Write about what you love and make money doing it. Sounds like a dream, right? You can absolutely make good money blogging. Don’t expect it to be easy though. There are steps you can take in order to be positive you can have a profitable website. To make money blogging, you need a plan. Continue reading to find out how your blogging adventure should start!
- The steps leading up to starting a profitable blog
- How to start making money
- Multiple ways you can make money blogging
3 steps to make money blogging
Blogging is so fun. And it’s even more fun when you’re making money! Making money with your blog definitely doesn’t happen overnight. There are steps you need to do to be successful at blogging. In this post, you will find out what those steps are, an explanation of the most popular ways to make money, and how you can start making money with your blog immediately.
Step 1
Do you already own your own website? If not, start one. This is the first step in making the money. (Of course!) Before I bought my blog, I did hours (and hours) of reading different blogs about how to do it, what hosting to use, self hosting or free hosting, and lots of other stuff I had no clue what I was reading. Then one day I was tired of researching; so I brainstormed for awhile about a name, signed up for Bluehost, and started designing my new website! I definitely recommend just starting a blog. (It only costs the price of one coffee a month!) The way I learned was to just jump into the blogging world. Okay, so now (hopefully) you have decided to start your own blog! Now let’s find out a few different ways you can make money off your new blog.
Step 2
After you have set up your blog (learn how to start a blog in 7 steps here), the second step is to create useful content. Make sure what you write is useful to your readers. How can your readers benefit from what you are writing? So here’s the main goal: make your blog the go-to resource for readers looking into your niche. Your goal needs to be focused on creating 10-15 amazing post immediately.
Step 3
The third step isto have a money making plan. Planning is key. Immediately when you start your blog, you need a plan for an income. There are many ways to make money, but you shouldn’t just rely on one form. Many people enjoy different ways better than others. You need to find out what works for you and your blog.
Many ways to make money
There are many ways to make money blogging. Some of the ways are affiliate marketing, selling your own products, advertising, and sponsored posts. Below I’ll break down a short description of each one.
Affiliate Marketing
This is my favorite way to make money blogging. Find an affiliate that matches what you blog about. I definitely recommend starting with Amazon affiliate. No matter what you write about, you can add Amazon ads or product links. Amazon is the best to start out with because of the way their program is set up. This is how it works: if you click on one of my Amazon links, you don’t buy what I’m advertising but instead buy a $50 sweater within 24 hours, I get a $5 commission. Another example is I get $3 every time someone signs up for an Amazon Prime 30 day free trial. That’s why I love Amazon affiliate!
A lot of bloggers make the mistake of signing up for 15 different affiliates when they first start. Don’t do this. The way to make money with affiliate links is to focus on one or two. Pretty much every company has an affiliate program, so even the most interesting niches can make money.
You want to only promote a brand or product that you personally use and would recommend. Also, you need to put a disclaimer in all your posts letting your readers know that you will be receiving a small commission if they buy one of your links.
Product Sales
When you sell your own product, you can make the most amount of profit. With affiliate sales, you only make 3-13% of what the buyer purchases. As soon as you figure out what you are going to write about- start thinking of something to sell. It could be a digital download, ebook, t-shirt, course, and so much more.
Research and brainstorm what your readers would buy. What would benefit them enough for them to pay money for your course/book/etc.
For example: Say you blog about fitness. What are your most popular posts? Healthy eating, beach body workouts, vegan recipes, weight loss tips? Your most popular posts show you what people are interested in. What age group is your audience? Are your readers struggling to lose weight or are they already fit? Take all this into consideration, then create a freebie off of that. Use that freebie to get email subscribers. Now start creating your product that you will sell. You know what your readers are interested in and you have email subscribers to market your product to.
Advertising
Ads are an excellent way to make money as well. (They should be used as a passive way of income and you should not rely on it to be your only source.)
After you have your blog launched for 6 months, you can sign up for Google Adsense. You also have to be accepted for Adsense.
So if you plan an using this source of making money, you want to do a few things before applying:
1) Start writing long and beneficial blog posts.
2) Create an awesome about me page, contact page, disclosure page, and privacy policy. Those pages are required to be accepted.
3) Choose a nice theme and color scheme.
I only recommend using Google Adsense if you have at least 10,000 monthly visitors. With Adsense, you may make about $5-$10 per 1,000 vistors to your site. Of course this varies per site, this is just an estimate. The most important question to ask yourself before using Adsense is if it’s worth it to you. Do you have enough traffic to make enough money using ads to place them on your blog?
After you have 30,000 pageviews a month, you can sign up for Mediavine. Mediavine pays about double what Google Adsense does, but there is a page view requirement.
I like a clean website. (Notice my blog has no Google Adsense or Mediavine ads- for now, it is an easy way to make extra money!) I do like to use Amazon Ads for my website because I can choose what is being put out there that reflects my blog. (See below for an example of a custom Amazon ad that I made.)
Sponsors
Another way to make money blogging is to get sponsors. A sponsored post is where a company pays you to write about their product. This is different than other ways to make money; instead of putting an affiliate link in a post that you could make thousands from, you are paid a certain amount most of the time. So, put simply, you are paid for the amount of hours you put toward that post.
The best way to get sponsors is to write to a company and ask for a certain amount of money or free products for a detailed review post. If you are interested in this type of income, what are your favorite companies that go along with your brand?
For example: If you are a food blogger and your favorite brand is Wholly Guacamole, you can email them and tell them you came up with an amazing recipe that includes their delicious product. You know that your readers will love it and that means it will increase their sales. You will do one sponsored post for x amount. Make sure they know that it will benefit their revenue if they invest in your post.
Have a plan
Buy a new notebook. In that notebook, have different sections. Your sections can be “blog post ideas”, “keywords”, “ideas for an ebook”, “course ideas”, and so on. Seeing my ideas and action plans on paper has really helped me to organize my blog ideas.
Look at bloggers in your niche. Don’t compare or copy, but get inspiration. What are their courses or ebooks about? What are their most popular posts? How do they make money?
Right when you start your blog: start planning on ways to make money and WRITE. How much and how fast you start to make money often depends on how much you put into it.
Here is a recap of a few ways you can make money blogging:
You can write about what you love and make money doing it. There are so many true stories of that out there. What do I recommend? Just start a blog and write about what you love. You learn as you go.
Here are a few important tips:
- Blog about what you can’t stop talking about
- View your blog as a business not a hobby
- Figure out ways to make money from the beginning
- Have multiple ways of income coming from your blog
- Don’t get discouraged and give it up- it takes time
- Long and benefit content is key
- Work very hard on your email subscriber list
I was not sponsored or gifted any of these products. Some of the links are affiliated, which means that by purchasing I make a small amount at no additional cost to you. Thank you for supporting me!
