Tales from BitcoinTalk - Monetizing Your Steemit Blog on the BitcoinTalk forum
Two weeks ago someone contacted me on the BitcoinTalk forum, asking me if I would be willing to review his website on my Steemit blog. You might remember the post about CoinScribble that I published a while back? Well, on the bottom of the post, it was mentioned that it was a 'promotional review'. Which basically means that someone paid me to write a review for them.
Like I said, the owner of CoinScribble had asked me to write that review and he paid me for it in Bitcoins. So, I basically earned more money from that deal than I had gotten in post rewards. I won't disclose exactly how much I got, but I'll show you the conversation I had with the owner of CoinScribble. He sent me a PM after reading a post of mine about Steemit.
As you can read, I offered him a 300 to 500 word article, after checking out his website. I also explicitly mentioned that I would write an honest review, also pointing out some negative aspects of his website. Which is the only fair thing to do really, no point in spreading lies, since that will certainly deter any possible new users.
He immediately accepted my offer and sent the agreed upon amount within the hour to my Bitcoin address. When he read the article, he was happy with it and I had just made more money than I had ever made on a single Steemit blog post.
Offering Promotional Articles as a Service
After writing that article for CoinScribble, I've been thinking that it shouldn't be hard to offer this as a permanent service on the BitcoinTalk forum. I would assume that it could be quite lucrative to make an offer for paid promotional articles in the Services Boards of Bitcointalk.
As you can see in the above screenshot of the Services boards, there are many different services being offered. If you look closely, there's also some demand for writers. I reckon that there would be quite some demand for paid reviews or just general articles about certain services.
I would personally mention that I would only be willing to write a review, when it's for a service that I would actually use myself. I don't want to fill my blog with generic advertisements for casinos etc.
You don't even have to be a professional writer, I mean I think that companies are actually looking for more personal and honest reviews, than just something that reads as an advertisement. Definitely keep this option in mind if you want to earn a little bit more by writing paid articles.
Stay Honest
Look, I know that some of you might have some ethical issues with writing promotional content like this. I don't blame you and it's definitely not for everyone. I personally see no problems with it, as long as the reviews are honest and if it's clearly mentioned in the blog post that it's a promotional piece.
Some food for thought perhaps? Let me know if you've ever thought about finding other means of monetizing your Steem blog!
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I might take a look at it... although, I think like you it would be only for things that I would be otherwise using or felt decently enough about. I see way too many post "reviews" on Steem already that are just astroturfing padding... where the person has just essentially reworded the PR briefing!
Completely agree with that, but I'd only do it for projects that I would review anyway. Also putting a focus on writing an honest summary of my experiences, instead of just flower-coating everything.
I've turned down quite a lot of offers in the past, just because I didn't like the service or they wanted me to write specific things.
It's pretty hard to do at the moment (at least in crypto). Things change so quickly, and so the user experience that you have might not be the same that others might experience!
That already happens alot with other stuff, but it is good that some tech review sites are doing reviews a month or even a year into a gadget's lifetime! Although, that might be a little long on the crypto timescale!
Great post and some great ideas here. I am glad that your first review worked out well for you. I have just started to poke around bitcoin talk again and I am slowly learning my way. Thanks for sharing!
Just keep at it, I know it takes a long time to grow there, but in the end it's definitely worth it!
Thanks! I appreciate it!
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I can't see why it would present any ethical issues, unless you were to upsell a poor product. I'm interested in hearing about websites like Coinscribble. People on Steemit are so productive. I think it's good to look for alternative ways to monetise our Steemit work - if we're so inclined.
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