A Personal Challenge

littleowl

Anglea wrote: »

Hi littleowl,

I used to use a directory that was at the library (sorry I forgot the name now as it was all years ago) but it was aimed at advertisers and listed every magazine and had very good statistics that you could use for target audiences and also how many readers they had as for letter writers and competitions this is a good figure to know.

Here are some ideas for short fillers -

TIPS, JOKES, PHOTOS, LETTERS

Chat, That's life - all those sort of reality mags aimed at women - lots of opportunites but hard as high circulation

Puzzle mags - write your own puzzles - again hard due to circulation levels
Yours - for older people - hard to get published but lots of opportunities
Readers Digest - you can do this online - some high paid opportunites

LETTERS

Hobby/Interest magazines with glossy photos - e.g.hobbies/natural health/expensive home mags

ARTICLES

Personal life stories - Chicken Soup Series - do it online
Spark Magazine - if you are into natural health/environment

GET PUBLISHED, NO PAYMENT

Specialised magazines e.g. there are many creative writing ones that you find the details about in Writers News or Writers Forum magazines in WH Smith

Specialist hobby -I got published in various Sherlock Holmes books.

Publications relating to health conditions.

Newspapers - Letters to the Editor. Very good practice.

PAID FOR PROJECTS

If you are good at crafts or other hobbies there are magazines asking for projects with instructions to be sent to them e.g. dolls house


Hope that some of you will find this interesting. There is such scope nowadays that it would take a whole book to list it all.

Thank you Anglea - that is a great list of ideas! I shall enjoy exploring them and, hopefully, might find some success

srvr

Hi All

Firstly the news, it hit my £1400 Idealistic Target after the end of July but sort of after end of June, it just took a while to get into my bank. So after six months i have made £1400 which i have to say i am quite pleased about.

However that amount of money causes its own considerations, considerations rooted in common sense. For this sudden affliction of common sense i blame none other than our darling of the slicethepie forum misspixierocktastic.

A while ago Pixie linked me the Snowball Calculator Site which is a great resource for managing your debt down. Since then i keep banging in numbers seeing how i can make improvements.

Basically, having this amount of money sat that could be saving me interest became too much of distraction and so i have decided to spend most of my money earned so far paying off a Credit Card Debt.

You may ask why should i then halt the challenge half way through, surely i could just hypotheticate the amount i would have in the bank at year end. Well thats a matter of psychology really as for me working out how much i would have had and then looking at the bank and seeing a much smaller number would be for me be depressing. Much better to end the challenge now, tell all to those who read it, declare victory, in that i hit my idealistic target, claim victory for being on course for my unrealistic target and rap it all up as the money is now spent.

I can tell you however that paying off this bill has increased the amount i have left from my wage packet by £50 per month and saved me about £360 in interest so its not a bad plan at all.. So thank you PIXIE :rotfl:

The question is what now, i really enjoyed this whole process and the encouragement and posts from you really helped more than you would guess. So, the cogs are turning, a new challenge is forming, a new goal looming and post to follow i think.

For now, thanks for your support, your help, your PM's, your posts and everything else. You just helped me earn a crap load of cash in very short period of time and that has saved me even more money over even longer.

Money Saving Experts, the lot of you :T

Singer_Of_Flames

Srvr, congratulations!

I commend you on making an unexpected but wise decision. There would be no point in making more money if you were accumulating debt the entire time. You have achieved a lot and all under pressure. Well done!

I can't wait to see your next challenge though! ^_^

srvr

Thanks singer :-)

As for the next idea i am trying to think of something bigger but not too big. I am trying to work out something that combines more than just extra curricular earnings, something that will be of interest to MSE readers in terms of subject, context and method. Finally, of course, its got to be something that will directly contribute to my goals. Most importantly though its gota be fun and a little exciting so i can keep it up.