Whatever your reason for starting a blog, you totally want to know the income earning potential your blog could have right?

Ofcourse! You’re only human. But with so many possibilities for making money, I couldn’t possible cover them all in this post (or know them all!). So I’ll run through the three most popular ways your blog can make you money.

• Affiliate marketing
• Selling your own products and services
• Advertising

That said, always consider your own skill set and the things you love to do. Search for opportunities in your niche.

For example, if you’re a creative you could sell digital media, if you’re a great writer you could do paid guest posts, or sell software as a service (saas), do consulting, do paid reviews, create membership sites and the list goes on.

Maybe you already have something in mind? In addition, you can still use these three income sources in a complimentary way.

First grab a copy of the Blog Income Planner below. Simply filling this out, will get your brain into gear and you just might come up with a formidable plan!

From Blog to Biz

Here’s what you need to do.

• Set up a blog
• Create content
• Build an audience
• Choose how you will monetize your blog and start making money

Sounds simple? The truth is, there is a lot to learn in each step of this process. Creating a blog is hard work. It also pays to be strategic. Not every method of monetization will be the right fit for your blog.

Often the best strategy is to choose several methods of making money. Building a diversified online income portfolio, reduces your exposure to any one revenue source.

Passive vs Active Income

Passive income is derived from online businesses that can operate and grow without requiring real time presence and where time is not traded for money. Passive income can be earned with little or no effort and for the most part is hands-off.

Active income is income for which services have been performed, where the income is earned as a result of you doing something. Your work and time is traded for money.

The methods discussed in this post are designed for the most part, to return a passive income.

“The moment you decide to use your blog to make money, you’re no longer a blogger. At that moment you become an entrepreneur and your blog becomes a small business” Jon Morrow. Smartblogger.

Top 3 Ways to Make Passive Income from Your Blog

1. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is the process of earning a commission by selling someone else’s product.

As a new blogger, Affiliate Marking is a great starting point for monetizing your website.

Here’s why.

• You can choose which products to promote – allowing you to select complimentary products for your website enhancing the experience for your audience.

• Affiliate marketing can be used as a research tool – to determine what sort of products your audience is interested in. If you want to create a product and test demand, try promoting a similar affiliate product to see if it sells.

• There is no time investment required – giving you more time to concentrate on building your blog and business. No time spent creating your own products and you can start promoting straight away.

• There is no financial investment required – as you won’t be developing or creating your own products which can be expensive. It’s free to become an affiliate.

• There are a huge range of products available to promote – through companies such as Amazon and Ebay, who run their own affiliate programs. Thousands of companies and brands use affiliate networks such as CJ Affiliate, Rakuten or Clickbank to run their affiliate programs.

• High commissions – paid by some products give you huge earning potential. Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income makes most of his revenue through affiliate marketing, earning over $100k per month.

• Low maintenance – means no work required to run payment facilities, marketing, sales and other tasks that come with selling your own product.

Here’s how it works.

Say you have a blog about cycling. One option would be to promote products sold on Amazon that relate to cycling such as bike pumps or clothing and footwear. When a visitor on your site clicks on the advertised product they are diverted to the Amazon website where they can purchase the product. Amazon will then pay you a commission on any product they purchase after entering the site via your link within 24 hours.

Here are some reasons why you might prefer to sell your own products.  You can also choose both methods at the same time.

• As an affiliate marketer you are not building your email list – and as any online entrepreneur will tell you, building your email list is your top priority. Promoting your own products is one of the best ways to grow your list. Promoting other people’s products only grows their lists.

• It’s risky business – building a revenue stream that relies on a third party can be risky. For example, after a state sales tax was signed into law in California, Amazon terminated its associates program leaving Californian affiliates high and dry unless they moved to another state.

• Picking the wrong product – can be detrimental to your credibility. Building trust with your audience, relies on positive experiences with the products you endorse.

2. Sell Your Own Products

Selling your own products gives you full control and has very high income potential. Two great products to consider for your blog are eBooks and online courses.

Ebooks

Writing an eBook can be very lucrative and provide a great source of passive income for years to come. Self-publishing is now incredibly easy – the barriers to entry are down!

E-readers like Kindle, the iPad and smart phone apps, give you access to a worldwide audience. Whether you’re an experienced writer or a complete novice, it doesn’t matter AT ALL. You can write your own content or hire someone to write for you.

Most of the best-selling eBooks are information products that solve problems, often no longer than 50 pages and some as short as 10 and written by people like you and me!

Online Courses

Everything is teachable and anyone can teach, including…yes you! Online courses are the next big thing as the e-learning industry booms.

Creating an online course is an amazing way for you to turn the skills you use in your day job or hobbies into a money making business. And most importantly making that all empowering switch from active to passive income. Creating an online course gives you an asset that you can sell over and over again.

Benefits to selling your own products are:

• 100% of the revenue goes to you – unless you decide to use affiliates yourself!

• You have full control – over the product features and sales process such as price, timing, marketing and promotions. You can use data to continually test and refine your product and sales process.

• Build credibility – by having your own information products, your audience are more likely to view you as an authority in your niche.

• Building your email list – not only do you earn revenue, you build your email list at the same time. Your email list is your most valuable asset.

Creating, marketing and selling your own products is hard work. Here’s what’s involved.

• Product research – find out what your audience want

• Product development – requires time, work, effort and money if outsourcing.

• Creating a sales page – marketing and optimizing your sales process.

• Customer service – answering queries and managing technical issues.

3. Advertising  

Advertising is one of the main types of income sources for blogs so absolutely you’ll want to explore this option if you want to make money blogging.

It’s nothing new to hear about bloggers turning their blogs into money making machines selling valued space amongst their website content. With that said, you need to scratch the surface a little to make sure you have the right strategy before you jump in.

Your blog is like a piece of real estate. You’re the landlord and you control the space on your website. What fills the space will either strengthen or undermine the value of your blog, both in terms or your readership and your bottom line.

While advertising works well for one blog, it’s not necessarily going to work well for another. There are two types of advertising options with different pros and cons.  For more information on advertising check out this post How to Be Smart About Advertising on Your Blog.

Direct Advertising

Direct advertising is selling space on your website directly to an advertiser, also called a sponsor. No middleman involved. For example, if you have a blog about buying property you could sell space on your website directly to a mortgage broker for a monthly fee.

The Pros

• No Middle Man – Without the middle man you negotiate your own pricing structure, terms and payment options and retain 100% of the revenue.

• Control – You have total control over what you display on your website and what your audience view.

• Value – Continue to provide value to your audience.  Strategies such as aligning ads with your content enhance rather than detract from your message.

• Build Credibility – Blogs that attract direct advertising consistently, are often seen as an authority in their niche.

• Creates Opportunity – Building a good relationship with your advertisers can create new opportunities for more deals with other advertisers through word of mouth.

• Flexible Ad Placement –  You decide the types of ad formats and placements to offer advertisers, eg: placing buttons or banners on your website or text links in your blog posts.

The Cons 

• Finding an Advertiser – It’s not easy to attract advertisers. Especially without a reader base. Advertisers are paying for access to your audience.

• Time Consuming – Finding advertisers, negotiating the deal and managing the placement process can take up a lot of time.

Advertising Networks

Advertising networks act as middlemen, connecting advertisers with publishers (you) that want to host ads on their websites. The most popular advertising network is Google AdSense.

The Pros 

• Easy and Free – Signing up with an Ad Network is easy and opening an account is free.

• Utilize Free Space – Many blogs use spaces like the side bar area to promote their own products or affiliate products. With no products to promote, you can use free space on your website to make money advertising on your blog.

The Cons

• Work, Time and Effort – Requires a consistent input of work, time and effort to attract the large amount of visitors you need to your site each day. A lot of effort considering the amount you earn.

• Distraction – Ads distract from your content and the message you are conveying. You work hard to bring visitors to your site only to encourage them to leave by clicking on an ad.

• Conversion Killer – Distracting visitors away from your call to action can be a real conversion killer. Don’t trade product sales for ad revenue. Not good for business!

• Looks Cheap – Ads can cheapen your website in your audience’s eyes.

• Visual Nightmare – Ads can be ugly and if not managed well, make your blog look like busy and confusing.

• Time Consuming – Managing the ad placement process on your website can have a way of consuming your valuable time as you fixate on positioning and managing your ad space.

• Speed is a killer – Your site slows down as content for the ads comes from another host computer. Most people leave your site after three seconds if a page hasn’t loaded.

• Promotes Your Competition – You risk promoting your competition. How often have you seen competitor products or services pop up on a company website while you’re researching their product?

The info in the post is a drop in the ocean when it comes to creating a business from your blog. Once you get through the technical stuff – that is the set-up phase, then you can focus on monetizing your blog. I just want you to have a sneak preview of what’s coming your way once your blog is up and running.

Hey, you’re doing well so far.  Remember, don’t think too much about what’s ahead. Just focus on what you need to do next. And that is click on the red button below and head over to the next tutorial!

4 STEPS TO FINDING THE PERFECT NICHE FOR YOUR BLOG

SHOULD I CHOOSE A FREE OR SELF-HOSTED BLOGGING PLATFORM?

SIGN UP FOR A DOMAIN NAME AND HOSTING + INSTALL WORDPRESS

AUTHOR: SARAH PILATI  Hi, I’m Sarah! I’m here to help you create your first WordPress blog. I cover the early stages of your project – getting your website up and running! If you have any doubts you can do it yourself, this website is for you! You can get started here.