Is it a real paid to write site or is it a scam?

On Factoidz I found the following question:

are www.writingjobs.net a good agency to join?

Here is my answer:

I have not seen this site before you mentioned it - that alone should tell you that it may be a scam, as I am a professional writer and I tend to know all the real sites. I've seen other site's like this one though and as far as I know, every site that follows this "line up" turns out to be a scam in the end, so I would tread very lightly here and avoid them unless you hear otherwise from a fellow writer (whom you personally know and trust) who has used this site with success.

I quickly scanned the site and I saw a lot of dangerous warning signs that indicate scam artist.

First off, let me point out that any site that spends several hundred words pumping itself up, and telling you over and over again they are the greatest and the best, with out really telling you HOW they are the greatest and WHY they are the best, should be avoided. I legitimate site would spend it's time telling you up front WHAT they do and HOW they do it.

Secondly, the site goes on and one about how much you should join and how much you'll love it, and ONLY at the VERY BOTTOM does it than decide to mention that, oh yeah, by the way, you got to pay all this money to us so we can tell you how we are going to tell you how to make money writing. BIG RED ALERT there! It reads like a ClickBank eBook ad or an ad for acia berry diets.

Thirdly, a REAL business or service is not going to flash the phrase "60 day money back guarantee" in your face every 5 sentences. A real business, will have a Terms of Service (ToS) page and ONLY on the ToS page will you find any mention of a refund - and you will also notice that they will usually call it a refund, not a money back guarantee. The whole "buy today, make lots of money tomorrow, or your money back in 60 days" pitch just screams scam on a loud speaker. ANY site, no matter what they are selling, if they throw a pitch like that at you, they are a scam - close the page and ignore them, there are better ways to waste your money than this.

Fourthly, what EXACTLY is it that they are asking you to pay for? They don't say. They dance all over the place telling you how great they are, but they do not specifically tell you what exactly it is that they are going to do for you once you dish out the money. They are making lots of very vague promises with out specifically telling you anything about them or their service at all. If you are going to pay for something, you ought to have a detailed list of what it is you are going to get for your money.

They say you'll find lots of freelance writing jobs if you pay them money. Okay - HOW? How are they going to find you freelance writing jobs? Are they going to send an agent to your house who will sit down with you and discuss your portfolio and determine which magazines (note - NOT eZizes, but REAL magazines - like O, Glamor, Country Living, Forbes, Popular Science, ect.) are best suited to your writing style and area of knowledge. Why should you expect them to do that? Because, that is what a REAL agent does - and a REAL agent usually charges you BY THE HOUR. An agent actually gets off their ass and goes out there are looks for jobs that match your specific writing style. Are they going to do that for you? They are making claims to being an agent - well, than where is their list of names? Will you get to choose which agent you want to work with or are they going to throw one at you at random?

From reading their site, my conclusion is, that they have no agents who are going to come over to your house and discuss job options over dinner with you. It appears that they are asking you to pay money in order so you can read a list of classified ads for writers. Yeah, you know what, these pay to find job sites are a dime a dozen. Pick a career, any career - contractor, waiter, writer, nurse, babysitter, whatever - no matter what career it is, you'll find dozens of scam sites telling you to pay them money to tell you where to find a job. You know what? Monster is FREE and they do the exact same thing, and 9 times out of 10, these pay-to-read-my-list-of-jobs sites copied their lists right off of Monster or CraigsList or some other free listing site and the scammers are now asking you to pay them for something you can find and read for free elsewhere!

So basically all you are paying for is for them to do your Googleing for you, which if you don't like surfing Google for free and finding free listings 100% free - than, yeah, go ahead and pay them the money and get the list. Just know that, you could have gotten the same list yourself for free with ten minutes surfing Google. Heck, if you are really just into the writing business because you want to make money, you could make more money surfing Google and compiling lists and asking people to pay you to read the list. The average freelancer makes under $12K per year - which is nearly half what they would make in a minimum wage job at the mall. Only a rare few ever reach the $25K income and you are hard pressed to find a freelance making more than $30K. If you are looking at the big names and thinking you could be a millionaire with writing, think again: the big pay writers like Stephen King and JK Rowling got their money off movie rights. Sure, it was a spin off of their writing career, but still, it was not the writing itself that paid big. Remember: if you want to make writing your career than you must first love to write more than you love to eat or have a roof over your head, because a writer's pay sucks, and every writer is going to tell you that. The fact that this site is making big promises of big pay from doing nothing but writing, should be a huge warning sign that it is NOT run by a writer, because no REAL writer is going to make those kinds of claims.

Additionally, why pay for services like this when there are sites like AbsoluteWrite, WritersWrite, NaNoWriMo.org, and so many others that offer listings/help/advice for freelance writers at, get this: 100% free. You don't even have to be a member to read their listings! The horror of it - you can scan sites without paying a penny or even joining the site - who knew? What will they think of next. :P

You should also read SFWA's Writer's Beware, which is a list of all the scams their writers have uncovered over the years.

Okay, here's the deal: if you are really serious about becoming a freelance writer, go to your local book store and buy a copy of this years (2010) Writer's Market. It's a directory of EVERY single REAL and Legitimate publisher who is looking to pay freelancers. The Writer's Market is like a phone book - and it HUGE - well over a thousand pages, and thousands, upon thousands of listings, posted by the publishers, editors, and agents themselves. As a general rule, if they are not listed in The Writer's Market, than they are not a real publisher/editor/agent. (The Writer's Market costs about $20 - $30 depending on with you get the big full edition, or wither you get one of the smaller "children's writer", "non-fiction writer", "poet", "song writer", or "short story and fiction writer" editions, and depending on wither the book store sells books at cover price or at discount.)




What's your take on this? I'd love to hear what you have to say about this post. Leave a comment and share your views!


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