How do beginner blogs make money? Can I make money online as a blogger? Can I live off my blog earnings? Will I be able to support my family? Is it real, or just a pipe dream?
When it comes to blogging to make money there are a number of reasons why you may be considering starting a blog.
Perhaps a second income is needed to help with college expenses for your children.
Maybe your boss has pushed your buttons for the last time and your looking for a way out. A perfect excuse to make money by blogging.
It could be that your near retirement and you recognize the need to bring in an extra income.
Considering starting a blog? Enroll in my FREE course and start creating your stunning website!
If none of these are your motivator maybe you are looking for control over your life and the ability to be financially independent.
Having personal motivation I decided to start out online. Initially in e-commerce and over-time I transitioned over to blogging.
Owning a blog that makes money is certainly a real profession and it is possible for you to achieve some pretty extraordinary success.
Becoming someone who blogs how to make money, or a work from home entrepreneur is not easy.
How do Beginner Blogs Make Money
The idea of how to start a blog for free and make money is probably appealing to the majority of people reading this article.
As great as it may sound keep in mind that the amount of success you desire is based on a ton of upfront work on your part.
As an example With blogging you could be writing articles, promoting those articles and over a three month time period make little to no money.
This can be frustrating! Blogging is about injecting your creativity into your work but it’s also about different strategies.
There is certainly a science to blogging and you need to learn it quickly if you hope to have a significant level of success.
The thing about having a blog is you have to work it. It’s up to you to figure out the strategies to implement in order to make your blog successful.
Have you ever heard the term “success leaves clues” This fact applies to blogging and because of that you can follow the path of other bloggers making money to create your successful online venture.
So we know that we want to make money online. We know that using a tool like blogging- that it’s possible to make money online.
Blogs How To Make Money
The question would be just how do beginner bloggers make money? Or another way to look at this is after setting up my website/blog where will the money come from?
In this post we will look at some ideas and strategies that will answer the questions how make money blogging? How to move from hobby blogger to pro, and how to live the laptop life?
This article is great for beginners and intermediate level- As it focuses on how to start a money making blog.
We have outlined steps to help you avoid pitfalls in your blog journey.
These steps are laid out in order and will save you time by answering specific questions, and filling in valuable details.
Blogging is an isolated profession, and if you start like I did you may feel like your on an island all alone trying to figure things out.
The good news is, that there are resources that can help you.
This article, and this blog is available to you written from our experiences, our success, and the many road blocks we had to overcome. I will share exactly how I make money blogging.
Lets jump right in and see exactly how do beginner blogs make money and how you can start your path to getting paid.
How to Make Blog For Money
This is the basic outline for your plan to make money blogging:
- Get a self-hosted blog
- Create great content
- Drive traffic to your site
- Find your audience
- Make money with ad networks
- Start selling your own products or services
- Affiliate marketing
- Sponsored posts
- Freelance writing
- Coaching/Counseling services
- Selling E-Courses
Looking at those steps it seems like a pretty simple thing. While some of the steps are relatively simple,
Let me assure that there is a learning curve involved and a tremendous amount of upfront work needed to even get close to having a successful blog.
So how to make money at blogging? Lets look at some initial setup and walk through the process.
Step 1: Setup your own self-hosted blog
This post is a bit long so I wont be going into details of how to setup a blog. For blog setup I have written a pretty extensive post that you can follow step by step.
It will guide through your initial setup and get your website/blog ready for launch. If you are looking to get started with blogging you can jump straight over to my post and learn how to setup a blog here .
A brief look at what the post will teach you:
- Registering your domain name
- Signing up for hosting
- How to setup WordPress
- Customizing your theme
- Launch your blog
Its a complete guide that will save you time and stress of searching the web, mistakes to avoid when setting up your own blog, and exact shortcuts to take to avoid blogger frustration.
As a beginner in blogging, it’s normal to make mistakes. That’s perfectly OK provided that you learn from your mistakes and not repeat them.
We also have a FREE course designed for you to go at your own pace and learn more in depth about how to start your blog and how to be blogger that makes money.
This course is available here and is completely FREE.
In the FREE course you have complete access to our resources in regards to creating your very own stunning website and learning just how do beginner blogs make money.
How Much Can A Beginner Blogger Make
Your goal is to reach a point where you will start making money from your blog, this money making venture can yield you a healthy passive income.
You will be making money on auto pilot!
Its all good, however most bloggers never get to that good part. At least where they have a passive income of $1,000 per month.
The main reason why is understanding that blogging is just like any other business. there is a tremendous amount of upfront work on your behalf.
You will find yourself giving a lot and in the beginning not seeing an equitable return. If you keep going, writing great content, learning new design tweaks, and getting better.
Eventually you will begin to see success and the picture in the puzzle will start to become more clear.
How Does A Blog Make Money
I’m mentioning this again because I know from experience that a common mistake beginners make is spending too much time and effort on the less important tasks that don’t yield results.
Everything is important regarding your blog, but you have some specific pieces that need to be worked on. All these pieces will come together to create your stunning blog.
Your primary goal at this early step is to have a blog running and start creating content that will get you traffic.
There is so much work involved in getting traffic (and potential customers), and you should devote your energy on those tasks from the very beginning.
Its been said you will spend 20% of your time creating and 80% of your time promoting.
One of the first things you will be doing is getting your own domain name and setting up a self-hosted blog.
Choosing to go with a self-hosted WordPress blog will be a good choice. You will own your blog and have full control over all functions.
You will be able to monetize it and over time It can grow to become an asset that can be sold.
If you are new or a veteran blogger I recommend having a simple process and creating your workflow to be productive.
There are many moving parts to blogging and you will find yourself jumping from task to task. Remember you want to focus more energy and time on certain things. “Content”
Step 2: Create Great Content
One of the more challenging parts of running your website will be creating content.
There are so many blogs today and more popping up daily. So you don’t get mixed in with the crowd of average to less than average blogs you MUST CREATE GREAT CONTENT!
Even before one starts a blog understand that content is the most important element for a blogs success.
Content is king– What does that really mean?
When writing content you will always want to write for your readers. Satisfying the queries and concerns of your audience is #1.
It’s also a way to have your articles ranked by Google. You will want to learn proper SEO Search Engine Optimization.
Related Reading: Learn Simple Steps To SEO
This is another lesson we will get into at another time but understanding SEO will bring free organic traffic to your website/blog.
What is considered great content
Great content will encompass the following:
- It’s unique
- Meaningful and useful
- Helps people with a problem
- Teaches or instructs
- Easy to read
There can be other ingredients to writing but these are some basic points you will want to make sure your content fulfills
To help with constructing great content there are tools for writers that you will be able to use. There are also SEO tools that help with making sure your writing is on point.
What Can You do to Create Great Content
Choose a topic that you have some level of expertise and a level of interest.
Think of something you have experience with… Now tell me about your idea and maybe your personal opinion about it.
That would be a potential topic for you to choose. Being able to create informational posts, how to do something, or even DIY content would be ideas for your outlines.
Once you launch your blog you will need to be adding as much content as possible on a weekly basis.
More content will help your readers come back to you blog as they see value in the topics you cover.
Choose a trending topic
One of the biggest issues you will face is having people to purchase your products. Finding a topic that is popular or somewhat trending will help you to discover your audience.
When you are in the research phase of a topic you can simply use google search and enter keywords from your topic and see what type of queries are coming up.
Look for the number of results and types of websites that appear in the first pages of Google.
For a newer website it will be difficult to compete with bigger more established writers.
Consider this point when doing your research and pay attention to search volume and websites that appear in the SERPS.
Be specific with your topic, keep it narrow. For example, you want to start an affiliate website and research a product. In this example we will use a “crockpot”
To be considered more narrow you can choose a specific brand and even a specific model of that brand.
Using one product allows you to “niche down”. Writing content can be all about the Pros and cons of that product, the diversity in meals you can prepare, and even reviews of the product.
I don’t recommend starting out with a broad topic because it may be harder to capture your target audiences attention.
If you are in a popular trending niche it will have a wider audience, but that could also mean tougher competition. You may be competing with big established companies.
Here’s an example to make this clear:
I blog about blogging. This is a broad and extremely competitive niche. If you search “how to start a blog”, you will get tons of results.
There will be established sites that dominate this niche and it may be difficult to compete.
The search term “how to start a blog” is very broad and it would be hard to get any traffic to your site.
The goal will be to narrow your topics to increase your odds at being discovered in search.
“How to start a blog for beginners” or “best ways to start a blog on a budget”, or even “how do beginner blogs make money” would be more narrow search terms.
Keyword research-This is a basic and very crucial concept when looking for ideas to write about.
Get good at keyword research and treat the process as an ongoing part of blogging that needs continuing education.
Keyword research will directly affect your blogging success.
Step 3: Grow your blog traffic
Now we get to the fun part! Driving traffic to your blog. I have been in many forums and one of the most common topics from newer bloggers is, I have a new blog with articles and no traffic. What should I do?
Quick question: What is organic traffic?
This excerpt is quoted from omniconvert.com
“The term “organic traffic” is used for referring to the visitors that land on your website as a result of unpaid (“organic”) search results.”
“Organic traffic is the opposite of paid traffic, which defines the visits generated by paid ads.”
“Visitors who are considered organic find your website after using a search engine like Google or Bing, so they are not “referred” by any other website.”
Organic traffic is probably the most valuable traffic to a blogger because it is based by “user intent”.
User intent when understood will be a tool you will need to leverage to drive traffic.
When a user types a search query they are looking for answers. They want to get information on a subject or learn how to do something.
They even want to learn about a product before purchasing. Looking at this search may help us understand “user intent”. Search term= “how to start a blog on a budget”
This search is specific and the intent implied is they want to start a blog and there ready with a small investment.
Related Reading: Improve Your Google Search Ranking
To rank in SERPS your content would need to clearly explain how to start a blog and include the monetary investment needed.
When you can effectively produce content that satisfies the user search, you will begin seeing your content ranked by google.
How do You Get Organic Traffic to Your Website/Blog
When you have organic traffic it can be easier to convert, or lead to a specific result on your website.
Results such as visitors subscribing to your email opt-ins, people purchasing your products, or even getting comments on your blog posts.
How do you get organic traffic to your website/blog- You need great content!
I’m a huge believer in “content is king” and will mention this from time to time.
As a reminder Google must read your content, understand it, and feel it is the most relevant to the search query.
This is one part of getting your blog posts to show up in SERPS.
Additional tasks to drive traffic to your website/blog.
Here’s A look into the aspects of technical SEO
We will look at some of the areas of your website setup to make sure you have an SEO optimized site.
- Mobile friendly
- URL Structure
- XML Sitemap
- Schema Markups
- Canonical URLs
- Website Speed
With SEO you will need to learn On-page SEO, Technical SEO, and Off Page SEO.
Related reading: SEO Guide For New Bloggers
On-page SEO is making your content easy to understand by search engines.
We can work on our On-page SEO by doing the following:
- Optimized titles tags
- Word count
- Use headings correctly
- Use internal and outbound links
What is Off-page SEO
This can be summarized as networking. Building relationships with other websites. A technical term for this would be “link building”.
When a credible website in your niche connects or links back to your website it shows Google that others trust your site. Links from other websites give you “link juice”.
More link juice= more credibility, and more domain authority. This will help with driving more traffic to your website/blog.
Remember Google is searching for the most relevant content for the search queries.
This includes great content but also websites that are easy to navigate and are mobile friendly.
A website with proper on-page SEO and off-page SEO will potentially rank highest in SERPS
How do you go about link building
Link building is a complicated topic and one that beginners to blogging find it difficult to understand.
I know this from experience and from the feedback I get from my blog readers and clients. The subject of link building was one that took time for me to understand.
I actually didn’t focus on it because I felt it was to much to learn. Let me tell you as a new blogger with those concerns you will reduce your chances of being discovered by Google.
It would be important to learn about the subject of back links and how they benefit your website/blog. I suggest using this article and referring back over time to get each section down pact.
Research has shown that its best to get quality over quantity.
Quick look at link building:
You may see offers online to buy backlinks (black hat link building). I strongly recommend you DO NOT buy backlinks. This is not a practice that Google is in favor of.
Reaching out to other websites in your niche for guest posting. Sending emails to other websites asking them to consider reviewing your posts and if they see value in them create a link.
Step 4: Build your Audience and Community
Once you have a blog with great content and the traffic starts to flow in, your next step is to build a community around your brand.
You have launched your website, you have great content that you have SEO for SERPS, and you’ve been gaining traffic. You will want to have an audience persona at this point and begin building your following.
By establishing trust with your readers this will position you more as an expert in your niche. Your readers will bookmark your site because your are proven to be a great resource. You will begin to see your traffic convert into specific results.
This is very exciting because you start to see the results of your efforts in building you business/brand. A very important point to note, if you hadn’t yet done this begin to brand your website/blog.
Create a look and feel that your readers will identify and recognize. Successful bloggers do this really well.
Your website, social media, and promotional pieces should have similar branding. Ie: logo’s, and colors.
How do Beginner Bloggers Build an Audience That Follows
Quick look at promoting your brand:
Email marketing
Email marketing is great when done properly. You are building relationships with your email subscribers over time.
While you can certainly offer products through your email communications its advised to not spam your subscribers with your offerings.
Always stick to providing value in your emails.
Social Media
Creating a social media presence is important. You can find your audience by developing followers on your social media channels.
It will be easier to direct these followers to your website especially if they are in your niche.
Lots of bloggers start out with Pinterest and Facebook. These are both great platforms to establish your presence. You will be able to join Facebook groups that will allow promoting and sharing which will speed up the growth of your brand.
Engage your audience
I like this suggestion because its where you can strengthen your community. When your readers comment on your blog posts you must give a reply.
Commenting can be addictive. When a new visitor comes to your site and reads comments they may join in the conversation. All this is great for building your community of readers.
Related Reading: Getting Your New Blog Noticed
How Do Blogs Make Money
As a reminder, it is important to note that you will not make money from your blog if you haven’t followed all the necessary steps.
This starts from the beginning and it’s important to have a written plan so you stay on track.
The trick to making money is having consistent traffic, developing an email list, and building your audience. Without doing these things you wont have much success.
1. How To Make Money Blogging With Ad-networks
I will give my opinion when it comes to using ad networks to make money. Google AdSense is very popular and easy for new bloggers to be approved.
However if your just starting, I would suggest focusing on growing your traffic, you may want to consider waiting to use ads until you reach 10,000 pageviews.
I recommend this because you can qualify for more premium ad networks that offer a higher payout.
This is just my recommendation. I am not suggesting that you pass on any chances to make money. When it comes to earning with your blog, whatever opportunities you come across-go for it, get your coins!
2. Create and Sell Digital Products
When you use ad networks to monetize your blog there is a commission split and it can be average 60/40. You would keep 60% of the proceeds.
When you create your own digital products outside of the cost to make your product you will have a bigger profit.
Creating your own products can be a great way to make money for a blogger. This method requires hard work and research to come up with products that people will buy.
The most common products to create and sell online would be ebooks and online courses.
Just remember you can do research to find out what types of products your audience would be interested in.
Create a budget so that you don’t over spend and manage your time on these types of projects. Do some testing to see what types of products convert better.
After discovering good test products go back and add more value and enhance your offerings.
3. Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is simply-you selling someone else’s products and receiving a commission for those sales.
If you’ve ever ordered a great ebook or taken an online course chances are they have an affiliate opportunity you can look into.
You would simply find products to promote that are relevant to your niche.
Sign up for their affiliate marketing program and once approved you will have access to there library of products and an identifier code (affiliate link) to track your sales.
You add your affiliate links to your website/blog
Visitors to your website can click your link and be redirected to the offering.
What ever they purchase through your link will generate a commission to you. What’s great about this type of transaction is that you have no inventory, no shipping, or processing.
That’s all handled by the maker of the product.
Affiliate marketing tips:
The best products to promote are those you have had personal experiences with.
Saying that doesn’t mean you need to go out and start spending a bunch of money to get products.
You can find products and research them. Look for reviews and find products with credibility.
Affiliate marketing is a great way to make money blogging. You will need to create a delicate balance of offering value to your audience for free and selling based on their needs.
By building a solid relationship with your audience you will prove to be a trustworthy source and even begin to see affiliate sales.
More information on affiliate marketing can be found here.
4. Sponsored Posts
If a business or brand reaches out to you and offers to pay you to post an article on your site about there services or products, this is considered a sponsored post.
As long as the brand is in a similar niche this can be a great way for a blogger to generate income. The blogger is essentially renting space on their website.
A very popular way of earning income bloggers dedicate a good portion of their time to this.
5. Freelance Writing
How do beginner blogs make money? Freelance writing!
Freelance writing is simply writing articles or content for a company or website while not being employed for the particular company or website.
A freelancer could write for several websites at the same time (as long as they have no restrictions by companies).
This is a great way for a blogger to make income because you are not bound to a job with a set schedule.
Freelance writers produce content for their clients, either working from home or in a rented office space.
6. Coaching/Counseling Services
In a nutshell, online coaching is when you receive your coaching/training from a coach online.
This can be done through training videos, apps, or from your website. Online coaching can be a win for both the student and the teacher.
The student has access to there coach in whatever setting they choose. They can receive instruction in the comfort of there own home or in a work environment.
The coach is able to create videos that give training which will free them up to use there time in other areas.
7. Selling E-Courses
E-Courses can be another great way to start making money blogging
Also known as courses taught online instead of in-person.
Typically an E-course would be prerecorded, but they can include live class sessions, projects and assignments, and many other components to give students a near-identical experience to in-person courses.
Developing an E-course will take a good amount of research. You will want to find out whats a concern that your audience has.
Can you create a valuable training for that concern and how to monetize it? There are lots of resources online that will help one with developing a great E-course for their readers.
Final thoughts
There are many bloggers that are making money through their blogs either by selling ad space, their own products/services or through affiliate marketing.
We spend a considerable amount of time online and the ability buy or join an offer on a website has become easier and will continue to thrive for bloggers and digital marketers.
Looking at various pieces of information we have determined there are some common denominators when it comes to making money online:
Content is king– Focus on creating great content for your readers.
Developed an audience– Engage your readers and build an audience of followers.
Diversification– When it comes to the question, how do beginner blogs make money?
Its recommended to create multiple streams of income, and not be dependent on just one way of making money.
Paying dues– You need to start and put the work in. Serve your niche or community.
Blogging is not a get rich quick endeavor, you will definitely put in some time and effort. Once your blog reaches a level of success that you desire its the best work you could be doing.
We hope this was informative and gave you some food for thought.
Now over to you
I’m curious, how long have you been blogging? What are some ideas that could help a new blogger get off to a fast start? Leave a comment below
If you still have questions about how do beginner blogs make money, reach out to us. Here’s our email getblogtips@gmail.com. We love to hear from our readers!
