Content is king

By Chris Ross
Posted Sunday, July 25, 2004

Introduction

A pencil. Yes, a pencil. In my opinion, every great idea has started with a pencil. Sure, lots stay in someone’s head, but to me a great idea doesn’t have any value until it’s written down. Until it’s written down it’s just dust I the wind: here today and quickly forgotten tomorrow.

But, every great idea needs a little something extra. Maybe you’re great at design, but you simply can’t write worth a darn. Or, maybe, you have the best idea for a website, but no real way to get the word out. Either way, we all have different skills and we all have something to give and wouldn’t mind getting a little something in return.

The website I’m talking about today is really about just that: getting something valuable in return for something valuable. Whether you are a website owner or a writer, this website has been rather successful at giving you what you need, when you need it.

Constant Content is all about giving webmasters the content they need to make their sites great while at the same time giving authors the exposure and income they need to keep doing what they are great at. At it’s core, it’s about allowing people to play to everyone’s strengths.

The Gist of the Gist

There are really two parts to Constant Content. If you are a webmaster, there are hundreds of articles available for you as free content, licensed content or exclusive content. Constant Content will even have content custom written for you if you don’t find what you need!

It’s a little bit like having hundreds of writers sitting around at your beck and call. Some would call it spoiled, but I call it a dream come true.

The flipside of this equation is for authors. As you can tell, I’m an author. I’ve written articles, reviews, tutorials and curriculum for magazines, universities, books… You name it, I’ve done it. For me the two hardest parts about being an author are exposure and a revenue stream. Either you can’t find enough work, or the work you find doesn’t pay you often enough or well enough to make life easy.

For writers, this is where Constant Content comes in. It provides you a place to showcase your work, to license it (lots of people buy, lots of money for you) and even to sell exclusive, lucrative, licenses of content you prepare.

As I said before, Constant Content really is about connecting webmasters and writers up to form a team. A very cool concept which works very well.

Webmasters, Put Your Hands in the Air!

By now any smart webmaster should be aware that content is what makes the site go round. Even if all you have is an Ecommerce site, it’s still ultimately the content on that site which gives it legs. Your users need to know certain things, and content is what fills them in. Whether it’s articles, reviews, tutorials, essays or editorials, every site benefits from new, professional content.

Before we get in too deep to how you can get that great content right now, let me go through some of the basics of how Constant Content works for site owners. The process is fairly simple. You go to the Constant Content site. Then you find the type of content you are looking for (there are several ways of narrowing it down). Once you’ve found a piece you like, you are able to see a preview of it to make sure it fits with the overall tone of your site.

You then have a choice. Do you want a “Usage” license or a “Unique” license. A Usage license basically means you are allowed to use the license, but so is anyone else who buys a Usage license. It gives you the content you need, but does not guarantee you won’t find it elsewhere. The flipside of this is that the content is very well priced: often in the 10-20$ range, which isn’t bad at all. If you’re looking for exclusive rights to a piece of content though, you will need to purchase a Unique license. This will guarantee that nobody else buys the piece in question. It’s a bit like buying a print of a famous painting versus buying the original. Both are great, both will work, it just depends on your needs.

Ultimately, there is only so much content on Constant Content right now, as it is a fairly new service. So, what happens if you don’t find the content you like? Well, you can either submit a Request for Content and hope authors help you out, or you can apply to have a piece custom created for you. Sure, you’ll pay a premium, but you will also work with the author to make sure the piece is ideal for your project.

Whether you choose to buy content already on Constant Content or get it created just for you, ultimately you’ll find what you need, at a great price, delivered with a smile. Constant Content allows you to play to your strengths, without having to worry about all the extra hassles.

Authors, Princes Among Men

Being a writer is tough these days. Either you can’t figure out what you want to write about, or you’ve written tons of stuff that nobody’s buying. After all, we can’t all be John Grisham’s (nor do most of us want to… though the 3 boats wouldn’t be bad).

Working with Constant Content has several key advantages, at least in my experience. First, it helped get my name out there. I submitted several articles for free which are now in use on dozens of sites. It gave me exposure, and several times has given me opportunities to write custom content for a decent fee!

The other area Constant Content has helped me is in writing that I’ve just got “kicking around”. I haven’t sent it to anyone, it isn’t published and it’s basically just gathering dust. I can submit the piece to the site and just sit back. Sometimes I’ll get purchases fairly quickly. But sometimes nothing will happen for a few months. Somehow that’s even more gratifying. The fact that I can submit content, and have it pay me for years to come isn’t a bad deal at all. It feels a bit like some of the royalty checks for book contributions that I get.

Besides the ability to submit free content, Usage content, Unique content and custom content deals, there is one other great thing about Constant Content: referrals. I’ve referred several friends to Constant Content. Every piece they sell, I get 5% for. Yeah, that’s right. Sometimes I wish real world publishing worked like this, because I know a lot of authors. If every time one of my friends got a big signing bonus for a book I got 5%… I could practically retire.

You Too Can be King!

While I’d hate to be really cliché and say Constant Content provides a win-win situation, I really have to. If you’re a webmaster you have access to a growing repository of reasonably priced content. If you’re an author, you have an easy forum to not only let your writing speak for itself, but to make some decent money while you’re at it. Visit Constant Content now at (http://www.constant-content.com) to find out more and to sign up for your account.

About The Author
Chris Ross