Is AssociatedContent.com (Associated Content/AC) A Scam?
AssociatedContent.com is one of the many get paid to write articles that have popped up on the internet nowadays. The reason these sites have become so big and why they’re willing to pay you to write about damn near anything is that search engines like Google.com are always looking to find relevant content to serve to users like you and I.
So some enterprising entrepreneurs have figured out a way to provide this content to Google while earning money for doing it. They pay you to write about anything you like and in turn Google will usually rank this content in the top 10 of the search results for given keywords. How AssociatedContent.com makes money and thus pays you is by displaying related ads on the content you write. Ironically most of these ads are served by Google. So it actually comes full circle if you think about it.
So let’s give you a clearer example. If you do a search on Google for "Get Paid To Write Articles" you should notice an associated content page result near the top of the results. If you visit the page you’ll see an article someone wrote about Getting paid to write articles and on the left of that article you’ll notice some ads. When folks click on these ads, AssociatedContent.com gets paid. In turn they share this revenue with folks like you who write articles for AssociatedContent.com. But just keep in mind this happens so many times for so many keywords so you can see how they can afford to pay you. It’s really a smart business model and why so many other sites like Helium.com and Mylot.com are doing this.
At the end of the day even if you didn’t understand a word I just wrote up there, all you really need to know is that AssociatedContent.com will pay you anywhere near $3-$10 per approved article that you write and submit.
It’s one of the easiest ways for you to earn some money online. If you can write an email chances are you can write an article. Do you have any interest or hobbies, then you should probably start there because you can easily belt out 5-10 400 word articles like nothing. The key to success with AssociatedContent.com is to write about what you have a passion for because your writing will be of higher quality and chances are they will pay you on the higher end because you’re adding real value.
Sure you could probably get away with writing about things you know little about. But I’m almost positive your writing will reflect this and thus your pay will as well assuming they actually approve your article.
What are some complaints about Associated Content.com?
Some of the biggest complaints have to deal with the pay. And I think that’s a result of what I just discussed. People try to "game" the system by writing articles that they have no knowledge of or have plagiarized or used elsewhere. So AC will usually reject these articles and guess what? You don’t get paid. This of course enrages people and this is where you get that AssociatedContent.com is a scam! So you have to keep that in mind if you happen to read anything negative about this or other websites that pay you to write articles. If you follow the rules you shouldn’t have any problems. Does this mean that there hasn’t been times where Associated Content has wrongly accused the innocent of breaking the rules? Nope!
But for the most part I think they’re an honest company and there are far more positive things being said about them than there are negative.
So I definitely recommend AssociatedContent.com as a legitimate work at home opportunity! You don’t need to be a seasoned writer to make money writing articles, you just need to have a passion about something and be able to dedicate some time to write about it!
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April 14th, 2008 at 5:19 pm |
April 15th, 2008 at 8:36 am |
Thanks for your comments. But let’s settle down. I didn’t mean to imply that everyone that complained was doing something wrong. I know of many programs where people did nothing wrong and were penalized. So that’s not what I meant to imply.
I don’t work for Associated Content so I can’t verify your claim they are using software to determine which articles should be used. In theory that makes total sense because sites like Associated Content want “keyword optimized” content because that’s what gets ranked and thus will help bring them visitors that click on sponsor links which is how they get paid and how people that write on their site gets paid.
So obviously its in their best interest to reward the people that understand this concept. No secret there.
Now with that said, is this necessarily fair to real writers that are writing great content that don’t keep Search Engine Optimization in mind? Probably not! But there are writers out there that can produce quality content that is keyword rich. I know because I do it all the time for my own blog and sites.
What associated content should probably do a better job of is providing keyword optimization guidelines for experienced writers who aren’t search engine optimization savvy. This would allow for “good” writers to produce quality content as they usually would but with keyword optimization in mind. I think this would be helpful to be traditional writers that know nothing about SEO and keyword optimization.
Some writers may not want to do this because of creative reasons and that’s fine and you’re right they should just spend their efforts else where.
But for regular folks that are trying to make money I think it’s worth a shot and effort. I’m a strong believer in doing a little bit of everything legitimate to earn an income at home.
Work at home jobs are hard enough to land so instead of people not making money searching for work at home jobs, why shouldn’t they make some money by writing articles at places like AC. This provides them a stronger chance of actually making money than spending hours searching for an elusive work at home job does.
And finally I really can’t say either way how writing for associated content would somehow tarnish writers reputations. If you’re producing crap for the world to see, then yeah I guess that would make sense. But if you’re writing good, optimized content, I can’t see why that devalues you in the job market. Maybe you can shed some more light on this claim.
In any event, I really appreciate your comments.
Always great to have intellectual debates. We don’t always have to agree but it’s nice to air out points from different perspectives.
Eddy