Gone are the days when blogging was just a place to share your thoughts. Blogs are big money-makers, but only for those who monetize them properly.
While blogging isn’t a get-rich overnight thing, there is money in blogging – even for total newbies.
How is it possible, you ask?
I’m here to share with you 7 ways to monetize your blog when you’re a total newbie.
1. Affiliate marketing
The most popular way of monetizing your blog by far is by affiliate marketing!
How does affiliate marketing work?
When someone clicks on an ad from your blog and purchases something, you get paid a commission.
You most likely don’t have anything to sell of your own. You just don’t have the resources to make it happen. So the next best thing to having your own product is selling someone else’s products.
If you have the traffic and can choose the right products to pitch, you can make good money with affiliate marketing.
What can you sell?
It depends on what your blog is about. If you have a fitness blog, you can sell weight loss supplements. If you have a finance blog, you can sell credit card offers. If you have a travel blog, you can sell hotel stays and flight tickets.
How much can you make?
Well, this depends entirely on your traffic, of course, but also on what you are selling. For example, if you’re selling $15 t-shirts, you might get a $4 per shirt commission fee. If you’re selling high-end handbags worth $1,500, then you might end up making $100 per sale.
Where do I sign up?
Once you sign up, look for products you want to promote and place some relevant affiliate links on your blog.
2. Display ads
Newbie bloggers should look to Google Adsense as their first step in monetizing their blog. It’s a super simple way of placing an ad on your blog and getting paid for every click you generate to the ads.
Ultimately, Google Adsense is not the path to riches. The reason being that there is a middle-man (Google) involved. They will end up taking about half of what the advertiser pays for the ad.
How much can you make?
Depending on the type of ad, you can make just a few pennies per click. But it depends entirely on what your blog is about.
For a blog about attorneys, expect to make a couple of dollars every click. For a blog about finances, 50 cents to a dollar. For a celebrity blog? You’re lucky to get a few cents per click.
3. Email marketing
Email marketing is another great way to monetize your blog. You see, many big-name bloggers don’t really make money from their blog – they make money from their email list!
Having an email list is essential to being a successful blogger. The reason being that you don’t always want to fill up your blog with ads everywhere.
To get more email subscribers, you’re going to need to create a freebie to give away to entice your readers to subscribe. This freebie, also called a lead magnet, can be created using Canva for free.
You should use your blog as a way to share your message, educate readers, and have them get to know you. But your email list? That’s to sell, baby, sell!
Why does email marketing work?
When someone gives you their email address, they are trusting you that you won’t spam them. Think about that; they are trusting you.
Since they trust you, the products you personally recommend to them via email will mean a lot more than just a random ad seen on a blog.
How do I create a list?
Sign up for a free account with ConvertKit using this link. Doing so will unlock a free account for up to 500 subscribers.
How much can you make?
Aim to earn $1 per month for every email subscriber you have. This is most definitely possible if done right. This means you don’t spam them, and you always offer something of value in each email.
4. Sell online courses
If you have vast knowledge of a particular subject, you can create a class and sell your course on your blog.
This concept is extremely popular because of Udemy. For example, you can teach a class on photography for beginners, use Microsoft Excel, or graphic design.
In addition to offering your class for sale on Udemy, you can also directly market your class on your blog. For example, you can create a series of 10 videos, each 15-30 minutes long.
Don’t just post these videos on Youtube; you are much more valuable than that. You can sell your course on your blog and make money teaching your skills to others.
To set up a course, you will need to choose an online course platform, also called a learning management system (LMS). For example, you can set up a course on your blog using a plugin like Thrive Apprentice, or you can host it offsite with my preferred LMS, Teachable.
5. Sell digital products like ebooks and printables
Okay, so if you are reading this, that means you probably have a blog already. You also probably have a lot of posts written up on whatever topic your blog is about.
What are you doing with all that old content? Is it just sitting there? Once your content has been posted, don’t let it sit there doing anything. Here’s what you can do:
Take that content and turn it into an ebook.
Open up Microsoft Word, Google Docs, or Apple’s Pages application. Look for your best content, and then you can combine multiple posts into sections, let’s call them chapters. Add an introduction and conclusion to your book, and voila, you’ve just created an ebook.
You can convert your text document into a pdf file that is sent to your customers after checkout. You can then promote your ebook on your blog or even on Amazon.
The benefit of selling your own ebook is that you get to keep 100% of each sale.
Don’t want to write a book yourself? That’s fine too; you can also make a bit of money selling someone else’s ebook.
But don’t bother using Amazon affiliate links to sell ebooks, as you’ll only get a paltry percentage of each sale.
Instead, go to Clickbank and promote higher-cost ebooks from there.
You can choose an ebook that sells really well, charges a good amount, and gives you a large percentage of each sale. That way, all of the work is already done for you, and you just need to promote it on your blog.
6. Sponsored posts
A great way to monetize your blog is to look for sponsored post opportunities.
There are companies out there who will not only send you a free product to try but will also pay you to publish a review.
When a product launches (or even before), companies want to get a good buzz going about their product. That’s where you come in.
How much can you make?
Smart bloggers can earn anywhere from $100 up to $500 by reviewing products every month. The possibilities are endless, however. For example, there are some Youtube influencers making millions just dropping product names into their videos. The same goes for Instagram.
Why will they choose your blog?
If you have an influential blog along with a strong social media presence, you are quite a valuable asset to a company looking to sell a new product.
Companies will look for popular blogs by looking at several metrics:
- Your traffic
First, install Google Analytics to track how many visitors your blog gets daily. This is the number one thing that a company will look for when deciding whether your blog is right for their product. So get to creating and start building an audience.
- Your social media reach
You may have a personal Twitter and Instagram account. But your blog needs one of its own. The earlier you get started, the quicker you can build up your fanbase, so get to it.
Companies are looking for bloggers who are “influencers” in their field. First, aim to get 1,000 Twitter followers; once you get that, aim for 10,000 and never look back.
- Your email subscribers list
Email subscribers. You must have an email newsletter if you are serious about blogging. Even if you don’t know what to write about, just create the list and don’t send anything.
It’s a valuable asset in your arsenal when it comes to pitching yourself to companies.
What’s the process?
Here’s how it works. First, companies will send you a sample to review (or free access if it’s an online-only product). Then you are expected to use the product and write a detailed review, including pictures and possibly video.
Then you publish your blog post and share it on all of your social media channels.
Where do I sign up?
Here’s a list of sites where you can register your blog to get paid for product testing.
Why do companies pay for this?
The company would hope that your blog post gets indexed in Google so when anybody Google’s this new product looking for reviews, your blog post shows up #1.
In the end, it’s a win-win for everybody. You get some free merch and payment, the company gets the press they want, and anybody researching the product gets to see a hands-on review.
Note: If you are going this route, be sure to add a disclaimer stating that you received the product free of charge, received payment, and are giving your unbiased opinion about it.
7. Offer a service
Add a personal touch to your blog by offering a personalized one-on-one service.
You’re an expert on something, right? Even if you don’t know it, you are. Even if you don’t believe it, believe it. Even if it’s not true, fake it ’til you make it.
Providing consultancy services is a great way of monetizing your blog. By offering consultancy services, you can charge a fee to help your readers with their issues.
Here are some services you can offer on your blog.
- Marketing help
- Coaching / consulting
- Freelance writing
You can promote your serves both on your blog and list your gigs on Fiverr as well.
Note: Don’t reveal the price of your services publicly. Your prices can change, and the needs of each client are different. Also, you’ll get more messages by not disclosing the price upfront.
Getting your blog ready for monetization
Ready to start monetizing your blog? Even newbies can start making money blogging. But you do need to make sure your blog is ready first.
Here are 4 major pillars you need established before you can properly start making money blogging:
1. You need a fast website
Slow websites cause people to leave websites. In fact, 40% of users leave a website if it hasn’t loaded in 3 seconds or less (source and source).
You can check the speed of your website using Google’s Pagespeed Insights tool.
The biggest impediment to your blog speed will be your host. I’ve been able to get near-perfect page speed scores using WPX as my host and WP Rocket as my caching plugin.
2. You need a good design
When I say you need a good design, I don’t mean you need a fancy design to hire a web designer. No, not at all. I’m just saying you need to have a design that is easy to navigate.
You need to make your website easy to browse so your readers can visit multiple pages. Remember, each page gives you an additional opportunity to make money. So take the time to make sure your website is user-friendly.
The WordPress blog theme I recommend for newbie bloggers is Astra. It’s the exact theme I use because it’s lightning-fast and puts the attention where it needs to be: on simplicity.
3. You need great content
It doesn’t matter how good your blog looks or how fast it loads if your content doesn’t cut it! When you continue to update your blog with useful and valuable pieces of content, people will begin to take notice.
When you create great content, you will naturally acquire more backlinks, as other bloggers link to you as a source, and Google takes notice as they receive positive signals from how users interact with your content.
4. You need perseverance
Look, blogging isn’t easy. It can be frustrating to build a blog, try and get traffic, and then wait for something to happen.
Most people start a blog but quickly lose steam when their dreams of making big money don’t materialize. But what you have to realize is that it takes time to build a blog in the eyes of your readers and Google. So be patient with the process, it is possible, and there is money in blogging!
Wrapping it up
Ready to monetize your blog? None of this works if you don’t! Hopefully, this article has pointed you in the right direction. Thanks for reading!
Until next time,
Edwin, DoSixFigures.com
