by Unknown Webmaster on March 8, 2010
I have a tendency to randomly jump into a new niche that I know absolutely nothing about a couple of times each year.
The last topic I choose when I went wild were “bible studies”, and before that it were “Chinese antiquities”. So far these sites has been a huge waste of time, however, I have learned a couple of pretty valuable lessons fx. how to find expert writers in any niche.
There are scores of PHD students and other experts, who are just dying to get someone to publish their articles. This means that if you create a good looking site and get a bit of traffic to it, you can simply post a “experts wanted” ad on your site, and they will contact you.
These people won’t be writing promotional stuff for you, however, they can write incredibly good “how to” articles and guides. In addition, they will be very likely to go out and build links to your site, since they want people to see that someone is publishing their articles.
The best thing is that these people will be okay with being paid 20$/article, as long as you make sure to point out to your visitors that they are an expert, and since that raises the perceived value of your site, I have been more than happy to do that 
In addition to being good writers, these people can also be a big help when doing keyword research and figuring out what to promote. A question like this one can really give you some amazing information:
“I’m having trouble finding advertisers for the site, and since you know much more about the topic than I do, I were wondering if you know about any really popular and/or expensive products that I may not know about”.
by Unknown Webmaster on March 5, 2010
Here are a couple of tips for how you can get better articles from your writers, without paying them extra.
I recently begun buying more articles fro my sites, and in the beginning I had a really hard time getting the kind of articles I wanted. As time passed, I have realized that the reason I got mediocre work from some of the people I hired, were because I didn’t know how to “manage” them properly.
These 3 tips are based on some of the mistakes I made early on, and will hopefully help you save some time and money
Tip 1: Deal with Writers, as if They Were Humans Beings
Writers are humans just like you and me, so you should expect them to act accordingly.
This means that they can’t read your mind, so if you already know exactly what you want, you have to write a detailed description for them.
You should also be prepared for them to make mistakes from time to time, and try to put systems in place that will either catch the mistakes early on, or minimize the impact they have on your project.
Tip 2: Use HUGE Page Numbers
Use huge page numbers, so they catch the eye.
This is what my document headers looks like at the moment.
The reason I include that huge yellow typographical scar on the pages is that it pretty much eliminates the chance of someone glancing over the page in a hurry and not noticing that there are more than 1 page if the first page isn’t filled out completely.
Tip 3: If They Screw up, it is YOUR Fault
Whenever something goes wrong, just assume that you were somehow responsible.
You were the one who told them what to do, so if your writer didn’t format the page correctly or added links to the front page instead of your Full Tilt Poker review, it is your fault!
Why it is your fault
You are the one responsible for telling your writer what you expect of them in a way they can understand.
When you hire someone to do a job for you, they want to do well, so unless they are grossly incompetent, “all” you have to do is to write proper directions, and you will get stellar work back.
