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After blogging for a few years, I have to say I was surprised by how many different ways bloggers can make money.
Since I mostly started my blog to make money, I wanted to learn all the different ways to make money. I also wanted to be successful with my blog, but unfortunately, some strategy was required before I started making my first income.
Don’t worry, I’ll teach you a few tricks to help you avoid those same mistakes.
While there are about a dozen or more ways to make money, I knew I really only needed to focus on a few to be a success.
But, I knew other bloggers who had successes with other monetization methods and were making a full-time income. So, even if I have no intention of trying out those money-making ideas, I want to share them with you too.
15 Ways to Make Money Blogging
When I first started blogging, I knew that you could make money as a blogger. It was partly why I started my blog: to have the freedom and flexibility to make money passively and live the life I dreamed about.
Now, I didn’t just start a blog to make money. I also launched my blog because I wanted to help people by teaching them the tricks and tips I had learned over the years.
Like how to make money, or save money. And now, I’m teaching you how to make money with your blog.
But, why not get paid to help people out too, right?
Related: How to Start a Profitable Blog and Make Money in 2024
So, I launched my blog back in 2022 and signed up for some affiliate programs. And then I added some links to my blog posts, in hopes that I would start making some sales.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t successful at first, since I wasn’t implementing any type of clear monetization strategy. And this is where I struggled. But, more on this later.
You’re probably wondering how to make money as a blogger, which is likely why you started your blog in the first place. Just like I did. Or, you maybe just found out that you can make money blogging, and haven’t been getting paid this whole time.
Regardless of why you want to monetize your blog, here are some of the best ways to make money with one.
- Affiliate Marketing
- Display Ads
- Sponsored Posts
- Selling Digital Products
- Membership Programs/ Subscription Programs
- Freelance Writing
- Other Freelance Work
- Coaching and Consulting
- Online Courses
- Online Workshops
- Webinars
- Email Marketing
- Sell Advertising Space
- Sell Physical Products
- YouTube Videos
If you haven’t started a blog yet and want to learn how, sign up for my free course, and you’ll learn over the next 7 days.
Free Course: How to Start a Blog in 7 days
Blogging can be one of the best ways to start building passive income on your own time. Whether you like to side hustle a few hours each week, or a few hours every day, blogging is perfect for anyone wanting to become their own boss and quit their day job.
Learn step-by-step, how to launch a blog and make it a success in just 7 days. You will discover the best tools and tips from an experienced blogger to avoid the mistakes that every beginner makes.
Don’t wait to take back your time and start earning passive income by writing about the things you love and enjoy.
Ways to Make Money Blogging Without Your Own Products or Services
With the half-dozen ways to get paid to blog without having to create your own product, it’s important to make sure that you are getting seen by search engines.
It’s one thing to create great content that your readers enjoy, while encouraging them to buy. But, it’s another thing to make sure that they can actually find your content.
While having your own blog is the foundation for making money without any products, there are some things that every beginner blogger needs to know to have success. And, a few tricks I wish I had known when I first started.
Don’t worry though, I won’t keep it a secret.
No matter what monetization strategy you use to create passive income from your blog, you will need to make sure you follow these few tips to have success with getting sales and commissions. This works when you try to sell your own products too.
- Know who you target audience is (get really clear on who they are, their pain points, desires, needs, etc.)
- Only create content for your target audience (your content becomes vague and unconvincing if you try to serve everyone)
- Most monetization strategies are not a get-rich-quick scheme (it requires dedication, faith, and strategy to see success)
- Serve before you sell (you audience will never trust you if you only ever try to sell to them, help them first)
Related: How to Start a Profitable Blog and Make Money in 2024
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is one of the best ways for any online entrepreneur to make money. Not just bloggers.
If you’re not familiar with affiliate marketing, though you’ve probably heard it many times from other bloggers, it’s a very neat concept.
Many companies or businesses will have what is called an affiliate program. This allows influencers, bloggers, YouTubers, and more to get commissions from the products they promote.
You can get a free ebook with some great affiliate marketing tips if you’re interested in trying out affiliate marketing.
While it isn’t as easy as just dropping affiliate links into a blog post, YouTube video, or even using a code on your podcast, the concept is that simple.
However, there is a decent amount of strategy you will need to implement in order to be successful with affiliate marketing.
Since you can use affiliate links and codes on your blog, YouTube videos, podcast episodes, in your email lists, and more, it’s helpful to diversify where you do place your links. The more easily accessible your links are, the easier it is for your readers to buy.
Starting with Amazon Affiliates is a great way for beginners to start making their first sales and get their feet wet.
You can sign up for Amazon Affiliates here.
Related: 22 Best Podcasts All Entrepreneurs Need in 2024
Again though, you always want to serve before you sell. Otherwise, your readers will never buy, and lose trust in you.
So, while just about every company or business has an affiliate program, you may also find that you can promote products or services from affiliate networks.
A network is where a bunch of products are available for promotion, making it easier for you to get conversions.
The payout for a successful commission can be a set rate percentage or exact amount. It can very from less than 1%, to even as much as 90% or greater, depending on the program.
Check out Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing to start the course today so you can learn expert tips to monetize your blog.
You can also grab Michelle’s free ebook of affiliate marketing tips for bloggers.
YouTube Channel
The great thing about having a YouTube channel to help monetize your blog, is that it is essentially impossible for A.I., or other creators to mimic, copy, or recreate your videos in the same exact way.
Additionally, when you can, placing your face on video for your audience to see greatly increases their trust of you, making them much more likely to buy. If they’ve decided they’re ready to buy, then it’s you they are most likely to buy through.
Similar to creating blog content specific to your target audience, it’s important to make sure your YouTube content follows this pattern as well.
In fact, if you are able to, you will want to create a YouTube video for your top 10 most popular blog posts. Because if it is popular on your blog, chances are it will be popular on YouTube as well.
When creating a YouTube video though, it’s best to aim for a specific topic. Most people don’t want to watch super long videos, so keeping the content limited to something highly relevant and specific should help.
You can get paid by having enough watch time ($2-$12 for 1,000 views), but, you can also get paid through the use of affiliate links or codes. So YouTube review videos can be a great method of adding some income to your blog.
Plus, you can also place these videos into your blog posts as well, to help increase your readers “time on page”. Which, of course, is a great boost for your SEO.
If you’re looking for other ways to build your website traffic, my Traffic Building Kit ebook includes over 100 strategies, resources, tips, tricks, and methods to improving your SEO, and building up traffic.
You can get 75% off (making it only $3.75) when you click the button below. The discount will automatically apply with the link. (or use code LETSGROW)
Display Ads
Display ads are one of the most common ways for new bloggers to make money. And, many pro bloggers still use this method as well, since they’d be leaving money on the table otherwise.
But, rather than trying to make money from your blog right away, and just throwing a bunch of Google Adsense ads on your site, wait a bit.
Wait until you have a bit more traffic so you can choose one of the higher paying ad networks. By choosing a better and higher paying ad network, you not only improve your SEO, but you also keep the user experience as a high priority.
Unfortunately, with most of the better as networks though, you have to have a large amount of monthly page views, or sessions. And, for most new bloggers, this is not easily attainable within the first few years. Sometimes even longer.
But, if you are looking to get high amounts of page views, I highly recommend you start working with Pinterest to get your minimum monthly page view requirements. Or sessions. Whichever your ad network prefers.
Many bloggers have been able to join Mediavine (a common higher paying ad network), or even Raptive, just simply from the traffic they get from Pinterest.
If your interested in using Pinterest for your traffic, it is important to know that not every blog niche will work well on Pinterest. But, if you have any type of lifestyle niche, you are golden.
There are many other niches that work well on Pinterest too though. So, don’t be discouraged.
If you’re are tired of your traffic not getting enough traction, I highly recommend taking a course called Pinteresting Strategies.
It’s a great course that is very comprehensive, and has helped me significantly increase my traffic from where I was. It’s probably the best course to start with, and is also very affordable.
There are a few other courses that I have taken as well, which I will list in a minute, but I highly suggest starting with Pinteresting Strategies since it delves into user intent. Not just how to satisfy the Pinterest algorithm.
You can also read my review of the course, and see how much my traffic went up after taking the course.
Related: 31 Proven Ways to Make Money With a Laptop in 2024
Sponsored Posts
Having a sponsored post is a great way for some bloggers to make some additional cash each month. Essentially what they are, is a way for companies, or businesses to increase their audience range by paying a blogger to host a paid blog post.
Since some bloggers get hundreds of thousands of page views every month, or more, it’s worth it for a company to pay a blogger to host an article.
These are different from guest posts. Typcially a guest post is a way for bloggers to network with each other, and it benefits both parties with improved outreach.
Guest posts are not paid opportunities. Or rather, they should not be paid as this goes against Googles terms of service.
But a sponsored post is different and is labeled as such. Typcially a sponsored post is not something that most beginners will get into until they have a bit more traffic.
Email Marketing
All bloggers, and in fact all online entrepreneurs, should have an email list.
Email marketing is one of the most lucrative ways to make money. It has the highest return on investment of up to 42x.
While building a mailing list is not as simple as just collecting an email address from your readers, it is how you get started.
I highly recommend signing up for Convertkit since it is a free platform that you can use to build a list. You can have up to 10,000 subscribers on your list for free. And, when you’re ready, you can upgrade.
These upgrades help save you tons of time by using automations, sequences, and more. So, upgrading saves you a tons of time. Which, is actually why I upgraded much sooner than what I needed to.
You don’t have to be a professional blogger to have a profitable email list. In fact, you can start making money from your list, even if you only have 100 subscribers.
The key to a profitable list is to regularly nuture them, and to make sure the content is highly relevant to their needs. This means that they don’t ever feel like you are spamming them with a bunch or marketing junk.
Weekly newsletters help with this.
Although, with your email list, affiliate links are one of the easiest ways to make money.
So making sure that you’re not overwhelming their inbox with constant marketing lingo will keep them warm, and willing to buy when they are ready.
Related: Convertkit vs MailChimp: Which is Better for Bloggers (2024)
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Sell Advertising Space
Selling ad space on your website is a bit different from display ads. When selling ad space, you are directly working with a business or company to place their ads on your site. This space is dedicated only for that company.
Using this method is a bit more time exhaustive and requires some effort. You will have to network and build a relationship with that company. This means you do much more work, and will need to put in some regular maintenance.
However, you are likely to have higher payments for that ad space since it is exclusive only to that business.
Alternatively, with an ad network, almost all that work is done for you. But, you don’t have as much choice as to what is shown.
Ways to Make Money Blogging With Your Own Products and Services
While getting paid passively through affiliate marketing and other methods, it isn’t always reliable, and you can’t always control how much you get paid each month.
Instead, when you create your own products, or offer your own services, you start to create much more reliable income streams to avoid the volatility of having an online business.
Some of the most successful bloggers are the ones who are selling their own products or services. And these don’t even have to be complicated either.
One of my favorite blogging friends, Michelle Schroeder-Gardner, has made over $5 million with her blog. A big portion of that has been from her online course, Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing.
Even though Michelle only has 2 courses she sells, between her affiliate marketing, ad income, sponsored posts, and more, she is able to make well beyond a full-time income and has retired early before she even turned 35.
She has even been able to travel the world on a sailboat yacht, lived out of an RV for months on end, and even went on a world cruise for a few months as well.
So diversifying your income streams with at least 2-3 methods give you your best chance of seeing similar success.
Here’s a few methods you can use.
Related: How to Start a Profitable Blog and Make Money in 2024
Selling Digital Products
Digital products are often one of the easiest and earliest go-to options to make money on your own terms.
This can be as simple as an E-book, printables, templates, and more. While it’s best to have your own online store on your website, it isn’t an absolute necessity.
You can use tools or platforms like Etsy, Shopify, Gumtree, and any other type of platform that allows you to sell and deliver digital downloads.
You can get 40 free Etsy listings if you open your shop up today.
You don’t even have to be a professional blogger to create a digital product. Simply creating an Ebook for free using Google Docs, or Canva can work.
And then you can publish it on a platform, and link it back to your website.
You can also use your email marketing service to sell products as well. If it is integrated into their system.
Convertkit is my favorite email service because they do allow you to do this.
Sell Physical Products
Similar to selling a digital product, you can also sell a physical product. In most cases though, this requires a bit more effort since you have to manage the product, the shipping, handling, logistics and whatnot.
However, depending on the type of product you offer, there is the opportunity to choose an alternative method like dropshipping. With dropshipping you can avoid all the hassle of managing the products, and all the logistics of shipping.
Printify is a great place to start creating some dropshipping products. And, you can get started for free when you sign up today.
Membership Programs/ Subscription Programs
Membership or subscription-based programs are a great way to make regular and consistent income.
This type of monetization method can be just about anything from coaching services, a masterclass, a service, regular workshops, monthly templates, online courses, and more.
It doesn’t really matter what is included in the membership or subscription that you offer. As long as you are providing new and consistent content that is exclusive to that program.
One program that I was a part of for a while is the monthly membership VIP group for a printables course. The course itself was its own cost. But, you could also join the VIP membership to get access to the exclusive group that included a mastermind Facebook group and new templates every month.
Your membership or subscription service doesn’t have to be expensive or complicated. Something as simple as delivering new Canva templates every month can be a great way to add regular income to your business.
Related: 23 Reliable Ways to Make $300 or More a Day
Freelance Writing
Freelance writing is one of the most common ways for bloggers to make money in addition to their other monetizing methods.
As a freelance writer, just like with your blog, you have some flexibility on your working hours. However, depending on the freelance work you chose, you may have to write a bit differently.
If you want to freelance write for other bloggers, you will want to use some keyword research tools like Rank IQ to make sure the content you write is optimized for search engines.
You can join platforms like Fiverr or Upwork to start offering freelance work. You can also network on Facebook to get work from there as well.
Related: How to Become a Freelance Grant Writer and Make $35 an Hour
Coaching and Consulting
Coaching or consulting services is usually not the most beginner friendly way to make money as a blogger. Since it requires trading time for money, you are limited on how much you can earn.
However, coaching or consulting is usually one of the more reliable ways to make money. Because it requires some level of expertise or experience before you become a coach, it may be a few years before you jump into this.
Alternatively though, if you have expertise or experience in a particular field, and your blog is an extension of that, offering coaching or consulting can be something you do much earlier in your blogging journey.
One of the most popular online coaches I know of is Maria Wendt. She has had her business for about 11 years now and has been a coach for most of it. She has some great Youtube videos that are pretty inspiring if you’re interested.
So, if you want to offer coaching or consulting, Zoom is a great platform to do this with. You can also create a course that has a coaching style to it, and offer group or one-on-one call with Facebook or Zoom.
Online Courses
Creating an online course has become a staple for many pro bloggers to monetize their business. Usually, since they have expertise in a specific field or topic, this is what they create a course on.
As I previously mentioned about affiliate marketing, my blogging friend Michelle from Making Sense of Cents created a course about affiliate marketing.
Since she has made over $50,000 in affiliate income just from a single affiliate platform, you can bet she has some expertise in the area. So, she created a course about it, and later made over $500,000 from that one course.
Now, there are many platforms you can choose to use to host an online course. While there are ways to create a course for free, I highly recommend using a platform as it will handle the checkout process for you. And will make it easier for customers to buy.
My favorite platform is Thrivecart, and it is my favorite for several reasons.
- It has a single 1-time, lifetime fee (no monthly fees)
- It has one of the highest conversion rates for upsells, bump offers and more
- You can easily create great looking checkout pages
- The checkout process is simple, clean, and offers multiple payment options (Paypal, mastercard, visa, discover, etc.)
- You can design upsells and bump offers to make more sales
- You can easily set up coupons and discounts for your customers
- There is an integrated affiliate program so you can sell more products with less work
- The course section (Thrivecart Learn) looks great, professional, and allows you to create text, video, image, downloads, and more for your students
While this platform isn’t perfect by any means, I love that the cost is a lifetime fee. And it’s actually much more affordable than you’d think.
Just one year of another platform, like Samcart, costs more than the lifetime fee of Thrivecart.
But, if you don’t have the budget for Thrivecart, there are plenty of other platforms like Teachable, Kajabi, Kartra, and more. However, these all still have monthly membership fees.
Make sure you do a little research into which one best fits your needs. A teaching platform is kind of one of those things that is very dependent on your specific needs. Not all of them will be suitable to you. And, price can be one of those things.
Online Workshops
An online workshop is often a live event for followers and readers to join for a specific topic. One of my favorite online workshops is a Pinterest Bootcamp by Nadalie Bardo.
She has hosted this bootcamp for the past couple years, and it is a great place for her to grow and nurture her audience. This is also where she sells her highest value course.
This bootcamp is typically a week long. But, yours doesn’t have to be.
You can do something similar with your own online workshop.
Again, it doesn’t have to be long by any means. Even a couple of afternoons, or just one evening can be a great way to host a workshop.
You can do this for free in a Facebook group, which is a great place to start since just about everyone has a Facebook account.
Alternatively, you can host these workshops in a Zoom meeting. But, you may be limited if you use the free version.
Similiar to a webinar, a workshop can be paid, or it can be a free event for your audience. Making sure it is a niche specific workshop will help boost the members who have joined your event.
Related: 31 Proven Ways to Make Money With a Laptop in 2024
Webinars
Webinars have become much more common, and are one of the more popular ways for pro bloggers to sell their courses.
A webinar can be paid or free, but in most cases, it is always used to help build up an email list. A great way to sell a product or course, is to teach some great tips throughout, and at the end, create an upsell for a higher value product.
Regardless, even if you don’t sell anything, and even if they unsubscribe from your list right after the webinar, you have built a lot of trust with that individual. So, the next time they see you, they will be much more likely to buy.
You can create a webinar on YouTube and embed it onto your site, or you can even use software like Easy Webinar.
Other Freelance Work
There is plenty of other freelance work available for bloggers to help monetize their online business. Aside from any type of writing, you can create digital designs, manage social media accounts, manage Pinterest accounts, and more.
One of the most common methods I’ve seen, other than writing, is to manage Pinterest profiles. This is typically a pretty easy side income for bloggers, as they usually have some past experience with the platform.
Which makes finding extra freelance work a bit easier.
If you’re looking for a freelancer to do some work for you, I highly recommend checking out Fiverr to find a reliable freelancer.
You can also join the Fiverr affiliate program to recommend freelancers to your audience as well.
Final Thoughts on How to Make Money Blogging
While I’ve mostly only used affiliate marketing to make money, I have made sure to start diversifying my monetizing strategies to avoid the volatility of an online business.
It can be tempting to just stick to only one method. But, ever since the craziness that was the Google updates in fall 2023 and all throughout 2024, many bloggers have struggled to get their ground back. And, I didn’t want this to happen to me.
So, while solely relying on display ads can be an easy go-to, using other methods like affiliate marketing, selling digital courses and products, and especially building an email list is the best way to avoid losing out on good money.
Finding what works for you is really what is key to success. Otherwise, you’re going to just be spinning your wheels, hoping something will stick.
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Such a great, informational post! Pinned for reference!
So glad you found it helpful!
You’ve explained everything in depth. Selling useful digital products to your audience is a great way to monetize blogs.
It absolutely is! And, with digital products, you can sell an unlimited amount, making it one of the best passive income methods for blogging.
Thank you for spelling out all the ways to make money blogging. While I’m still relatively new to the blogging world, I’m working on implementing some of your suggestions. Thanks for sharing.
Very much enjoyed this post. Thank you so much for sharing all your insights.
I’m glad you liked it! Hopefully you find a method to monetize your blog that works great for you.
So many great ideas. I am a new blogger and trying to monetize my blog, so this was very useful.
That’s great! I suggest starting with affiliate marketing since it doesn’t require much traffic to get started.
Here is the link to a free affiliate marketing Ebook with tips and strategies to get started if you’re interested.
https://letsmakelifegreat.com/affiliate-marketing-tips-for-bloggers
And here’s a link to a comprehensive course for affiliate marketing as well.
https://letsmakelifegreat.com/Making-Sense-of-Affiliate-Marketing