Monetizing your block is an important step in building your business and one that all blog owners will face eventually. The inevitable next question is how? While there are countless ways to monetize your blog, this article will look at some of the most popular. If you’re interested in generating recurring revenue from your blog then read on, and learn how to monetize your blog.
Which Method Is Best?
Before we jump into actual methods I want to ask one common question, which one of these methods is the best? The short answer is that it depends, and each one may be the best for a particular site or situation. There isn’t one general answer, so it pays to think about your audience, your skillset, and experiment a little to figure out which one works best.
With that in mind, I’m a huge fan of diversifying and building multiple streams of income for a single site. The issue is that most of these rely on a third party and that puts you at risk if they ever decide to cut you off. If you’ve set up multiple streams then you can weather that storm and keep on generating revenue. If you put all your eggs in one basket then you’re at the mercy of that service.
Take as an example our other site theindoorgardens.com. This site has display ads, affiliate links, and we’ve created our own E-Book that we link to from the site. This gives us 3 streams of revenue and makes the site more resilient should one get cut off or change its payouts.
Display Ads
One of the most popular and easy ways to monetize your site is with display ads. These are the ads that show up on your site and come from some sort of ad network like Adsense or Ezioc. These networks help display relevant ad content on your site, and you get a percentage of the cost the advertiser pays.
The benefit of these networks is they have a ready list of advertisers that come from a wide range of industries. Depending on the network, you can start using this monetization strategy as soon as you want. Others have larger traffic requirements, but this can also come with extra features or increased revenue.
Display ads are an easy way to monetize your site, but be careful about going overboard. Too many ads can harm the user experience and make the site hard to use. I’m sure you’ve been on a site that has a constant stream of ads, think about how difficult that site was to use.
Ads also have an effect on the speed of your site. Each ad has to load in its content and this makes the page load and function slower. Too many ads can have an extremely negative effect on your page’s speed, and this can affect your seo.
Display ads are a wonderful monetization tool, but you need to be careful with how you use them. They can also have low rates, so it’s often wise to supplement them with other forms of revenue.
Curated Banner Ads
Another option similar to display network ads is to offer long term banner advertising on your site. This differs from network ads in that you’re selling a specific space on your site to a customer interested in advertising on it.
This can be lucrative as you can be guaranteed a specific price for the duration of the ad placement. This can make judging your revenue much easier than with display ads that can vary in CPM and payouts.
In terms of revenue, it depends on a lot of details like traffic, audience engagement, industry, and more. Here’s a decent overview of some of the considerations to keep in mind if you want to go this route.
One of the downsides of this method is that it’s more involved as you’ll need to deal with the advertiser. You may also need to work with them to do things like replace the ad which would likely be handled by the network in other cases.
Sponsored Or Review Content
Another method is to accept sponsored or review content for a fee. In these situations you’re being paid to add a post or review to your site. This can serve dual purposes of both bringing in revenue while also adding content to your site.
Keep in mind that you should always disclose your relationship in these cases and make it clear that it’s a paid sponsored post. Otherwise, you risk losing trust from your readers.
You’ll also need to be large enough to make this valuable to whoever is purchasing the post. Don’t expect to charge hundreds for a sponsored post if your site only gets a handful of visitors.
You also need to ensure that the quality of the post is up to par. A paid post is no excuse to throw garbage up on your site.
I’m also wary of how often I accept sponsored posts. Too many and it can cheapen the look of the site and make it seem like a cash grab. I always make sure that sponsored posts only account for a small percentage of the total content on my site.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a great method to generate revenue. In this model you push users to a 3rd party site and then get a cut of the sale. This can be a one time fee for a purchase, or in some cases recurring income for as long as the user uses the service. This can end up being a lot of revenue, especially with services that offer a large percentage as the commission.
You also get a lot of options in how you market on your site. Many big retailers like Amazon have an affiliate program, and many smaller ones even have one. This gives you a lot of choice in who to work with, and also you typically get free reign on where you place the links.
The downside of this is that it can take a lot of traffic to start generating revenue. While display ads can start making money on lower traffic sites, affiliate links tend to need more traffic to become viable.
You should also be disclosing that you use affiliate links on your site. This is a requirement of most major partners, and you can have your site penalized if you don’t make it clear.
Your Own Product/Service
Lastly, you can always offer your own product or service. This can be an excellent revenue generator, and gives you a lot more control since you set the price.
The options here are many, but a couple of popular ones include
- -Consulting
- -Writing an E-Book
- -Offering Training
- -Selling Physical Merchandise
- -Selling Branded Merch
- -Dropshipping
And of course many more.
The downside here is that putting together a product takes a lot of time and effort. You need to spend the time to create the product, or invest the cash to pay someone else to do it. It can also take a lot of time to get into a production state, and during that time you might not be generating any revenue.
You also need to be sure that your audience is receptive to what you’re offering. You don’t want to invest a few months into an E-book only for you to realize that the information in it isn’t in demand. This is why these types of projects are often best for established sites that have an idea of what their audience likes.