7.3 Volunteer Writers

To use old content, you have to have content in the first place. If you don’thappen to have any out-of-print books that you’ve written lying around —and you don’t feel like writing something new — another option is to askpeople to write for your site for free.

Lots of people like writing. Just look at Amazon. They didn’t pay a penny forall those book reviews. Their users write them for free and Amazon benefits.

When I started www.WorldVillage.com, I didn’t have money to pay thepeople who reviewed software for me. Instead, I contacted the gamecompanies and received complimentary copies of their computer games,which I then forwarded to a staff of volunteer writers. The agreement wasthat they would provide me with a written review of the game and theywould keep the game as payment. I’ve got dozens of game reviews that

bring users to my site and get them clicking on my ads. I didn’t pay a pennyfor them but years later they continue to generate revenue for me.

You don’t have to use reviews though. Whatever the subject of your website,you can add a line asking people to send in their thoughts and comments.You can just say something like: “We want YOU! We want your thoughts,articles and comments. Send your submissions to editor@yoursite.com andwe’ll post them here.”

You can then create a whole new set of pages for your users’ submissionsand put AdSense on each one of them.