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If you are planning to start a blog or you already have yours, I’m sure that this question has come to your mind more than once “How to make money from a blog?”
When my friends and relatives found out that I’m making money from my blog, the also asked me how is it possible to make money out of it. In fact, every month I receive a few emails asking this very same question.
That’s why today I’m writing about how you can monetize your blog. This blog will come handy if you are a brand new blogger or you are planning to start a blog soon.
If you are thinking about starting your own blog, I createda tutorial-guide that will helpyoustart your own blog in less than 15 minutes. You need very little investment, starting at only $3.95 per month (this dealis only through my link) for blog hosting. Additionally, you will geta free blog domain (valued at $12-15) through myBluehost link, onlyif your purchase is for at least 12 months of blog hosting. My recommendation is for you to beself-hosted. This is importantif you want to monetize your blog because your website will look more professional.
I’ve included some common questions about monetizing a blog.
How to make money from your blog?
This question is the first one that people ask before start blogging.
Reading a blog is free, right. So, how can you make money from your blog? And what’s, even more, mysterious who is paying you?
You get paid from advertisers, sponsors, affiliateprograms and by selling your own products.
For example, if you use Google AdSense as your advertisem*nt network, you will be pay by Google on a monthly basis.
Google pays you throughbank transfer, but other platforms pay you through PayPal or by check in the email (like the Amazon affiliate program).
Is it too late to make money from blogging?
Absolutely no! It’s never too late for new bloggers. If I would have thought that 2 years ago (when I started my blog), I would have never made over $1,000 a month from my blog.
There are thousands of people in the world who are waiting to read what you have to say. Plus, there are plenty of opportunities for new bloggers.
I know bloggers who started less than a year ago and are making huge amounts of money (over 5 figures). That’s proof that you can make money from your blog.
If you don’t have a blog yet, now is the right time to start. Don’t leave it for later on. The online world keeps growing and growing and there is plenty of room for your blog.
I recommend you to have a look at the handbook Building a Framework from Abby Lawson. In this Ebook, she explains how to start your blogging framework and how to create your own brand for your blog.
How long does it take to start making money?
There is no exact answer to this question.From days to months.
If you check my monthly income reports, you can see that during my first month of blogging I earned $75.91.After a few months I was averaging $300 and today I’m making over a thousanda month.
I don’t spend much time blogging because I do it as a part time, but if you do it as a full time, I’m pretty sure that you can make much more than me.
There are bloggers out there making thousands after only afew months of starting blogging. However, there are also bloggers who don’t make any money.
As you can tell, blogging is not an easy-lazy way of making money. But if you are serious about it, you may even make a living out of it (that’s my goal).
How long does it take to start making money depends on you, how much time you put into it and how serious you wanna take it.
Ways to monetizeyour blog
Below there is a list of common ways of monetizing your blog. You can choose only one or combine all of them. It really depends on you.
I recommend monetizing your blog by using more than one stream of income so you diversify your earnings.
#1) AffiliateIncome
Affiliate income is one of the most common types of income for bloggers.
To put it simply, affiliate income is when you link a product that is sold on another site (for example, Amazon). If somebody clicks your link and ends up buying that product from Amazon, you earn a commission on that sale.
The best way to promote affiliates is by reviewing products that you are familiar and happy with.
There are many affiliate programs you can apply and almost every online product has its own affiliate panel.
I recommend doing the course Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing from MichelleSchroeder-Gardner to learn more strategies about affiliate marketing (she went from $0 to $50,000 in affiliate income!).
Some affiliate networks that I use and recommend areFlexOffers,ShareASaleand Amazon Associates. These networks work with thousand of companies and it’s so easy to find good affiliate products in there.
Read more:How I Tripled My Affiliate Income In 4 Months
#2) Advertising Networks
Advertising networks pay you when you display their ads on your blog. It can be in the sidebar, at the beginning of a blog post or in any other location of your blog (you decide where).
The more views and clicks these ads have, the more you will earn.
Display advertising is one of the easiest ways of making money and the first choice for many bloggers. You just need to insert a code that it’s given to you.
Each advertising network asks for a minimum number of page views before applying, but there are others that you can apply even if you don’t have any traffic yet.
Some of the popular advertising networks are AdSense (no minimum traffic), AdThrive, MediaNet and Monumetric.
Read more:Google AdSense Vs Monumetric: Which One Is Better?
#3) Sponsored Content (articles, photos, tweets, etc)
Sponsored content is a type of advertising that’s designed to promote a product without having the feeling that’s advertising. It can be a sponsored post, Instagram images or even a tweet.
It’s very common for bloggers to get paid for sponsored posts. You can get paid for reviewing a product related to your niche.
Where to find relevant sponsored opportunities?It really depends on the niche of your blog and the traffic your blog receive. Making money from sponsored posts may take a bit more of time and effort than display advertising but it also pays better.
You will expect payouts of as low as $30/post up to $400-$500/post depending on the reputation and page views of your blog. There are bloggers getting paid thousands for a single article, but it makes sense because they reach so many people.
Some of the common sponsored content sites are Izea, Taboola, Cooperatize andFind Your Influence
Side note: Always promote products that you have tried and that you personally believe in. Writing a sponsored post of an untrusted product, just for the sake of making a few dollars, is not a good idea and I ask you to reconsider it. It will damage the trust of your readers and hurt your blog in the long term.
#4) Sell Ebooks
You can write an Ebook if you are an expert in an area or have something to share that will help others. If that’s the case, go ahead!
There are many bloggers making a living from their ebook sales (I’m talking about thousands of dollars per month). You can do it too.
Selling Ebooks is not very common between brand new bloggers. However, after you blog for a few months, you’ll be able to know what your readers are looking for. Then, you can write an Ebook which answers what they want.
#5) Sell Courses and Products
Similar to selling Ebooks, you can sell your own courses and products.
A course is similar to an e-book but it generally has videos and exercises. It’s very common for a blogger to offer a course at a certain price (for example $97) and then the ebook, which is the reduced version of the course, at a lower price (for example $27).
This is great because not everybody can afford $97, and having an ebook to sell will lead to more sales. Plus, you will provide flexibility to your audience.
There are plenty of platforms for your courses, Teachable and Udemy are recently very popular among bloggers.
What will work best for you?
People will tell you to start displaying ads, but there is no universal rule.
The best tip I can give is for you to focus on what best suits your audience needs. On my blog, I try to display only 2 ads in the sidebar but I don’t add any ads inside the content because I believe it’s confusing. Instead, I use affiliate links for some of the products I’ve used and I recommend.
Other bloggers only focus on sponsored content or a combination of any of the five categories above.
Side note:I recommend to diversify as much as possible. A combination of 2 or more of the above categories will help you minimize the risk in the case that any of your streams of income fail.
How do you make money from your blog? Is there anything you would add to this list? Please, leave a comment so others can learn from your experience.
