Agreed completely. There's plenty of blame to go around on this one… especially regarding that particular company.

Onwards to the debate!

I ‘m pretty solid in my position. Confidence isn’t much of an issue for me. I have a good grip on what I can and as yet am unable to accomplish and I’m not afraid to try when I’m not sure. Failure doesn’t bother me, it’s the not getting paid part that hurts. 😉

You just can’t forget to remember when considering content mills that every person’s situation is different. Being able to ignore less lucrative offers in favor of focusing purely on your own goals and quality gigs is a luxury.

As much as I would love to do nothing but work on proposals and opening doors, it takes time and responsibilities are always present.

I look at it much like I did with my previous business. In practice I only accepted long term contracts, and only those which were within the realm of my preferred services. I am capable of much more, but the time and labor intensiveness lowered net profitability at the end of the month too much to warrant regular practice.

Occasionally however I would take a big hit in expenses. At times like those, I would take on one of those one off contracts and write off the time and labor because in real world figures, it erased my losses.

Demand is little different. The only difference is that at the moment, my regular contracts are too few to allow me the luxury of ignoring the less attractive one offs.

As far as placing blame, again, Demand is no different than any other business. It’s up to the individual to examine and evaluate. I knew from the outset that Demand was little more than a band aid. It figured into my plans only so far as it will allow me to profit while I grow. I made this decision because I took the time to research them properly. BTW, if someone cannot do the basic research required to educate themselves about a prospective job or client, should they be writing?

It boils down to the individual in my opinion. Those who jump into freelancing ignorant and incompetent will pay the price and be weeded out. Those who enter it with forethought and planning will do better.

I think in the case of placing blame, it rests on both the writer and Demand. Your in-depth look at Demand was excellent, and it showed the double-speak being bandied about by the company so well. But in the end people should have enough skepticism or foresight to make sure what they're getting into is really what they're expecting. Some think it's a great idea no matter how it's sold. Some buy the facade and don't look in the windows.

I think it's disgusting how the company talks out both sides. But I shake my head in dismay that people still choose this path willingly and defend it staunchly at times.

When Demand actively markets themselves as a full-time opportunity (while their execs claim they don't try to create full-time work btw), and when they're paying "advocates" who have influence over the writer community who also promote them as a full-time gig, I do think the blame falls on more than the writers. Yes, they should do their research. But when you research Demand, their media hype and sponsored "whores" are often what you'll find first. So yes. On one hand it's their responsibility to know better. But on the other hand Demand goes out of their way to fill the picture with misleading info that can look rather convincing.

So while I'd like to blame people 100% for getting into their own messes ("mess" being subjective and referring to those who want more but find themselves feeling stuck there), I just can't at this point.

I got to see this happen to some degree with Stacey Abler who I'm coaching (we document her progress at All Freelance Writing weekly). She was writing for mills like Demand Studios. Within just 2 weeks we were able to replace and see a 50% increase over her Demand earnings. She went from $15 per article to $175 per 1000 word article that quickly, and she's since increased her rates a bit with that client a bit. She had a goal of $.25 per word. In a month and a half she already was earning $.30 per word with one client she reached out to.

There's a huge confidence bump when a writer gets that first client who says "yes, you're really worth that much to my company." And there's often no looking back. I have no doubt Stacey's going to keep moving up from here. And I hope Paul and others who might want to improve their careers get to experience something similar.

As for the sponsorship issues, sometimes acknowledging it exists isn't enough. The problem (for me) is when that sponsorship leaks into other things such as influencing opinions shared on larger issues, making the blogger a complete hypocrite at times (like saying they want to help people get higher paying gigs and then mentioning it like it's some great full-time opportunity), being pushed in social networking without real disclosure of the relationship every time, etc. I've yet to see that.

I'm actually taking part in a CBC radio interview next week, and we'll talk a bit about mills. I'm hoping these kinds of issues come up, but we'll see. If they do, I'll share that when it's up and archived.

I'm going to say it and see if you agree – do you think the reason you're still writing for Demand is less about not being established than it is about you're not feeling confident? From where I sit, you seem worth a lot more than $15 or even $20(which is still too low for your skills).

Don't paint Devon with too broad a brush either, Paul. Her comments come from years of her own experiences with writers and with clients who have discussed quite strongly with her their objections to content mill writing. And her comments created this dialogue, which has been good, from my perspective.

For what it's worth, I started my career with NO content mill experience. I was working one day, unemployed the next. If you consider this to be your only job, you'll put all your effort into growing it. That includes making smarter choices. I'd bet you can find much better work than DS. It takes seeing the $15 as a crutch, as a road block to what you really want to be doing.

Before you ask, I do this with my lowest-paying jobs pretty regularly. I weigh the price paid in with the value of the experience and the impact on my portfolio. If it doesn't fit, I move upward. It's like a promotion at work – no one wants to stay in the same place all the time, right? In fact, we'd probably fight hard for that promotion.

Consider yourself up for promotion. 🙂

I haven’t discarded Demand yet for the simple reason that I haven’t become entirely self sufficient yet. I started a concerted effort to make writing my career only 6 months ago. Before that, I ghost wrote for folks who were impressed with my forum posts and asked if I would do some favors for them.

I wrote a few atrocious pieces for online magazines as well. This was before I’d even thought of doing it professionally and was instead focused on a brick and mortar business I owned and still keep viable.

My switch to writing came about from first receiving a lot of praise from people when I wrote in-depth pieces on forums, then after having my curiosity piqued, finding articles from my personal website being cited and even swiped and reposted all over the web.

That was the wake up call.

Anyhoo, I write for Demand because I’m just not established solidly enough yet.
I’ve got my main strengths nailed down, still need to work on a couple aspects of my grammar that are more problems of habit than knowledge, and still have to educate myself a bit more on the finer aspects of marketing and positioning myself.

I have private contracts, however they as yet are only enough to make this profitable but not profitable enough. Demand gives me something of a band aid for this. It provides a way for me to keep income up where I need it WHILE I grow into a position of sustainability.

I’d mention, that as far as Demand goes, I only write in the $15.00 dollar range. Less than that is just too little to even think of bothering with. Citing $10.00 seems a bit disingenuous since that’s a way to make them appear even cheaper than they really are. It’s not necessary because as I said, we get it.

My point is, folks need to avoid painting with a broad brush when criticizing companies like Demand.
If you don’t like them fine, but realize that those working for them are not Demand itself and it’s likely they have a whole host of mitigating factors that render their working for demand nothing more than a footnote in their overall plans. It reflects much better on the writer if criticism is properly and fairly directed, rather than slap dash applied, ending up splattering a bunch of folks who really don’t deserve it.

For example, your opinions on Demand are better focused than many I have read and this led me to consider them on their merit.

Devon’s on the other hand, rather than motivate me to consider her criticisms, instead led me to consider her own motivations and sincerity. It did absolutely nothing to encourage any introspection regarding my own actions and I came away without even thinking for a second about Demand itself. She came across as angry and spiteful and her points lost any credibility with me simply because I was attacked personally for no reason other than she does not like Demand.

When I go after something, and I do it often, I try to make certain of my objectives and whether or not the offensive is justifiable and rightly placed. I learned some time ago that it is too easy to shoot yourself in the foot when your emotions take control ahead of your reason and took many lumps because of it.

Here's the thing – I would argue that Demand content isn't writing – it's keyword crunching to increase the company's search rankings. And that to me is the biggest disservice done to writers. They present the jobs as writing jobs when in fact the "articles" don't even have to be good as long as the right number of keywords are in it.

You say you're good enough, motivated, and you write for them. I counter with this – then why not work for someone who values your skills a little more?

You're right – these places are no competition for good writers.

That said, what was disconcerting not long ago was the influence these places had on the rates for good writers. Plenty of people who have commented on this blog were complaining about clients who used DS rates as a negotiating point, trying to understand why a writer would need more than $10. When that happens, it affects all of us. Thankfully that seems to have waned a bit, but that it happened at all is disturbing.

I had my own client situation in which the client argued my rate POST-contract, saying they could get their press releases and blog posts much cheaper elsewhere. I walked away. Two months later they came back and begged me to return at MY rate, citing their "horrific experiences". So it affected me temporarily, but I was lucky to have them realize that talent was worth the price.

At the moment I have an ongoing gig that pays me about what you'd make writing six articles an hour. It's a small job, it's easy, and it's easily transferable elsewhere. Moreover, the credit looks damn good on the resume as I'm certified in that particular area.

That's what I want for all writers – a gig that pays you back in a number of ways.