Viability of content creation for increasing income?

[Richard]

This is a serious question for someone starting out. How viable is content creation for creating the millionaires of tomorrow?

My goal is to work smarter, not harder when embarking on the journey of content creation. Thus, writing countless pieces per week, because I HAVE TO- doesn't sound too appealing. An optimal example, of someone killing it in with content creation is Mike Cernovich.

Again, how viable is this option?

 

[CCarter]

If you are not a writer (enjoy writing), you probably are not going to be able to make a career or creating a long term project out of it.

You also don't have to write millions of words, sentences, or articles to have the same impact of a dozen high quality pieces of content which you promote. You should spend more time on promotion 2x to 3x to the amount of time you are spending creating. So if you spend 1 hour writing, you'd better spend at LEAST 2-3 hours promoting that content piece.

TheWireCutter.com's total pages is about 1,400 results and it sold for $30 million (NYT buys Wirecutter for $30 Million)

In the digital sea of over-information and new content coming out daily which is barely readable, you'll standout by increasing your standards - and that's not possible by churning out content in high volume.

I don't think anyone is going to be a "millionaire of tomorrow" by simple content creation. You have to provide a lot more value and/or a higher standard to stand out among the competition.

Another example in the SEO world Brian Dean (backlinko.com) is fairly well known - but his site only totals 77 pages. He's got about 3 to 4 dozen solid content pieces that are strong and powerful - informative and actionable - some are interactive and others are well illustrated.

Quality > Quantity.

 

[turbin3]

What CCarter said is literally the only thing a content writer needs to hear at this point in time.

In essence, it's like economies. The internet has seen probably a few large cycles in different ways over the past few decades. You could call this one a "content bubble". With massive content inflation, content valuation declines considerably. Profitable content that withstands the bubble is typically "hedged" massively with quality, creativity, effective presentation, and expert level promotion.

I'll tell you one thing, in times where massive oversaturation of the same content is prevalent, there can actually be even better opportunity! People are in content overload with everything flung at them these days, yet they still yearn for those few words that are truly perceptive and filled with unique value. While the other guys are busy working on volume and matching everyone else' boring content, you could be focused on depth of insight and absolutely killing it!

 

[bernard]

If you like Mike Cernovich, why not check out the real deal in https://boldanddetermined.com/, which is essentially what Mike C. copied. This is a guy you can follow from beginning with nothing to doing well for himself. What's interesting is that after having established himself with an audience, he did very little posting, but I know for a fact he got insane open rates on his emails, exactly because people knew it wasn't fluff.

 

[Ryuzaki]

You don't have to, or need to, scale content.

• 100,000 pieces of content + 1 hour of marketing = $0.00
• 1 piece of content + 100,000 hours of marketing = $999,999.99+

If you build it, they won't come if they don't know it's there. The only thing you need to scale is promotion. Once you've ran that post into the ground and siphoned every possible penny it could have produced, you can create a 2nd piece. And each one can be a million times as amazing as they would be if you were scaling content.

Admittedly, I don't do it this extreme. I do scale content to a degree, but that's after I got the first set earning passively. Then I support them with more content and roll out the next batch. Same concept, less extreme than "1 piece," but same philosophy.

The content farm ship sailed a long time ago when Google released the "Farmer" update.

 

[secretsauce]

Creating content that solves a problem and has buyer intent is what I focus on as both short-term + long-term income strategy.

I would rather create a piece of content that is better optimised for the buyer phrase than the comp and has less competition so I know it can rank and start earning. Then do the "marketing" internally on the site via internal links and external promotion via backlinks.

I then reinvest the money made from this on the next piece(s) of content.

 

[LiamGallagher]

Well, these guys, as usual, are totally right.

I used to have several blogs back in ~2010 and I used to write 4 posts every day. They were not top notch, as I'm not a writer. After some years, I had ~1000 posts but I was doing barely $300 or so because I spent no time promoting my content. I used to think that massive volume equals massive earnings, but I was plain wrong. It is the combination of content + promoting that will make you earn more.

 

[Dracarys1542]

Creating content that solves a problem and has buyer intent is what I focus on as both short-term + long-term income strategy.

I would rather create a piece of content that is better optimised for the buyer phrase than the comp and has less competition so I know it can rank and start earning. Then do the "marketing" internally on the site via internal links and external promotion via backlinks.

I then reinvest the money made from this on the next piece(s) of content.

The problem I'm falling into is how MUCH content does a site need to have before I start really promoting it? Even if a piece is gold, if its an empty site with a single article... its not going to do much is it?

 

[Prentzz]

The problem I'm falling into is how MUCH content does a site need to have before I start really promoting it? Even if a piece is gold, if its an empty site with a single article... its not going to do much is it?

This depends so much, but since you're looking a precise number, somewhere around 20 posts is probably as good a point as any. This will fill up the homepage on most websites, give you the opportunity to improve your writing and also allow you a breadth of posts to promote.