Can you make money blogging?
A question that I hear a lot is “Can I make money blogging?”
On the next pages I am going to explain how you can make money blogging.
First of all, treat blogging like a business, not like a hobby or something that can make you enough money to pay for a couple beers per month. You can (if you want to) make a living off blogging. Actually it’s pretty easy if you found out how people make money online.
Anyway, some people think “monetizing” a blog is something evil, something you have to be ashamed of. I tell you something: It’s your *** webspace, your server, your blog, your domain, your content and your time we are talking about here. You have a lot of expenses. Monetizing a blog is not something you should be ashamed of. People will criticize you for putting too many ads on your site, they will even threat you or do other things, but as long as you give something back to the visitors there’s no problem.
I put as many ads as I want to on my sites. I don’t give a shit about what people say, but I care about how my site looks and how people can interact with it. Although I put a lot of ads on my sites I am trying to make it look like there are only a couple. If you take a look at webmasterweblog.com you’ll notice that there are plenty of ads, yet it doesn’t look “spammy”.
The best example that proves the theory that you can put as many ads on your site as you want is:
That site is full of ads. Actually I can’t remember any other site that has so many ads. Yet, that site is getting millions of visitors:
a) because the author adds quality content
b) because the author knows how to do SEO
Golden rule: Put as many ads on your site as you want, but add something of value to your site that people need and want. If you don’t have something of value people won’t visit your blog.
Find something people in your niche NEED.
Advertising won’t make you rich
It’s true, you won’t become rich by putting adsense ads on your site. Well, there are some exceptions.
a) Only if you have 10,000,000 visitors a day you will actually be able to make a living off adsense.
b) Or if you rank high in a highly competitive niche, e.g. “mortgages”, “sex”, “poker”, etc. They all pay very well. Actually you can make $1 per click. Then it’s just a question how long you will need to generate 100 clicks per day.
Anyway, most bloggers who are making a living off blogging alone are actually no real bloggers. What the hell am I talking about? Well, I’m talking about the fact that all those “bloggers” are actually marketeers. That’s a big difference. You need to know how to blog AND how to sell.
Where’s the real money then ?
As a blogger or webmaster (well most webmaster are blogger too) you should become familiar with E-Mail marketing. If you own a blog with 3000 visitors per day and you are not building a list then you are losing big money. Just imagine how much you can earn if you send out just 1 mail to 5000 people. Let’s say we are selling our own product for $15,99 – it’s an ebook… 200 people buy it (less than 5%!). That’s $3198 just from 1 mail.
Don’t own a product? Sign-up for the BEST affiliate program. The product should provide a lot of value for the people in your niche. Some affiliate programs offer 100% commission. I know of one that converts well and pays you $47 per sale (wow we just tripled the amount above!).
Aweber is the one and only
Aweber is the best e-Mail marketing service out there. There are some alternatives, but they are not as reliable and intuitive as Aweber.
Why shouldn’t I setup my own eMail server?
When I first started out, I thought I could setup a mail server myself. Heck, I even installed a resource-hungry e-Mail marketing software on my server (which I still regret although I learned a lot about SSH and Linux). Don’t bother! It’s simply not worth it. There are many things you have to consider. Do you know what Domainkeys are?
DomainKeys is an e-mail authentication system designed to verify the DNSdomain of an e-mail sender and the message integrity.
Yep, setting those up for any webserver is extremely difficult. Besides, do you want to put extraload on your server? I speak from experience: Your sites will grow and you will need all of your resources. Mails are small, but when you are sending out 10,000 mails per day you put a lot of extraload on your server.
But the main reasons to signup for Aweber is
Your mails WILL get through. Many mail servers will simply ignore mails from your own server even with domainkeys. It’s actually a bit more complicated to send out mails than you might think. Sending out 100 mails is no problem at all, but we are talking about 10,000+. Your server will quickly get marked as a “spam” server. With Aweber you won’t have to bother with domainkeys or anything.
Golden rule: A reliable e-Mail marketing service will help you to sell your products.
Why you will need a product
Ok, you got a list by now? Start selling!
Get your own products. That’s essential, because it will make you more money in the long run. You can add “backend sales” to make even more money. Backend sales are for example OTO’s or additional products that only buyers can access. OTO’s are “One-time-offers”. Let’s say someone buys your product, then the chances are high that he/she might buy from you another time.
Add a special offer that the buyer will a) see only one time and b) has a special price. The “faked” urgency will increase your chance to get another sale.
Ask me:
Do you have any questions regarding Aweber? Do you need screenshots, explanations, etc. ? I am there to help you, you can contact me via mail: admin [at] webmasterweblog [dot] com and I’ll answer your questions.
Should you decide to signup for Aweber, please use the link below:
Building your e-Mail list:
Building your e-Mail list is going to be your next task. As a subscriber you will get some free tools from me that will help you to build your e-Mail list (subscribe to my mail list on the right by downloading the ebook). I am constantly building my own lists, currently I am getting 70 new signups per day. Don’t you want to do that too?
Leave your response!