Never in the recent history of mankind has it been easier to write a blog post on how to monetize a blog. A few years ago, the tech side of things was more hands-on. Unfortunately, that also required a sizable investment just to get things going. Fast forward to today, and you can professionally do your blogging activities for a fraction of the cost.
To profit from your blog, you’ll need a monetization strategy. The first elements to consider are your monetizing options. As more and more people choose online channels to do their shopping and fulfill their needs, these options are more suitable for you and your customers.
A website without much content can be promoted, but it doesn’t have the potential to be known and read as a blog does. This is because you are writing new and helpful information often. Content is why acquiring traffic from search engines and other sources is possible. Quality content has a high demand among readers.
What to do before or after you get traction with your blog? I’ll present you with some tried and true options next:
1. Sell an eBook
The creation of intellectual property is one of the best ways to get ahead today. We live in the information age, which means we have experienced a shift from the established industry, since the Industrial Revolution, to a new economy, based upon information and technology.
As a content creator, you may feel you want to communicate so much more in each article. However, sometimes articles get too long because you want to cover a topic in-depth. The solution for this is to create an eBook.
Sometimes the benefits of writing an eBook are social. For example, you can establish yourself as an authority by creating content this way. Being an authority lets you increase your credibility with your audience, which can increase your chances of landing that gig you’ve always wanted, offering more value to your audience, and being recognized as a thought leader in your field.
We are all in one business. The business of selling trust. This is the golden key for sales everywhere in the world. If your prospect believes you have their best interest at heart when you make a recommendation, it will have much more weight than if you’re just pitching.
Other significant benefits you’ll find by becoming an eBook creator are:
- Create a new stream of income
- Generate leads for your business
- Repurpose content effectively
- Increase traffic to your website
- Sell without being salesy
2. Affiliate links
Affiliate marketing happens when you sign up with a network or a company to sell its offers. Then, when someone buys their product through your link, you get paid for every purchase they make.
It’s commonly known as performance marketing online since the vendor only pays when they get results through you.
3. Advertising
As you have seen in newspapers, ads are close to the content. This happens because most offline publications have a business model of advertising and circulation. In the online world, something similar happens, but with a difference. In the online world, you can see ads close to the content, but these ads are closely related to the text. This creates an ecosystem where ads are more valuable to the reader and more connected to their source.
Google AdSense
As a famous example, you can embed AdSense Ads on your site. AdSense is a simple and free way to cash in on your content by displaying ads next to it. It works because Google will pay you for the ads you show on your website based on the number of clicks or ad impressions. But, of course, it all depends on the type of ad.
Negotiated directly
If your site is a good fit for a brand, it’s possible to strike a deal with this company. Most companies that successfully use online marketing to serve their customers have a healthy promotional budget. Therefore, they may contact you to place an ad on your site for a fixed amount. This benefits both parties because either one will know precisely what to earn and spend.
4. Paywall
This business model has taken prominence because of many newspaper brands doing business online. But, at its most basic level, it’s a way to restrict access to content, such as news, via a paid subscription or purchase.
This business model is widely used in academia, where you can obtain a research paper by subscribing to an academic library.
I haven’t seen great results with this business model regarding the average blogger. However, you may find one of the other options more suited to your venture.
5. Premium content
This is like a paywall but has essential differences since a part of the blog is exclusive to subscribers. You can implement this option if you create engaging, educational, informational content.
You create a member-only area where the customers who pay, usually month to month, will access your premium content. This content can include articles, courses, workshops, or episodes.
6. Sell services
One of the fastest ways to make money, online or offline, is by offering services to your target audience. This opens many opportunities for you since you can use your knowledge to make someone’s life easier.
What can you offer? There are many activities you often perform that seem easy to you. This is because you have developed a skill, and this is valuable. However, some people may not find performing this activity as easy or rewarding, so they lookout for help. This is when you, through your blog, let them know you can fulfill this need at a specific price.
What can you offer? I will mention two examples:
Example # 1 – Coaching
So, your website is booming, and you decided to provide a service. You have the option of becoming a coach. You can be a life coach, a business coach, an executive coach, a career coach, a leadership coach, etc. You decide what service to provide according to your skills, goals, and passions.
The coaching process aims to improve performance to increase your customers’ self-awareness in a specific area. The coach helps the other person improve their performance at its most basic level. In addition, the coach facilitates the process of learning.
Example # 2 – Freelance blogging
Writing is one thing; blogging is another thing. A writer provides value by writing words. A blogger persuades, communicates, and uses his many skills to create value for an audience. A blogger has experience with the many systems of blogging. For example, a blogger may be experienced using one or many Content Management systems, such as WordPress.
A freelance blogger can create outreach campaigns and backlinks to their desired website. All these activities are outside the comfort zone of many writers. A blogger is closer to being a specialized marketer than a writer per se. This shows in their fees. Bloggers can demand more monetary value simply because they provide a better deal.
7. Sell your online courses
Being a product creator is a magnificent way of making money online. You can package your knowledge and turn it into a course. One of the benefits of working this way is that you make your content once, and you can sell it again and again for a long time, especially if it’s evergreen content.
What is an example of evergreen content? Evergreen is the symbol of perpetual life. Like the color in trees, the term is used for lasting and sustainable content.
This doesn’t mean you can’t profit from a seasonal perspective. This means your content will only be in demand during certain seasons. Just like snow removal, it’s only needed during particular conditions in the calendar. This also means taking advantage of specific fashions and trends in your niche or industry.
No matter the type of content you choose to create your online courses, it’s crucial to remember you’ll have the following benefits (among many others)
- You’ll earn passive income.
- It gets more accessible and easier to manage the process
- Work from anywhere
- No physical expenses required
- You can get started for free
One reason to sell the courses through your blog, not through a specialized course platform, is to create a database of warm clients whom you can sell repeatedly. You also are in constant touch with your target market. This means you are creating more value for your prospects and current customers. The difference between selling through your blog and selling through a platform is that with a blog, you’re a business owner, not only the content producer.
8. Sell eBooks on Kindle
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ll recognize selling books on Kindle as a great money-making opportunity. Statistics show that only in 2019, more than 335.7 million eBooks were sold in the United States alone. However, the number could be higher since major retailers don’t always share their numbers, and several methodologies exist to measure and track the market.
A Kindle Edition refers to any eBook with the correct format to be viewed on a Kindle device. Thousands of magazines, books, and newspapers are formatted for this purpose. It is crucial to note that these eBooks can also be consumed on other devices.
You’ll find Kindle eBooks have the following characteristics:
- Generate leads
- Cab be published quickly and be shorter than traditional books
- The cost of production is low
- The Kindle App is ubiquitous
- You can correct mistakes easily
- Amazon takes care of the little details
What does this monetization method have to do with your blog? First, you can drive traffic, therefore customers, to your eBook.
9. Virtual Summits
What is a virtual summit? Is an online event of collaborative nature where a host interviews the speakers. It can be compared to an online conference that collects online presentations. You will find five or six experts on a topic, to more than thirty experts on that topic. It is worth saying that it is a very effective way of generating leads.
The value it generates can be immense since attendees can enjoy the summit for free or a fee without paying for travel expenses or booking a hotel. This is an ideal scenario for many individuals since they save a sizeable amount of time.
This is one of the few ways you can capture thousands of prospects’ attention without the hassle, risk, and cost of hosting a physical event the traditional way.
Organizing a virtual summit will create value for you since you will skyrocket your leads and reputation. It is also useful for speakers and partners, who will be able to share what they know and increase their public. The audience benefits by accessing high-quality content and information from reputable sources.
How to sell the correct way?
As you can see, you have many options when it comes to How to monetize a blog. Although each option is suitable for various needs, it is essential to mention how to implement them in your blog.
This is where many bloggers get it wrong. Some old courses (in the online world, can be 10 years or more) teach to paste a link to buy a product in every forum or blog they can find. This is the equivalent of spamming.
Is there a better way? Of course, there is. Much like in the real world, if you only cold-call people, only a tiny minority of the people you’ve called will respond to your offer. This metaphor of hot and cold is handy for the online world. To recap, cold is when you’re far away from your objective, or it also means people are not interested. To be cataloged as hot means you’re interested or close to buying something.
Then, you need a system that can get your prospects from cold to hot. It must have another characteristic in the online world: It must be automated. Automation is a way of doing repetitive actions, again and again, with little to no human input. This means guiding your visitors through a website, sending emails when certain events are true, and so on.
I don’t know if you’ve heard of a business and marketing funnel. This is precisely what you need to profit from your visitors. The first step in the funnel is attracting your target audience’s attention. Next, you can publish high-quality content and drive traffic to your website. Most people will read your content but won’t opt-in to your mailing list, step two.
An email list is a powerful asset in your arsenal. Statistics show that you can make around $38 for every dollar you spend on email marketing. You get subscribers by offering a lead magnet, a high-quality but short (usually) piece of content such as a list or short guide, usually in text. But it can be a video or audio as well. The third step is once they subscribe to your email list, they are the recipients of a sequence of emails where you provide valuable content.
As you can see, the prospects began as cold traffic, and they’re getting warmer and warmer through each step of your funnel. Once they’re inside your email list, and you are providing content directly related to their problems and needs, and once they trust you, you can pitch one of the seven products or services I mentioned in this post.
This is where you make sales and earn a comfortable living. What you have done through the nurturing sequence of emails is a form of pre-selling your products or services. But don’t call it a day yet. Once you have a series of loyal customers, you can add them to a buyer list where you provide special promotions and treat them how you’d like to be treated. It is essential to mention that once a customer has bought something from you, they’re the best candidates to buy yet another product or service; they become “hot” customers.
A little shortcut
I receive a question often. It’s about how hard it is to create content continuously. This goes for eBooks, email newsletters, blog posts, sales letters, etc.
First, I recommend you show your expertise in the field you choose. This means you will provide your audience with the utmost value. Sometimes you just don’t know what to write when creating a product you want to sell on your website.
This is where you can use Private Label Rights (PLR). You can use a little shortcut for content not indexed by search engines. You don’t want to use it in blog posts because duplicate content is frowned upon by Google and other search engines. It’s not worth it to jeopardize your hard work.
For other channels, such as email and eBook creation, you may want to look at these PLR products. It can give you a head start on your project. One helpful tip is to customize the content as much as possible (from 40-70%). This will make sure you’re adding enough value to your offer.
Closing thoughts
You now know your available options when it comes to how to monetize a blog. First, you may want to analyze where your strengths lie. What captures your attention? Perhaps you want to leverage your writing, or maybe you’re great in front of a camera. Perhaps you excel at outreach. Possibly, you like to provide a valuable service, and you’re fantastic at it. You can do whatever you choose willingly since you’ll decide what’s most convenient for you.
The critical bit is to know your options. You can also mix and match among categories to create something unique. As you can see, a blog can be considered an online business once monetized. Let your imagination inspire you as you take notes and choose the best course of action for yourself. Remember, it’s your business, and you can decide what your agenda will look like in the following months and years ahead.
