Back in the early ’90s, blogging was not considered a worthwhile career. For most, it was either a side hustle or a hobby. However, thanks to technological advancement, this perception is changing. With almost 5 billion people worldwide connected to the internet, there has never been a better time for bloggers to reap the monetary rewards of blogging, including bloggers who have under 10k followers.
The term “blog” was initially known as “weblog” but was later shortened. Early in the 1990s, when blogs evolved, they were primarily online diaries where people would provide personal accounts of their lives. On the other hand, a website is a page or collection of pages on the World Wide Web which is provided by one person or entity. If you don’t already have a business website, you can use your blog to create your online business presence. You don’t necessarily need a blog if you already have a website. Likewise, you don’t need a website if you don’t have a blog.
Factors to Consider Before Monetizing Your Blog
- Before diving dip into the deep end of monetizing your blog, it is advisable to consider the following factors.
- Content: Valuable content sets you apart from the crowd and competitors in your niche. If you can, be the best. If not, be unique
- Traffic: Writing may seem like the most important part, but creating content is only half the process of monetizing your blog. Traffic drives leads to your blog, which eventually translate to sales. Some great ways to generate traffic include networking, social media, and writing guest blogs
- Product: This refers to what you intend to sell to your audience. It may range from your products i.e. e-books, to affiliate products, to advertising space.
- Optimize with analytics: Tools such as Google Analytics enable you to keep track of users who enter your site, how long they stay, which pages they look at, and where they exit your site. As your website grows, you can perform a split test by sending two versions of your blog/site to your friends and followers. It’s worth redesigning the layout based on the results.
Tips on Increasing Your Blog’s Revenue
A Forbes magazine article suggests that once you have built a flow of regular blog visitors, you can begin to think about monetizing your blog in different ways. Depending on your experience level and niche, you could pick the business model that matches your style.
1. Affiliate marketing
This is a great tool for monetizing your blog. It involves referring to a product or service by sharing it on your blog and is a great way to monetise your traffic.
For example, through eBay’s affiliate program, bloggers promote products using links either directly through content or by using banner ads. All the links lead to Amazon products where the purchase is made. The blogger gets a commission for each sale if the buyer is from their site. It is worth noting that you are required to disclose when a post has affiliate links so that you do not appear to be manipulative.
Affiliate marketing can be utilized through ad networks like Amazon Associates, or you can create private partnerships with advertisers and businesses with an affiliate program. If done well, blogs work well, especially for those who want to generate passive income.
2. Selling digital products
The good thing about writing and selling your products online is that there are already millions of buyers who are ready to buy. Digitization has ensured that the majority of people worldwide have access to digital products through various devices. These products include e-books, online courses/workshops, images, videos, music, apps, plugins, digital planners or themes.
A great place to start would be Amazon’s Kindle, which is used by 47% of e-book users. You can also use your blog to promote your product(s). If you choose to use this strategy, it is important to first listen to your audience and then create a digital product that suits their needs.
3. Sponsored product reviews
This strategy is suitable for bloggers with a niche readership, such as new parents or keen gamers. Sponsored product reviews work by enticing readers to create a favorable inclination for the product in their minds.
It involves being paid to promote a brand’s product(s) through featured reviews in your blog content. You can either pitch to brands, or brands can also reach out to you depending on how popular your blog is.
4. Selling advertising space
Ads may be the most popular way for bloggers to make money. You’ve probably noticed the numerous ads that pop up when you click specific blogs or websites. These are the ads that generate revenue for bloggers.
This is done either by offering advertising space directly to businesses that want to appear beside your content (direct deals), or through an ad network such as Google AdSense. When a blogger signs up for Google AdSense, they allow it to post adverts on their blog for a fee. Every time readers see the ad, the blogger is paid either per click or per impression.
In per click, the blogger gets paid a small fee every time a reader clicks on the ad whereas, in per impression, payment depends on how many times the ad has been seen. Since there are billions of ad impressions daily, advertisers tend to pay based on intervals of 1000 impressions.
If you earned an estimated $0.15 from 25-page views, then your page revenue per 1000 impressions (RPM) would equate to $6. Although this may seem discouraging at the start, it tends to pay off with consistent effort. To make a full-time income through this model, you would need to have 100,000 page views in a month. This would earn you more than $3,500 per month.
5. Offering coaching services
Based on your skill-set, you can choose to offer your coaching services online at a fee. These services are popular now since most people are limiting face-to-face interaction to minimize the spread of COVID-19. Selling coaching services through your blog can definitely be a lucrative prospect whether you set yourself up as a life coach or as a business development coach.
As a beginner, you could start by offering virtual assistant services or social media management services to experienced bloggers. While doing this, it is important to consider your blog’s niche and your existing knowledge to determine what makes sense to you and your income goals. It’s also wise to figure out how much you’ll charge and the number of hours you’re willing to devote to the service each month.
For example, if you want to offer coaching services at a rate of $50 per hour, and you’d like to earn $1000 per month, you’d have to sell 20hrs of coaching services to meet that goal. Before you offer your services for sale, it is advisable to confirm your availability since this could be a huge setback.
Take Away
Whether your blog is a hobby blog or a business blog, it is possible to earn from it. It’s not a get-rich-quick scheme, but with patience and following the right strategies, you could make enough to support your family and more.
