10 Steps Towards Choosing Blogging As a Profession

Seven out of 10 bloggers I know blog for money, and there is no wrong in it provided as long as one follows some blogging etiquettes. A blog is a platform to express or share one’s opinion about topics which may or may not form a niche.

With the power of words and the underlying expertise, this opinion is converted to a principle and hence one starts making money. For professional bloggers, it becomes highly significant to not only create good content but also get good traffic, just because most monetization programs do not depend on content but traffic. Both of these factors are extremely important for a blogger to mint money.

Web traffic is such a paradoxical term which makes people dread about it offline, but get into its amorous embracement online. More the traffic on a blog, more are the chances to generate money.

billionbloggers Out of million bloggers on the web today, a very miniscule percentage of them are able to earn money out of their blogs. This is because most of the bloggers do not know the the correct way of presenting stuff to their audience.

Today, we shall check out some of the proven ways to work on, in case you’ve decided to quit your day job;

You got to research well to know the kind of topics that people like to read online. A small work around over the web will make you know that technology focused or product oriented blogs are the most read. This is one of the most targeted niche by bloggers, both amateurs and experienced. There are various others which you need to find out. Remember to write on topics which people like to read more as it increases your chances to make money. However, content is the king!

  1. Implement traffic building strategies for your blog by registering at various forums, social networking sites and communities like twitter, reaching out to other bloggers, posting quality content and regularly updating of the content. More importantly, if there is an increase in traffic; it is important to sustain it by working harder. blogtraffic
  2. Making ‘coffee money’ is not a big deal. So placing ads on your blog when it is new will not help anyone much. But, again this is a debatable topic and many would disagree with me by saying that ads should be displayed from the initial days. But, I would always prefer a strategy of ‘wait to monetize.’
  3. If you’re thinking of minting money through ads, Google Adsense is one of the most widely used methods to monetize your content. The money that a blog generates depends on the category of the blog and the related ads being displayed on the page. The Adsense program has made many a bloggers rich and been one of the most effective mediums to make money from a blog. adsense
  4. A blogger can also look for paid writing positions on different blogs. If you have carved a niche for yourself, it becomes easy to write for others and your own successful blog becomes a testimony of your blogging skills. The motivation here should be to bring good name to your blog with exposure and experience on writing at top blogs, the additional income being an icing over the cake.
  5. Determine new ways of income apart from the traditional ones. Look for new contracts that will fetch you a lucrative income. Publishing a book, selling personalized products and services, etc. are some of the methods by which a lot of established bloggers make money.
  6. Indulge into Affiliate Marketing. It is good to initialize your affiliate marketing skills by promoting products that you like. R.T. Butcher clarifies the practical application of affiliate marketing when he writes, “Just find a merchant on one of the many affiliate networks (search Google) and place a link or banner on your blog. Whenever someone leaves your blog through the banner or link and purchases that product you can earn a commission”.
  7. One of the hottest methods to earn money is by selling ad space on your blog. An ever increasing number of companies act as an interface between a blogger and an advertiser to get relevant ads on your blog that will become another money making tool for you. The key here is to strike a good balance between the ads and the content; otherwise the results can be disastrous.
  8. If there is a demand of the various posts you write on your blog, you can sell fresh content to other blogs and make money. Selling content has made quite a few bloggers help run their businesses better. SEOmoz is one of the leading SEO firms which have successfully sold memberships on their site which gives an access to quality content.
  9. It is also advisable to have a good set of widgets on your blog as they can augment your blog. Joining a site such as BuySellAds, WidgetBucks helps a blogger get advertising widgets to display in addition to being in rich media format which increases the aesthetics of your blog.

These were a few methods which have been tried and tested in the blog-o-sphere. One needs to be highly active and must be a quick learner to accommodate with the dynamics of money minting strategies on the web.

Blogging 101 – Top tools to monetize your blog

make money After the process of setting up a blog, working with the basics and promoting it, it’s time to milk some money out of your hard work. No doubt it’s not a cake walk but at the same time, it isn’t a rocket science either. We shall look at some of the monetization programs which you can opt for your blog.

The biggest of all is Google’s very own – Adsense. For the uninitiated, Google Adsense is an advertising program by Google than can be run on your site or blog to enable text, picture and video ads. The Adsense program is one of the most recognizable and widely implemented online monetization tool by bloggers across the globe. It is one of the highest revenue generation program for most bloggers. The ads which get displayed on your site are more often than not contextual.

One of the main reasons of Google Adsense program being widely used than others is the ease of use and the Google brand. The ads are closely matched in context with the post, geographical location, and other parameters, etc. There are different ways to use Adsense effectively. Be it feeds, search, domain names and mobile content – Google has it for all!

Surprisingly, most people think that Adsense is the only program that is present on the web to help them monetize your blog. However, there are a plethora of other programs that people have successfully made money with. We shall talk about a few of them;

  1. Clicksor – It helps in driving customers with graphical banners, text ads, interstitial ads and pop-up ads. It is different from other programs because it majorly focuses on concentrating on converting visitors to your site into consumers via their product Content Marketing Technology. This helps the user in increasing the ROI quickly and effectively than others.
  2. TargetPoint – They claim to be technology leaders by providing the most relevant of ads. It is one of the most cost effective pay-per-search based program. The company only works with a limited numeral of direct advertisers. Their services are mostly publisher oriented in which the publisher will have control command over the ads form, regulation over ad content, entire statistics on your performance and enhanced bottom-line revenue.
  3. Adbrite – It is tipped as the 2nd best advertising program after Adsense. The ads fit the content of your site and have their base of advertisers which are biggies such as Live Nation, GM, AT&T and Verizon. As they are the 2nd best, their ads run on more than 1 billion pages and provide opportunities to scale up.
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Meet Labanon, Malaysian 5-Figure Wonder Kid

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_7VY3-YZkE[/youtube]

Here’s a short video with Labanon, the 17-year old Malaysian Internet marketer who made more than RM10,000 in one month with his e-book called Tip Adsense.

They just keep getting younger and younger, eh?

The interesting part of this interview is the fact that you don’t need to be the expert in order to sell an e-book. In Labanon’s case, he compiled tons of Adsense tips from other Internet marketers and sold it as an e-book. He has also compiled all his secrets into a case study called Rahsia 10K.

Building Your Virtual Real Estate by Sunny Tan

Here are the presentation videos and presentation slides from our first mastermind session in Armada Hotel on February 16, 2008. Presentation by Sunny Tan on “Building Your Virtual Real Estate”, part 1 and 2, as well as the presentation slides in PDF.
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