As I’ve said numerous times, I do a lot of writing on Medium.com. Well, that was until this past few months.
Since October, I’ve noticed that my earnings on that site went from mediocre to non-existent. Though I’d never earned a massive amount of money on the site, I did earn enough each month to help pay for some of my online activities. My biggest thing was that it helped pay for my annual membership to the site itself. However, if things keep up the way they’ve been going, I may not be able to achieve that goal.
I went through a bit of a depression through the month of November, and I took most of December off to focus on the holidays. Since the first of the year, I’ve been working on expanding my endeavors. I’ve been trying to keep up with this site, as well as my other blogs. I’m also working on not one, but two online shops. Those are taking a little longer to get together, but it will happen. And finally, I’ve gotten back to work on Book 2 of the Investigating the Beyond series. It’s still in draft form, but I’m about ready to send it off to the editor.
I’m also getting kind of excited about the revamping of my Substack newsletter. I’ve actually been working on that more than anything else in the past couple of weeks. I have an actual plan for both the free and the paying versions. My goal is to make this newsletter a valuable resource for creatives of all types. Not just writers, but cartoonists, painters, musicians, puppeteers, and whoever else feels that their hobby is an art form.
The free version will come out twice a month and have links to my latest posts, shop items, and literary works. There will also be an article or a review of something I think will be of value to my readers. I’m still working on what that will be, but I’ll come up with something.
As for the paid version, I’ve already set up a chat room and am in the works to put together a few contests. I’ve got a couple of writing friends lined up to be judges, so it won’t be me choosing the winners. I’m also thinking of doing some videos. Some will be how-tos for crafters, some will be poetry and/or short story readings, and some will just be me giving out advice and information on some of the weird stuff I know.
I’m learning the hard way that you really can’t put all your eggs in one basket. I put a lot of faith in Medium.com and now I’m paying the price, literally. I’m not saying I’ll be leaving the site any time soon, but I won’t be putting in as much time there as I have in the past.
I’m not saying I’ve found the key to success, not even close. I’m saying I’m going to expand my horizons and try a few new things. I have a bad habit of convincing myself that I’m going to fail before I even try and I jump ship. The thing is that sometimes you have to fail. It’s how you know when you’ve finally found success.
I hope you’ll join me as I take baby steps toward finding a way to make a few extra bucks. I’m not expecting to become independently wealthy, though that would be way cool. I just want to have enough coming in to keep up with my online endeavors.
If you have any suggestions, let me know. I’d love to hear them.
Until next time,
Stay Creative!!!
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Christine Graves has been writing online for nearly 30 years. She has written everything from fiction and poetry to reviews and ad campaigns. She runs three blogs, Graves Publications, Priestess of Words, and Collected Keepsakes. She currently writes for a platform called Medium.com and runs several publications through them.
Christine is also an avid collector of vintage anything and an arts-and-crafts kinda gal. She is a sucker for a garage/yard sale, secondhand stores, and auctions. Because of this, she’s opened her first real online shop called Prairied Treasures and another that showcases her AI artwork called Pathways through the Past.
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