Blog monetization comes in many forms, making it easier than ever to turn a regular blog into a business. Monetizing your blog takes work, but it pays off when you start seeing income roll in from your posts.
Here, we’ll share some of the easiest and best ways to make money with your blog, even if you’re just starting to get your feet wet as a blogger.
6 Ways to Monetize Your Blog
Be sure to check out our beginner’s guide to starting a blog. Then, consider these popular ways to monetize a blog as a beginning blogger:
Sell Advertising Space
Perhaps the simplest method of monetization to set up is placing ads on your site. You can sell ad space on your website and reach out to companies to pitch, but Google AdSense offers the most hands-off approach to advertising. You just need to place a code on your site and tweak your settings to display relevant ads, and you’re ready to roll.
With Google AdSense, you can also turn on the Auto Ad feature, which allows the algorithm to decide where the best ad placements are on your site in terms of visibility and engagement. Google AdSense will then display ads in the best spots where visitors are most likely to see and click on them.
Affiliate Marketing
When you go through an advertising network like Commission Junction or ShareASale, you’ll have access to advertisers and their links and banners that you can add to your site. Visitors can click on the links and banners, which each have links that are unique to you. When visitors sign up or purchase through your links, you get paid.
This is known as affiliate marketing, and it’s one of the best ways to make money with your blog. You can promote companies and products that are relevant to your content. Although it’s a form of advertising, it’s not in-your-face advertising that often turns people away – if you do it correctly.
Think of NerdWallet, for example. This site has affiliate links everywhere when it recommends credit cards, bank accounts, and more. But they’re intertwined with quality, helpful content that doesn’t feel like advertising.
Set Up a Paid Membership
If you have a lot of knowledge about your niche to share and you think people will pay for it, then you might consider creating a paid membership platform. Use it to host restricted content, set up an exclusive forum, or offer other valuable resources for paid members only.
Bloggers who use this method often create paid memberships for monthly content relevant to their niches, like stock photos for a photography blog, printable worksheets for a teaching blog, or DIY tutorials for a home improvement blog.
There are several plugins available for paid subscription creation on WordPress, but MemberPress is one of the most straightforward and comprehensive.
Sell Products
A blog doesn’t have to just be about content; you can also attach a shop to your blog with a simple link in your menu. Link to your shop page that you can build through WordPress with various e-commerce plugins or link to your Shopify store. You can sell either physical products, digital products, or a mix of both!
Digital courses are especially hot-ticket items right now for bloggers. Make your course relevant to your niche and use your blog to promote it. Thinkific helps you create and sell your course from start to finish.
Write Sponsored Posts
You write most of your blog posts for free, but it’s possible to get paid for them. A paid post is known as a sponsored post, and it’s another way to advertise while seamlessly integrating a promotion into your content.
You can find companies to work with for sponsored post opportunities through networks that match bloggers with brands. Linqia, Acorn, and Social Fabric are a few to try. You can always reach out to your favorite brands, too, to ask for a chance to work together on a sponsored post.
Freelance Blogging
Freelance blogging is a round-about way to make money with your blog, but it’s also one of the best ways to do it as a beginner. As a freelance blogger, you’ll leverage your expertise in your niche – the same one you blog in – to write paid posts for other blogs.
Freelance blogging is unique in that you don’t need an ounce of traffic to get started. All you need is an authoritative blog. It doesn’t matter if you’re still in the process of building it, because freelance blogging gives you backlinks to grow your authority and traffic when you link your site in your author bio.
Traffic is Key for Monetization Success
Steady traffic is a key factor of blog monetization success. Not just any traffic, though; you need engaged visitors who want to return to your site and share your content. Build an email list to notify your loyal readers each time you publish a new post for an early boost in traffic.
Social media share buttons are another powerful traffic-boosting tool. Share buttons make it easy for your visitors to share your articles across their favorite social media platforms and boost your traffic in the process. Plus, they’re easy to install and free to use!
