Monetize Your Blog – for Newbies
To Monetize your blog is one of the first things Newbies need to do.
You have spent hours creating the best blog you can, and the main reason you did all this is to help build your tribe of followers. Also, to build your email lists and to create Authority in your chosen niche.
All these reasons extend from one goal… To have a profitable online business!
Why not Monetize Your Blog such that you lead your blog followers to your products and services?
You should be doing this right from the start!
At least have the plans in place right from the start, so you can implement your monetization, as soon as you have the basic blog built, and start to drive traffic to it.
To earn Fast Cash from your blog, you obviously must have products and services your visitors can buy.
Some of the most common ways people are earning directly from their business blogs, are:
Build Mailing Lists
Email Marketing is the source of traffic to sites, and conversions to sales every day. It represents most of the income for all online Internet Marketing businesses.
Email marketing absolutely goes hand-in-hand with Selling your own products and services, and with most facets of Affiliate Marketing.
If they come to your site, and don’t buy, you have most likely lost them forever.
But if you get their details on your list, you have an excellent chance of getting them to buy it later, or buy something else.
Just because they were not in the market for the product they first saw, never means they won’t buy your other products.
Your Blog, and your Blog Posts are excellent places to have Opt-in Forms, and your blog should probably have an exit pop-up with another optin form as well.
Sidebar ad Images
One of the first ways to Monetize your blog, is to add Sidebar ad Images.
Ad Images linked to your own products or services, or Affiliate Products.
These usually consist of an eye-catching image, often with animated text, linked to the product or service sales page. The image ad is intended only to catch the reader’s attention and entice them to click through for more details.
The job of making the actual sale should be carried out by the Sales Page.
Your Blog sidebar will normally have other important items, including your email list Optin Form, your recent posts, your post categories, etc. You will need to plan the layout, the order of importance of all these items, but still have space for the Image Ads. This means you will want to choose 2 or 3 image ads only, and make them closely related to the niche that your blog is all about.
Affiliate Marketing
Another great way to Monetize your Blog is to include Ads to Affiliate Products or Services
This is probably one of the quickest ways to make cash, especially if you don’t have your own products to promote yet, which is the normal situation that most newbie bloggers find themselves in.
It involves finding affiliate products related to your niche, becoming an affiliate, and then promoting these products on your blog.
You can do this with linked images as mentioned above.
However, probably the most common and productive way, is to write a good blog post in the form of a product review, and finish off with benefits to the buyer, and your affiliate link embedded in the text of the post.
Alternatively, the post might be not a product review, but more an informative instructional post on this subject, but then finish off in the same way, with some benefits for the reader to have the product and include your affiliate link.
You can find a huge number of products in almost any niche on Affiliate Marketplaces such as ClickBank. If you are like me, in the Make Money Online niche, you also have JVZoo and Warrior Plus marketplaces.
Google Ads (formerly Google Adwords)
To monetize your blog with Google Ads you need to sign up for a Google Ads account and get your site approved.
Then you place a short code on your site, where you want the ads to show.
If you are using WordPress for your blog platform, there are plugins that make adding the Google Ads code very simple.
Each time a visitor clicks on one of your displayed ads, you are paid a small amount by Google.
Google Ads can be in your sidebar, in your footer, or within related posts.
Because these ads do not pay a huge amount, I recommend you use them, but don’t overdo it. You don’t want everyone that you get to your site, clicking away from your site, for the few cents you will earn.
Amazon Product Sales
We all know that Amazon has millions of products, and that people trust Amazon, and don’t hesitate to buy from their site, as they are reliable, have good prices and have quick delivery.
Becoming an Amazon Associate is easy. You can apply get your Amazon Key, then you can find WordPress plugins or whole WordPress Themes, that are simple to install on your site, to promote any niche related products from Amazon.
You can place ads in your blog sidebar or at the bottom of your posts and other blog pages.
The most common way, is to have a page or several pages set up basically as a ‘store’ and display several related products, so the buyer can choose from what you have listed. The plugins I mentioned above, will take the product image, product description and price details, directly from Amazon and display on your pages.
One big advantage about this system is that Amazon ‘cookies’ the person to your account for 24 hours. This works and works well. An example could be that a visitor clicks your link to say an exercise bike, but while on Amazon they buy more exercise equipment, items that you don’t even have shown on your site, but you still get your commission for all these products.
Sell Advertising Space
Another way to monetize your blog, but only once you are established online, is to have other people’s ads on your site.
If you wish to do this, you will need to really have Authority in your niche, and a lot of traffic to your site. Once you are at this stage, you can sell space on your site, or certain pages, for other people’s banner ads, etc.
These would usually be at the top of your main pages, in your newest posts, or in your sidebar. The more clicks you can send their way, the more demand you will have, and the higher prices you can charge for displaying the ads.
As mentioned, you really need a lot of traffic to your site, or you won’t make advertising sales. So, take your time, before looking at this option.
Offer Your Services
If you are planning to sell your own services, maybe such as website creation, copy-writing, or advertising services.
You can use these to monetize your blog by having ads and links to these services, directly on your blog.
If you are very good at, or are considered an expert on, for anything related to your niche, you can use your blog to sell consultations, or actual ‘done for you’ services.
Everybody is very good at something, if yours is related to the niche your blog is in, promote yourself and earn from this.
One of the most common ways to monetize your blog using services, is by you offering consultations or coaching on the topics you cover on your blog. You don’t have to actually be doing the work, teaching others what to do is a great service as well.
You may also be interested to know, that I have written an eBook that expands on this topic.
It firstly outlines a lot more information on planning and setting up your blog, before you monetize it. It is a good read, please take a look at the details here!
Thanks and All the Best!
Pete Bentzen
P.S. Leave your comments or questions below, I love hearing from my readers!
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