People are often searching for a long-term remote job or supplemental income. In between studies and freelancing, I’ve spent the last few months creating articles for a copywriting firm. I also have a CV on ClearVoice but have not received much work from the site.

Hopefully, reading the review will provide you with some insight into getting started as a freelance writer if that is your interest. You may find a means to supplement your income if you are motivated to do so or if you need to work from home.

This is a legitimate employment opportunity, and may be the gateway to permanent to a full-time remote occupation. How you apply it, is your choice.

Starting as an Independent Copywriting Contributor

Captain Words is an UpWork type service provider, sourcing articles for clients from writers worldwide, with quite a few employees and contributors working from South Africa. It’s a terrific learning curve in content production for blogging and marketing, as well as a great side hustle for some extra cash. Because you must conduct research for your articles, you will learn something new every day. Although many of the articles you create will be for sites that publish them to generate money from affiliates, it is not passive or affiliate revenue.

Your attitude will decide your success. You have control over what you do and how much money you make. However, unless you are a brilliant writer who can crank out volumes in short periods of time or progress faster through the seniority levels, your income will not be enough to travel the world and live as a professional nomad if that is your aim. You may, however, be able to create your own working hours and a timetable to fit your everyday routine.

I am aware that the organization has recently begun to roll out an app that was designed for them, and that much of the work is being allocated through the app rather than utilizing Trello for project management. You will also notice that with the début of the ChatGPT Ai writing technology, the laws, and regulations prohibiting plagiarism may be altered or more stringently applied to any articles supplied by the authors.

I recommend reading the entire article so that you’ll know what to expect if you’d like to join the company as an independent contributor. Click on Captain Words to apply. Please add my name, “Anthony Gillespie,” as a referral on your application.Internal systems and work platforms at the company may change, but the general organization and onboarding process should remain largely unchanged from the article below. Send me a mail and tell me when you sign up, and cc Captain Words HR if you remember.

Evaluation

Before onboarding you as an independent contributor, Captain Words asks you to write two assessment articles to see if you can follow the project guidelines on the job tickets, meet deadlines, and evaluate if you can write.

The articles get graded, and editors comment on them. Writers that pass the assessment must attend a remote interview if the company likes their writing style and has passed the initial assessment stage.

If your application is unsuccessful, you may not receive a notification. The company generally shares the grading and reasons with applicants if they are not selected to continue the onboarding process.

Onboarding Articles

As the company does not pay for onboarding articles, it remains the property of the writer. You can publish it on your blogs or journals if you have one online after grading, or keep it as part of your writing portfolio.

After a short video interview, Captain Words will create a Trello board and a Pumble account on their systems if they accept you as an independent contributor. The team communicates via these mediums and, of course, also via email.

Once employed, the writer gets paid for the first two training articles that they have to write as part of the training session. There is a 48-hour deadline attached to them. If your rating is good, you may be required to write only one training article before taking on projects from paying clients.

Teamwork

The team is overall pleasant and professional. Due to remote workers working in different time zones around the globe, some of them at night, there will be delays in answers and much improvisation.

Working with this company was a rewarding experience with a lot to learn. The tools to manage its freelancers are organized and functional. The knowledge I gained while doing this project is of great value to me as a freelance creative. I use it every day in my writing endeavours.

Subject

Most of the Captain Words writing projects are about iGaming. I can’t say I am a gambling fan, having a bit of a history with people who have had addictions. One of them liked to visit casino floors and gambling sites online frequently.

However, it allowed me to insert a thought or two about responsible gambling into the projects I had to complete here and there. Hopefully, someday, that will make a difference in someone’s life. I believe the written word can change lives.

I learned a fantastic amount about diamonds. Considering I am married, male, and unlikely ever to give or receive a diamond, I know a lot about different shapes and colours of diamonds set in engagement rings in all kinds of mountings.

Suppose you are committed to doing the tasks to the best of your ability and prepared to take on something outside your comfort zone. There are opportunities to write about other subject matters between the gaming reviews.

Project Ratings and Deadlines

All articles get rated, and every manager has access to the statistics of previous reports that a writer completed. The higher the rating of your work, the more requests for work you will receive to do new work from other project managers.

Meet deadlines and communicate challenges or obstacles via project managers. If the coverage of your subject is factual, engaging, and error-free, there will be projects on the board to do.

All articles get checked for errors and plagiarism, returned for revisions, and then through an editor to do minor edits before submitting them to clients for approval.

Writers must return the corrections within 24 hours, but they are sometimes time-sensitive. Unfortunately, if articles get rejected, the writer does not get paid for them.

Invoicing and Ownership

On the 13th day of the month, writers invoice the company for completed projects, unless otherwise informed. Only after the writer submits an article for editing can it be captured for invoicing. Contributors get paid per word. Captain Words generally pay into a Payoneer or PayPal account the same day or, on average, about five days after invoicing closes.

If you decide to sign up for Payoneer, remember that you must have US$50 in the account before transferring the money to your bank account. Their service fee is less than that of PayPal.

Contributors own the copy they write to, where Captain Words pays them for the piece. Captain Words owns the article and copyright of what you wrote when they pay you for it. They can resell and publish it to whomever and wherever they want to under a ghost-writer’s name or a pseudonym.

The Work Arena

All work is done and submitted online via Google Docs. The company does provide you with the tools and guidelines to check your work for errors and plagiarism before submitting it. It is expected for every writer to study, review and proofread their work before submitting it for checking.

Screenshots need to be attached at the bottom of the document piece to prove that writers have checked their work and stayed within the word count required in the brief. Initially, it is time-consuming, but it gets faster as a writer gets used to the system. Good connectivity is, however, essential.

Domain Authority

Research links also need to be attached at the bottom of the document. Editors and Project Managers are supposed to use these to check facts and figures after establishing their Domain Authority (DA) score. The higher the Domain Authority score of a site is, the more credible the source.

To be regarded as a credible research resource, a Domain Authority score of 50% or higher is expected for any site used for research. These numbers can change with different writing projects. The DA score must be much higher for a web domain to be considered a subject expert, generally above 70%.

When writing about the gambling world, finding a site with a DA rating of over 40% is challenging. It is often best to check the sites’ scores and only use information from the higher-rated sites if none of them has a high Domain Authority rating. Note to the project manager at the end of the article if no research links had a very high DA rating.

Higher-rated articles mean a contributor will get more work. If editors disagree with the facts when they check an article, but the writer can prove them wrong, they will generally increase the rating for the article. They learned something from the piece. A research site with a strong DA rating of 70% or higher can achieve the goal of verifying lesser-known facts used in writing.

SEO Strategy

In a successful Search Engine Optimization strategy, the highest-rated sites appear in the top results in most search engines but are usually paid ads. Unique content combined with a good DA rating means a higher placement and display on the first or the second results page. Few people browse further than that when perusing search engine results.

If the plagiarism checks made by the World Wide Web search engines also have a low score and the meta title and description are unique, keyword searches will hit frequently, which then pushes the results from the search engine towards the top of the search results.

A good article will relay information that is not readily available to the reader. Having something new to learn in a written piece that will educate and pique the reader’s interest will result in a higher ranking on search engines. Google tends to push duplicate content down when displaying them in search results.

Project Communication Streams 

Google Docs allows the ability to write comments and revisions or reply to comments on the project file and inside the Google Docs Word Document. Other team members working on the same project can similarly view and reply to the notes. Comments get emailed to the parties they directed when commenting within the Google document.

Editors will generally make notes and changes within the document and return it to the writer by adding a link to the file in the project ticket on Trello before moving it to the writer’s Review column. Reviews take precedence over new work and must be completed first.

After receiving the review notification or spotting them on their planning board, writers can comment or reply to changes within the document if they disagree with comments or changes the editor asks them to make or mark them in the document as they make the changes.

The Google Docs system will send a note to the editor with any comments the writer replies to in the document in response to their critique or remarks when they are doing the revisions.

Writers can also use Pumble, the team chatting platform, to discuss comments or changes that the editor they are unclear of or do not agree with. It is always wise to follow up directly after replying to comments or changes the editor made in the document. Technology does sometimes fail.

When a writer finishes a revision, they will resubmit the document for checking by moving it to the Checking board in Trello.

Constructive Criticism

I rarely got any revisions back on my projects, except that one that just kept coming back. It can be disheartening if you keep getting corrections back on something you have worked hard for. If you consider it constructive criticism, you can learn a lot about your writing style by checking the comments and improving.

Remember, articles get rated. If you disagree with a comment that your facts may be incorrect; have a leg to stand on and the material to back your research up, speak out. If you do not, the decision to avoid the conflict can affect the rating you get from the editor when they check the piece. Ratings affect how much work you get from Project Managers.

Do not argue just for being argumentative. That will give you a reputation as somebody difficult in the work environment. That will only count in your favour if you can consistently produce very high-scoring writing that is thoroughly researched and elegantly presented.

Project Deadlines

I research and test many systems when writing articles, including content I publish on my Instagram account, journal, or website. I love writing. At times, I write just for writing. Research alone can take me up to a day or more, depending on the subject. Writing can take up to a day, depending on the word count of what you need to submit.

Due to the time I spent researching other projects and errands, I often worked overnight to meet project deadlines. Deadlines are generally 24 to 48 hours apart after creating a work ticket on the project board. Sporadically, the deadline for urgent jobs is shorter.

When you have several projects and revisions on your planning board, it isn’t easy to meet all your deadlines. Manage the workload.

Accepting New Projects

It is up to you to accept new projects if they are in their Inbox on Trello. If you decide to take jobs, you need to move them to the Accepted column. If not, you need to contact the Project Manager and inform them they will be unable to accept the project, in which case the PM will find another writer to tackle the project.

The more work a writer can handle and complete in full and on time, the more tasks they will get from the Project Managers. Don’t be shy to reject a job if you cannot manage what you have. Instead, do not accept any new projects until you complete what is already in the system.

If a writer decides not to accept a job, they need to inform the Project Manager when they see the project in their inbox. The PM’s also have deadlines and will find another writer to assist. For urgent jobs, they will often chat to the writer and ask if they will manage the deadlines before dropping them into their inbox, but that does not always happen.

Project Guidelines

Project guidelines are attached to the Trello ticket, including deadline dates and sometimes writing templates. This information is not always correct. I have experienced that a few Project Managers are unfamiliar with what their clients require before they create the tasks on the project management board. If you are unsure, ask questions before starting.

Feedback is, at times, sketchy; when you ask questions. Every so often, you have to improvise and hope your writing meets the client’s expectations. Once, a Project Manager never replied to my query about a project. They were not available online, either, due to working in different time zones over a weekend.

Having an early Monday morning deadline due for submission, I improvised and hoped what I did was what the client required. I had to rewrite the article twice.

Graphics and Illustrations

Some projects required photographs, illustrations, cartoons, or diagrams inserted in the article as part of the project brief. The content you usually charge an hourly rate for as a freelance creative will not earn if you create it yourself as a writer. The company only pays for the writing.

Captain Words supplies the contributors with links to stock photography sites that they can use to search for Creative Commons or free artwork or images. The most common stock art sites they recommend for graphic resources are Pixabay, Unsplash, Pexels, and Stocksnap.

Despite that, I have found the following sites helpful when searching for free or low-cost stock art assets. Creative Market, Graphic River, Envato, Mix Kit, Raw Pixel, Yellow Images, Creative Fabrica, or Pond 5. Remember that some content needs attribution to be used free of charge. You must purchase other resources.

Considering that most articles are about iGaming, you will often not find relevant graphics for the subject unless you can metaphorically use something with a contextual connection to the content you wrote.

If you cannot find images that meet the project brief, make a note at the bottom and inform the project manager. Alternatively, source a watermarked image from a paid stock art site like Shutterstock or Getty Images. Include the lores watermarked image in the article with a link where the client can purchase the material.

If you use creative commons material from the net, check the attribution requirements and include it with the graphics and notes. The Project Manager can remove it when they scan the submission and make the final call. Do not just use any images from the net. Copyright laws are pretty strict, and there is much focus on them. Ignoring copyright laws can cause complications, most people would instead like to avoid.

Revisions

Revisions take priority over new projects. In most cases, they must resubmit for checking and completion within 24 hours. Generally, revisions are fast to complete. There are exceptions, and occasionally a revision may mean a total rewrite or researching and rewriting more than half of the original copy.

Urgent orders do come along, and the writer may be required to complete checks and finalization much faster at times. Writers may have to put new work they are busy with on hold to meet these deadlines. In large quantities, revisions can accumulate and delay other deadlines. When they are busy with new work, writers need to inform project managers if this is the case, to communicate delays to their clients when this happens.

Rewrites

As a rule, Captain Words do not pay for rewrites. I had such a situation, but after discussing it with an HR manager, she agreed that the project manager had given the wrong instructions when she assigned the project to me.

The area has many shades of grey in-between. It is not necessarily black and white. If you received the wrong project specs, speak up. The client rejected the first article, but the company paid me for both pieces. Hopefully, they will be able to use the new rewrite to meet the requirements for another order.

Rejected Articles

Generally, the company does not pay for pieces that a client has rejected. They did pay me for a 4,000-word article that took two days to research and almost a day to write.

The Project Manager forgot to attach a brief to the Trello ticket and did not answer any questions about the project. If I had waited another day, I would not have been able to meet the submission deadline while waiting for answers. Another case of improvisation failing.

Despite being paid for this work, writing this article, unfortunately, cost me a design client and a relatively big freelance design project. I could not prioritize their project above the piece I already had on my due schedule. I had already committed to a relatively tight deadline for the article for Captain Words.

Manage the Workload

If you are a freelancer, consider how it may affect your other work if you work for more than one company. It is a time-consuming job. Do you have the time to do it, attend to other freelance work, and still get some sleep and relaxation when working on many projects?

Managing Deadlines

There are sometimes quite a few projects in your inbox at once. It is best to accept the ones you can complete and inform the project manager as soon as possible when you cannot take any more projects or if you cannot commit to the task at hand. That way, they can pass the ticket on to another writer.

Caption Words expect writers to commit to four articles of 2,500 words per week. You may work a whole week with little time in-between to do other things while writing approximately 10,000 words per week. The project guidelines for a writer’s piece will indicate the article’s length. The word count can exceed or be less than the required number of words within a 10% margin.

If you can do research quickly, are a subject expert, or are a swift writer, you can probably output more work and earn more. If not, you may find your work for a meagre hourly rate. Research and writing go somewhat faster as you get used to the system.

Remuneration

Captain Words pays $8 (US) for a thousand words. Once fully on-board, a writer can earn a salary of $80 (US) per week if contributors meet the company’s expectations of writing at least four articles of 2,500 words per week. That is $320 (US) per month, approximately R5,200 (ZAR) per month depending on the forex exchange rate.

If you are a student, live with your parents or family, or live in a rural area where you pay very little or do not have to pay for accommodation, fuel, or cars, you could probably live off the remuneration.

When you have additional recurring expenses like Medical Aid, Retirement Annuity, Life Insurance, or month-to-month rent and debt, this will not give you the means to earn a living unless you can advance in the company. Finding additional side gigs that pay well in the little spare time between creating the copy may not be easy.

Advancement

Once you have written ten articles, you can apply for a position as a Project Manager. Once you have written 100,000 words, you can apply for a position in the company as an Editor. I am not sure what the remuneration is for these positions, but they first employ within their writing ranks. You have to start at the bottom.

Project managers and editors still have to write some articles between their workloads. Still, I am unsure how many articles Captain Words expects them to submit between editing and project work. There are opportunities to earn more in-between writing if you have completed enough articles to move forward within the ranks or renegotiate your rates.

Remuneration Platforms and Invoicing

Unless otherwise instructed, writers usually submit invoices for completed work to Captain Words on the 13th day of the month. Captain Words pays timeously and usually settles invoices within four days of submission via PayPal or Payoneer.

When you receive payments for your work, you will pay a small admin fee to either PayPal or Payoneer every time Captain Word deposits your payment for the month’s work. Forex rates will claim another small amount once the funds are withdrawn and deposited into your bank account. A foreign currency does ease that expense as long as the ZAR value remains weak.

Work Expenses

As a student, stay-at-home worker, or someone with a stable internet connection sharing accommodation with someone or staying with their parents or families, Captain Words can be a good source of additional income.

Data and Connectivity As A Nomad or Travelling Volunteer

Not all rural areas have fibre available. I lived on a farm while doing this research. Connectivity consisting of only a satellite meant no internet connection whenever there was bad weather. The ISP also charged high rates for data, which means data cost me round about tR800 (ZAR) R800 (ZAR). Keep in mind that I also used data for design projects and studying.

At the start of this journey, I had to buy a SIM card from each mobile service provider to see which would offer me affordable data rates and the best connection. Mobile connectivity in South Africa is costly, and working on only a SIM card for a week was quite a costly experience. To be able to do the work, you need to be connected.

I also had to load a minimal amount of data on each SIM card to test mobile data connectivity when there was bad weather or when the ISP had issues with their satellite network, which was often.

Electricity

Load shedding three times a day with no internet connectivity makes it challenging to meet deadlines. Investing in a UPS or a power backup system should be considered. I replaced my laptop soon after the motherboard blew out to meet deadlines.

Investing in a UPS, router, and laptop will be a wise investment to continue the work and meet deadlines, but initially, it is quite a significant expense if you do not have the tools already.

General Observations

The income earned from Captain Words will not be enough to sustain a lifestyle as a Digital Nomad or Remote Worker. If you are a speedy writer, you may earn more, or if you are a subject expert, maybe you can renegotiate your rates with the company.

The other option, try to move up in the company ranks rapidly in a formal employment agreement as an editor or project manager. You need to have written a certain number of articles to apply for these positions when they become available.

Living Expenses

There are opportunities to explore if you have a stable internet connection and time to do so within the company. It is easier to do if you don’t have financial obligations that need to be met in a short time or any dependants to take care of.

Suppose you are a student, live with family, or are in a situation where you do not have to pay for accommodation and everyday living expenses like a car and insurance. In that case, you will likely make a living off the income earned here.

You are welcome to contradict or correct me. I base my opinion on my monthly expenses, which are very little. It depends on your lifestyle and circumstances. The unemployed, retires, pensioners, and residents in informal settlements often survive on much less.

Teamwork

Being on the road and residing at a few new destinations every few months has recently seen me not often work with teams for a while. Some fantastic people from all creeds and cultures have crossed my path, but I have not made many lasting friendships—passing ships. Hopefully, someday, our paths will cross again.

As a freelancer and often a volunteer, you are self-reliant in your tasks, disciplines, and deadlines. Being a constant traveller does have drawbacks.

I liked and respected the team I worked with in my previous positions. Even though it was often a challenge getting to know them when mainly working at night, I often think about the team at the graphics agency in Modderfontein. I often think and miss the team I worked with at a packaging company in Springs.

There were some great people on both teams. Many have changed jobs and moved on, but I hope life will treat them well in all their ventures. I often miss the part of the work-life balance of teamwork more than I would like to admit.

Subsequently, I enjoyed recently working with the team at Captain Words after travelling for almost two years. I hope we will get the opportunity to work together again somewhere in the future.

Conclusion

Working with Captain Words was definitely worth the experience and knowledge I gained. It may give you a foot in the door towards a remote job opportunity at a copywriting firm. You can use the content you create for them in your printed work portfolio, as long as you credit them in context. They own what they paid you for, and you may not publish it online.

Captain Words is a legitimate company, using technology to provide for a growing community of clients worldwide seeking new creative content for their online presence and businesses. However, some companies will pay more for online content. They are in resale, and sell your content to meet the demand from their clients.

You often need some experience to be considered a content creator when applying for positions. Start as a contributor. Captain Words may be a way of gaining that experience you need to progress in your remote career, or get your foot in the door towards permanent employment.