In this special part, I want to walk you through and help guide you on how to make money from blogging. This is one of the most favorite questions in the minds of all bloggers. No matter how big or small their blog is, everyone wants to make money off it.
There’s nothing wrong about it. Every blogger puts in a lot of effort to build and run their blogs – so they deserve to make some money off it.
IMPORTANT: before you can begin this list, it is imperative that you create your own blog first. If you don’t know how to do that, you can refer to our previous post on how to start a blog. But if you already have a blog, you can continue with the steps I’m going to elaborate here.
Also before you consider taking the steps to making money by blogging online, you have to set a target. Depending on your zeal, you can start with about $1000 to $10,000 per month and make sure you work towards it.
The Importance of Income Streams Diversification
A wise man once said, “don’t put all your eggs in one basket,” this same going goes to when you want to monetize or make money off your blog.
Diversification in this term is the ability to spread or create different sources of income without relying on only one. This simply says that you should discover and apply different ways of making money with your blog.
The reason I highly recommend this is because any current or intended sole source of monetization might and will dry up later on but if your streams are far spread, it won’t affect your stream of income.
Also when deciding to monetize your blog, it is essential to do it early when you are just starting to get a lot of views.
You might begin monetizing later on then some of the readers who think that bloggers shouldn’t get paid for all their hard work might quit visiting or start complaining.
Doing this, it would make your intentions clear that you don’t just blog for a hobby but you intend to make a living out of it.
Apart from that, starting to make your monetization intentions known on time has its advantages.
First of all, you can start adding your ad slots on time and set up an initial design for your blog.
Secondly, you can try to work out all forms and types of monetization method that is best for your blog.
Create Your Blog First, then Make Money Off it
Creating a blog that makes more than a $1000 a month is really that easy. Here, we are going to put everything together, things that you need to hit your primary goal on how to make money off blogging.
Going through this steps wouldn’t take much of your time, and I believe that you have a blog and have learned about how to compile your mailing lists, driving free traffic, sending emails to your readers.
If you are hoping to get a blog started, you can click the link to go to our comprehensive guide on how to start a blog.
The Making Money Phase
Following closely the processes being laid out here is critical. It’s much more important to be serious and make up your mind on never giving up.
With that said, let’s jump right to the first making money phase.
1. Ad Revenue
In this segment, we are going to look at the fundamentals of Ad revenue: how you can place ads, where to put them, and the maximum amount of ads you can place.
Before we start off, it is essential to know that blog experts recommend that there should be no more than four to five ads on your website.
This because Google Ads limit you and also you don’t want to make your blog look spammy. Too many Ads sometimes turn off readers because most people read your blogs for informative purposes.
Now that we have cleared that, where should you place your Ads?
First off, you can put one Ad as a banner Ad at the top of the page; this is because you technically tend to lose readers as they scroll down your articles as a result of the shorter attention span on the internet. So placing an Ad there, it automatically becomes the most important Ad on your blog, and it is going to be seen by virtually everyone who visits your site.
Secondly, the next place you can place Ads is on the sidebar. If you are new to blogging, it is very advisable to put up your photo of yourself and introduce yourself, talk about your blog and what it is about to give a more precise understanding to new readers and visitors. After that is done, you can also add another Ad directly under the former on the sidebar.
Thirdly, a good in-text Ad is not so bad after all. In-text Ads are Ads that are found in the article as you scroll down. You can place this Ad after few informative parts of the article, but you should aim it to come up, probably immediately after the side ads. This is because the earlier you place the ads on the page, the higher your chances of your revenue going up.
Lastly, experts also recommend a floating Ad placement on the bottom of the page. This is because, like the first Ad placement, most of your visitors and readers are going to see it and the chances of generating revenue from it are just as high as the first one.
Note: If you eventually start gaining a lot of visits on your blog, like about 10,000 visits per month, we recommend that you sign-up for premium Ad networks like AdThrive.
You can actually earn more and be paid well for advertising, so if you decide to make Ad revenue a long-term strategy, you can consider switching over to a premium Ad network.
Getting Started with Ads
I know you are very keen on setting up Ads in your blog, but there are some things you need to know first before doing that.
In this part, we are going to be looking at the setting expectations for your Ads, the advantages and disadvantages of Ads on your blog, and recommended ways to set up Ads.
First of all, let’s jump right into the expectations of Ads.
Most people starting out in blogging for the first time are confused on how much they can make and how many views they need to make cash while blogging.
When starting out, it is normally recommended to use Google AdSense but honestly, you can only make about $1-$2 a day just from using Google Ads depending on your traffic and your desired niche.
This is because new bloggers do not have a lot of traffics and Google AdWords traffic is not targeted.
If you really want to make a lot of money from advertisement, you need to up your game to about 10,000 views per day and also using premium Ad networks too. If you don’t have that much view, there are other ways you can monetize your blog too.
The Advantages of Ads
- They can help turn visitors that won’t buy products to loyal readers
- Ads can add an additional diversified revenue stream to your blog
- It is 100% passive
- You can money monthly from just ads provided you have a lot of traffics
The Disadvantages of Ads
- They can come off as “spammy” sometimes
- They can make your blog look unprofessional
- They can end up diverting attention away from your articles and also the products you are selling.
- You need a lot of traffic to actually earn from ads
With that said, we recommend that if you are okay with making about $1-$2 per day and you are being motivated by that, you should very much go for it. Just proceed to sign up here, but note that you need to create a blog first in order to get easier approval from Google.
Most successful blogs today didn’t build their success from ads at first but now make thousands of dollars per month with up to about 10,000+ views on their blogs.
You just have to give the blog your time and set your expectations for it.
2. Sponsored Posts
Most of us have seen the term “sponsored posts” on the internet somewhere else, and are wondering what this means.
I am going to take my time to go through what a sponsored post is, how it works, and tips on what to do and not to do when you plan on starting this monetization stream.
It is important to know that if your blog does not look professional and also established, you would have a hard time using this method of monetization.
Sponsored posts are one of the numerous ways to monetize your blog, in which brands sponsor or pay you to promote their brands directly.
Being on your blog, Instagram post, Facebook uploads or twitter tweets, certain companies spend a lot of money to collaborate with people who have blogs or social media accounts to promote the brand’s product or even websites. So how does this work?
How It Works
Most companies who sponsor bloggers tend to look out more for influencers.
Influencers are people who can create contents which can influence people’s style, a way of life or habit of doing things.
When a blogger is ready to be sponsored, he or she can then try to contact companies directly and individually to inform them they can offer sponsored posts on their blogs or social media account.
One of the other ways is to go through an agency, which is the best option for you as a newbie.
The company contacted or linked to you by an agency, then checks specific factors which we are going to talk later in this article.
They research and gather information on your blog like “is the niche perfect enough for their brand?” or “is the traffic enough to offer the sponsored post to a blogger?”. After that, you can agree to discuss the rate at which each sponsored post would make.
Upon the agreed terms, the blogger makes his posts, and the company pays the blogger directly for work done.
Helpful Tips
When deciding to monetize your blog with sponsored posts from companies, the best way you can handle this is by starting out with a sponsored post agency.
These companies act as middlemen and guarantor to both newly started bloggers and large companies who are willing to give out the sponsorship deals.
They also charge money for their services, but once paid, you can save a ton of your time on looking out for companies that want to give you a sponsored slot.
Other Tips
Always make sure to research the company and brand you want to work to make sure they are genuine.
This is because if you recommend the brand to a loyal reader, you act as a semi-guarantor. If the company has a bad reputation at hand, it can end up damaging your own identity.
Do not use “follow links” when working with brands. This is because brands that use “follow links” are just interested in backlinks for their SEO purposes.
Always post contents that are related to products in your niche.
How to Get Started with Sponsored Posts
First off, before you start out with sponsored posts, you need to find an agency or a PR firm. These agencies help you connect with companies that are ready and willing to pay for sponsored posts or otherwise thereby saving you stress as a blogger.
Some of these agencies are listed below, and you can visit them and register with them:
- Acorn Influence
- Best buy Blogger Network
- Bloggin’ Mamas
- The Blogger Program
- Everywhere Agency
- iConnect Influence
- The Niche Parent Network
- The Motherhood
- SocialStars
- The mission list
- RhythmOne
3. Affiliate Marketing
Once you are a blogger, or you are planning on making a living off one, you have to know what affiliate marketing is already, but in simpler terms, it is one of the major ways to make money with your blog.
In this part, we are going to learn a broad overview of what affiliate marketing is, why it is very much recommended for you to use it, the best way to input affiliate links and common mistakes inexperienced bloggers make when just starting out.
What is Affiliate Marketing?
This is simply when you recommend or promote other people’s product, but you are paid a fraction of the percentage sales as commission.
Most of the times, the commission after the affiliate product is sold can be from 10% to as high as 70% of the total sales price.
This is because you as a blogger are doing most of the work, and when companies make products, they just keep lying around there, so they offer huge affiliate deals to willing affiliate marketer’s to entice them to sell their products faster.
Why Use Affiliate Marketing?
In this paragraph, we are going to go through the advantages of affiliate marketing and its minor setbacks, setting the expectations and also selling higher-priced products.
So jumping straight to the advantages of affiliate marketing, let’s review few of them below:
- In promoting affiliate marketing, you can avoid the risks of creating your own product because you are just marketing someone’s product.
- You do not go through the stress of providing customer services.
- There’s no cost or time-wasting creating with a sales page.
- Most affiliate products have already developed an established market.
- It can help make you a reasonable passive income.
- It can help you run a social experiment on which type of product people look out for which can guide you while creating yours.
Disadvantages
- You don’t have any control over the product.
- If the sales page isn’t that great, it will affect sales on your affiliate links.
- Minimum retention of customers.
Setting Your Expectations
You must be determined, and you must consider setting expectations on the amount of money you want to make on each affiliate product.
It is imperative to know that the higher the sales tag on a product, the higher the commission you make selling the product as an affiliate, but if the product is high-priced, you should not expect a steady stream of sales from it.
When you are selling a high-priced product, it requires a very good email sales funnel with lots of sales experience, so it is advisable to first startup as a newbie with low-priced products then rise to expensive products.
The Correct Way of Placing Affiliate Links
Adding affiliate links to your articles is a very great way to guarantee your affiliate products are sold. If this is done correctly, it can increase sales and ensure daily sales as far as the traffic comes through.
The first question to ask is “where can I place my affiliate links”?
For e-commerce products, such as Amazon, it is advisable to add your links throughout the article.
For example, if you talk about a coffee machine, you can add your link to the name of the coffee machine.
Another place you can place your affiliate links is at the end of the article. This is also great for other affiliate products by calling a call to action at the end of the article.
You can also place it on a resource page which has your favorite resources.
The common practice is to link affiliate products in your emails. This is very much recommended for affiliate products that needs more trust and extensive information before buying them. In other words, it is not allowed for Amazon products.
Another way is by posting through social media, but you have to be careful as to some rules don’t apply to certain products. Also lastly, you can link your affiliate links to your videos if you are using YouTube.
How to Link Your Articles
- It is critical to first note that you should bold your affiliate links and underline them. You might also result in changing the color of the links too.
- Making sure the audience has information on where the link is taking them to is another great way to link your articles.
- Don’t be too spammy in your linking; this tends to turn readers off from the product
- Ensure that your affiliate links open in new windows if needed to, especially on Amazon products. If your link is placed at the end of your article, or in other words a “call to action” link. You can keep it in the same window because you might want them to visit the other page and also stay on the page.
Common Affiliate Marketing Mistakes
- Being shady and deceptive
When using affiliate marketing, you should try as much as possible not to do this, ever. Don’t try to trick someone into clicking links or buying affiliate products because it might end up breaking the relationship trust between you and your readers.
Also, don’t try to make people think it’s your product if it’s someone’s product. Furthermore, don’t even add false testimonials. Most of this behavior and attitude get people banned, and at the same time, you lose trust in you.
- Throwing everything on the wall
Do not appear spammy when promoting affiliate links. Your audience can see through it and undoubtedly it won’t end well on your sales.
If you are linking kinds of stuff everywhere, it can appear very annoying, and your readers won’t appreciate that at all. Also, try and be as selective as possible on your affiliate products and test them out then also find new products if it becomes necessary to.
Failing and still trying is far more important than anything because you can be able to learn from mistakes. It takes time, but when you have perfected it, it would be far easier to make sales.
- Promoting before buying
You have to purchase a product before promoting it. You have to treat your affiliate marketing as a business investment, regardless whether there is any need to use it or not, also regardless of the price – keep it in mind that it is a business investment.
This is very important because you get to see what is inside the product to avoid promoting garbage to your readers and losing their trust.
- Not having confidence
Not having confidence is one of the mistakes linked with affiliate marketing. You have to be confident and take charge because this is your business.
Having confidence in the product you are promoting and the ability to sell it is very crucial too. This can be achieved by knowing your product and how it functions.
- Not linking enough
Always link your products in an email more than once, this gives your readers the chance to click on your link and at the end of each article or email, always provide a call-to-action link.
This depends on the type of content you provide. Don’t do it too much but make sure you give them enough chance to click the link.
D. Amazon Associates
Using Amazon Associate gives you the ability to link amazon products with an affiliate link in your articles or social media posts.
Although different rules might apply, if done successfully, you get a commission of 1%-10% when someone buys that product and also a commission when the same person buys any other thing on Amazon in the next 24 hours.
Although this is a perfect way to earn money online, there are some restricted places you cannot link amazon products. For example, in emails, PDFs or any other downloadable access or login.
Also, you can’t use the star rating system, and you also can’t use your own links to purchase products and make a discount. It is advisable to read all rules before applying for amazon associates.
How to Get Started with Amazon Associate Program
When applying for an Amazon associate program, you need to have an existing Amazon account, or you could just create one. After creating your Amazon account, you can then apply for amazon associates, but in doing so, you have to keep few things in mind.
On applying for amazon associates, you have to make a sale in less than 180 days unless your account will be closed and you have to re-apply for an account. It is therefore advisable for you to have at least 20 visitors a day on your blog before you can apply for one.
Getting Your Link
When you have applied, and your account has been approved, you can then log in and get your link.
If you select a product like protein powder, you can search for it on your search bar in the Amazon associate page.
Different protein powders would definitely appear, but there is no full information as to how the products are rated, if it’s prime or not (it is advisable to go for prime products) or the reviews.
What you have to do is that you can open a new window then search on that same protein powder then you can view the full information on each product and research on it before promoting it.
After that, you can go back to the selected product on your Amazon associates and click on get link.
How to Link Products in Your Article
Linking amazon products in your articles can be a little technical, but if done correctly, it can come off as being professional. You can be able to use in-text links.
This is very good for simple, trustworthy products which are very low priced and require little or no thought to purchase.
When adding links, make sure it opens up to a new window, and it doesn’t take your readers out from your page.
Also, make sure you link where it makes sense and keep the links in mind when you write your articles depending on your niches. You can also go back to your old highly trafficked articles and add amazon links too.
Resources page is a place to list out or include your favorite affiliate products and services. It is important to explain why you love the products and you should also consider linking it on the menu of your website so that everyone can see it.
Review and Comparison Articles
Review articles are designed to sell or get a few clicks, and they are far more effective for mostly lower-priced products. They tend to give the buyer options based on individual needs or options that are suitable for their budget.
Review articles also tend to make people click on your articles even if they don’t end up buying it or they just want to get specific information on the desired product, but they can actually end up buying another product in the next 24 hours.
When writing a review product, you have to tell them why they need the linked product you are comparing.
You can create a top 5-10 bestselling product on Amazon, and when comparing articles, you have to tell your readers what makes it different from each other. Also consider adding an image for clearer descriptions and add a CTA image link at the end of each article.
How to Create Review Articles
If you want to write a review article, you have to find a topic that aligns with your niche and start with a few review articles while spacing them out. For example, you don’t like to have about 5 “top 10” or “top 5” articles in a row. If you have difficulty searching for a topic, you can make use of Pinterest.
Finding products to write on, you can type the products on the Amazon search bar. When compiling the list, a top 5 list should contain 1 or 2 different product that has unique features although it might be expensive.
Having a low-cost item and premium options can also help readers can also weigh the options for each product.
After each review articles, you should recommend the best brand. It could be the best selling or the products you personally tried and loved too while stating both the positive and negative opinions.
Arrange the products or the article from the worst to the best, ending with your #1 recommended products – also use images too.
E. Selling Your Own Products
Selling your own products for beginners is a perfect way to make money off a blog, and it is easier to start up with a digital product you can create yourself, like an E-book, full course outline, video tutorial or software, etc.
It is convenient and cheaper to make especially if you have the skills, thereby making cost production very little as possible.
In this category, we are going to look at how we can start selling your own products on your blog.
Step 1: Choosing a Topic
From creating an E-book to video tutorials, it is vital to first know your topic or niche.
Choosing a topic is quite easy, you just have to talk about what you are comfortable with and also what aligns with your blog niche. After that you can then look into gathering information for your contents.
Information can be sourced out through extensive research. You can gather information from blog comments, forums or even your mailing lists.
Another perfect way of gathering information is by using surveys. You can use SurveyMonkey to get information from your own email lists.
Step 2: Write your own E-book
After sourcing for information, you can then go into writing your own E-books. You have to be extensive in your writing, but some may ask, “what about if I don’t have any writing skills?”.
Well, you can pay for someone to Ghostwrite an ebook for you. Platforms like Fiverr and Upwork can prove a very excellent source for fishing out freelancers.
Step 3: Create a Dedicated Sales Page
For you to successfully sell your ebook or product, you have to create a dedicated sales page for that product.
Consider creating a sub-domain page on your blog for selling the ebook or create a new domain specifically used only for the sales of that book.
You can use www.clickfunnels.com to build and create a trustworthy sales page for easy sales conversion due to the reputation of the site.
Step 4: Promote your Product
After going through all the steps above, you can then promote your products. Promoting your product on your blog is easy because you are sure of the product and you know the contents it provides.
You can create articles to help sell your products too just like in affiliate marketing, but it is better here because it is your own product.
Another way you can promote your ebook/contents is by creating emails for your mailing list. Please be honest and transparent as possible and try not to trick anyone into buying any of your products.
Time to Take Action
So as you can see, there are different ways in which you can make money by blogging online, and I hope this article has helped you in so many ways to discover the various steps.
Sometimes not all the various steps might work for you but also try as much as possible to try most of them or even all to help you diversify your streams of income and find out the one which best works for you.
Over the time, you would learn or discover what works for you but never be afraid to try new things. I hope you enjoyed this article and tell me what you think about it below in the comment box.
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