How To Monetize A Blog in 2019
This guide is designed to help you understand all of the opportunities of which you can monetize your website and help you to make a living online.
1. Display Advertising
Display ads have the capability of delivering impressive revenues to bloggers, but they can be tricky to manage and can end up making you very little money if not done right. If you want to succeed with display advertising, you need to focus on all types of details about audience, context and blog traffic.
Most blogs don’t have the traffic volume to make a real difference with display advertising. You must understand all your options before establishing whether or not display advertising is for your blog.
Display ads are easy to set up on your blog and command no special skills. They deliver passive income and work on all types of audiences from the start. Profits are usually small, despite the fact that they need high traffic. They can also put off readers, who may end up turning to other blogs to avoid these ads.
These blogs are usually ideal only if you have huge web traffic and other revenue sources. They may also be useful when you want to monetize your blog speedily with ease. You have a ton of ad networks that you can pick from.
Google AdSense is one of the most popular choices, but you can also choose Media.net for Yahoo or Bing. The best part is that these networks are based on context, so they display ads related to the content of your web page. Here are some display advertising options for your blog:
PPM
Get paid every time a user lands on the page that displays the ad when it is seen, irrespective of whether the ad is clicked on. This means that visitors don’t have to click on the ad and you will still receive money. The problem is that it needs more web traffic than any other ad types and doesn’t pay as much. PPM works best for high-trafficked blogs like news or humor sites.
PPC
With PPC, you will get paid when a user clicks on your blog ads. This is a standard advertising task and offers the best value for money, but you will need to choose advertisers relevant to your blog content for increased clicks. PPC works best when ads are relevant to your blog content.
Banner Ads
Banner ads are set in headers, individual posts, and sidebars. They can either be PPM or PPC. They are commonly used and effective for advertising, but they can also ruin your blog look depending on the ads displayed.
RSS Ads
RSS ads appear in your blog’s RSS feed and are great for making money. Unfortunately, RSS feeds have now become less popular, which has reduced your ability to make money from them. They work best when you have a big RSS list.
In-Text Ads
In-text ads are entrenched into your written text. If a reader clicks on these ads, they are re-directed to the consequent ad. The best part is that they look like links, but they can be distracting and annoying from a usability standpoint.
Mobile Advertising
If your blog has a mobile app, then you can advertise through different mobile channels like Millennial Media, ADMob, and Adfonic. With billions of mobiles connected to the Internet, you can take huge advantage of this form of advertising.
Mobile advertising works best when you have a mobile app and want to benefit from the huge bevy of Internet-connected mobile devices.
Advertising Widgets
You can use AdSanity widgets to customize and manage different ads on your blog. With advertising widgets, you can offer detailed advertising information to profit from single or multiple ads, but you need to put in more effort and be prepared for a higher entry cost.
Advertising widgets work best when you already have ads and want to enhance profitability from them.
Sponsored Content
Sponsored content requires advertising in the form of a blog post. Relevance and number of visitors establish the effectiveness of sponsored content. It is a good way to earn money because most visitors don’t have a problem with labeled sponsored content, but it can also put off some visitors.
This may only work well in some sectors, depending on how well the content suits your blog. Sponsored content is best when you have a wide audience.
2. Create A Sales Platform
In some cases, the best way you can make money from your blog is to create a sales platform. If you provide value through your content and offer relevant information to your readers, then they probably won’t have any problem buying from you.
Here are some of the best ways to turn your blog into a sales platform:
Offer Blog Merchandise
You can create blog merchandise by selling caps, t-shirts and any other stock for your blog. This fun idea can earn you tremendous revenue, but it is highly situational. Blog merchandise is best when you have an engaged and active set of readers with a cool interactive brand.
Create an eBay Auction Store
You can even create an eBay auction store for your blog because it is easy and quick for earning added income. This economically efficient strategy is simple to set up, but it is not suited to every blog.
Some people may not take your blog seriously and you may not earn your desired income from it. This strategy is best when you’re in a creative niche, which can link to tangible products.
Begin An E-Commerce Store
You can also sell items directly from your blog without having to involve any third parties, giving you an opportunity to monetize your blog, but you will naturally need products for selling. Turn your blog into an e-commerce store easily with Woocommerce.
3. Sponsorships and Reviews
Most bloggers will agree that readers are their biggest assets because they make you influential and authoritative. When influential people have something to say, people listen. This gives you the perfect opportunity to undertake product reviews and offer sponsorships because you can use your influence to earn revenue without using underhanded tactics.
Here are some of the best options you have:
Paid Reviews
When it comes to paid reviews, the advertiser will pay you to review their product or service. You will need to let your readers know that the review is paid for. In some countries like the U.S, this requirement is mandatory.
You can either use platforms like PayPerPost.com or you can find your own way to earn from paid reviews. Getting paid to review products in your industry is effortless, but not every blog has this opportunity.
This works best when you have a high-traffic blog with an understanding audience. You can also get paid for reviewing products in the form of gifts, but most people prefer cash.
Get Sponsored
Leverage your influential dialogue with your audience to get a company sponsorship to promote them. This is extremely lucrative because you get paid without having to do your own branding, but you need to have a blog that is popular with high volumes of traffic.
Turn Into A Brand Ambassador
If you’re a fan of a brand, then you can become a brand ambassador by promoting the company. You will get paid in commissions or cash, making it a good way to promote your favorite brands, but you will need someone to value your blog and image.
This works best when you have a high-traffic blog with lots of interaction.
4. Passive Income Through Affiliate Marketing
Every blogger wants to earn passive income, so affiliate marketing presents the perfect opportunity to help you in your quest. With passive income, you need to do some work to get it right. Here are some of the best ways to earn a passive income through affiliate marketing:
Affiliate Program
Become an affiliate to earn money by selling products without having to create them yourself. This is a good revenue source without the need to develop your own merchandise, but you can also put off your audience with the wrong products or if you overdo the selling on your blog.
One of the biggest affiliate marketplaces to you can start from are CJ.com and Clickbank.com
Affiliate Links
You can develop evergreen content with outbound links to relevant affiliate products. Monetizing your content through affiliate links is a good way to earn revenue while offering good value to your readers, but it takes an effort to set up and may not earn you enough revenue.
This strategy works best when you publish new articles regularly and constantly promote your blog with all the tactics listen in this guide.
5. Become A Leader
As an influential blogger, you naturally want to mentor your readers, so why shouldn’t you get paid to be the leader that you already are? When you charge a fee for your services, you can focus on providing quality advice to help you spend your time more judiciously. Here are some of the best ways to become a leader:
Consulting
Consulting allows you to use your expertise to solve or troubleshoot problems. This strategy is highly effective and allows you to build quick credibility with your audience. It works perfectly well as an alternate revenue stream. This strategy requires experience and may not be ideal for novice bloggers.
Consulting is best when your intervention is highly respected while offering measurable results.
Coaching
Your expertise can go a long way in helping clients solve their problems. While it is similar to consulting, coaching emphasizes on support, motivation, guidance and encouragement.
With coaching, you can charge a flat rate to earn a reliable income, but this time-consuming process will slow down your blog growth. You also need to have a high degree of authority to be successful.
6. Earn Revenue Through High-Quality Content
Your job as a blogger is to create high-quality content for your audience. You spend innumerable hours writing and researching your content, but some of it is simply too valuable to be offered for free.
If you didn’t charge a fee for some of your content, it would probably be impossible to reach such high standards. Here are some of the best ways to earn money through high-quality content.
Private Interviews
You can interview industry experts on a range of different sector-specific topics and charge a fee for accessing this interview. Interviews are cheap to establish and easy to tackle, but you must find well-known experts to command a fee for the interview. This strategy works best when you have good connections in your industry.
Develop Your Own Courses
You can create courses and teaching resources that a reader can go through at his or her own pace. Self-paced course material should ideally include a combination of audio, video, and text to stay interesting for readers.
This is one of the simplest ways for you to make sustainable profits while it can also build your credibility. Keep in mind that creating a course requires a great deal of time and efforts.
Several places you can publish your course are Gumroad.com and Guides.co
Create Video Courses
You can create video courses as a less intrusive way to reach out to your readers effectively. Keep in mind that video courses take a lot of time to set up and may require special editing software. You can upload your course to Udemy.com and offer free copies from the start to get reviews and feedback.
Write E-Books
E-books are the perfect way to start monetizing your blog. They have low upfront costs and no ongoing costs. E-books require no customer support and are easy to develop while helping you win credibility with a wider set of readers.
Unfortunately, they don’t offer enough profit per sale and work best in conjunction with other forms of revenue or when you are looking to build your industry authority.
However there are E-books which generated six figures in sales, but this depends on the industry and the efforts you put in the creation and promotion.
7. Maximize Your Blogging Capability
As a blogger, you naturally have power over your industry content, so why not make some money by finding ways to maximize your blogging capability? Here are some of the best ways to use your blogging skills to your benefit:
Paid Guest Posts
Business sites and other blogs will pay you to post information on their websites. If you do this for more than one, then you’ll see your bank balance swelling up soon. Paid guest posts are perfect for polishing up your own writing and the best part is that you get paid to do it. They are relatively time-intensive and it may take you a while to earn some good money.
Some blogs will allow you also to include a link to your own blog in the author bio box, which also help you to get more traffic and better Google rankings
Ghost Write For Other Websites or Bloggers
You can also offer ghostwriting services to other websites and bloggers to earn money. While similar to guest posting, you will not be credited for your work here.
This is a good way to build relationships and earn revenue, but it can be time-consuming and may not be as lucrative in the long run.
This strategy works best when you are into freelancing and don’t mind offering content to other writers and websites.
Create Sales Letters
Writing sales letters for businesses requires good marketing and copywriting skills that can earn you a ton of money, but not everyone is capable of doing it well. This strategy works best when you’re a blogger with a lot of copywriting experience under your belt.
8. Create A Unique Product Offering
Creating a unique product offering for your readers can help you earn a steady income, but it also requires in-depth planning and hard work to be successful. Here are some of the best ways for you to turn this into a lucrative monetization opportunity for your blog:
Develop Your Own Products
If you are in an industry with physical products, then you can create and sell your own to make a ton of money. Physical products add credibility to your blog and make you a serious competitor in your field, but it naturally costs more to run because you will spend time and money on producing prototypes before arriving at the final product.
This works best when you are in an industry that allows for selling tangible products like healthcare, exercise websites, diet websites and much more.
Create A Mobile App
You can easily create a mobile app for your audience to use for selling or promoting something to them. You should ideally have a large audience so that you can use your blog as a platform to promote and build awareness for the app.
You can then use this to create cross-selling or promotional opportunities. This strategy works best when you have experience in website development, and you understand your audience well.
9. Organize Events To Connect With Your Audience
As a blogger, you may have a lot of social connections and love to talk to your audience. Creating events is an excellent way to promote your blog and get paid. Here are some of the best ways to use events to connect with your audience:
Organize An Event
You may want to step out from behind the computer to organize a live event to earn some money.
If you have readers who live close to you and are willing to travel, then you may be able to earn some money by bonding with your readers face to face.
While it can be difficult logistically, organizing an event is a great way to bond with your readers. This strategy works best when you have a strong audience bond. You can use popular services such as Meetup.com to get more attendees at your event.
Paid Speaking Opportunities
You can also use your blog as an opportunity to unveil a public speaking career. Of course, this will highly depend on your niche, industry authority and comfort with speaking in public.
This strategy works best when you are a good orator and have something valuable to offer your audience.
Host A Social Media Party
Bloggers have social media authority, so you can ask a company to sponsor a branded social media party; enabling you to get paid for your effort.
You can leverage your large social media following to get paid for promoting specific brands through parties. Keep in mind that the audience is specific, so you will need permission from them to pull off the party.
10. Use Crowd-Funding
Harnessing crowdfunding will allow you to make money while changing lives. Here are some of the best ways to rally the crowd for your blog:
Build a Crowd Funding Page:
If you have a specific blog mission, you can build a crowd-funding page to source funds from your readers. You will get paid for your initiative, but you must have a worthwhile mission that people can support.
This strategy works best when you have a goal or mission that inspires action from your audience.
Get Donations Through The Beacon Network
You can get donations for your creativity and innovation through the Beacon network, but keep in mind that this rewards creative work mostly. This works best when you have a blog related to the creative or advertising industry, and you want to do something different.
Get Your Readers On Flattr
Flattr is an interesting platform to help you share your creative content and get paid for every like. This is a good way to get paid for your creative effort, but you must be able to convince your readers to join the system. This strategy works best when your audience uses Flattr.
Request For Donations
You should not underestimate the power of simply requesting for donations when you want to make money blogging. Put up a page for donations and ask your readers to donate for specific situations.
This strategy is one of the easiest monetization opportunities for your blog, but it isn’t dependable every time. This strategy works best when your readers appreciate your great work.
With so many monetization opportunities to earn from your blog, you’ve got to make the right choices that resonate with your industry. Once you’ve gone through this guide, you will be able to start making money, so don’t wait any longer. Your actions will determine your success.