June 24, 2009

Residual Income from Examiner.com? Uhhh...

Angela

One of your examiner.com posts said:

I write for a number of these sites because it's residual - when I retire, these articles will still be making money for me.

Sorry, Mary. Not true with examiner. If retirement means quitting, then you won't see a penny more than the few pennies you're getting now. I asked them about that - if people quit, what happens to their articles and their pay? Examiner said they continue to run the articles, but once writers quit, they are no longer paid. So, no residuals from them.

Examiner pays one penny a click and they do not pay for repeated clicks from a single computer, accidental or short visit clicks (you must stay on the site for a full minute or however long their software determines is necessary to actually read each article), or repeated clicks from a single IP address. So, if you and your roommates all use the same IP address, only one click counts. Not that three pennies from a single ISP is really any better than one penny.

Pathetic is four articles totaling 6000 words and getting less than $5.00. Even more pathetic is seeing that your four articles were viewed 450 times in a given week, but only getting paid for 400 of those views-or $4.00. So, (you're) out 50 cents because some 50 or so people read fast, and didn't stay on the article/site long enough to earn that "one penny" a visit. That's when I quit.

They do have a few well known, professional writers, but check back in a year - I'd bet my next (real) paycheck that they'll all be gone, moved on to jobs that pay real wages.

D.