How to Make Money Blogging

Did you know that you can make money with your blog? Yes, your blog can be a source of income. It can be your gig if you need a gig or side hustle if you need one of those.

We can all agree that you can make money while blogging. You didn’t know or you thought that only applied to big bloggers? Nope, nada, no. Anyone can be pulling in money with their blog if they go about it the right way. First of all, you don’t need 100,000 followers or monthly views. You can make money if you put the work into your blog. And, it’s going to take time so don’t think that you are going to be swimming in money right away.

This post contains affiliate links. I would never promote a product that I don’t love and my review is honest. If you decide to sign-up or purchase anything, it will cost you nothing extra and will provide me with some compensation.

If you didn’t know you could make money while blogging, I’m here to tell you that you can. There are multiple ways that you can utilize to make money. Just don’t be in it for the money because then it’s no longer fun and an outlet.

Let’s keep in mind a few things

It’s not going to be easy to get money and you are going to have to work at it. Your first month isn’t going to be filled with pots of gold. You aren’t going to make thousands of dollars after a month or two despite the income reports you might see out there — most of those people making those numbers have blogged before and created a new blog.

Most bloggers are considered social influencers or micro-influencers at some point. You have to remember that your blog is your brand and you want your brand to pop when it comes to this saturated world. Also, don’t trip over the fact that blogging is oversaturated because there will always be opportunities out there. Think about it like this — can you count on your fingers a number of brands there are out there? A lot. The different beauty brands and fashion brands, you are not limited. You just have to promote yourself and get yourself out there.

Never ever get discouraged just because you have one great month and then a lousy month the next. It’s a tough market to always expect to be making money if this is just a side hustle.

Last, dedication is key. You can’t get discouraged and you have to really stick to it. Trust me, I’ve felt like giving up a lot but I’m not.

So how do you make money?

There are multiple ways to make an income with blogging. You have many options out there that you can capitalize on. You just have to really dive in and master it.

Are you ready for all the ways to make yourself some income?

Just remember that you need to think long and hard about some of these ideas and the time you have to dedicate to it. It’s not as easy as one would think. I learned that after buying an e-course and learning about one area that I am trying to excel in.

Affiliate Marketing

With Affiliate Marketing, you are pairing up with a brand and promoting their link/product with hopes that someone clicks-through to the link. You want a conversion with these links — some brands want clicks while other brands would like people to click-through and purchase or sign-up which would go from click-through rate to conversion rate. Affiliate Marketing is great if you utilize it the right way. This is what you see a lot of fashion bloggers utilize — you spot Like To Know, Reward Style and Shop Style Collective links and the bloggers will receive a commission from it. It’s a great gig if you have great fashion pictures and pieces that people want.

But, don’t worry — there are options for people that aren’t fashion bloggers. You can join networks like Awin and ShareASale where you will find tons of brand partnerships that have links to products you might have used in the past and want to link to. Personally, I like both networks because they have tons of brands that you can work with like Etsy, Grammarly, Boardbooster, and more.

Influencer Marketing/Sponsored Posts

Influencer marketing is all the rage right now. As someone that works in digital marketing and for a brand, I have seen the ins and outs of managing influencers and having a partnership with them. Luckily for you, there are influencer networks that you can apply to where you can connect with brands for sponsored posts. There is Linqia, Real Clever, RevInfluence, TapInfluence, and many more networks out there that will be of service to you. Personally, I have worked with Linqia and the campaign that I worked on featured CPC which is cost-per-click. I was able to make good money on the campaign that I worked with and it was a product that I already used which is great for me.

You can make an income based on being an influencer or micro-influencer — being a micro-influencer is definitely the move right now due to the fact that brands are looking at smaller personal brands compared to big ones to share their products. Sponsored posts are a great way to make money and you can set your pricing with these type of things.

Advertising

One way to gain some income is looking into advertising. You can use the space on your blog to advertise for other brands and blogs. This is not a bad idea when you think about all the things that people want to click-through to. Plus, all the networks that I mentioned above all have ad units that you can place on the side of your blog so you can advertise their networks and help gain leads. Another way to leverage an income is hosting a giveaway because it brings in traffic and new followers that will click on the advertisements. There are many ad networks out there like AdSense and Media.Net that will allow you to place ads on your site and in between posts to leverage clicks-per-costs.

Events

Technically, events could fall under sponsored posts but there are local events that will host bloggers and pay some big names to show up especially if they are a smaller brand. Events are a great way to leverage an income especially if you’re hosting the event because your name is essentially all over it. Some influencers can receive $500 just to show up at an event. I haven’t done this yet but I have seen many bloggers and social media influencers take part in these events. It’s not a bad way to get a source of income but you definitely have to schmooze and network all over the place.

Services & Products

Many bloggers succeed and make bank off of courses, e-books, webinars, etc. In my opinion, this is one of the best networks to go into. Just think of the course people put together and sell for $197 — sell to 10 people a month and you’re making a pretty good income. There are dozens of things to create products and services on like Pinterest, Blogging, Social Media Partnerships, and more! There is so much in this part of services. You could offer up consultations on blogging and branding. If you’re a graphic designer, you could help out people by having branding services. Services and products are where it’s at! This is my endgame, for sure.

I think it’s amazing what people put together and how they help people while making a living doing what they love. Another great thing about all of this? Some of these bloggers offer affiliate links so you can advertise a course that you took and loved. There are also sites like SiteGround that offer affiliate/referral commission. I will say that I took the Making Sense of Cents Affiliate Marketing course and it was worth the money — I’ll definitely write a review on this for those interested. For now, I will leave you with the thought of putting together a course on something you’re good at or something you see doing well on your site regularly.

Time to monetize your blog to make money.

See, there are tons of ways to make money with your blog! Monetizing isn’t the easiest and things don’t happen right away but it is possible.

Most people get turned off at the idea after making a few cents every other month but you have to give it time. It took me forever and I learned a few things along the way. Heck, I have made money one month and literally, 27 cents the next month so don’t trip if you aren’t cashing out because I’m not cashing out.

You really need to utilize all efforts like your email list and building your traffic. You have to be honest and give honest reviews because people can see through the fake reviews. If you want to learn more about blogging, check out You Need to Start a Blog and Blogging Lessons that I have Learned on this blogging journey.

I’m not a pro at monetization yet but I will get there one day. Until then, I’m in the same boat as you so let’s talk about it.

Are you monetizing your blog? Do you want to monetize it?