AND THESE DAYS IT IS EVEN EASIER THAN EVER TO DO THAT.
Back in my early days on the Internet, having a strong interest back then in the horror fiction industry I set out to start a monthly online horror fiction magazine, and to my surprise it actually became quite successful.
WELL, WHEN I SAY IT WAS SUCCESSFUL, I MEAN IT WAS POPULAR.
This was the early 90's and AOL was primarily the "go-to" when it came to anything online. Anyone could create a website and put it out there for all too see. The problem back then was monetizing the whole thing.
FrightNet Online Magazine was what it was called, and featured fiction from some great horror names like T.M. Wright, Douglas Clegg, Michael Laimo, and others. I eventually went on to publish a short story anthology called Dark Whispers. I went by the name Ivan S. Graves doing the magazine and the anthology.
Several times I have considered restarting the magazine since nowadays monetizing is quite a bit easier, and even creating subscription based content is much easier now than it was when FrightNet Online Magazine had its day. But running the site was actually quite time consuming, and while I thoroughly enjoyed what I did, I am not sure I have the time these days to do it, nor do I particularly feel up to it.
BUT I STILL WANT TO MAKE MONEY ON SIDE GIGS, AND PROBABLY SO DO YOU. It is a large part, besides enjoying writing, that I started this blog several years ago, writing about things I like to talk about like politics and money. And it is still hard to actually make money even with all of the affiliate programs and Google AdSense and all of that sort of thing.
THAT IS STILL THE CASE EVEN IF YOU GET GENERALLY GOOD TRAFFIC TO YOUR BLOG.
So I decided to pursue another avenue. I also like to write music and do play the guitar, and depending on who you talk to, I am not terrible at singing either. Like many things, including my style of writing, my music is my own brand—it's different. And if you were to listen to my last album, Pink Flamingoes, or my iTunes single All You Are, you will certainly see that.
Does the music effort earn enough to pay the bills? Not hardly. The truth is that the hardest part of any of these ventures is getting your wares out for people to take a look at.
You don't have the marketing backing that some bloggers can afford, or that the music industry will provide its stars, and when it comes to music in particular, it is nearly impossible to get radio airplay. Still, the point here is that there are multiple ways to get it all out there. Sharing on places like Facebook or Twitter is of course one place to do it. But for music there are also places like Bandcamp and SoundCloud. Although the latter does not pay anything, it is just a place to share and perhaps in some way introduce what you do to people who may be interested in checking a bit further and who may be interested in buying a bit of what you do.
One of the keys, I think, is to keep plugging along despite it all. You never know, one day something may click and then the sky is the limit. It's tough, but you have to keep doing it. Keep playing around with what you are writing about, and keep on changing how you format it all.
Like this blog, for example. Recently I decided to try something a bit different in the manner in which I was writing it. Using more "breaks" and boldface type and italics to set things apart and hopefully keep the reader reading. And, increasing the frequency of posts. The more you add to your blog, the more content obviously is generated, and the better the ranking your blog overall will get when it comes time to being catalogued and indexed.
I recently read an article about a 28 year-old retiree who made a little over $62,000 in the first year of blogging, and if nothing else it served to make me think that if nothing else, at least it is POSSIBLE to actually make something significant doing all of these things. Especially if you are able to do multiple things such as blogging, making music, and maybe even starting up a magazine like I did.
Going back to the thought of restarting FrightNet still intrigues me if for no other reason than based on what I know right now, it could actually be the one thing, the one online endeavor, that might actually stand a chance of making the kind of revenue that that 28-year old retiree makes. Or more even. And certainly it could serve as another platform for some of my other stuff—which would of course have to be relevant to what I was doing there. I could, for example, market a song like 102 Idle Stones, Voices, or No. 130 Melancholy in D from Pink Flamingoes which do have a bit of a horror slant, or a song like What I Want on my Bandcamp which is certainly dark and sinister in nature.
The main point of this post really comes down to one thing for me. Do what you love, share what you love, and hopefully someone will love what you do. If that happens, if people actually find that they love what you do, someone may actually one day pay you for it.
As I said before, you just have to keep on doing it. Not everything is going to be gold and one can't expect overnight success. Just like when you play the lottery, sometimes you even have to accept that no matter how often you play, you may never actually win...
BUT YOU CANNOT WIN IF YOU DO NOT PLAY!
There is a ton of content out there, and there a ton of people out there all vying for attention. It's a tough field, and its tough to get the attention. It takes time like all things ultimately do. You have to have a lot of patience, and no matter the immediate or even long term outcome, you have to believe that what you are doing is still worth doing. No matter what happens. No matter who pays attention and who does not. No matter if you make money or you do not.
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