How to use izea

Have you joined izea.com yet?

This post contains affiliate/referral codes

If you are already there you may be a bit baffled by how it works. I know a lot of bloggers (myself included) have been confused by the new layout when they joined Izea.

I have figured it out though and izea is definitely one of my favorite networks, if not my absolute favorite! I’m here to share with you a few tips on how it works so you can make the most of your izea membership!

First off, What is izea? – Izea is a site that connects bloggers with brands. You’ll find sponsored post opportunities there, along with chances to get paid for tweeting or using other social media sites to promote brands. 

How does it work?

I’ll be sharing screen shots from my personal izea dashboard so you can see what I’m referring to. If you haven’t already, sign up for izea, then when you log in, it should look like the image below. . . Sometimes there is a welcome message which you will need to X out of to get to this screen or click the purple “sponsorship” icon to the left.

The “new” tab at the top shares your most recent opportunities. These used to be called ‘leads’ if you are familiar with Social Spark. 

Let’s run through how these leads/opportunities look!

Name = Brand

For = Which blog is being offered the opportunity. This really only matters if you have multiple blogs. Otherwise, all your leads will be for the same site.

Type = What type of lead, do they want you to write a post, share something on social media etc.

Platform = WHERE they want you to share. In the image above it shows a paper, which represents a blog post. Could also show a twitter symbol for tweets or other symbols for other types of promotions (posts and tweets are currently most popular).

Expires = When the job expires. This part usually reads TBD (to be determined) until you get the job. Then it will state when they want the job completed.

Price = How much you will be paid for the job. This part also reads TBD until you are in negotiations or have been accepted to the job.

When you scroll down your ‘new’ screen you will see all of the opportunities currently available for you to bid on. If you see something that does NOT fit your niche or is something you don’t want to write about, you can click the little triangle in the top right of the opportunity and push the “decline” button. This way your new tab doesn’t get cluttered with unwanted opps.

If you DO like what you see, then you will enter the bidding process. Click “bid” on whichever opportunity you’d like to try first. That will take you to a screen like this one.

You can see here some information from the advertiser up top. They give a complete description of what they are looking for from you so you know exactly the requirements before you bid on something. There is a blank spot for you to write in your bid, and there is usually a minimum and maximum bid limitation as well. Sometimes they only share minimums like in the image above.

Now is where it gets tricky! You have to choose how much money you’d be willing to do this offer for. If it’s a tweet, start out with a few dollars. If it’s a post you will probably want to charge much higher. Whatever you choose, you must bid between the minimum and maximums set up by the advertiser. If you think you should be paid above the maximum, then you can decline the offer.

After you place a bid, the opportunity moves from the “new” tab to the “pending” tab. (tabs pictured below)

You can see I have six posts currently in my “pending” tab. This means I’ve bid on them and am waiting for the advertiser to either

• accept my bid
• deny my bid
• make a counter offer

Denied bids move to the “taken/cancelled” tab up top. Declined bids will also be there, along with opportunities that you’ve completed. If you open that tab you will see all of the offers that have ever come your way. If you look at them, under “status” you will see several different categories.

• Declined by you – self explanatory
• Declined by advertiser – meaning the advertiser did not accept your bid
• Published (with date) – This is an opportunity you took and completed. The completion date will help you know when to expect payment in your izea account, as payments arrive no later than 30 days after completion. 
• Deadline missed by you – This means you were accepted to a campaign but did not complete the requirements in the appointed amount of time. 
• Deadline missed by advertiser – This means the advertiser didn’t officially “decline” you but didn’t accept you to the job before the job ended either. Essentially the same as declined by advertiser, as you didn’t get the job. 

The last tab to discuss is the “actions required” tab. Here, is where you will find the opportunities that you have been accepted to complete! yay!!!!

I don’t have any that are incomplete right now, so I can’t show you a screenshot, but this part is pretty straight forward. You craft your post or tweet in the box provided and then click submit! It will then be reviewed by an advertiser to be sure that all of their requirements were met and then you can post!

When opportunities make it to this tab they will have a deadline in place. This shows that you must submit your content prior to that date. Once your content is submitted it make take a day or two for the advertiser to approve but you won’t be timed during this period. When the advertiser approves it, the offer will again appear in the “actions required” tab along with the HTML of the post for you to copy/paste into the HTML form of your blogging platform. If you are not sure how to find the HTML portion of your blog, check out the image below.

You can see I’m drafting this post right now *wink* and where the arrow is pointing it says “text” there you can see the HTML portion of what I have been typing in to the “visual” tab. So you would copy the HTML of your post from the izea dashboard, then paste it in to your post draft using the “text” option up top. You can switch back to “visual” immediately after pasting to see the post as you normally would.

Last, after publishing you must submit the URL into the submission box on the same page where you found the post HTML. Izea usually gives you a specific time period in which you can get this done as well, to ensure that posts get published in a timely manner. Typically a couple of days.

After submitting you simply have to wait 30 days for the payment to appear in your dashboard up top! You can see at the top of my page my current balance is around $3. I keep a bit of money in there always so that my monthly membership fee is taken from there.

A few more FAQs.

Price – There is a free version of izea, but you are limited to only 3 bids per month. Which isn’t much! I’ve upgraded to the ‘standard’ plan which is $1 per month. Definitely worth it! The money will be taken out automatically from your balance each month or you can pay with a credit card.

Why am I being declined? – It does take a bit of time to work up momentum with izea, but I encourage you to keep trying! It took me a few weeks before I was getting really awesome offers and at good prices. Keep at it, it’s definitely worth it! If you are consistently being decline you might want to check out 5 reasons you are not getting sponsored posts for some tips.

How often should I log in? – DAILY. Izea is the only site that I recommend checking daily, but I do think it is important! For one thing, they don’t have emails going out telling you when you get an offer yet, so you will miss some if you don’t log in right away. Secondly, I’ve noticed that the faster I apply for opportunities the higher my chances are of being accepted. I don’t know if this is a coincidence or not but when I apply a day or two after an offer has gone up I usually do not get the job. It’s worth it to take the 30 seconds a day when you are checking Facebook, to also check izea!

Are pitches important – I’m not going to say they are unimportant, but they are not required. Honestly, I don’t pitch most of the time. I just bid. If it’s something I am extra passionate about I will let the advertiser know, but other than that I leave the “pitch” portion blank and still get plenty of work from izea.

What to bid – This is a REALLY hard question to answer, simply because it is different for every blogger. When you have been working for awhile you will soon have in your mind different amounts that seem fair for your blog stats. Just don’t underprice yourself! You are valuable as a blogger and advertiser so have some confidence and price what you feel you are worth according to the value you can bring the brand and your readers by sharing about the product.

If you have MORE izea questions, leave a comment and I will try to answer them there or address them in another post.

I hope this helped you to be a bit less intimidated by izea. It is one of mine and Becky’s FAVORITE sites and we don’t want you to miss out on the awesome campaigns offered there! They also have excellent customer service, so don’t be afraid to reach out to them directly if you have encountered a problem. They respond quickly and helpfully.

If you are wanting to monetize your site or just grow your following but need a bit of personalized help, we are here for you! Becky and I offer blog coaching and you can get all the details here. We love to help!