How do I Start Blogging for profit – is it even possible?
Blogging for profit is something many people are curious about. In fact, so many people ask about making money blogging, that it became apparent that an article dedicated to the subject would be quite valuable. Blogging for profit doesn’t have to be all about business; in fact, adding a little joy and humour (Canadian for ‘humor’) can make it all the more successful.
The first question to be answered is “How do I start blogging for profit to begin with? Is it even possible?”
- Where does the money come from?
- What do I sell?
- Do I need to sell anything?
- Would someone pay to read my blog?
The answer to all these questions can be boiled down to a single very simple one: Become an affiliate.
Disclosure: This page may contain affiliate links. These are links to sites that pay us commissions. We do not endorse these sites unless otherwise stated plainly.
What is an affiliate?
The most basic definition of an affiliate is someone who sells something for someone else without having to buy, stock or ship anything, and who gets paid automatically from sales made by them.
The way this works is pretty simple. The one most people are familiar with is the Google Adsense system, where you sign up as an affiliate, then you put a little bit of code on your pages and get paid for traffic or sales that come via the code on your site.
There are literally thousands of affiliate programs to choose from, and I am going to make the very bold statement that Google’s program is one of the last ones I would choose. The reason for that is that many people do it incorrectly and suddenly find themselves banned. Learn how to do everything correctly, also called White Hat SEO.
In fact, the one I most often recommend to start with as an excellent affiliate program is the Adlandpro Affiliate program. The support is excellent and personal, and they have paid like clockwork since 1998. If you join, be sure to follow the instructions and get it set up properly! It’s not difficult, and you can always contact me if you need a little help.
How do I get people to visit?
The next, obvious question is, how do I get people to click on the links on my blog? The short answer is, you need a lot of good, targeted traffic, before you can make any money.
The best way to do that for most people is to simply start writing and publishing your blog. You won’t get instant, paying traffic this way, but you will start to see it grow.
If you want a lot of traffic in a hurry, you’re going to need money, and lots of it. You can buy traffic from the big search engines, but be prepared to pay a lot for it. Alternatively, if you want to kick start your blog without breaking the bank, you can use Paid Keywords from a smaller company like Adlandpro, which are much less expensive and often very responsive, depending on your niche.
Nothing is really more effective for the average person to create steady, unique, search engine attractive, list building, sales pulling traffic than simply blogging. That simply means writing regular high quality articles and publishing them on your website.
But how do I start blogging for profit?
“But,” you say, “I don’t know how to blog and I can’t write! You’re not making it easy! I wanted to know how to make money with a blog, not how to right a bestseller!”
My answer is that you will likely be both surprised and amazed by how well you can write (and blog), if you want it badly enough and you’re willing to give it a shot and really put some effort into it. You just used the term, “bestseller.” Do you want your blog to be a bestseller or just a mediocre or no-seller?
Let me ask you a question. Have you ever had a conversation with someone? Of course you have! That’s how simple blogging is.
If you can carry on a conversation with someone, you can write quality blog content. Blogging is not about getting a top mark in English class. It’s about carrying on a conversation about something you’re passionate about with people of similar interests.
Think of it like this: When you write a blog article, that’s the conversation starter. Simply put in print the kind of stuff you would share with coworkers in the coffee room, or buddies at the pub, or a friend you bump into in the grocery store…
When people reply to your article in the reply or comment section, that’s the other half of the conversation. It’s pretty simple.
The mechanics of the article
Just create your article with the same words you’d use to tell a friend. A blog is not a book (although some have turned into one)! A blog is just you sharing yourself with the rest of the world. Be yourself.
If you’re worried about your terrible spelling (who isn’t?), use the spell checker in your word-processing software. Most blog platforms have a spell checker built right in anyway. If you use Grammarly (highly recommended), it will check both your spelling and your grammar.
Use photographs, cartoons and videos to illustrate your blog (making sure not to use copyrighted material without permission). Often, people who visit your blog will enjoy the pictures and share them, which helps to spread your blog.
You can get high quality, free photos from places like Pexels.com and Pixabay, just to name two. Hint: Make sure to have a share button on your blog!
If you like making videos, you can create a video blog, or switch it up and instead of always writing your articles, create a video to make it more interesting. Just follow the instructions on the blog platform you are using like Blogspot, Tumblr or WordPress for how to include a video.
Remember when you video blog to say something about the video in print, both before and after you embed it in your blog. That makes the search engine happy, and will help bring even more traffic.
Success doesn’t arrive tomorrow!
Blogging won’t bring you instant success, but now that you know how to start blogging for profit, you have a path that will take you there. When you’re regularly publishing quality posts on your blog with the long term results motivating you, you will succeed.
It takes time for your blog to get noticed. Tell your friends about it, include a link to it on the social sites you belong to and in your signature files that you use for emails, forums, etc., and your blog will gradually become known, gathering a larger and larger following.
Put a subscription box on your blog, so that people can subscribe for future updates, and your list will build automatically.
Put share buttons on your blog so people can share with their friends.
Put a comment box on your blog and ask for comments. That really helps get a conversation going.
As people share your blog with one another, it grows virally, and the traffic will increase at a steadily increasing rate. When you begin to have a good stream of traffic, the affiliate links on your blog will get more clicks, bringing you more sales and commissions.
Be consistent. If you publish your blog once and forget about it, you won’t make any money. That’s not how to start blogging for profit; it’s trying to get rich with no effort!
Be persistent. You need to be regularly publishing articles on your blog in order to get noticed and stay noticed by the search engines. This is usually referred to as “work.” Blogging can and should be a lot of fun, and you should enjoy what you do, but in order to finally be successful, you need to produce something, even when you don’t feel like it.
Don’t try to write great, long epistles for every post, but you should write often! If you can, write a little every day. As long as you keep the conversation interesting to you, it will be interesting to someone else. Don’t quit. Quitters are guaranteed to fail, every time. Blogging for profit takes real time and real effort, but the end rewards are worth it.
Please share your thoughts on what works for you in the comments section, below. Your input is very valuable and may be just what someone else needs to really get going. And remember, sharing is caring! Don’t forget to leave your link.
Well done and the telling it like it is.
One thing I have learned and shared with clients is the importance of knowing your market and write for them. Ask a lot of questions in your posts. Remind them to comment.
On of our blogs, this yea,r has generated 12,095 comments as of today, all of them answered, some threads are 3-4 deep
Thank you for your insights, Chuck. You make a great point. Have you or anyone out there done a comparison? Are there any numbers for engagement on articles with questions, vs those without?