People don't really pay for magazine subscriptions very often anymore.
So if people don't want to pay for the New York Times or The Atlantic, they probably aren't going to pay to subscribe to your blog.
Blogging is a pretty popular way to try to make money online.
It really can be a pretty profitable side hustle, and some people even make an impressive full-time living by running a popular blog.
But first, you have to figure out exactly how you're going to monetize.
For a blog, content is basically the product.
But when you're giving away the vast majority of your content for free, what's left to sell?
In a recent post from Blog Tyrant, the author lists three smart strategies for turning a blog into a money making machine.
There's more than one option, and your niche and subject matter could affect what's going to work best from you. But here are some great ideas you can think about.
It’s really important to remember here that there are a lot of ways to make money from blogging and creating paid products is just one of them. But let’s take a look at some scenarios that might give you some idea.
Example scenario stage #1: combining old with new
Let’s say you have a blog about eating vegetarian food when you have IBS. It’s a very niche topic that can provide wonderful benefits for those that are struggling to live with the condition and also want to avoid eating meat.
So, your vegetarian blog (…we need more vegetarian food bloggers, by the way…) would be a wonderful collection of recipes, photos that you take yourself, information about how you came up with the recipes and then also you own stories and research about dealing with the condition.
Next, you could think about releasing your own hard copy version of a cookbook. This is a great example of using a mixture of old content and new content in a new format and charging money for it. Lots of people prefer to cook from a book, and people also like to have them on coffee tables which they can’t do with a digital version. So this is old content in a new format.
Example scenario stage #2: combing income streams
Following on with the example of the vegetarian cooking blog for people with IBS, the next thing you want to look at is diversification.
When it comes to making money with the blog you could/should have a mixture of income streams that, over time, add up to a good source of revenue. This could include affiliate products like cookbooks and implements from Amazon and maybe even different supplements that you’ve tried (if that’s even legal in your country).
When you mix this with your cookbook sales you might find that you can make a tidy income of people paying for products that are new things you create, re-formatted old content, and content/products created by other people.
Example scenario stage #3: expanding in to different verticals
By now you cooking blog and book is ticking along nicely. You’ve got a bunch of fans who like your thinking and have had some nice results with your recipes and solutions for IBS. It’s at this point that you might think about exploring verticals.
For example, you’ve been relying on the cookbook sales for a little while now so why not expand out and organize live cooking shows in the areas with the biggest subscribers? You might even create an annual meet-up or camp where people get together and do fun IBS stuff like not drinking and taking it easy. 😉
You could launch your own line of aprons with a funny joke from your blog, you could create a podcast that is donation-per-listen that goes over other cooking ideas, interviews with interesting people in the niche, etc. The possibilities are quite literally endless.
You can learn more about how to monetize a blog effectively over at Blog Tyrant.
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