EDIT: Helium changed its payment policies on December 6, 2010.
Helium and Constant Content are two websites that offer a lot of job opportunities for freelance web content writers. Both sites have recently undergone improvements and are actively recruiting new writers. Both have options for adding articles to their site while also hosting a freelance writer job board. Both sites pay via PayPal. However, Constant Content is the better of the two sites for freelance web content writers — but not by much.
Money
Helium sporatically pays a small upfront payment for each article added in certain categories. Helium clearly states what categories they will pay for and what they won’t. Unfortunately, writers have to write and submit an article and then compete with four other writers and THEN get selected by Helium staff in order to get payment. But all articles can get revenue sharing – which adds up if you happen to submit a heck of a lot of 400 word articles on subjects you know about.
Constant Content lets the writers put a price on their own articles. Theoretically, this means that one article could pay a lot more on Constant Content than on Helium. But this is often not the case. If an article is accepted to Constant Content, it is merely housed on an online catalogue and sits there until someone buys it. Then, Constant Content takes 35% of the cut. Constant Content is a huge gamble, but it occassionally pays off.
Website Design
EDIT: Constant Content is updating its website
Helium has a far more user-friendly website design than Constant Content. Writers can easily find what they are looking for in Helium’s extensive FAQ sheets. They also have a friendly forum that is often looked at by Helium staff. Be careful of bad-mouthing Helium on Helium’s forum or you will be banned.
This is not the case with Constant Content. The site is geared for article buyers and not for writers. It is very difficult to find any answers to questions. Even the “Submission Guidelines” are as clear as mud. Trying to negotiate the categories to know where your written article will fit in is also difficult.
You also need to register to the Constant Content forum separately from the Constant Content site. This is a step not needed with Helium. Although the Constant Content community of writers can be helpful, the staff is not.
Overall Experience
Helium is less stress and slightly more money for the web content writer than Constant Content, but both are low-paying gigs. Helium also has helpful staff that are willing to answer any question (or at least point you in the direction of someone who does) and fact checkers. Although anyone can post an article to Helium, not every article stays up on Helium for long.
Constant Content treats writers with contempt. They do not offer up-front payments. They do not explain what their impossibly high standards to meet are. They will allow anyone to register to become a writer but then waste a lot of time rejecting articles and not explaining why. After a very small number of rejections (sometimes as low as three), you are banned from the site for life — although this rule is only sporatically enforced. Hopefully in the future they will require writers to submit an application with a writing sample so they can quickly weed out the writers they will soon ban.
Those banned from Constant Content that are very good writers with a thorough grasp of English are certainly welcome at Text Broker, HubPages, Yahoo! Voices, Writers Access, iWriter and, of course, Helium.
