In this post I am going to answer those questions running through some of the tried and trusted ways Bloggers have been making money along with some new and niche ways to turn a profit.
10 Ways To Make Money From Your Blog
1} Pay Per Click Display Ads
Let's start with the most obvious option PPC ads.These are banner ads you will see on many websites you visit and as the name suggests you get paid every time someone clicks on on of the ads you have displayed.For PPC ads Google AdSense is the market leader by quiet some distance.
The amount you are paid per click is determined by a bidding system.Advertisers select how much they are willing to pay per click on their ads.A number of factors are used to pick which ads fight it out for a place on your blog including the subject of your blog and with AdSense the visitors browsing history can be used.If more that one ad is suitable to be displayed on your blog the highest bidders unit will be chosen.
I say AdSense is the market leader here as they have the highest PPC rates in the business.I will cover this more in future posts along with listing some of the best AdSense alternatives.
2} Direct Sale Ads
This is selling ad space on your blog directly to advertisers for a set amount of money over a set amount of time.Direct ad sales work best on blogs with higher page views while other factors such as social followers, subscribers, Page rank and Alexa rank can be taken into account by an advertiser.
Dealing with Direct ad sales can be time consuming and getting you blog in front of suitable advertisers can be difficult.For this reason it can be a good idea to outsource your direct ad sales to a site like BuySellAds.Com.Again we will cover this more in future along with listing the best platforms you can choose to manage your ad sales.
3} Affiliate Sales
Affiliate sales are a system were you link to products or services and get a commission from any sales made by the people you referred.Your link which is called an affiliate link will have a tracking cookie so any sales from traffic you referred can be credited to you.
You can use standard ad banners around your blog or link directly in posts/pages perhaps in the form of a review or recommendation.Again I have found good traffic is important for affiliate sales.
Among the most popular Affiliate sites you can use are Amazon Associates, Click Bank and Share A Sale.There are literally hundreds more affiliate sites and programmes but again high traffic will be key and actually linking to affiliate products you have used and recommend in a post will be most successful.
4 } Selling Your Product Or Service
Affiliate sales are in essence selling other peoples stuff, you are a kind of middle man getting a cut of the action.But what if you had your own stuff to sell ? Now your not getting a cut you are pocketing the lot.Products can be anything from an Ebook covering your subject of expertise to material products.You can also offer your services as I do with blog design services.
Now you can actually be the one offering an affiliate programme and having others sell your stuff for a cut.Sites like Click Bank and Commission Junction are great ways to start this.
5} Sponsored Posts
A sponsored post is exactly what it sounds like, you are paid by a product or service provider you write a post about their stuff.There are a few best practices you should look out for :
- Always declare a post as sponsored
- Use No-Follow links in sponsored posts failure to do so can lead to Google penalties and loss of search traffic.
- It is best to have actually tried the product/service so you can give a genuine review
6} Premium Membership
Blogs are of course free and even some of the biggest newspapers have struggled to get people to pay as little as a buck for their content.However some blogs have found success providing premium content and/or extras via premium membership.For this your blog will need to be hosted on a CMS like WordPress.
7} Monetized Video
I'm sure you will all have seen ads on your favorite YouTube videos but did you know in many cases the publisher of these videos are earning from those ads ? YouTube offer a revenue sharing scheme of sorts basically it's AdSense ads on videos.You can publish video posts on your blog and of course the videos will also be viewed on YouTube.As with all these methods traffic is key, more traffic=more views=more clicks on ads=more revenue.
8} Get Paid To Blog
It will be important to can write to a good level but you don't have to be an expert by any means.Most blogs hiring writers are also in English so you will need to have a high fluency in English.
9} InfoLinks
I have placed InfoLinks down the list as I have to admit I am not a fan.I find InfoLinks very intrusive but I know a number of bloggers that have had great success using it.InfoLinks has a number of options including banners, pop up and pop unders.However the main feature of infolinks is InText ads.
Basically they turn key words within your posts into highlighted links.Your blog readers can hover over these highlighted links to see a related ad/recommendation clicks on these ads are paid.
10} Selling Your Blog
Yep I did say Selling Your Blog.After all your hard work it would be hard to let the blog your poured your heart and soul into go but everything has a price.I have sold five blogs in my time from small blogs to one of the largest blogs online in their niche.The following are key factors for potential buyers :
Traffic - To sell a blog it will need to have great traffic numbers this is the first thing buyers look at.
Earnings - The second thing buyers look at is how much the blog is currently making per month.
Domain - You will never sell a blog using a sub-domain (Like myblog.wordpress.com or myblog.blogspot.com) so make sure you are using a custom domain.It costs $10 per year for a TLD (.com .net etc) so get one for your blog as soon as you can.
Three of the sites I sold I did so through Flippa, Flippa.Com is a website and domain marketplace.The huge advantage of using a service like Flippa is it gets your site in front of people looking to acquire websites and blogs (People that would otherwise never know you blog is for sale).The downside is there are fees attached but I would never have sold the three sites I did without Flippa.
To Sum Up
For me the most successful ways of money making from my blogs were :
- Selling Blog design services
- PPC ads using AdSense
- Direct ad sales using BuySellAds
- Selling up and moving on
What's your experience ? I would love to know were you have had success making money blogging.Leave your comments below.
Paul Crowe
I'm the owner and main author here on Brighter Blogs.I've been a full time Blogger and Web designer for over eight years.I have worked on thousands of projects and blogs over the years and I bring this information to you here on BB.Making every tutorial easy to follow for bloggers of all levels.
Some interesting tips I have never though of the fact one could sell a blog.Did the blogs you sold have very large traffic and earnings ?
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