Write a comment
How much money can you make from a blog? Wondering how do bloggers make money and fancy giving it a go, here's what you need to get started and how to turn your blog into a successful money-making business.
As much as we at Money Saving Central love to save money, we also need to make a little. I'm often asked questions such as how do you make money working from home? or how can I earn money online? so I thought I'd put this little guide together for anyone thinking of becoming a work at home blogger.
Make Money Blogging
In reality, blogging is not a quick money fix and you really need to do it because you enjoy it, most people don't make money for around a year as the first year is spent creating your brand. To create a strong brand you will need:
>> A self-hosted blog from the start so your domain name is always your own and you're not tied into a blogspot url.
>> A catchy blog name and logo
>> An aesthetically pleasing, easy to navigate website which is GDPR compliant
>> Plenty of content (blog posts)
>> Connect with other bloggers
>> Social media pages with lots of content and followers
It is also important to choose your niche - make sure it's something you're good at and stick to it. Our niche is finding deals and saving cash so we run a money saving blog and stick to it. So if you happen to have a qualification in fitness you might want to run a health and fitness blog, or if you have a passion for travelling you would be perfect to run a travel blog.
Alas - Like Rome, this can not be built in a day. You should really focus on the above as well as writing great content that is useful to your audience before you look at monetizing your website. Then, once you have all the above in hand you can start making money.
Ads
You can insert text ads directly into your blog posts and also banner ads into a sidebar on your website. You will earn revenue if someone clicks on them but to be eligible for the AdSense program your blog must be at least 6 months old and fully GDPR compliant. Make sure everything is in place before you apply.
Google AdSense used to be the easiest to be accepted into and was a great start for any blogger, but now ezoic has no minimum requirements, so it's for everyone.
With Ezoic you also get free hosting (if wanted) and a free site speed tool called leap that passes your sites scores on core web vitals. Plus you will earn much more than with AdSense.
Update: after moving from Adsense to Ezoic MSCs revenue has increased 4x from £2.50 per 1000 views to around £10 per 1000 check out our Ezoic Review
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a great way to earn a commission every time you promote a company's product(s). Simply put, if you were to mention a product you like in one of your blog posts you can turn the link into an affiliate link so it gets tracked, then, if people buy that product through your link you will get a certain percentage. You would have to apply to the merchant's network and be approved before you would be able to qualify.
There are many affiliate networks out there and for newbies, I would suggest going with ones like Viglink or Skimlinks. There are many advantages of choosing an all-in-one platform such as Skimlinks and they have a great WordPress plugin so you literally don't have to do any work. Every time you post a link (if they have that merchant in their list) the link will be converted automatically for you.
There are a few major players in the affiliate marketing game and the merchants are quite spread out so you will have to join quite a few if you need a large array of retailers to promote. You can find most retailers via
TradeDoubler
Commission Junction
Except for Amazon and eBay, who both run their programs in-house, and are somewhat harder to be accepted to (both are on skimlinks)
The bonus of joining these individually is the retailers seem to add all their voucher codes, deals, and sales information on their individual networks and these types of offers are very sparse on Skimlinks.
Brand Ambassador
Blogging has become seriously popular in the last few years, which is why brands from all over the world are desperate to get bloggers to mention, review and promote their stuff. Brands usually like product reviews or advertorials.
Advertorials are adverts in the form of an article or blog post - So for example, say Nike bring out a new line, and your blog is a popular women’s sports fashion blog. Nike might offer to pay you a set payment in exchange for, say, 500 words plus four images of their products in your blog post.
Reviews
A lot of bloggers start off by reviewing products and when you become an authority in the reviewing community, brands will often send you their products to review free of charge which is great for newer bloggers to get them started but as your DA score rises, you will start to get the products for free and a nice fee for the review to boot.
Sponsored Social Media Posts
You’ll have to work hard on building your followers and fans before this will ever be an option but once you have established a strong social media presence with plenty of followers/likes you’ll be very attractive to brands and the price they are willing to pay can be surprisingly high.
Guest Posting
It will take a long time for people to come to you as a guest blogger, but if you stick at it the rewards are endless. Major brands who you have caught the attention of and even the press often get in touch with bloggers who are an authority in their relative niche and will pay you to make a cameo appearance (guest post) on their website. For example, if you’re particularly knowledgeable about saving money, a news outlet might get in touch and ask you to contribute some budgeting advice to people who get into debt at Christmas.
You can and should search for guest blogging opportunities yourself, two great ways are:
You can also use twitter to find guest blogging opportunities by searching hashtags such as #bloggerswanted #prrequest and #bloggersrequired
Blogger op sites
Blogger guest post opportunity websites such as BlogDash and Get Blogged all of which you add your profile, stats, and links to so that brands can easily find - and hire you.
Journo Requests
You can again use twitter to find reporters who are looking for quotes and case studies by searching hashtags such as #journorequet and #prrequest - this is a great way to get paid and also get your blog out there in magazines and newspapers.
If you know of any other ways to earn money from blogging, or have any questions, please let us know in the comments below...
