How to make money from a blog

July 3, 2010 by Albert Njoku

There are several answers to the question of how to make money from a blog. Its an established fact that blogs do make money. The goal of every blog is to gain a wide readership and then monetise such traffic. Therefore, the first step towards making money from a blog is to build up traffic. A lot has been said about this but the bottom line is writting good content that will keep the reader engaged. However, it has to be said that blogging is not a get rich quick vocation. It does involve a lot of both physical and intellectual exertions. When a good reader base has been established, any of the methods below can be used to generate revenue:

1. Advertisement: This is the most adopted method for monetising a blog. You can either publish direct adverts or use any of the content sensitive advert platforms like Google Adsense. Direct advertisers will only come when you have a large traffic base. Very much like TV adverts, networks with a large audience charge more. Also, you will get more clicks to you contextual adverts if you have a large user base. Several services are available to use here: Google Adsense, Yahoo publisher network, Chitika, Kontera, AdBrite, Bidvertiser, Infolinks etc. For direct adverts, you will need to negotiate directly with customers.

2. Affiliate marketting: This involves adding links in your articles pointing to online shops in the hope readers would click them and go on to buy stuff from the shop. You earn a commision for each sale made. The problem here is identifying what will sell or what people are keen to buy at any material time. You will need to register with an affiliate network, middle men companies who help you keep track of clicks and earnings. Popular affiliate marketting networks are Amazon Associates, Neverblue, Affiliate Window, Clickbank etc

3. Product reviews. Some bloggers get paid to review products and services. In any case, you have to first convince people you can write very good reviews. You also need to have reasonable traffic. Advertisers want to reach as many people as possible.

4. Selling blogs/Websites. This involves building up a blog and then selling it off. Stories aboud of big blogs that have been sold for a lot of money.