When I first created this blog, my goal was to discuss ways to create multiple income streams. One such income stream involved making money online. I am now going to expand on that idea and discuss how to make money with a blog.
There are many ways to TRY and make money with a blog. And, there are probably thousands of courses you can by online to try and learn how to make money with a blog.
However, in my experience, we can probably boil it down to a few ways that work best for the average blogger.
If you actually want to make a living as a blogger, you need to realize a few things.
First, it will take a lot of time and effort.
You need traffic
The main key to making money with a blog is traffic. Without website traffic, you can’t make money.
A true blog generates traffic simply through published content…advertising is not used to send traffic.
In my experience, organic traffic actually works better than paid traffic when it comes to generating income.
Why?
Because organic traffic is the result of somone searching for a solution. They will type in a phrase in a google search, and then they will be presented with a list of websites that deal with that topic.
If your blog shows up on that first page of a google search, there is a good chance someone will click on your link to see what you have to say.
I have found that when people find their way to my blog as a result of organic traffic, they appear to be more in a buying mood.
When they find their way to my blog as a result of paid traffic, they are less inclined to buy right then and there.
Unfortunately, it takes a huge amount time and effort to get organic traffic. Therefore, you may want to consider mixing in some paid traffic just to introduce your site to the world, and to perhaps collect an email address.
How to monetize your blog
There are a number of ways to monetize your blog, but the three basic ways are
- Sell your own products or services
- Sell affiliate products
- Advertising
Sell your own products or services
When I first began my quest to make money online, the first thing I learned was to sell my own digital products.
This is probably the best way to make money with a blog that does not get a huge amount of traffic.
The internet is full of “how to” information products, from ebooks, to memberships to courses. This is because many people are looking for solutions to problems.
If you have some knowledge about a topic that most people do not have, then you can create an information product around that knowledge.
I’ve seen information products range in price from as low as a few dollars to tens of thousands of dollars. The value of the information is what drives the price.
You can also use a blog to sell your service, whether you are an accountant, attorney, consultant, hair stylist, etc.
Lastly, you can also set up a blog to sell physical products, whether they are your own, or someone else’s. Selling someone else’s products gets into the next topic below.
Actively posting on your blog will eventually drive traffic, and people will then be inclined to inquire about any service you offer if they enjoy your content.
Affiliate products
If you are going to set up a blog as a part time type of business, and don’t have your own products or services to sell, then perhaps you will be more interested in selling affiliate products.
The most popular affiliate marketing program in the world is the Amazon affiliate program.
You can set up a blog that is focused on one particular topic, such as backyard barbecue, and sell barbecue grills through Amazon.
The problem with that model nowadays is that Amazon has drastically cut its commissions to about 3% on many of the products sold there. Therefore, you’ll want to focus on bigger ticket items in order to make a decent commission.
Another issue with Amazon is that the cookie that tracts an individual referred to their website through a link on your blog only lasts for 24 hours.
If that person doesn’t buy anything that day, then you will not get credit for the sale.
The advantage that Amazon does offer is that once a person gets to their site, Amazon does a lot of the selling for you. And, whatever that person buys that day, whether it was a product you referred them to or not, you will get credit for the sale.
With that in mind, if you are intent on using the Amazon affiliate program, you will want to be sure visitors to your blog are already in a buying mood. That’s a topic for another day.
Aside from Amazon, there are thousands and thousands of other affiliate programs.
Big retailers like Target and Wal-Mart have affiliate programs, and there are also affiliate programs for digital information products. Think of such topics as fitness, or trading, and you can find many affiliate programs.
These digital products tend to also pay higher commission rates, and since businesses that offer these products also have other products to sell, you can get paid multiple times as a result of referring a single client.
Advertising
The last major way to monetize your blog is by selling advertising. The most popular advertising program utilized by many bloggers is Google.
Everyone who has been online has seen Google ads on many of the websites they visit.
However, the only blogs that truly make much money from Google ads are those that get a substantial amount of traffic.
You may also sell advertising directly to businesses.
For instance, if you have a blog that focuses on a particular locality, you can sell ads to businesses in that location. Again though, you’ll probably need a considerable amount of traffic.
How to make money with a blog – my two cents
The world of blogging and internet marketing can send you down numerous rabbit holes, as there can be so much to learn.
Because the first way I learned to make money with a blog was to sell my own information product, I went down that rabbit hole first.
The learning curve to sell your own products is incredibly steep and requires a massive amount of effort.
Not only will you need to learn how to set up your own blog, you will need to learn how to create online courses that include video and other content, and then post that stuff onto a website where only your customers can gain access.
If that does not intimidate you, then you can certainly go in that direction. However, you should expect to put a minimum of six months worth of work into developing something worthwhile.
With this in mind, I believe the best way to make money with a blog is through affiliate marketing.
This will still require a good amount of work, but the majority of that work involves writing good content on your blog. You won’t make a ton of money right away, but over time, you will start see your efforts pay off with sales.
Approach blogging as a business
The key to achieving success with your blog is to have an actual plan before you start.
Many people like myself will start out just haphazardly trying out this, that and the other in an effort to make some money with a blog.
On the flip side, I have seen some blogs have great success by pursuing a particular model, and then sticking with that exclusively.
With this in mind, before you take the plunge and start a blog, follow the steps I’ve outlined below.
Steps to building a profitable blog
Here are the key steps to building a profitable blog…
- Decide whether you will build a blog that focuses on a single niche, such as golf, fitness, investing, or whether you intend to write a general type of blog like the one you are currently reading.
- Figure out how you will monetize your blog, ie your own stuff, affiliate products, advertising, or a mix of all three.
- Come up with a minimum of fifty topics that you know you can write about easily. These will be the topics of your first fifty blog posts.
- Find a website hosting service for your blog. Yes, you want to use a paid hosting service, rather than set up a blog for free on Blogger or WordPress.com. I use Bluehost for all of my blogs.
- Pick a name for your blog and a domain for your blog. Once you sign up for a hosting service, you’ll be able to search for a domain.
- Choose a theme for your blog. I use the Avada theme for this blog.
- Find a service for email marketing. For small blogs, you will want to build an email list to market to. I use Aweber on this blog.
Once you have done all this, it’s a matter of setting up your blog for search engine optimization (SEO), producing quality content for your blog and being patient.
I can tell you that in the beginning, it may be quite frustrating to see no monetary reward for your efforts.
Eventually, however, a few dollars will begin to roll in and you will learn what is working best for your blog, and what is not.
Final Thoughts on making money with a blog
The primary concern for this post was in helping you figure out the best way that you personally can make some money with a blog.
There are two basic approaches… 1) creating blogs that make you passive income after you’ve set them up and monetized them and 2) focusing on a single blog as a part time or full time business.
Both approaches will require considerable work up front.
After you are satisfied with a blog using the first approach, you can create another one, and then just do enough work to maintain your original blog so it produces that level of passive income you desire.
The second approach will require continuous effort if your goal is to have that blog provide you with income to pay your bills.
With that in mind, figure out the approach that you think will work best for you, and then get to it.
Thanks for reading!
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