One of the hottest topics going around on the freelance writing message boards is writing for Cloud Crowd. With all the talk going around on the various WAHM boards, I decided to post my thoughts on this writing opportunity.  First, I’ll point out that Cloud Crowd utilizes a Facebook app and you  have to allow Cloud Crowd to access your profile in order to apply. I thought that was a little unnecessary, but allowed it. I will point out that I haven’t had any problems with them since allowing that access to my profile.

Okay… so all in all I think Cloud Crowd is a good egg to have, if you are a patient person. Now, here are my specific experiences and thoughts about them:

First, you have to pass a writing test, which is a test article that you will be paid for if you pass. They do not give you much for guidelines except for word count of between 280 and 315 words. So, I wrote a title and then my article came to exactly 315 words. I submitted it and waited a few days. When I checked back in, I was rejected. I looked at my editor’s comments which said that I was over the word count. I knew I wasn’t so after fumbling around with an appeal button that didn’t seem to work, I found the support forum and posted a message. Obviously the editor counted my title as part of the word count, yet I never count the title in a word count, nor does any other place I write for!  After about 24 hours, my test was reviewed and I was approved to write.

I wrote my first article, which was medical related, as I understand that is what the majority of the $10 articles are right now.  I submitted it with no problem and woke up the next morning to see the money in my PayPal.  I thought to myself  “not bad!” I could definitely work at a place like this, that pays so quickly!

Next, I decided to try the smaller articles, called definitions. These are also medical related, paying about $5.25, up to $6 with the bonus. I spend a while on this one cause it was the first one of this style and I wanted to make sure I got the formatting right (3 paragraphs, centered title, keywords used 3 times, etc..). I finished, uploaded the Word document, and hit submit. My article was immediately rejected.    So I had to get the job number and go post it in the support forum for someone to look at. It appears this is a glitch they are aware of but can not find why it is happening, so they can’t fix it.  It took about 24 hours for someone to look at it and then approve it, and then I got paid.

My next two items have gone through without a hitch. And, now that I’ve written a couple, I am writing them faster since I know what kind of style they are looking for.

My other peeve is that they provide you with three sources to use when writing your article, but so far they have  not been any help for me. They may have the keyword on the page, but the references don’t provide information that is needed to write the article. So I do spend some time doing a little research.

Even with these little hiccups, I feel that Cloud Crowd is good to have when you need or want some fast money. Or if you have some downtime. But I would not rely on them as your sole means of income.  This evening I checked in and there were no $10 articles to write so I did a couple $6 definitions. My first one was approved by the time I was done with my second one. My second one was approved after I was looking around for a Cloud Crowd banner.. which I didn’t find.

Other than the larger articles or the little definition articles, you can also search for the URL’s for people to use when they write articles, but that task only pays about 35 cents.  And, I also believe they sometimes have other tasks that are kinda like MTurk.  But I haven’t seen any.

Originally posted 2011-04-05 19:35:56. Republished by Blog Post Promoter