10 Ways To Make Money From Blogging
This post was contributed.
Every person has a passion in life. You might be an artisan chef, a master wordsmith, or a well-traveled globetrotter. Whatever the most important thing in your life is, there’s no better way to extol its virtues to the public than by starting a blog.
Plenty of writers blog simply for the pleasure of doing so; some people don’t see their creative endeavors as money-making opportunities. If you do want to make some money from your blog, though, there’s a surprising number of ways to go about this.
Do bloggers make money? Absolutely!
Here are 10 ways you can blog about what you love and make money in the process.
How to Start a Profitable Blog
Sell affiliate products
 This might be easier for some bloggers than others, but it’s well worth looking into. Affiliate products are basically products or services which you advertise on your blog, and the more signups or sales you earn for that service’s company, the more money you make.
Web hosting is a great place to start; every blogger needs a good place for their blog to live, so no matter the content of your site, this will be a relevant affiliate program for you. From there, you can look into companies that provide services or products specific to your niche and approach them for affiliate links. You can even affiliate with digital marketing companies, such as iNet Ventures, from where you can earn a great regular income – sign up to their affiliate program.
Create premium paid content
 If your blog is well-subscribed and you’ve established yourself as a leading voice in your field, now is the time to implement a premium content filter. Placing especially sought-after posts behind a paywall ensures that those who really want to read it will pay for it, while those who don’t will look elsewhere. Your free content will always remain free for hobbyists, but serious aficionados of your chosen subject will pay to read what you’ve written if it’s good enough. You could even diversify, depending on your expertise; perhaps blog content could remain free, but more expensive and time-consuming projects like tutorial videos could be paid content.
Your own blog/website
Yes, you can blog on many platforms, but how about your very own website? It means you have zero restrictions and are ultimately your own boss. You can certainly get creative with the style of your blog, for example, check out Venture Photography and how they present their content – it flows well between their service and content for readers, a nice mix.
Have regular giveaways
 This option works really well if you’ve got a sponsor or a good relationship with an affiliate company. Put simply, people love free stuff (who doesn’t?), so having a giveaway on your website is an excellent way not only to build rapport with your content consumers but also to drive sales of a particular affiliate or sponsor product, which in turn means more money for you. This is a win-win proposition, as it’ll create more business for your partner while also driving people to your blog. You’ll get their fans and they’ll get yours. Perhaps you blog about furniture, if so, why not provide a regular giveaway of popular DIY furniture – you’ll soon have many fans.
Get sponsored
 If you’re concerned about integrity or particularly invasive advertising methods, then sponsorship might be for you. Effectively, companies will pay you to generate certain content, which they could then reproduce (with credit, of course) on relevant platforms. Your sponsor will include a link to their homepage or relevant product site as part of the sponsorship, and every click-through you generate will net you some cash. Make sure your sponsor is related to the content you’re creating, and you can’t go wrong.
Allow companies to advertise on your blog
 On a related note to sponsorship, one way of making money from your blog is to sell advertising space on your page. Be innovative when you consider where this advertising space actually is. When was the last time you clicked an ad banner? When was the last time you didn’t just close an annoying popup (if you’ve even seen one recently)? Including links in-content is a good way to naturally integrate ads, as are embedded YouTube videos or social media feeds. Just don’t use banners – it’s not an effective way to advertise anymore.
Utilize search engine optimization (SEO)
 SEO remains a marketing hot topic. What’s the best way to create engaging, informative content that’s still optimized for search engines so that it’s easy for users to find? SEO is crucial if you want to draw new readers to your blog. Tools like Google’s Webmaster Tools or SEMrush can help you figure out if your content is visible on search engines. Optimize keywords, make sure your images are searchable and you’re golden.
Keep a regular update schedule
 If your blog sits for days or weeks without content updates, people will grow bored and go elsewhere. What constitutes a reasonable amount of time between updates will differ depending on the content you’re creating; if you’re making videos which take a lot of editing work, it’s reasonable to upload weekly or bi-weekly, while written content might need to be more regular. A steady stream of viewers ensures a steady stream of revenue with the right money-making tools in place.
Set up an online teaching course
 Websites like Udemy and The Great Courses Plus are great ways to turn your expertise into financial gain. Put simply, if you’re an authority in your field, then you can charge people to take part in an online course that you teach. If you find yourself at parties describing in great detail what you do and how it makes money, then it might be time to turn that lengthy explanation into profit. If you’re good enough, there will always be demand; it’s time to create supply.
Sell merchandise
 This is more appropriate for some bloggers than others, but there’s rarely a time when you won’t be able to create some sort of merch for your blog. If you’ve got a strong brand identity, then printing your blog’s catchphrase, logo or another brand identifier on a T-shirt is a great way to start. This can be inexpensive in terms of your costs, and it’ll rake in a profit. Everybody wants a T-shirt, right? This links in really well with holding giveaways, too, as you can build up a brand association with your merch before you sell it. Speaking of which…
Build a strong brand identity
 “Oh, yeah, that blog, the one with…err…” Nobody wants to hear their blog described like this. When people talk about your blog, they need to be able to summarise exactly what it is, what it’s about and why it’s worth reading in a sentence. Think of a snappy name, a great strapline and a strong central concept, and the rest of the work does itself. This is more of a tip to facilitate a strong money-making platform rather than an outright money-making strategy, but it’s very, very important that your content is strong, else many of these methods simply might not work.
Host blogger’s comments:
Takeaways: How to start a profitable blog
It’s true. You can get paid to blog.
There are many ways to earn money blogging. This post shared 10 of them.
Use these strategies as your action plan for how to start a profitable blog.
Readers, please share so other bloggers discover how to start a profitable blog.
Your turn. Do you know how to get paid to blog? Are there any tips on how to make money blogging you can add?
I look forward to your views in the comments section.
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