A few years ago, the word “blog” did not exist in most people’s vocabularies, and now it seems that everyone is expressing themselves with an online journal. You may have heard stories about people making money with their blogs. It’s true!
Obviously, the first thing you will need to do is start a blog. We will cover this in more detail in another course, but the basics would be that you choose a blogging platform (we recommend Wordpress), install it to a web host, set up a domain for your site, and then begin writing.
Google’s Adsense program is a great way to get started making money on your new blog. Submit an easy application at www.google.com/adsense. Once you are approved, you just add some html code to your blog and small text ads will appear on your blog. Google will display ads that share a common theme with your blog. When one of the people reading your blog clicks on an ad, you get paid! The amounts vary, and clicking the ads on your own blog is strictly prohibited. Do not expect to strike it rich with Adsense. You can make good money with the Adsense program, but it depends highly on your topic selection and the amount of traffic your site gets. If you get a lot amount of traffic to your site, you will not make much from Adsense.
Affiliate marketing is another great way to make money by blogging. Most companies have an affiliate program, where they pay people to advertise their product online. In most cases, you will be paid a percentage of the sale of an item. Most affiliate programs have many different ads you can choose to include, ranging from full-color graphic ads to simple text ads. You can find affiliate opportunities through Linkshare (www.linkshare.com) and Commission Junction (www.cj.com). The AzoogleAds.com network is also a good source for CPA advertising. Marketing affliate products can net larger payouts for new bloggers because it is not as dependent on your blog’s traffic. It is based more on your skills as a writer and your ability to persuade.
“Pay per post” is somewhat controversial, but still a way to make money blogging. When you are being paid to post, you are actually paid to write about a certain product. In a nutshell, you can register your blog with a company and they will give you a list of things you can choose to blog about. Once you have completed your post, you send a link back to the company and if they accept your post, you will be paid. There may be certain guidelines to be approved, such as the amount of time your blog has been online, how many times you have posted in the last 90 days, and if it is indexed in search engines. The controversy enters into paid posting because it entices the reviewer to post a falsely positive review. So, your best bet is to disclose the fact that it is a paid review and then be honest about it. Being paid to do a review is no reason why you need to lie about it. Sources for paid posting are ReviewMe and PayPerPost.
The most important thing to remember is to keep your target market in mind. If your blog is targeted to stay-at-home moms with young children, you will want to keep your ads focused to things that would appeal to them. Do not try to create a blog that appeals to the masses. If you have several different target markets in mind, it will be easier and more profitable to create several different blogs that cater to individual markets. In other words, make sure your writing has a focus and does not try to be all things to all people. It is easier to write for and, ultimately, will be much easier to target advertising for.
