Recently, in my July 2010 blog and income report, I had mentioned that I wanted to really step up my game with writing online. I think I’ve found the place: Helium. But what I’m really excited about is the new project I’ve been considering: is it possible to write 1,000 articles in just 100 days?
The Challenge
I know what you’re thinking “One thousand articles, what the ?!?” and to be honest I’ve also been thinking the same thing. But ya know, we have to dream big to reach big goals.
One thousand articles is going to be very difficult, it basically comes down to ten a day. However, as I have explained before, I have previously mentioned it’s very possible to write an article in 20 minutes. This comes out to be just over three hours of writing every day – and that’s not including writing for my other blogs and here at Murlu.
I’ve recently been very inspired by the writings from Alex Whalley especially when it comes to article marketing. Article marketing isn’t a new concept to me and you may be wondering how this relates to Helium – if I want to succeed with the bigger picture (making money with Helium) I will need to deploy these type of tactics.
My Pledge
I’ve often heard (and wrote) the best way to accomplish a goal is to tell everyone. I want to do exactly that.
So here is my pledge to you, Murlu readers. Within 100 days from now, starting August 9th, 2010, I will have 1,000 articles on Helium.
But I don’t want to make this just about me, no no no. As you can tell from reading my blog, I love talking about the methods I use to make money online. Every investment I make toward a product, service or project I ultimately write about it – you benefit in the end!
My Intentions
By the end of the 100 days, I want to have 1,000 articles on Helium. I also plan to make a bit of passive income once these articles are up and running.
At the moment, it seems Helium pays 1c per page view. This may not sound like much but let’s look at the larger picture.
1,000 articles x 1 page view @ 1c each = $10 a day
30 days x $10 = $300 extra a month!
And that’s just 1 view each day for each article. What if I stepped up the game by promoting these websites on social bookmarking websites, drive up traffic and implement some killer search engine optimization?
1,000 articles x 10 page views @1c each = $100 a day. Holy crap!
Is just 10 page views possible for each article a day possible? I think so, especially when you factor in all the traffic formulas and tactics. That’s definitely something to work toward.
The Support
I’ve written for many different websites and article marketplaces but Helium is very exciting. One of the main things I already enjoy about it is the wide variety of topics I’ll be able to write about.
In an essence, Helium will become an extension of Murlu – a secondary location for articles related to blogging, business, traffic and more. This does mean that I will be tweeting and even linking occasionally to these articles – if you’d like to help (which I would be greatly appreciative of), please follow me on Twitter.
I want to do one extra thing: I want to extend this challenge to you!
That’s right, I believe that we could all benefit from taking this challenge that’s why I want to extend it to you. By the time this is all said and done, we will all be making money online.
And think of it this way, even if you know you won’t be able to keep up with the 10 posts a day, it’s still a great habit to build – you’ll be writing, making money and expanding your brand!
So here’s what I’d like for this to work out (and how we can all benefit):
- Contact me and tell me you’d like to join in this project
- Sign up for various social networks and bookmarking sites
- After each article is posted, we will tell each other (within the group) and hopefully everyone will be kind enough to share on each of these networks – big profits for everyone!
Just think, if we got a group together we could help promote each other, build a community and really do something amazing!
And here’s the bonus – a contest!
I’m very passionate about this project and I hope you will be too.
So I want to put this incentive out there: It will become a contest.
After the 100 days are over, we will pool together all of our accomplishments and see who completed the most articles.
And here are the prizes:
- 1st Place: $200
- 2nd Place: $100
- 3rd Place: $50
- Plus, each person will get a hight post here on Murlu (backlink!)
To enter, please contact me.
If you were even just one of the three people to join in on this project, you could walk away with easy money!
There is one condition though, I will need to refer you to Helium – I’m not going to lie, Helium does offer referral bonuses which will help go toward the prize money – but this also means that you could invite people into the contest as well – you gain referrals!
I hope this will be incentive enough to join in. Even if you just write 20 – 30 articles throughout the entire project, you’re still well upon your way to make money online.
Wrap this up
I know this is going to take a large chunk of time out of my day and yours too if you plan to join in on the contest. But just think, you’re building a great habit out of writing and making money while you’re at it.
It will be difficult and require work but now is the time that we take charge with our lives, earn some passive income and live freely.
Waddya say, do you want to join?
Image by Wit
That is interesting. I currently write a lot on ezine articles. Does helium let you place backlinks at bottom of content? Or is it link free?
Hi Steve,
Actually, Helium does let you link out throughout the article (not just in a footer) – they don’t want you overly promoting yourself so I wouldn’t drop in dozens of links but yeah, you can point back to your blog or website – or your niche site!
Helium has a PR of 6 and if you look at Alexa it continues to grow and grow – it doesn’t trump eZine’s PR but I’m beginning to see quite a few Helium articles appear within search results in great positions.
It would be a great way to not only promote and build backlinks but the revenue you can make will certainly earn you some of your time back. Couple this if you point it to an affiliate site and you could make even more money
Helium does not allow self promotion within articles. It is explicitly stated in their rules. (I’m not sure how they would react to your little competition requiring people to sign up under you either, they can be a bit funny about that kind of thing.)
) and @gailseymour on twitter, if you want to follow to see one way of promoting your own and other helium writers articles for mutual benefits.
You can’t mention your business or websites in articles directly in a promotional manner (e.g. “get this report from my website”), but you are allowed to link to those websites in the third person, (“get a free report about this here”) provided when readers follow the link you can’t easily be identified. So for example, Steve probably couldn’t link to the free reports he offers on the SteveScottSite.com if he used his own name as his pen name on Helium, but if he used a different name he might get away with it, and it would be okay to link to this report on an alternative site, so long as it diodn’t mention him as the author.
You also can’t use affiliate links in your articles of any description at any time within the rules.
I can’t join in your competition because I’m already on Helium, but good luck with it, just don’t go spamming the site, it’s not intended to help you earn affiliate commissions from alternative sources, but to earn revenue shares from your helium articles themselves.
If you join, follow the community link at the bottom of the page and go to the “how to promote” thread of the forums for help and advice on generating page views and staying within the rules.
I’m Gail Seymour on there (and everywhere else
Hi Gail, thanks for chiming in on this and clarifying a lot of information. It’s funny because I happened to be on your profile recently – now you’re here!
I (and I hope others) completely understand about promotion and affiliate links. I have no intent to include either of them in any of my articles because it would be very detrimental to the Helium community.
So far, the experience has been great! If you ever want to add to the discussion, feel free to swing by as the project progresses
(P.S. Thanks for the suggestion on the page-view link, going to check that out now)
1000 articles in 100 days, i’d have to give up education and work all just to fit in the time to write that many articles. I’m interested, but what’s the length of the article have to be? Depends on how quick i can write and the length of the articles need to be written.
I can see it to be quite the time constraint when you couple in school – I’m a little worried myself because I’ve been mulling around about going back to college in the fall.
The minimum article length is actually only 400 words which really isn’t that bad. That would be what, 4,000 words a day at 10 articles? Does seem like much but you could always divide them out.
Say you were watching TV and decided just to write during commercials. If a commercial is 2 minutes, you could easily fit in 100 words, go back to watch the show and then do it over again.
Even if you decide not to join in the contest, it would be a great way to push yourself, build that drive!
WOW!!! That seems to be a lot. But I like the mathematical stats that you have also posted here
Thanks Kharim
At first I was thinking, maybe I’ll just make it 2-300 articles but ya know, you have to go big!
I’ve always been a big fan of time constraints. If I said 200 articles in 100 days, everyone would just do the bare minimum but with this kind of pressure and size, it will make people think outside of the box, try new things, break their comfort zone.
I hope you can also use the mathematical thinking elsewhere. When you break down the bigger picture into smaller chunks, you get to see it on a micro level – what needs to be done now to build what will be accomplished later.
Always keep the mindset of “what if I did this…” and you’ll always keep an edge on what you do.
Hey Murray,
Sounds awesome idea.
. That’s really great idea murray.
1000 articles in 100 days
Thanks for sharing this great Post.
Looking forward to hearing about your progress.
~Dev
Hey Dev,
Glad I have your support.
I was also thinking of starting a side blog just dedicated to this. It would help organize the project, contest and help those who participate to collect their ideas and talk amongst each other along the way. Stay tuned.
This really does sound like a challenge. I shall be watching this with great interest.
I hope we all can inspire you as we go Dean – if you ever feel like jumping in, we’ll be more than willing to help. Thanks for the support and inspiration!
Man, that’s mad! I like the mathematical aspect too. Am I up for the challenge? I guess there’s no harm in trying. I’m not really joining the contest though. I’m motivating myself thanks to you. It’s the long term effect that I’m after.
Have a good one.
Awesome Gines!
I’m glad you’re up to the challenge. It’s going to be a long and hard journey but ya know, we all talk about the game of making money online but it’s always action which nets the greatest results. If we work together, we all can walk away with great new habits, a huge accomplishment under our belt and some extra bucks in our pockets.
Murlu my friend, I love this!
(potential for $100 a day extra does sound good after all)
Fantastic post, I feel very humbled that I somehow helped inspire you too!
What I love most is that you have made yourself accountable to your readers, which is a very powerful tool to help achieve goals, so well done there.
In regards to joining you, i am very tempted but atm have so much on I worry that I might be taking too much on, not that I am saying no at this point
I have not heard of helium? is there a link to the site? Are they an article directory?
the other thing is that I assume you are going to write all 1000 articles yourself?!? Holy crap indeed.
I would use UAW because I’m a cheat LOL.
Oh, and to answer your question over at my blog, in case you don’t get a chance to get back over there – yes UAW submits for you too. You write three versions of the same article, choose how many submissions a day and it spins those three into between 400 and 2000 articles and submits them at your requested rate (say 50 a day) until it runs out of articles. Then you can simply hit ‘submit’ again and start the process all over!!
Tres magnifique.
Anyway, will get back to you before august 9 re: the challenge, just let me know more about helium.
Thanks Murray, awesome post again mate.
Wow, Murray, this will be one heck of a challenge at the end of the 100 days.
But, you know what? I have faith in you. You are a writing machine!
Just think of the end of it where you will have all the articles accepted and submitted, and earning money for you forever and ever. One quick burst of energy (for 100 days) and then you can collapse
Thank you Karen!
Your support is much appreciated.
That’s, in essence, is one of the goals in mind. I think the dream many of us have is through passive income. Sit back and bring in the dough while we spend time with family, friends and loved ones.
I’ve been reading a great blog RaamDev. Raam has been traveling all over India and its neighbors; in short, I’d love to do that with my girlfriend one day but without having to worry about stopping all the time to do work just to keep going.
But in the larger picture, I think this is an amazing platform we can all use to improve ourselves. I know what many may be thinking “how does writing all this improve yourself’ but think about it – you’re building great habits, you’re setting goals, you’re benefiting your income, building authority and hey, it just sounds like fun
In the end, I hope everyone (not just participants) can benefit from this as it comes along. I’m sure there will be great posts in between the 100 days that may just spark that one idea that makes them go out and do something great!
I am waiting to see that milestone reached, that is a great goal
Thanks for the support Tinh – it’s very lofty but I believe if we try hard, we can all make it
I would take part if I would have enough time. But I like the idea.
You don’t think the quality would suffer a bit? Maybe if you have that much inspiration you should write a book. Still I am very interested to see how you do in this challenge. If you even get close to your goal (without duplicate content, machine generated nonsense etc.) you will clearly be ELITE!
I was actually thinking about that Bruce haha. If you consider how much work we, as bloggers, pour into our blogs and writing elsewhere we could all have a book!
I think the quality will be a variety but it will often be the subject and mood I’m in while writing. Since a lot of my articles I plan to write will be about small business, blogging and the net (so I can integrate them into tweets and mentions here), it should come together nicely.
One great tip I’ve heard and used is to find a subject and become the master of it. I can’t say I know everything about eCommerce, blogging and such but I know enough that I could write endlessly about without running out of ideas. I have a notebook and files where I’ve been collecting ideas for posts here on Murlu – it’s now reaching over 2,000!
I do plan to write all of these by hand and avoid duplicate content. Some type of content may overlap a bit depending on the subject and, hey, I’m human so I’ll probably forget some of the topics as I go along.
I’m sort of 1/2 and 1/2 on automated software. I do see its benefits for marketing purposes but I want to make sure that each article does bring quality so it doesn’t just sit at the bottom.
Thanks for the support and discussion Bruce!
Wow Murray. This is an amazing challenge.
If I could right articles at the rate of 3 a day, I’d definitely be involved!
I really like how you’ve angled this to supporting your goal of travel, that’s brilliant.
I’ll read the article about an article in 20mins then I’ll get back to you!!!
Thanks for swinging by Matthew and all of your support!
I agree, even at 3 articles a day it will still be quite the feat and accomplishment. I want to push myself and hope others will as well but the challenge will be tough, it really comes down to just saying “this is what I want to do and I want to accomplish it”.
Especially in the make money online blogs, we do talk a lot of theory but how many actually sit down and do it? Time to put the money where my mouth is (is that how it goes?).
Plus, just imagine – we all get on board, it works out perfectly and we can all meet up in Hawaii or something, kicking back, sipping beers and having a party
Hey if we meet up in Hawaii, I’ll be sipping on some Pina Coladas.
OMG Murray you really knocked my socks off with this one! I’ve been meaning to get into article marketing and deciding on the spots to start was part of the research but you’re pulling my arm here with the challenge.
Oh man and it’s also good timing too because I would love the monetary stats you presented here. Your dream is growing onto me, I’m in. Definitely gonna try it and hold myself accountable for it as well.
This will be fun, perhaps at the end of the 100 day challenge maybe you can compile the resources which made it happen for an ebook, case studies, a product in the making here my friend. I’ll definitely buy it!
Send me more details on Helium and also how I can get started please?
You’re reading my mind Thu!
I was just thinking about that today. Although I’m still hesitant about selling stuff (I have this old school web mentality of “free”), I think if it works out really well it could becoming something great like that. I was even thinking about stepping it up, doing videos and maybe even consulting if it works out the way I plan.
I have some great ideas that’s going to bring a lot of info toward article marketing and such within the next few days and weeks. I still plan to write regular posts about various subjects but this would be really great to bridge the two together – what better way to support everyone participating than continually giving tips as it’s going!
Thanks for the support Thu.
Hi Murlu, this is quite a challenge! I would like to join you but I’m launching another blog this month and that will have to be my big project for now. I am curious about Helium now that I know they pay for page views. I do article marketing currently but only for exposure. Do the articles have to be unique to Helium? How often do they pay out? I like the idea of putting something out there and having it passively pay you for years, even at a low rate.
Hi Jennifer and thanks for the questions.
Lemme try my best to answer them for ya but first off, congrats on getting your project well underway – be sure to let us know as it launches, would love to see how it unfolds as well.
As for the questions:
The articles can be unique or based on titles people have already suggested. What I have been playing with as it ramps up toward the project is submitting a mixture of my own posts and jumping on ones they suggest. There’s literally hundreds each day that by the time I’m done going “oh, that would be fun to write”, I have dozens of tabs open!
The minimum threshold is $25 which isn’t too bad and seems like that will be reached fairly quickly. Helium states that payments go out on the 10th of the month and must be requested at least by the 4th. So 6 days from the time you request it – not bad at all considering many other places have you waiting until the next month rolls around.
You nailed it about lifetime revenue – as long as the site stays up, you’ll keep earning. Additionally, you still keep copyright on the articles so if you ever decide to go elsewhere or if Helium somehow goes down, you can take all that you’ve written and publish them for your own websites or on another paid writing website.
so what’s Helium?
You’re gonna keep me guessing aren’t you.
Helium is a paid article website – think: Squidoo, Hubpages, AC, Suite101 and so on.
Can’t really remember why I chose Helium overall but I’ve really been enjoying it, community is very welcoming and helpful and so far it seems to be going over very well
hey.. You can start a post on this blog which welcomes the suggestions for posts topics.. I mean the real demanding posts topics & after writing the article or post, group or writers can notify the demanders & specific problem prone readers. So providing the usefull & compelling contents. & thats my experience that if u face a problem, then u are not the first one. writers can check the demands of suggested topics on searching the SEs & forums..
So i m “In”.. (Hav droped u a mail also thru contact page) Best Wishes – - Rajat Jain
I actually had something similar in mind so thanks for bringing this back up.
I thought it would be a great way to help people along their way with these writings if I could help out additionally by giving suggestions, what others are writing and even resources to help them along the way. This would help clear up any “writer block” which they may be facing. Cause think about it, 1000 articles will be difficult, even just finding the right topics – If we all can pitch in to help one another discover ideas, we’ll be well upon our way.
(I also sent you over an invite)
Hi Murray, I think Rajat idea is good. Perhaps you can put up a 1000 Articles Challenge page or whatnot that could help us keep handy or even contribute. Something with an interactive experience here on your blog. Overall, 100 days is going to need a lot of back and forth.
hi Murlu.,
can u let me knw is ther any criteria to comment on ur posts.. ??
My comment is deleted.. i hav dropped a mail, but not response.. i liked ur habit of answering almost comments.. But mine deleted.. You can say simple NO..
Anyways.. Thankss.. Rajat Jain
Hi Rajat,
I’m not entirely sure why many of your comments do get flagged but I’ve been keeping an eye out for them and have been approving them. I think after a while they will stop being flagged because the system will say “oh, yeah this is a legitimate comment because they’ve been approved before”. They should be up now and answered
Thanks!
Now that’s definitely a target and then some. I really do hope you reach (as well as anyone else who’s joined). I’ll be following your progress and rooting for you with my pom-poms.
Take care and good luck. Goooooooo, Murray!
Thanks Ebele, any support is very welcome
It’s going to be a big project but I think if we all put forth the effort we’ll be able to do something great. Join in when you want Ebele – this project is to benefit everyone 
Murray best of luck..but don’;t you think this will hamper the quality of articles…
There may be a dip in quality at times Harsh but I think the trick is to continually chose different topics so you always have fresh ideas and can change up how you write instead of going over the same thing time and time again.
Meanwhile after going through all the comments and seeing the passion inside you.. Some how it’s motivating me and even I feel like writing atleast 5 posts a day.. Dont know if I’m up for it, considering my other services and work keep me engage..but I would like to give it a shot..
Thanks for such a nice post and motivation
After your most recent income report, five articles a day would be crazy awesome! ShoutMeLoud is already doing so well, just think how big it could get at a rate like that. I would do it as a test for a week; write 5 articles a day and see what kind of impact you’ve made on the blog and if it exceeds your expectations keep running with it
This looks super interesting. I will have to check out Helium. I have used InfoBarrel a little but haven’t done much “shopping around.”
Thanks for the great post!
Hey Murray, Sounds like a great goal and a big challenge. That’s not a bad deal at all if it brings in some extra cash. Best of luck to ya!
I’m not looking too much to make money off of Murlu as just plainly using it as a platform for other things. I just need a bit of extra room to play to really set the bar higher, ya know? Thanks for the comment Scott
Wow… we got the same idea. I find myself really hard to do 10 articles per day. I also want to make 1000 articles in short time but in 35 days so far I only manage to create 100 articles… Are you able to pull this one off?