Contacting a requester

[4rumid]

Two or three months ago, I submitted a few articles for a request and the requester bought them for his website. I've just written another article that I think he'd be interested in. Once it gets accepted here, would it be all right to contact the requester and let him know that he may be interested in an article available at CC? I would contact him directly on his website, so he wouldn't see my email address. That is, no contact information would be exchanged, and the purchase would be through the CC system.

Would CC have any problem with that?

[Celeste Stewart]

I suspect that they would. Not only is there the issue of contacting the customer (even if no contact info is exchanged), but it could be annoying or perceived as spammy to the customer. I'm sure you'd word the information well, but. . .

Besides, if the customer is a regular CC customer, he'll likely be back looking for content. He may even be subscribed to that category and automatically notified of new articles.

[Lysis]

I get a lot of the same users buying my stuff, so I'd just upload it and sit tight.

[4rumid]

Thank you both for your input. It was the potential spamminess factor that had me concerned -- I certainly wouldn't want customers getting annoyed by frequent contacts from writers. So -- until Ed or Support weighs in -- I'll just submit it and hope for the best.

[4rumid]

The customer just bought the article! And it hadn't even been posted for a week! Selling never loses its kick. (Although it's only my 6th sale. Maybe it loses its kick for people like Celeste . . . )

[Celeste Stewart]

Congrats!

Selling hasn't lost its kick for me It's always a thrill to get paid for stringing words into sentences! I love it!

[yashuasgirl]

It's appropriate to ask relevant questions as many requests can be quite vague. Use your judgment and realize you may or may not hear back. Don't let a lack of a response postpone you from writing an article if you're interested in the topic. Sometimes, customers don't really know what they want - they know it when they see it.

So I take it then that we are allowed to communicate with a customer, to ask pertinent questions about a requested article? I have had one article accepted by CC that hasn't sold yet and now I have an article that I wrote for a public request "Why You Should Stop Smoking" in the review Que... My question is..when a customer lists things like what the title should be, is that literal or suggestive? I took it as literal and that is the title to the article, although the article is much more than what the title suggests. The other thing the customer did was put a word count in the request. It was for 1,450 words which I thought was a bit long for the offered price of 30 to 40 dollars. I pounced on it though, as I really want to write for CC and I have to start somewhere. I just quit smoking myself so I was comfortable with the subject. I guess what I really want to know is, if the customer wants 1,450 words is it imperative that it be exactly 1,450 words? If the article is shy say three words or so will that article still be offered to the customer if it passes review? Sure hope I hear something soon....aren't newbies a pain in the rump though?......I hope I have posted this in the appropriate place.....

[Celeste Stewart]

For the most part, it's all suggestive. I wouldn't worry about a three word difference in word count either.

[jrichards]

@yashuasgirl
I agree with Celeste on the word count and price. If the titles are provided I would suggest that writing an article that uses the titles is a good option, as the requester may be hoping to capture search engine rankings for a particular keyword phrase.

@4rumid
We really aim to keep customers protected from massive amounts of email/spam, so our policy is to just have people put their articles up and let the customers come and visit without personal emails being sent out, we do have a number of notification system that customers can opt into, so there are a number of methods to keep them in the loop. Email notifications for particular categories, RSS feeds for categories, RSS feeds for authors, RSS feeds even for search results. So, between all those methods and people just coming around to visit the site, customers are reasonably quickly notified when a new articles that come onto the site that suits their needs.

-jrichards
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