Watch Out For Content Thieves!

Weird news from the awesome Rick over at PandaPassport.com:

I was a little disappointed to see that, especially since I had written a pretty hefty Dalian piece for them a while back. Maybe they figured that if I did one piece pro-bono, that I wouldn’t mind if they lifted all the stuff I’d written about Dalian? I don’t know… They do link to DalianDalian.com
on one of their pages, but I really don’t think that’s gonna cut it on
their listings pages. Especially considering that when users search for
a Dalian bar or restaurant on Google, ChinaExpat will be right up there
in the rankings thanks to the content they lifted (word-for-word) from
us.

UPDATE: This is especially mind-boggling considering that ChinaExpat has their content stolen a while back, and made quite a bit over noise over it. I suspect this is a case of the site owners not knowing what hired writers are doing… But Jesus, c’mon people.

I guess content stealing isn’t anything new, but the China expat blogosphere has been so friendly and helpful and just so nice, that I’m surprised to see this. Really, I’ve found expat bloggers are nicer than your average net user and much less inclined to flame.

Content stealing also happened to Beijing Olympics FAN! but the scraper was for a generic sports blog, not a fellow China blogger, and I already knew there are evil scraper bots out there.

Also I think most bloggers like seeing themselves quoted on other sites, but hate seeing their words mysteriously appearing somewhere else. I guess it’s the difference between an inter-blog dicussion and just grabbing some else’s content.

Via  ChinaExpat.com, Don’t steal our Dalian content. by PandaPassport.com - China Blog

Bazaar

Christmas season is coming. The best opportunity for business is participating in bazaars. You can sell whatever things you like. It can be gift ideas for christmas, clothes, flowers, and furnitures. But before deciding to have one, make sure that you have enogh budget to buy your things to sell. Then, get a supplier or buy your things to re-sell. You can ask the bazaar organizer to partcipate their event. You will just need one or two helper in guarding your stall. You can start early as December. There are lots of early Christmas shoppers now.

Freelance Writing

I have a full-time job on the weekdays.I hang out with my girlfriend on thursdays and fridays. When i get home from work, i get on websites like ninerniner.com, associatedcontent.com and textbroker.com and do some freelance writing. I set up a paypal account and all of the money i get from those websites goes right into that account. It’s good money on the site. Depending on when the sites accept the writings, you can get roughly 30-70 bucks a day. I write 2-3 articles a day for one site, and i blog 2-3 times for another site and its very time consuming. I gotta go to work at 1:30 today and i am trying to get as much money on the side as possible so i can afford my laptop.

Upstart

In the spirit of my recent Craig’s List finds, here’s an older one from Simpson’s Paradox on the same topic:

Just saw an ad looking for writers for “an upstart magazine”. I’m thinking they meant “a startup magazine”, you know, a no pay, write for exposure, percentage of clickthoughs, etc., magazine, rather than a presumptuous and self-important magazine, but one never knows.

Via Simpson’s Paradox » Blog Archive » Upstart

Credit Cards and Freelancing

An article called How a Credit Card Makes Freelancers Bawl on how to avoid common problems with credit cards, accounting and freelancing. It’s geared to freelance writers but it’s good advice for anyone with a home business or startup.

Meet Joe, a freelance writer with a decent portfolio containing a mix of print and online articles. He loves to skydive and play tennis. Joe has one credit card for both personal and business purchases. After all, freelance writing started out as a side venture that eventually grew big enough that he could quit his corporate job for the freelance life.

In the beginning, the credit card bill didn’t faze him. He didn’t have many business purchases being a fledgling freelance writer on the side. Now that he’s gone big time — managing his credit card and its bill becomes a hassle.

Highlight here, highlight there, everywhere a highlight

When he receives the bill, he has to study the items to figure out what they are. After all, that printer he bought from Printers R Us shows up on the credit card as Dominate Electronics World, the parent company. So he has to make the connection between the order from Printers R Us and the parent company by comparing the purchase price.

He takes out his green and yellow highlighters. He highlights personal purchases in yellow and business purchases in green. After all, green means money and business brings in the dough. Whoops, he highlighted a personal purchase in green and scribbles notes to fix that. By the time he finishes with his bill, it looks battered and worn.

The article talks about all the reasons it’s good to have a separate account for business and personal expenses, which seems to run counter to the basic idea that fewer credit cards is better. Worth checking out!

Via How a Credit Card Makes Freelancers Bawl  | Freelance Writing Jobs

Tips for a successful buzz marketing

The buzz marketing is very attractive since the goal is to make marketing without spending a cent. In the traditional marketing, you have to spend a lot of money to make advertisings in TV, to put a classified ad in news paper… With the buzz marketing, you will be able to put life in your advertisings giving them a bigger impact more than 500 or 1000 times than the traditional marketing. How to do it ?
- First you have to create an emotion (love, hate, happiness…), for that you have to decide which kind of emotion you want your customers to feel according to your advertising goal.
- Create a surprising and stunning advertising, if you want people remind you, you have to do something very different that nobody has been seen before.
- Tell a story, dont think it is just to promote your product, you have to tell a story with your product.
- Authorize to share, to download and to integrate on the blog or web site of your customers.
- Connect with your customers, normally when someone get impacted by your advertising, he/she will always let a comment, dont hesitate to answer to the comment or to share an opinion with them.
- And the last tips, never block the access, when your advertising get famous, dont limit the download or to put a price, since it was free, it should be free.

my business

ive been busy lately with my business. a lot of reservers now!! and im so happy. once my boxes arrived from US ill contact immediately my customer for their payments. then ill send their items. thats easy but a little stressful. but im happy doing my business. it makes my day complete.

Market Rates

An anonymous Craig’s Lister posted this guide to standard market rates. I guess he or she was also tired of applying to jobs, and wasting time exchanging emails to find out that “the going rate” is 25 cents per blog post. Sure, you can get content for that price… if you want to outsource to Asia or get a copy-pasted article.

Standard Market Writing Rates for Professional WritersFor those of you who are unsure of what to offer a writer for pay … here is a current standard market writing rate schedule. Of course, all rates can be negotiable to a certain degree, but this should provide you with a strong point of reference. Good luck!

Advertising Material
Copy/Scripts/News Releases
$350 to $500 per page
$750 to $1,000 per project for brochures
$75 to $150 per hour

Articles
$0.40 to $2 per word
$100 to $3,000 per article
$40 to $100 per hour

Corporate/Business Writing
Reports/ Marketing Plans/ Technical Writing
$1 to $2 per word
$300 to $12,000 per project
$50 to $125 per hour

Editing
Varies according to publication/project
$30 to $60 per hour
$500 to $20,000 per project

Ghost Writing
Articles or Books (no credit to writer)
Generally 2-3 times the usual article rate

Books (credit to writer)
$10,000 to $50,000 flat fee
Entire advance + 50% of royalties

Press
News Releases/Studies/Reports
$1 to $3 per word
$500 to $100,000 per project
$50 to $125 per hour

Newsletters
Writing only; layout extra
$0.30 to $1.50 per word
$400 to $6,000 per issue
$50 to $80 per hour

Newspaper Writing
Large Daily Newspapers
$0.30 to $1.00 per word
$250 to $2,500 per article
$330 to $1,250 per column

Smaller Community Newspapers
$0.10 to $0.50 per word
$75 to $1,000 per article
$75 to $500 per column

Online/Web Site Writing
Varies widely; “business” sites pay higher
$1 to $3 per word
$60 to $100 per hour

Periodical Writing
General Interest/Consumer Magazines
$1.00 to $2 per word
$500 to $10,000 per article
$400 to $1,500 per column

Trade/Special Interest Magazines
$0.30 to $2 per word
$500 to $4,000 per article
$300 to $1,000 per column

Scripts
Radio (highly variable)
$40 to $80 per minute of script

Television (highly variable)
$60 to $130 per minute of script

Speech Writing
$500 to $8,000 per speech
$60 to $130 per hour

Teaching/Instruction
$25 to $80 per hour
$200 to $800 per day

Translation/Adaptation
Literary
$0.10 to $0.20 per word

Other
$0.25 to $0.60 per word
$40 to $80 per hour

Via Valuable Information for Writers and Posters.

Starting Your Business

Starting a business i not that easy to do. It needs lot of efforts, mind buggling thinking, and study of course. ONce you have decided on what kind of business you are planning to establish try to have a study first before putting it to action. Try to determine if that plan of yours will be a hit on the place you are planning to put it up. Try also to determine the class of people/market you are trying to serve. By this way it will be clear to you if you are about to have a clear success or not that business plan of yours. But if you are really decided to put it up even you see that it will be a big gamble then let it be done. Just don’t ever blame anyone once it was failed.

Eating Better While Working At Home

I saw this article on Putting the “Work” Back Into “Freelance Worker” on Freelance Writing Jobs There was quite long list of ways to treat your home office more like a clock-in job (although you’ll still have to deal with the “I’m busy, it’s not like you have any REAL work, you work from home!”). Getting proper sleep and eating well are the major points for me. I tend to use my time well but just grab whatever’s around and eat while I work.

4. Eat well. It’s far too easy to hit 5 pm and realize you’ve been existing on cookies and ice cream. Don’t fall into the trap of neglecting your diet. Eat proper, healthy snacks, and take the time to eat lunch. Your blood sugar will thank you for it and you’ll be better equipped to work.

5. Take your lunch and breaks away from your desk. Just because you’re working from home doesn’t mean that you have to chain yourself to your work. When you’ve done some work and need a break, get up. Go for a walk outside, head into another room, do something that is away from whatever you use as a home office. At lunch, resist the temptation to eat at your desk while you do a few things. You deserve to sit at your kitchen table and eat properly. Taking a proper break will make you less resentful about the work you have to do.

How do you keep healthy and energized at work?

Via Putting the “Work” Back Into “Freelance Worker”

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