Free Writing Center

As we all continue on writing into the New Year, I’d like to take a moment to pause and reflect upon the many changes that are actively taking place across the online writing community.

As I’ve written about earlier on this blog, there is a parting of ways for people who spend a lot of time online. In particular, there is the “content producer” - the writer who exhibits the skill and ability to not only research topics that are in demand, but also to put the result of that research together in ways that are coherent and useful for readers. Then, on the other side, there are the Internet users. Those who search and surf, post comments and forum posts and in general “make use of” the Internet.

Yes, it is a parting of ways - that of the paid writer, and that of the entertained or educated (whichever the case may be) reader. Which group do you fit into, and is the line really that clear?

Are You a Content Producer or a Consumer?

I used to work for clients who were web designers that would purchase domain names with the home of publishing a page featuring lots of Google ads, with the hopes that the one web page would start generating tremendous ad revenue over time. In fact, there are still folks out there who believe that this dream will really come true.

In a recent article that I wrote for MakeUseOf, the popular tech blog, I discussed among other things the importance of fresh content for the SEO quality of a website. Stagnant websites simply don’t do as well as competitors who are always adding new content. A number of commentators either didn’t know about this fact or didn’t believe it, but it’s part of the reason why the Internet is now splitting into these two groups - the content producers and content consumers.

The Growth of the Internet

Just pause for a moment and consider the sheer growth of the Internet thanks to this phenomenon of competition for the freshest, most relevant content. Now, blogs and major informational portals are hiring and paying decent wages for high-quality writers to produce informative, novel and useful articles for the Internet audience.

Yes, there are still all of those spammy websites out there that produce garbage pages only to “trick” search engines into ranking them highly and to attract the occasional web visitor - but in time those are getting weeded out as search engine algorithms become more and more intelligent at identifying the relevant, high quality pages that pertain to an Internet traveler’s search terms.

This is the reality. As the Internet evolves into a massive database filled with more and more pages of content, the websites that win are those that have the better content - the high quality, well-written useful articles. And how do you get the content that’s better than your competition? You hire a high-quality writer with a mastery of the English language and with the ability to persuade, convince and teach your readers on the niche topics that you target.

When you choose your writers, just remember that more than any other service in the entire world, with online writers - you get what you pay for. So pay well, and screen out all of your applicants who can’t write well - only hire the best!

If you do hire well - before long, you’ll quickly recognize that your content and your website as a whole is consistently ranked at the top of search engine results.