Buying from iWriter advices ?

I've written a couple hundred articles there. 99% of the people asking for articles do a poor job when explaining what they want. Especially when you don't have a track record you need to be clear because writers are gambling that they understood what you want, and will be able to write it for you, get it approved and get paid.

Just put yourself in their shoes. Don't be like the guy who wanted an article about 'Warrants in Dallas County' . I wrote 'What to do if there is a warrant out for you in Dallsa County'. He complained that what he had wanted was 'How to tell if there was a warrant out for you in Dallas County.' (it might have been the other way around).If he wanted a specific angle he should have asked for it. The point is ask people you know if they can tell what you want, before you post it.

If you're going to be buying from iWriter, here's some general advice for you.

1) First and foremost, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD CLARIFY WHAT YOU WANT. I understand that some of the clients don't have English as their native language, but some of the instructions I've seen in the past on there is so jumbled or unclear that it's hard to write something to their standards.

Tell the writer EXACTLY what you want and any kind of special instructions you'd like to include to help the writer out.

2) Understand that you're only going to get what you pay for. It's hard to expect even a foreigner to be excited about writing for .50c per 100 words. That's what writers start out at on iWriter. For their first 30 articles (until they get a 4.2 rating at which they become Premium). However, even Premium writers only earn slightly over $1.00 per 100 words on average, so you can't expect a majority of the writers to be enthusiastic about providing the best work they've ever done.

There are Elite writers, but again, they really don't make much. So, while you might be on a budget, just remember you're only going to get what you pay for. You can't expect to find some rockstar writer who's going to churn out amazing quality at that price.

3) If you find a writer you like, you can add them to your favorites and request them for special projects that you'd like only them to write.

Best of luck to you, but just remember point 2, don't expect much. After all, you're only going to get what you pay for.

I see, so even if I get an Elite to do the work I am still submited to get badly written content so its mostly a hunt for writers I like most and keep track of them for later rehire.

As for item 1 I completly agree it must be well described or we would be both wasting time and money on it.

Bullseye, indeed I would be one of those hehe... but you probably have that spoted already.

Do you think oDesk or eLance would be a best target place to get this sort of work done, regards quality, etc ?

Using iwriter what is the average cost of a 800 word quality article?

iwriter have cheap article provider, but i recommend you first make test order not more than 3 articles and see the quality.

but if you're really looking for quality content you must spend considerable amount of money to get one

And no you do not have to spend alot with writers there are a few articles I have gotten there that is better then some of the writers i have gotten here

I use them quite abit and never go with a elite to do my articles
I go with 4 stars you will find some very good writers ive got 4 there i use for all my stuff now.
1.Id suggest when you start out there posting all the info on what you want and expect as stated above.
2.assign a different article to different writers
3. weed out the ones that are no good even if they rewrite its still crap
4. make a list of the really good ones and ad them to your favs so you can use them over and over.

I send articles over to the ones I use and usally with in 2 days i have them back
I like there service you just have to weed thru it.

I've never bought articles from there, but have heard very good reviews.

Like someone else said, make sure to put exactly what you want.

It all goes back to the functional requirements of any outsourced job; if you don't specify clearly what you want, you open yourself to get burned in one way or the other.



Avoid a surprise, and specify what you want clearly. (Unless of course, you prefer the pandoras box approach lol).

I haven't tried them out, although I have used 99centarticles.

Yeah clarity is first and foremost..the biggest problem usually is miss communication. That always brings a bad result. A good trick is to get one article written out (1000 word) Then split the paragraphs into say 5-8 each talking about something different but still on the same subject and make that clear to the writer. Then each of those paragraphs can be the start of a new article (by placing that paragraph at the beginning of the article) . All you do is spin the article and you can make 8 new articles that can be spun hundreds of times. that's what I do and it works a treat!

I've been writing there as a part of the challenge I am running and I can tell you the biggest issue is people not being specific in their requests or being way too specific.

Some of the requests are as simple as "Write me an article about computers" ... Way too vague and no one will touch it with a barge pole because they don't want to get bad feedback, which can affect the amount they earn.

Conversely, people who are too specific with the "I want an article that is 543 words long, with 4 sub headings with the keyword in and I want these other 10 keywords used 5 times each, but don't use the main keyword more than 6 times whilst ensuring that the English is good quality with my keyword of "How Make Ice Cream" "

If you are overly specific and place unreasonable demands, people won't go near your article. As someone said, the pay isn't exactly brilliant for writing articles and people aren't going to spend an hour or so researching and trying to meet your requirements for $4.05 (premium) for 500 words.

The key is to know what you want and to communicate it clearly and then you will get quality articles back. There are some great writers on there but you need to give them something to work with!

All the best

Jason

cgimaster,

The pieces of advice I'm going to share with you will elaborate what do our fellow Warriors exactly mean by 'be clear in your instructions.' Although it's obvious that I represent Content Writing 360°, a content writing firm, I will try my best to give you unbiased thoughts, suggestions, and recommendations.

1. Provide complete, clear, and precise instructions to your writer.
This means you should give your writer your preferred style, positioning of keywords, keyword density, selection of keywords, positioning and the availability of your Call-To-Action (CTA) statements, and more. Mind you, we, as writers, will apply our own style and standards in writing if our client does not tell us specifically how he wants us to write his order.

In the company I represent, we have this what we call 'in-house standards in writing.'
We have our own style when writing product reviews. So if the client does not proactively tell us the structure of his product reviews, we give her our default sub-headings when writing product reviews, as an example.

2. Be reasonable when you tell your writer your preferred 'style' in writing.
Some clients "refuse" to understand that every writer has his or her own style in writing. There are cases that two writers may have a somewhat similar style but they're still different in many ways. How did I know that? I'm reading our writers' works before I deliver the job code to our client (I'm not a proofreader, however).

Bottom line, it's all right to show a reference that reflects the style you need. But keep in mind that even identical twins are different in many ways, too. Remember the SMART technique: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-Bound.

I think that's all for now. If I find an opportunity to contribute more in this thread, I'll add more into this. I hope this helps.

Content Writing 360°

No problem, cgimaster.

A Call-To-Action (CTA) statement can be a sentence or a short paragraph, placed in the last paragraph of the article. It's a sentence or a paragraph that conditions the mind of your reader to do what you want him to do.

Let me give you an example. If I were to write an article that should encourage readers to try Content Writing 360°'s service, my CTA statement would be like this:

"Everyone is reading this message. We process orders on a 'first-come, first-serve' basis. If you don't want us to write content for your competitor so he can outrank you, jump off the fence, and contact us now!"

I would like to make a disclaimer that my example is only an example, and was not written in a such a way that you will go to our company instead of iWriter. I am just trying to help, with examples, the best way I can.

I hope I was able to address your request, cgimaster.

Yes it was dead clear loved the example , very appreciated, got a lot of ideas from your 2 last replies on how to describe what I want in a clear and direct way.

cgimaster,

I am happy I was able to help you. Our fellow Warriors who responded to your thread helped you as well in the best way they can.

Just one last tip. In most cases, you won't have any issues hiring established individual writers and content writing firms as far as quality is concerned. What you need to find out is their style in writing. I am not a native English person, too. Sometimes, we know how and what we want to say in our own vernacular language, but we just do not know how to choose the best English words that will reflect the same impact as when we say it in our own language.

I've tried to get some articles from them and expect that what you pay is what you get...So don't expect a well written article and very good quality..You can find great article writers here at a reasonable price...maybe around 11 to 20ish i guess not really sure about that but the quality of their articles produced are excellent