So you have a blog. How do you start making money from it? While you won’t get rich overnight, depending on your readership, it is possible to make money blogging. Here are just a few of the ways.
Advertising Revenue
Did you know that you can sell space on your blog just like a newspaper or TV channel sells ad space? One way to generate blog income is to sell ads on your site. Whether you sell them to companies, Etsy shop owners or even other bloggers, this can be a nice source of revenue. Be sure to create an advertising & pr page on your site with your rates, and be willing to bring up paid advertising with companies looking for exposure.
Product Reviews
If you don’t mind getting paid in goods or services, one way to generate “income” from your blog is from product reviews. In exchange for your honest opinions, and the exposure you provide on your blog and via your readers, companies pay you in the form of the product or services you’re reviewing.
So how do you get review items? The first step is truthfully to grow your readership. Yes, you may have a blog, but no one is going to send you free stuff if only 10 people read it. Spend some time building a quality site, and growing your readership including your Facebook fans and Twitter followers. Once you start to grow and can show results, then gradually start contacting companies you’re interested in about possible reviews. Visit their websites, or do a search for their press releases and look for a media contact. There are also several great blogging groups that have regular opportunities that you can apply for. Watch for a list coming soon!
Affiliate Programs
Affiliate programs are a way to get access to multiple advertisers, and the ways you get paid can vary. Sometimes you get paid just if a customer clicks on an ad, others are for so many views of the ad, others are if customers print a coupon, register their e-mail/info or make a purchase. I’ll be providing a list of affiliate programs I use in a future post, but it’s also good to check with any blogging buddies that you might have for their recommendations.
Sponsored Posts
Sponsored posts are articles that are paid for by an advertising or sponsor. The focus or topic can vary slightly, and sometimes an advertiser might want a whole piece dedicated to a product or service, other times they might just want you to include a link or two on specific keywords. These links do typically need to be “do follow” links, which means search engines can travel through them from your site to the sponsored site and the FTC does require that you disclose when an article is sponsored. See my disclosure at the bottom of this post for an example.
So how do you get sponsors for sponsored posts? If you belong to any blogging networks, they frequently have paid opportunities available and I’ll be providing a list of some of these groups in a future article. Typically you have to apply separately for each opportunity, and only a few bloggers out of many are selected. These are often on really tight deadlines, so make sure you can deliver before you commit.
You also may have companies approach you about a sponsored post or text link, and can negotiate pricing and due dates directly. Be sure to have your contact information very obvious on your home page so that potential sponsors can easily contact. I also often pitch companies for sponsored posts. If a company or group sends you a press release, and it’s not something you’d normally cover, try e-mailing them back and offer to provide a sponsored write up for a fee. It doesn’t always work, but you might be surprised at the results.
Got questions? E-mail me at 2kidsandacoupon(at)gmail.com. Watch for more blogging tricks and tips coming soon!
Disclosure: I am participating in a blogger campaign by Bucks2Blog and was compensated. However, the views and opinions are my own.www.Bucks2Blog.com).
