How To Make Money From Your Blog – The Basics
One of the many questions that I get asked all of the time is how I make money from blogging. I’ll be honest, when I first started my blog five years ago, I had no idea it was even possible. If you read my previous post, you may remember me saying that I just literally jumped in, started a blog with no research AT ALL. I don’t recommend that at all. Which is hopefully why you are here reading this post today.
Today is the second part of my “Get Started Blogging Series”. If you haven’t started your blog yet, I highly recommend reading my How To Start A Blog post. That post will teach you how to get create and set up your blog from start to finish.
I am going to share with you (in the simplest way possible) a few ways that you can make money from your blog. Blogging can be an excellent source of income. But, blogging for an income of any sort takes work. You need to plan, write, photograph and execute your posts so readers will keep coming back for more.
Establishing yourself in the blogging world does take time and effort but you can most certainly start monetizing your site right away, no matter what your niche is.
But, there are a few things you need to do first.
- If you plan on making money from your blog
, either through affiliate marketing
, advertising, or any of the other ways that bloggers make money, you need to create a disclosure page on your site. This need to be visible so your audience can see them. I include mine in my top menu and also at the bottom footer.
- You need to include a disclosure statement at the top of any post that is a sponsored post or includes affiliate links. What does this mean? The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) requires that all bloggers disclose when they are getting paid for posts and/or receive free products that they are reviewing. Disclosure is required to help build a level of transparency between bloggers and readers. Not disclosing actions like being paid for posts or using affiliate links is considered deceptive.
- If you are collecting information about your readers like names and email addresses, then you will also need to create a Privacy Policy Page too.
How To Make Money From Your Blog
Display Advertising – Did you ever click on a website and see an ad or two displayed? Well, that owner of that site is getting paid to have those ads run on their site. If you are a smaller site, then Google AdSense would be a great fit. If you have a larger number of page views, then an ad network like Mediavine will help generate a nice monthly revenue.
Sponsored Posts – You can work with brands and promote their products on your site. You can either pitch brands on your own, or work through media agencies like Social Fabric, Massive Sway and Influence Central to name a few.
Affiliate Marketing – Affiliate marketing is when you link to certain companies products within your posts. You receive a commission if a reader clicks on the link and buys directly from your site. The commissions vary from company to company.
Products – Many bloggers create their own products and sell them directly from their site. Products can either be physical or digital. Examples include eBooks, books
I hope you found this helpful. It does seem very overwhelming at first. My recommendation is to take your blogging journey one step at a time.
Happy writing!
I like reading a post that can make men and women think.
Also, many thanks for allowing me to comment!