- Can you make money blogging?
- What are the different ways to make money blogging?
- How much money can I make?
- Can I make money while talking about life?
- What blog should I write to make money?
If you’re asking any of the above questions, you’ve come to the right place. In this super guide on how to make money blogging , you’ll learn all about it to help you get started.
These methods are based on my 10 years of professional blogging experience. I also shared payment screenshots of some income sources to give you a broader perspective.
If this is your first time visiting SidelinePlay, I recommend reading our About page to learn about my work (opens in a new tab).
A few years ago, blogging was just a hobby for some people in addition to their full-time jobs. Today, blogging still plays that role, but many things have changed.
Nowadays, blogging has become a lucrative online profession and large numbers of people are starting blogs and entering this noble profession.
How much money can you make from blogging?
Just like any profession (doctors, lawyers, financial advisors), bloggers can make a wide range of incomes, from $1,000 to $2 million per year.
How much money you make depends entirely on several factors:
- Which niche are you picking?
- How much time do you spend studying and practicing?
- How much traffic does your blog attract?
- What digital marketing techniques have you implemented?
There are various other factors like consistency, your network, personal motivations and goals that also play a big role.
However, the niche and your digital marketing skills alone can help you grow quickly in the blogging space.
You can explore other articles on SidelinePlay to learn more about mindset and motivation, but in this guide, we’re going to focus purely on making money blogging.
To make things easier, I’ve answered many common blogging-related questions at the end of this guide.
What are the ways bloggers make money (various sources of income)
There are many methods you can use to monetize your blog. Depending on your blogging level and the type of blog you blog, you can choose a method that fits your style. Check out the end of this article for answers to many important questions that bloggers like you ask.
- Advertising networks such as Google Ads and Ezoic
- Direct Advertising
- Affiliate Marketing
- Native Advertising
- Paid reviews/sponsored posts
- Sell digital products (e-books, blueprints)
- Online courses available
- Provide online consultation
- Provide services based on your skills
In addition to traditional advertising, you can also try other monetization techniques. Don’t just add ads, but work on adding value to advertisers.
1 high paying ad is better than 4 low paying ads.
1. Ad Network: (for beginners)
Ad networks are the easiest and most widely used method of monetizing your blog.
The two most popular ad networks are:
- Google Ads (provided by Google)
- ezoic
- monetag
You need to own a blog to get approved by these ad networks. They automatically display ads based on the content of your articles as well as user interests. Most new bloggers use these methods to make money as it brings in recurring income. Since the ads displayed are of high quality, it does not affect the user experience.
If your blog gets less than 300 pageviews per day, then you can use other ad networks listed here . However, your goal should be to get approved for Google Ads or Setupad as soon as possible .
If you are using contextual ads and not getting enough benefits, you should try switching to direct or affiliate ads .
2. Affiliate Marketing: (Most profitable method): Intermediate + Advanced
Affiliate advertising is one of the best ways to make money because a single sale can bring you more money than a single click on a contextual ad.
If you are new to this, read my beginner’s guide on what is affiliate marketing .
In the screenshot below, you can see the affiliate earnings for one of these projects:
That’s over a million dollars, and I didn’t spend a penny on paid advertising.
I’ve covered affiliate marketing in depth:
- What is affiliate marketing?
- How to Start an Affiliate Marketing Business
- How to Choose the Right Affiliate Program
Of course, there is also SidelinePlay's affiliate marketing eBook .
Here are some popular affiliate marketing marketplaces you can join :
Another great thing about affiliate marketing is that you can use this technique on any blogging platform, such as BlogSpot, Wix, Squarespace, Medium, and even LinkedIn. However, I prefer self-hosted WordPress because it has many advantages over other blogging platforms.
All you need to do is share the unique affiliate link of the product you recommend and when someone buys it, you will end up making a huge commission from the sale amount.
Affiliate marketing is how many bloggers make millions of dollars every year from blogging.
3. Selling your own e-book: (Intermediate)
If you notice, the business model of top bloggers is related to selling their own products (e.g. eBooks).
All you need to do is choose a topic, write an eBook about it, and then sell it on your blog or on Amazon. Once you become familiar with this process, you can make a decent income selling eBooks online.
Additionally, having your own products to sell is the best way to generate passive income.
You can compile the articles into a well-structured book and sell it on your blog or other platforms like kdp.Amazon.com to make money. This will also give you credibility as a writer.
You can use a freelancing network like Fiverr to find someone to design your book cover.
You can also consider using WooCommerce to sell physical products on your blog.
You can refer to the following guides to learn more about publishing a book:
- 13 Useful Software to Help You Create Your First E-Book
- 7 Most Popular Platforms to Make Money from Self-Publishing E-books
4. Native Advertising
* Savings
Native advertising has become one of the frontiers of making money on blogs. Especially for news and recruitment blogs, native advertising can bring very high income.
There are native advertising solutions out there that are worth your time and effort to implement.
5. Launch an Online Course (Membership Site): Advanced
- Can you convert your textbook into video format?
- Can you add a checklist and a downloadable template?
- Can you produce a 1-2 hour video course?
If your answer is yes, then this approach is definitely for you. Thanks to technology, anyone can now easily create an online course, and if your course is unique, your chances of reaching your $1 million goal are very high.
You can use the following platforms:
Create and sell your online courses.
6. Direct Advertising (Intermediate)
There is no doubt that Google Ads is the best advertising program for bloggers, but it also has some limitations. The biggest limitation is the amount you pay per click.
If you manage to get direct ads, replace those AdSense units with direct ads.
The best way to start direct advertising is to try different networks and add a page on your blog called “Media-kit or Advertise with Us” to get new deals.
You can also use a plugin like WPAdvancedAds to manage your ads.
The best way to do this is to use Google Apps to create a professional email address like hello@sidelineplay.com.
(Optional) Then set up the process with HubSpot’s free CRM.
You can set this up on the Hubspot free CRM , which will greatly improve your workflow.
Here are some articles worth checking out:
7. Sponsored Reviews (All Levels)
Paid reviews are a great way to increase your monthly income. You can quickly make $10 or more from a small review post. I personally make at least $1,200 per review on ShoutMeLoud.
Here are a few things you need to keep in mind when doing paid reviews:
Here are some sites where you can find paid review/sponsored content opportunities:
- Famebit (for YouTube channels)
- Izea Pay Per Post
- tomoson
- Edit content
8. Conducting campaigns for brands: (Intermediate and Advanced)
This is perfect for any type of blog that has an established audience. You can help brands reach their target audience by running campaigns for them. To do this, you’ll do brand collaborations, host webinars, or even paid advertising or create videos.
You’ll find more and more bloggers working with various brands. Keep an eye on this genre as it has become one of the hottest ways to monetize blogs.
9. Services
Depending on your skills, you can offer a variety of services. Depending on your area of expertise, you can offer services such as content writing, logo design, SEO, etc.
In the past, I have provided services related to WordPress, SEO, and hosting. Providing services not only helps you make money, but it also gives you more use cases and helps you hone your skills. At one point, I was able to make over $2,000 per month just by providing services.
In fact, launching your own service is very simple. All you need to do is create a page on your blog and list the services you offer. Make sure to place a link to that page in your blog navigation bar and in a prominent location for maximum visibility.
Make it easier for your audience to contact you and ask for more information about your services. When you are dealing with the first 2-3 customers, you will have enough ideas to improve the sales process of your services. In fact, you will be able to automate some things, such as payments and follow-ups.
Can you blog about your life and make money from blogging?
This is another increasingly popular form of blogging where many people talk about their daily lives and create a community around it. You may have seen many of these vloggers on YouTube, and you can do the same thing with your blog or even YouTube.
Some popular topics for this type of blog include:
- lifestyle
- Fashion
- trip
- motivation
- entertainment
The key here is to keep it entertaining, add value, and create a community around your brand. Depending on your style and consistency, you can make a lot of money with this strategy.
Many beginners also ask, should I focus on blogging or vlogging ?
Well, it’s a good idea to combine the two. Producing video content (recording, editing, and posting) requires a lot of time and money, while creating text content requires less time. Combining these two techniques well will help you grow faster and start earning a good income sooner.
Gone are the days when we bloggers relied solely on AdSense to make money through blogging. Now that we have many more ad networks and monetization methods available, we can increase the earning potential of our blog to a great extent.
If you’ve been using these traditional methods to make money from your blog, then it’s time to revamp your blog business plan . Make some new tweaks, change the design, and optimize the marketing aspects of your blog.
FAQs on How to Make Money Blogging
Can you really make money blogging?
I am living proof that someone can make a good living blogging. A lot of it depends on your persistence and perseverance. In my case, I worked nearly 14 hours a day for 4 years to get to where I am now, making over $20,000 a month blogging.
As the online space matures, there are now more and more opportunities to make money from blogging. The only problem is that you need to stick with it for nearly a year before you start making a decent income and have to quit your job or rely on blogging for your living.
What blog should I write to make money?
If you don’t want to blog about your life and are wondering what the best topics are from a blog monetization perspective, here are 4 factors you should consider.
Passion: Something you are already passionate about or interested in. This thing doesn't have to be something you studied in college or at work, but it can be as simple as something your friends, family, and others call you for advice on. For example, cars, food, finance, travel. Get out a pen and a piece of paper and label it "Passion List." Now, list down every topic you think you would be interested in and could blog about.
Traffic and Trends: You want to make sure the topics you discover by creating your passion list have decent traffic and interest. Trends will let you know if the topic is growing or dying. Trends.google.com is a free tool that allows you to measure traffic trends for any topic.
Monetization: The third factor that will help you find a profitable blog idea is the monetization options. You need to understand how you plan to monetize your blog. Will you use ad networks like AdSense, or affiliate marketing? For example, the topic “Whatsapp” is growing very fast and you may be passionate about it, but the monetization is terrible. Even if the traffic is high, the money earned is negligible.
Competition: This is the last but not the least factor. If you go into a highly competitive niche, you will find it hard to stand out and outperform the big existing companies. I don’t mean to discourage you but if you can choose between 2-3 themes, go for the ones with medium or lower competition. If you end up choosing a broader niche like fashion in a highly competitive niche, it will only take a few extra months to become successful. So you need to keep this in mind when considering competition.
I recommend you to go through more articles of SidelinePlay to get a clear idea about how to choose a niche.
How will you receive payment for your blog?
Your advertisers may be located in different parts of the world, and you can receive payments from them in 5 popular ways. These are also popular ways for these companies to pay. PayPal
Payoneer , Wise, Wire transfer (your bank), CoinBase (crypto payment)
Once you start making money, it’s a good idea to open an account on all of the above sites that allow you to receive payments. They’re all free to join and easy to use. You can also use these services to pay freelancers or virtual assistants.
There are many ways to make money blogging, but I recommend not putting too much pressure on yourself and just take them one by one.
All of the above ideas are valid, and you should find out which ones work best for your particular blog niche .
Here are some more articles to help you make money blogging:
What strategies do you use to make money from your blog? Let me know in the comments below.
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