If you are on the internet, chances are you have visited, interacted with, or contributed to a blog. Nowadays, people consume information from blogs on the internet. Bloggers create content to teach, entertain, and persuade people on a consistent basis. So it is important for bloggers to know how to make a living by blogging.
it is possible to make a living by blogging. Blogging gives you several opportunities to make money, including things like sponsored content or affiliate programs as well as regular ads. However, if your blog is brand new, it will take some time before you start seeing a heavy flow of revenue.
While blogging is a way to make a residual income over time, it is not an overnight process. Building a blog that generates revenue takes planning and execution. It is important to prepare to create the blog, to understand how to drive traffic to the blog, and to know how to monetize the blog. Once these key components are understood, bloggers can launch their blogs and begin making a living by blogging.
Preparing to Create A Blog
Running a blog requires structure, branding, and strong content to monetize a blog, so bloggers make a living by blogging. To do this, the blogger must:
- Identify their niche
- Design the visual brand of the blog, and
- Be a reputable site for information, product, or services.
Identify The Niche
First, bloggers need to identify their blog’s niche. This enables the blogger to begin to think about the needs and wants of their audience. And it allows the blogger to create content that will resonate with their audience. When content is relevant and compelling to the audience, there is more engagement, and more opportunities to make a living by blogging.
Design The Visual
Blogs encompass more than just words in a web space. After identifying the niche, bloggers need to communicate the purpose of the blog with the visual aspects of the blog. This includes the logo, the colors, the layout of the site, and even the accessibility of the site. When these aspects are all determined and executed, bloggers can begin gaining the trust of their audience and building the reputation of their brand.
Be Reputable
When trying to make a living by blogging, the blog’s reputation is important. If the blog regurgitates information from other blog sites, the value of the blog is decreased. Having a specific perspective that is easily identifiable by the target audience helps solidify the blog’s brand. Instead of going to another site to consume, the audience will practice loyalty over time and increase the opportunities to make a living by blogging.
“The way to gain a good reputation is to endeavor what you desire to appear.” – Socrates
How To Drive Traffic To A Blog
It is necessary for blogs to have continuous traffic in order for bloggers to make a living by blogging. A blog with high traffic is more valuable to advertisers. It indicates that the public is loyal to the content, or the delivery of the content. There are two ways to get traffic to a blog: organic and paid. Here are the pros and cons of both:
Organic Traffic
Bloggers do not need to pay for organic traffic. This is a major upside to bloggers who seek to make a living by blogging.
- Time-consuming. Internet users type questions into their search bar every day. The blog posts at the top of the search almost always answer those questions. And they are often the top result because they use SEO best practices. Using SEO best practices will net organic traffic. This gives articles a better chance of ranking higher on search engines.
- Can be slow to generate results. There are millions of blogs, and they all compete for the attention of their target audience. There are also many blogs which invest in generating traffic via paid methods.
Paid Traffic
An influx of traffic can be attained by using online tools such as Google Adwords or Facebook Ads. These methods place a blog’s content at the top of the search engine, or it pushes the content to more people who are likely to engage with the blog. With a clear call-to-action or a subscriber pop-up, paid advertisement is another way to invest in a blog and to gain traffic.
Paying for traffic can be expensive and costly for the reputation of the blog. If the blogger does not know their audience or how to target it, they will spend more money on paid traffic. And content that is not relevant or compelling to the target audience, it may diminish the reputation of the blog’s brand. In this regard, paying for traffic may be a quick way to get views, but it does not always guarantee the blogger will make a living by blogging.
How to Monetize A Blog
A key part of setting up the blog is electing for it to be monetized. This enables bloggers to receive payments directly from the site host. Once the blog is ready to be launched, bloggers should incorporate a subscriber pop up. Subscriber pop ups allow bloggers to learn their audience and to alert their subscribers when new content comes out.
One of the best predictors of blog revenue is the subscriber list. The subscriber list gives information about site traffic. So bloggers can use their subscriber list to predict how much they may earn by blogging. Bloggers who know their audience can make a living by blogging in at least five ways.
1. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is a way for bloggers to earn passive income by blogging. Bloggers simply include affiliate links to products, or services, that are relevant to their content. When audience members click the link and make a transaction, the blogger earns a commission for creating a lead and a sale. Affiliate marketing is a highly popular method for bloggers to earn a living by blogging.
2. Sell A Product
Blog sites are the perfect place to create an audience around a product or product line. Selling a product or product line is a way to create something tangible that audience members can engage with even before they have subscribed to the blog. It is also another way to add to a subscriber list. In some respects, selling a product gives bloggers more insight into what content is lucrative for their blog.
3. Sell A Service
Blogs are an extension of the people who operate them. They can be powerful marketing tools for freelance services such as digital marketing, writing, editing, proofreading, graphic design, video production, professional speaking, consulting, etcetera. Offering these services on the blog is one way to make a living.
4. Sell A Course
As mentioned earlier, people consume most of their information from the internet nowadays. Selling a course on a blog is another way to make a living by blogging. It also helps build an audience and creating a reputation for the blog. And it creates opportunities to tier products and further understand the target audience. In this way, selling a course on a blog site is a great way to increase the income earned by blogging.
5. Advertising
High-traffic blogs are the most sought after by large advertisers. But, blogs with a niche audience and growing subscriber lists have the potential to earn from advertising. To earn money from advertising, bloggers need to join a network such as Google AdSense. As the blog grows, it is possible to join more networks and offer space on the blog for more advertisers. Over time, revenue earned from advertising can make up a part of earnings by a blogger.
As technology advances, the opportunities to make a living by blogging will evolve. Bloggers already have many opportunities to earn a living by blogging through selling freelance services and products, or advertising. Blogs are an integral part of the internet economy. It is important to know that it is possible to make a living by blogging and to know how to make a living by blogging.
