How to Make Money With Blogs
Advertising Programs - Perhaps the
most obvious changes in the past few months have been with the addition
of a variety of viable advertising options for bloggers. No longer are
bloggers only presented with the Adsense and/or BlogAds choice - instead they now have a massive array to choose from. Getting the most publicity recently have been Chitika’s eMiniMalls of course but there are just so many other options now that also include:
<Adgenta, CrispAds, Text Link Ads, Intelli Txt, Peak Click, DoubleClickTribal Fusion, Adbrite,
Clicksor, Industry Brains, AdHearUs, Kanoodle, AVN, Pheedo, Adknowledge, YesAdvertising, RevenuePilotTextAds, SearchFeed, Target Point, Bidvertiser, Fastclick Value Click and OneMonkey
(to name just some of the options - I’m sure I’ve forgotten some) and
there is a smorgasbord of options. Of course there is more to come with
MSN Adcenter and YPN both in beta testing and with a variety of other advertising system currently in development (so I hear).
RSS Advertising - The past 12 months have seen some
advances in RSS Advertising also. I’m yet to hear of any bloggers
making big dollars through it to this point - but as improvements are
made to the ad programs exploring this I’m sure we’ll start to see
examples of it being profitable.
Sponsorship - In addition to the array of advertising
programs that are available to join there is a growing awareness in the
business of the value and opportunity that exists for them to advertise
directly on blogs. I’m hearing more and more examples of this and have
been fortunately to have a couple of ad campaigns of my own in the past
month - one with Adobe a couple of weeks ago and another just completed
with Ricoh for a new digicam over at my Digital Camera Blog.
These are not isolated cases - as I say I know of many blogs exploring
sponsorship with advertisers at present and suspect we’ll see more of
it in the year ahead. Sponsorship is also happening on a post by post
basis with some bloggers being paid to write on certain topics by
companies - either in one off or a regular fashion.
Affiliate Programs - There are larger affiliate programs like Amazon, Linkshare, Clickbank and Commission Junction but also literally thousands of others from the large to the very small.
Digital Assets - Increasing numbers of bloggers have
been developing other digital assets to support and add revenue streams
to their blogs. By this I mean that I’m increasingly seeing e-books,
courses and tele-seminars being run by bloggers. My recent foray into
this with the first series of the six figure blogging
course that Andy and I ran a few weeks ago and have just released the
study version of. This type of activity will only increase in future -
in fact this week I’ve seen numerous examples of bloggers running
courses.
Blog Network Opportunities - with the rise in
popularity of Blog Networks - bloggers are also being presented with
more places to earn an income from their blogging - by writing for and
with others. While it might be difficult to get a writing gig with one
of the bigger networks - there are plenty who are always asking for new
bloggers to join and who are willing to pay bloggers using a variety of
payment models. While there are distinct advantages of blogging for
yourself - blogging for an established network who will handle a lot of
the set up/promotion/admin/SEO etc has it’s advantages also. More and
more bloggers are combining writing for themselves on their own blogs
with taking on blog network blogs as additional income streams.
Business Blog Writing Opportunities - as
blogging has risen in it’s profile as a medium more and more businesses
are starting blogs. Many of these companies have internal staff take on
blogging duties - but an increasing number of them are hiring
specialist bloggers to come on and run their blogs. I know of a number
of bloggers who in the past month or two have been approached for such
paid work. Check out Bloggers for Hire if you’re looking for this type of work.
Non Blogging Writing Opportunities - Also becoming more common are bloggers being hired to write in non blogging mediums. Manolo’s recent coup of a column in the Washington Post
is just one example of this as bloggers are increasingly being
approached to write for newspapers, magazines and other non blog
websites. Along side this is the rise of bloggers as published book
authors - this is to the extent that one blogger I spoke with this week
complained to me that they were one of the few bloggers than they knew
who didn’t have a book deal!
Donations - Tip Jars and donation buttons have been a
part of blogging for years now but this last year saw a number of
bloggers go full time after fundraising drives. Perhaps the most high
profile of these was Jason Kottke of kottke.org who through the generosity of his readership was able to quit his job and become a full time blogger.
Flipping Blogs - Also more common in 2005 was the
practice of ‘Blog Flipping’ - or selling of blogs. This has happened
both on an individual blog level (I can think of about 20 blogs that
sold this year) but also on a network level (the most obvious of these
being the 8 figure sale of Weblogs Inc to AOL).
Merchandising - My recent attempt to sell
ProBlogger.net T-shirts wasn’t a raging success, but it is an example
of how an increasing number of bloggers are attempting to make a few
extra dollars from their blogs by selling branded products through
programs like Cafepress
(although I have to say they’ve lost one of my own orders and are being
quite unresponsive to my requests to follow it up at present). While I
didn’t have a lot of success with merchandising - quite a few larger
blogs are seeing significant sales - especially blogs with a cult
following. I’m not at liberty to discuss details - but I know of one
largish blog which will see sales over $20,000 in merchandise for the
calendar year of 2005.
Consulting and Speaking - While it has been popular
for established consultants to add blogs to their businesses we’re also
starting to see bloggers with no consulting background earning money by
charging readers for their time in consulting scenarios BECAUSE of the
profile that their blogs have built them. Blogging has the ability to
establish people as experts on niche topics and we all know the value
of being perceived as an expert. I spoke to one blogger last month who
charges himself out at over $200 an hour for speaking and consulting
work - his area of expertise was something that he knew little about 18
months ago - but through his blog he’s become a leader in his field and
a minor celebrity in his industry.
As time rolls on there are more and more blog earning
opportunities opening up. Feel free to suggest your own ideas in
comments below
most obvious changes in the past few months have been with the addition
of a variety of viable advertising options for bloggers. No longer are
bloggers only presented with the Adsense and/or BlogAds choice - instead they now have a massive array to choose from. Getting the most publicity recently have been Chitika’s eMiniMalls of course but there are just so many other options now that also include:
<Adgenta, CrispAds, Text Link Ads, Intelli Txt, Peak Click, DoubleClickTribal Fusion, Adbrite,
Clicksor, Industry Brains, AdHearUs, Kanoodle, AVN, Pheedo, Adknowledge, YesAdvertising, RevenuePilotTextAds, SearchFeed, Target Point, Bidvertiser, Fastclick Value Click and OneMonkey
(to name just some of the options - I’m sure I’ve forgotten some) and
there is a smorgasbord of options. Of course there is more to come with
MSN Adcenter and YPN both in beta testing and with a variety of other advertising system currently in development (so I hear).
RSS Advertising - The past 12 months have seen some
advances in RSS Advertising also. I’m yet to hear of any bloggers
making big dollars through it to this point - but as improvements are
made to the ad programs exploring this I’m sure we’ll start to see
examples of it being profitable.
Sponsorship - In addition to the array of advertising
programs that are available to join there is a growing awareness in the
business of the value and opportunity that exists for them to advertise
directly on blogs. I’m hearing more and more examples of this and have
been fortunately to have a couple of ad campaigns of my own in the past
month - one with Adobe a couple of weeks ago and another just completed
with Ricoh for a new digicam over at my Digital Camera Blog.
These are not isolated cases - as I say I know of many blogs exploring
sponsorship with advertisers at present and suspect we’ll see more of
it in the year ahead. Sponsorship is also happening on a post by post
basis with some bloggers being paid to write on certain topics by
companies - either in one off or a regular fashion.
Affiliate Programs - There are larger affiliate programs like Amazon, Linkshare, Clickbank and Commission Junction but also literally thousands of others from the large to the very small.
Digital Assets - Increasing numbers of bloggers have
been developing other digital assets to support and add revenue streams
to their blogs. By this I mean that I’m increasingly seeing e-books,
courses and tele-seminars being run by bloggers. My recent foray into
this with the first series of the six figure blogging
course that Andy and I ran a few weeks ago and have just released the
study version of. This type of activity will only increase in future -
in fact this week I’ve seen numerous examples of bloggers running
courses.
Blog Network Opportunities - with the rise in
popularity of Blog Networks - bloggers are also being presented with
more places to earn an income from their blogging - by writing for and
with others. While it might be difficult to get a writing gig with one
of the bigger networks - there are plenty who are always asking for new
bloggers to join and who are willing to pay bloggers using a variety of
payment models. While there are distinct advantages of blogging for
yourself - blogging for an established network who will handle a lot of
the set up/promotion/admin/SEO etc has it’s advantages also. More and
more bloggers are combining writing for themselves on their own blogs
with taking on blog network blogs as additional income streams.
Business Blog Writing Opportunities - as
blogging has risen in it’s profile as a medium more and more businesses
are starting blogs. Many of these companies have internal staff take on
blogging duties - but an increasing number of them are hiring
specialist bloggers to come on and run their blogs. I know of a number
of bloggers who in the past month or two have been approached for such
paid work. Check out Bloggers for Hire if you’re looking for this type of work.
Non Blogging Writing Opportunities - Also becoming more common are bloggers being hired to write in non blogging mediums. Manolo’s recent coup of a column in the Washington Post
is just one example of this as bloggers are increasingly being
approached to write for newspapers, magazines and other non blog
websites. Along side this is the rise of bloggers as published book
authors - this is to the extent that one blogger I spoke with this week
complained to me that they were one of the few bloggers than they knew
who didn’t have a book deal!
Donations - Tip Jars and donation buttons have been a
part of blogging for years now but this last year saw a number of
bloggers go full time after fundraising drives. Perhaps the most high
profile of these was Jason Kottke of kottke.org who through the generosity of his readership was able to quit his job and become a full time blogger.
Flipping Blogs - Also more common in 2005 was the
practice of ‘Blog Flipping’ - or selling of blogs. This has happened
both on an individual blog level (I can think of about 20 blogs that
sold this year) but also on a network level (the most obvious of these
being the 8 figure sale of Weblogs Inc to AOL).
Merchandising - My recent attempt to sell
ProBlogger.net T-shirts wasn’t a raging success, but it is an example
of how an increasing number of bloggers are attempting to make a few
extra dollars from their blogs by selling branded products through
programs like Cafepress
(although I have to say they’ve lost one of my own orders and are being
quite unresponsive to my requests to follow it up at present). While I
didn’t have a lot of success with merchandising - quite a few larger
blogs are seeing significant sales - especially blogs with a cult
following. I’m not at liberty to discuss details - but I know of one
largish blog which will see sales over $20,000 in merchandise for the
calendar year of 2005.
Consulting and Speaking - While it has been popular
for established consultants to add blogs to their businesses we’re also
starting to see bloggers with no consulting background earning money by
charging readers for their time in consulting scenarios BECAUSE of the
profile that their blogs have built them. Blogging has the ability to
establish people as experts on niche topics and we all know the value
of being perceived as an expert. I spoke to one blogger last month who
charges himself out at over $200 an hour for speaking and consulting
work - his area of expertise was something that he knew little about 18
months ago - but through his blog he’s become a leader in his field and
a minor celebrity in his industry.
As time rolls on there are more and more blog earning
opportunities opening up. Feel free to suggest your own ideas in
comments below
posted by Vinagre at 3:41 PM
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