How do you make money with a Blog?

benmaxime · 10-03-2009, 11:04 PM

Hi
So I run an entrepreneur blog and I am having trouble finding ways to make money. See my Signature.

Besides many different ways of advertising how can I make money? Actually How do I find advertisers?

Is affiliate marketing more beneficial? Reviewed posts? Sponsored posts?

Please fill me in, thanks!

javiert30 · 10-04-2009, 02:42 AM

Yes affiliate marketing are, try adding more affiliates and do not let your blog die, update it frequently.

Arob · 10-04-2009, 02:10 PM

God help all of us bloggers if the guy who writes the Entrepreneur's Blog can't make any money! LOL

There are four ways to make money with a blog,

1) affiliate marketing and this includes Google AdSense
2) paid posts and this is NOT recommended
3) estore loaded with product - esp your own
4) corporate slave selling ad space in newsletter

You want more insights check my Smojoe blog.

ktmurf · 10-04-2009, 05:11 PM

Affiliate marketing and referral based programs have worked very, very well for me. I'm not sure how well that works for blogging unless you partner with like minded bloggers and everybody generates traffic for the same site. Which, to think of it, isn't a bad idea at all....four hands are better than two, and so on.

Affiliates and referrals for me were more product based. I've got a site with guides and tutorials and what not. Tons of information, no secret business miracles, just facts. Stuff that anyone can go find, but my niche is that it's all in one place, under one roof. No searching, no countless hours of research. It's all there in black and white in one package. I now make 10x the profit in a month than I did the first year it was up, on selling access through referrals that the partners get 40% of.

Look at affiliates and referrals as highering a sales staff. It's going to cut into the bottom line, but without them you wouldn't have made the sales in the first place so....

I wish you luck, my friend!

benmaxime · 10-04-2009, 05:51 PM

Ok got it. It seems like affiliate marketing is the way to go!

rpermana · 10-04-2009, 08:56 PM

1. google adsense.. i earn like $3.00 - $7.00.. not a bad income

2. affiliate marketing.. i recommend clickbank

hippie_wantab · 10-04-2009, 09:41 PM

OK, so it was always my thinking that there were two ways to do the blog thing:
First, become an experienced entrepreneur. Then blog about your experiences, which people will be interested in because you went throught the school-of-hard-knocks and have lots of wisdom to give.
Or the other way, blog about your business sence to show how much you know; promote it; gain readers; and then from that pool find investers/partners for you next big idea.

Maybe I'm super old-school. But writing a blog for a few bucks..when there are already SO many out there, seems tacky. I mean this in a totally serious wanting to know way- but what makes you and your blog special?

ktmurf · 10-04-2009, 09:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hippie_wantab

but what makes you and your blog special?

This is why I don't blog, personally. From time to time, I submit material to online publications, magazines and print, but blogging is just......super-saturated right now. I've seen guys dump HOURS into blogs and still only get 20 or 30 hits a day and it's just not worth it.

Let alone trying to sell ad spots on a blog for $15.00 when $15.00 will get you an ad in a circulatory print with a circulation of thirty thousand.

Or $30.00 for One hundred and fifty thousand impressions on facebook or something similar.

Not knocking the original poster, but this is reality. Without knowing your market and/or demographic you'll never go anywhere.

You should be building backlinks with sites that are generating honest to god traffic. The name of this game is building relationships, contacts and being seen. If you have to give something away to be seen, it's worth it.

benmaxime · 10-05-2009, 08:39 PM

Wow, my blogging experience feels like a total waste now, great!

hippie_wantab · 10-05-2009, 08:57 PM

Benmaxime

Nothing is a waste! It's all experience. God knows I've made plenty of business mistakes. But it's important to look kt's advice and information, and now apply it.

benmaxime · 10-05-2009, 09:01 PM

What are the best types of products that I should promote through affiliate marketing (on my blog)
Anything specific?

Thanks!

ktmurf · 10-05-2009, 09:15 PM

Brother, I didn't mean to discourage you. I just wanted to show you another way to look at it.

If you want to make your blog work, you're going to have to talk your way into the spotlight. Push your way to the front. There's a long rough road ahead (for all of us) you have to stay the course and do what you need to do to survive.

This forum is a wealth of not only information, but contacts. If everyone were to add a links/affiliates/partners/suggested sites/recommended links page to their websites and everyone make banners and what not available to everyone else we could all not only benefit from recip. linking but we'd drive traffic to each other's sites.

You blog, I sell startup material, someone else may have something else worth mentioning. We can all help each other.

Plus, there are tons of advertising opps out there that don't cost a bundle.

I'm paying twenty cents for every one thousand page impressions on facebook right now. They have a minimum $1.00 per day and you can schedule your add for as many or as little days as you can afford. This would put your ad in the spotlight to tons of traffic if you can get their attention. You can also pay per click on facebook but it's a little more expensive but the $1.00 a day minimum still applies. If you were to bid .20 per click, that's still 5 actual visits to your site a day. Is that worth a buck to you?

I've got some display advertising companies that I work with. They deal with a ton of magazines and newspapers. You submit one ad, and they'll take care of placing it in whatever publications you choose. Some of these publications(paper print) have circulations of 20k and a classified ad costs 7-18 bucks per. I'm currently saving a little cash to purchase a bulk run of a total of nine hundred thousand circulation for just under $300.00

I'm not guaranteed any traffic from this but if the people don't know that I'm here, they won't come see me.

Since blogging is your thing, maybe you can try writing a few how-tos at eHow.com. They pay if your article generates alot of traffic and you can backlink your own articles from your blog too.

I'm currently working on an eHow campaign writing about things I know about. Some not even business related. Hobbies, etc.

I don't know how accurate this is but I read that an average decent article will generate about 5 bucks a month, if you were to write one everyday for a few months that could jump to a big number pretty quick.

Things I'm exploring...

Tell us more about your blog, my friend.

Kevin

ktmurf · 10-05-2009, 10:37 PM

double post, somehow...heh

SirLucius · 10-05-2009, 10:41 PM

The number 1 problem you're going to have monetizing your site is not choosing between adsense or affiliate products or even CPA networks. It is going to be traffic, because all monetization strategies boil down to two things: 1) traffic 2) conversion. You'll have to master both. You want to attract a steady stream of buyers or people who are looking to purchase something or are in a product comparison mode. These are the individuals who are most likely to click on ads in and around your site. Your wasting your time appealing to information seekers with your blog, because they will not click on ads as they're not out to buy anything.

Use the free online keyword commercial intent tool from Microsoft. Any keyword with a rating above 50 has web surfers who are mostly likely to buy. Combine the use of this tool with Google Trends and Google Keyword Research Tool to find high traffic keywords that have commercial intent.

I would also recommend that you watch this video on how to get high traffic to your blog without killing yourself.

Dragizzane · 10-05-2009, 10:47 PM

look, you make money in the business world by bringing something to the table that no one else can, think of how many blogs there are out there, use your blog to gain people who are interested in what you say and think but dont pour your life into it. Once you have a small "fan base" ,if you will, then you can start to involve more and more programs. If you know alot about business maybe write a book and have people who hit your blog give you constructive critisism. The same people will also be excited to purchase a copy of it and that is how you make money