. And again, not to brag, but I only got a three-star rating and I think I'm kind of good. Um, so the way it works is you apply. Oh yeah. And their, their, their pay is terrible. Their pay is in the gutter. It was bad. That all being said, I got a lot of feedback on that video that was like, look, maybe for you Zooli, high and mighty in your tower, um, you can accept higher rates, but for beginners, it's good to have a platform like Textbroker where you can just get your foot in the door. Hey, just editing this video and found out that Textbroker is not accepting new writer registrations until spring of 2023. I'm making this video in January. So it might be a month or two before you're able to sign up just so you know. So I'm coming back and I'm giving Textbroker a fair review. The way it works is similar to scripted. So you have to apply. Once you apply, you get a star rating, one, two, three, four, or five, the higher, the star rating, the higher paying jobs you qualify for on the client side, they will upload. Once you've been accepted, clients can upload job briefs to a job board and they can specify, oh, we want only five star writers or only four star, only three star. As a three star writer, I was only allowed to apply for three star or below jobs, which hurt me in my soul. So you can get paid three different ways on Textbroker. You can accept jobs on the job board. Those are very simple. You apply, you don't even have to apply. Actually you accept the job, you do the work, you get paid very straightforward, very simple. These tend to be really short, snappy jobs, very easy to do, um, like a couple of hundred words at most. I think I earned $2.42 doing those. So you can also apply to join a team. So this means that you'll have a more regular relationship with this client. You're like, hey, I want to write for you, car company, because I think you're great. Please hire me. And this means that they'll send you regular assignments more frequently than just like the one-off that you might get on the job board. And if you're a really great writer or your portfolio is really well filled out, you'll have the option to do a direct order. So this is when the client says, hey, we want Zooli to write this article for us. The pay for those is, as I've said, so like the job board jobs are the lowest paid, team orders, medium, direct orders, highest. The pros. Really having to think here. You, okay, there are some pros to this, right? It is very, very entry level. Um, you don't have to write a whole blog post. You can just write a little bit of copy, a couple hundred words, and you can get paid. You don't necessarily have to upload like a portfolio. You just have to pass this, this grammar test and you don't have to like make a proposal. You can just nab a job and get paid right away. Cons. This is a longer list. The pay is very, it's like a genuinely insultingly low. I consider it insulting how low the pay is on tax broker. Um, and it's not just me. I think if you're thinking about it, you should be insulted too. You are worth more than that, than they're paying you. And I'm getting all high up again. It's good to get your foot in the door, but don't do more than a couple of jobs on tax broker because you are worth more. Okay. I also found the application was not very well laid out. It was not set up to help you show off your best self. It was confusing. The instructions weren't clear. The website is super janky, like I said, so it's, it was not a great application experience. So overall, I hate to say it. It's probably the best if you want to get paid right away out of all five. Um, but it's the worst out of all five in terms of user experience, in terms of the kind of writing that you're going to do in terms of the pay potential. So what I recommend doing, if you're watching this video, I recommend signing up to all five and I recommend giving each one of them the good old college try. I mean, post three articles on simile, vocal and medium, at least apply and see if you can get three jobs on scripted and tax broker and really see which one works for you really see which one pays the best, which one you enjoy the most, which one has the highest earning potential for you in the long term. You might find that tax broker is good for just getting your confidence up and just getting a couple of jobs and getting your foot in the door. That way you can add some experience to your resume and then you move on. Or you might find, I don't know how, but you might find that you love tax broker and you want to hang out there. You want to live there. Good for you. Amazing. Or with scripted or medium like me or vocal or any of the other platforms I've mentioned. Hopefully this video served as like a good place to start. You understand what you need for each of them. You can go ahead and get started with each one. I really recommend doing a mix because that way you're not dependent on any one platform and you've got a good chance of finding something that works for you. So these five writing platforms pay beginners. I think they're all, are they all great? No, they all have their merits. I'll say that. I would love to hear what you think of this video, of these platforms. Are there any other platforms you'd like me to review? Let me know in the comment box below. And as always, if you like this kind of video, subscribe. And if you want to see more, let me know in the comments. If you hated it, keep that to yourself because I'm very thin-skinned and I am easily hurt. Thank you so much for watching this video. Have a great rest of your week and I'll see you in the next one. Bye.