10 Money Making Blog Tips To Help You Make Money Blogging (2024)

Last Updated on June 23, 2020 by ellduclos

Did you know you can actually make money blogging? Crazy right?! I started my first blog in April 2017 and now I make a full time blogging income. Many bloggers go into blogging as a hobby which is perfectly fine! However, if you are interested in making an income with your blog, that’s perfectly fine too! YOU CAN! Today I wanted to share with you 10 money making blog tips to help you increase your blogging income this year.

In 2019 I made over $50,000 with my blog (before taxes and expenses). This is just 2 years into my blogging journey. Here’s a snap chat from my business paypal. (this doesn’t account for all the payments I’ve made because I do have some direct deposits.)You don’t need to be a 6 figure blogger to blog full time. If you are making any money from your blog you should feel proud! It’s not easy.

Needless to say, it’s possible! Please keep in mind that the money doesn’t come quick for everyone. There are many factors to take into consideration. My timeline may be different than yours and that’s okay. One of the top factors being “how much time a person can dedicate to their blog” because it does take SERIOUS dedication to make a full time income blogging.

I hope you find these money making blog tips helpful and motivating! Let’s get into it!

Disclaimer: Affiliate links are used and you can read my full disclosure here.

Have a solid foundation

Before you can expect to make money blogging, you need to have a solid foundation. Without a solid foundation it’s not as easy to make money. So what do I mean by this? What makes a solid blog foundation?

GET SELF HOSTING

It’s important to start your blog on the right platform for your blogging goals. If you have a goal to make money blogging, you probably don’t want to use platforms like wix or squarespace because they are very limiting. They don’t allow you to customize to your full advantage, you won’t have complete ownership over your site, and they aren’t the best for SEO (search engine optimization). If you have a self hosted wordpress you will have ownership over your site, limitless customization, fast server speeds and better SEO.

So what self host do I recommend?

I personally have been using Siteground for almost 3 years and have nothing but good things to say. They have the best live chat support, their servers are fast and never down, and it’s been affordable.

What plan should you pick?

The start up plan is good if you are starting fresh and don’t need help transferring your site from wix, squarespace, blogger or wordpress .com. It’s also the most affordable plan at $3.95 a month.

The grow big plan is good if you are wanting site transfer help, you can message Siteground’s live chat and they will help you transfer your site successfully. It’s also the plan you want to get if you receive over 25,000 monthly blog views. This plan starts at $5.95 a month.

When purchasing your plan keep in mind that you are getting an initial discount which will not apply upon renewal. If you do decide to purchase a plan with Siteground I recommend signing up for at least a year or two in order to save the most money overall.

You can purchase a plan here, AND if you are new to starting a blog, you can read my step by step guide on how to start a blog on Siteground here.

PROTECT YOUR BLOG LEGALLY

On top of having the right platform you also want to make sure you are blogging legally. If you are making money with your blog, using ads, collecting emails, using affiliate links, creating sponsored posts, then you need to have the proper legal policies in place!

You need to make sure you have a privacy policy and disclosure policy on your blog. I use these legal templates that are drafted by a fellow blogger and lawyer, Amira. I also have an interview that you can check out with Amira that opened my eyes to the legal sides of blogging.

Know your audience

Before you can make any money blogging you need to know who your audience is! What does your audience struggle with? What is your audience interested in? For example, my audience is bloggers, typically women who want to grow their blog and pursue their passion full time.

This is a huuuuge reason as to why I am able to make money, because I know who my audience is and I provide them with valuable tips pertaining to what they struggle with.

Maybe you are a blogger who writes about finance and budgeting. It’s quite possible your audience consists of those who struggle when it comes to budgeting and saving money. Ideally you would want to create content and products around ways to help others save money and learn how to budget or become debt free etc.

Once you know your audience and what they need help with, it will help you make those sales!

Build trust and personal connections

The truth is, you could have 100,000 + blog views and make little to no sales if you don’t have an audience that trusts you. You could also have 500,000 followers on Instagramand make zero sales if your audience doesn’t trust you. What I am trying to say is, QUALITY OVER QUANTITY.

In order to make sales you need an audience that can trust what you are saying, ESPECIALLY when it comes to selling a product.

I was terrified to launch my first product, Pinterest with Ell. I thought to myself, what if no one buys it? BUT, when I launched I was surprised to find out that people DID trust me. I ended up doing almost $3,000 in sales the month I launched.

I thought that was a great turnout for my first ever product launch.

Building trust and knowing your audience also works the same for your affiliate sales as well. If you want to make affiliate sales you need to build a trusting audience.

Here’s screenshots of just a few affiliate sales I made this past month:

Provide valuable free content

If you want to sell a product, course, or make an affiliate sale, you need to provide VALUABLE FREE content. Think about it, if you are providing content that’s free and valuable, your audience is going to trust that your paid content is worth it.

Create personal connections with your audience INSIDE and OUTSIDE of your blog

The biggest thing that’s helped me make money blogging is the personal connections I aim to make with my audience. I do my absolute best to reply to my audience in blog comments, on social media, in my Facebook group, and via email. A personal reply goes a long way. It makes your audience feel welcomed, heard, and valued. That’s important. The worst thing you can do is treat your readers like a number. Make those personal connections.

I love building personal connections with my readers through comments on my blog but I find it important to establish connections outside of the blog too.

The best thing I could have ever done for my blog is create a Facebook community to connect with my readers on a more personal level. I created Boss Girl Bloggers where my readers can join and get their questions answered. I do my best to respond to as many questions as possible. It’s helped establish that trust and personal connection.

I am telling you, this makes a world of a difference! If you want to learn how to create and grow your own Facebook group then check out this post.

Show results

If you want someone to purchase your course or a product you’re recommending, PROVE to them that the product is worth it. For example, I make sure that my course sales page shows my own personal results as well as reviews from those who have purchased my course.

I’m sorry but if you try to sell me a blog traffic course or a monetization course without showing me that your strategies have actually worked for you and others, then I will not purchase.

There are too many courses out there that are priced high and promise you the world without any proof and stats to back up what they are selling.

Without concrete evidence that the product is worth the price, the less sales you will probably make.

Get eyes on your content

I know I said quality over quantity but it’s still important to care about your blog traffic. The more eyes on your content, the potential for a sale increases. ALSO, did you know that you can make money just by having people read your blog post? YEP, and you do this by using ads. Now I am not talking about google ads because in my opinion its a waste of space. Google ads pay very little and just take up space on your blog with no real purpose. Mediavine on the other had is the REAL deal. Their payout is better and it can add to your income.

Last month I made over $800 just from ads on my website.

I had a little over 100,000 blog views at this time.

The amount of money you make via ads on Mediavine can be entirely up to you too! You can change your ad density easily so if you prefer to have less ads on your blog and only earn a little, you can do that too.

This is passive income that I didn’t have to put much effort into. If you have a solid content marketing strategy that brings you blog views, then you can make money blogging.

In order to qualify for Mediavine you need to have at least 25,000 sessions in the last 30 days. (not page views) As you can see I had 114,642 page views but only 62,494 sessions.

So how can you grow your blog traffic to get accepted into Mediavine and get more eyes on your affiliate links and digital products?

Pinterest Marketing

This is my number ONE source of blog traffic and I know I sound bias because I have my own Pinterest E-course BUT I promise you, you want to get into Pinterest marketing if you are a blogger. Whether you learn from me or someone else, LEARN PINTEREST.

I received over 150,000 page views in the last 30 days thanks to my updated pinning strategies.

E-mail Marketing

Although I personally don’t find e-mail marketing to be as effective as it once was, it still works. Have an e-mail list builder set up and start growing it. I use Mailerlite and it’s free for up to 1,000 subscribers. If someone joins your e-mail list it means they REALLY like you. It also means they are more likely to make a purchase than someone who isn’t a subscriber. Nurture your e-mail list and you can find yourself making sales and growing your blog traffic via your e-mail list in no time.

A lot of bloggers ask me, what’s the best way to grow your e-mail list? My answer is, create a freebie! This is something you offer to your subscribers in exchange for them joining your e-mail list. You can create this freebie using automations on Mailerlite.

Ideas of great freebies:

Guides
How to’s
Printables
Stock Photos
Journal Pages
Mini Courses
Free Tips
Planner Pages
Templates

Another great thing to remember is, the more valuable your freebie is, the better chance you have at selling a product to your e-mail list in the future.

SEO

Another great way to grow your blog traffic is through SEO (search engine optimization) I highly suggest doing some in-depth research on the best SEO strategies. SEO is tough and can be a very slow burner. I know only the basics and hoping to take an in-depth course soon!

Social Media Marketing

The last way I grow my blog traffic and sales is through social media marketing. I have a heavy focus on twitter because I have an awesome engaged audience on Twitter. Shameless self promoting -> Follow me on twitter @BGBLOGGERS

A single tweet of a blog post link can bring me hundreds of blog views.

I also try to promote my links via my Facebook page, Facebook group, and through my Instagram stories using the swipe up feature.

If you need tips to help you grow an engaged social media following then check this post out.

PAUSE! Snag my FREE IG Crash Course!

Promote Wisely

The next tip I have when it comes to making money blogging is to promote your affiliate links and courses wisely. You don’t want to come off as too salesy but you also want to promote your links enough to increase your sales. It’s all about being tactical!

Tips on promoting affiliate links:

Make sure you include them naturally throughout each blog post using text links. A huge turn off for your readers can be banner links. They look like ads. Yes I have Mediavine ads on my blog and people are less likely to click on them as opposed to a text link that’s naturally thrown into my blog post.

If you really want to have your link stand out, make it big with a call to action.

For Example:

–> Click here to start a blog on Siteground <–

You have to play around with your techniques to see which work best for your audience.

Create a resource page or shop my favorites page

Creating a resource page is a great way to promote your affiliate links. Here’s mine for example.

Depending on your niche your resource/shop my favorites page can be products you use for your blog, beauty items you use on the daily, health and wellness products you swear by, the best tools and products you use to help you budget and save money, etc. Whatever your niche may be, create a resource page or shop my favorites page using your affiliate links and add it to your main menu.

Create a pin linking to your affiliate link

Another great way to make extra affiliate sales is by creating a pin for your affiliate link and promoting it on Pinterest like you would your blog post. However, before you do this make sure you look into the affiliate program’s rules to make sure it doesn’t go against their terms of use.

If you want to know some of my favorite affiliate programs, I share a ton that I use in this blog post.

Create content that makes it easy to link to affiliate links

Having content that is geared towards your affiliate links makes it easier to make a sale. So what kind of content can you create?

Round up posts of your favorite products (example: top 10 favorite skin care products)
Step by step guides and tutorials for specific products
A product review, these typically bring great results especially when they rank on search! Someone who is searching a product review for a product they are wanting to purchase, will be more likely to convert and purchase depending on the review.

Remember, only promote affiliate links for products you actually LOVE. Honesty goes far.

How to promote your product

Now you might be wondering how to get more sales when it comes to your own digital product.

Create a stellar sales page

Like I mentioned before, having a stellar sales page is KEY to making a sale. Your Sales page should include stats with proof that this product works (especially if it’s a course of some kind or something that promises an end result)

It should also include reviews and testimonials from previous purchasers. If you need to gather up some reviews when you are first starting out you can reach out to others to see if they’d be interested in collabing. They can be beta testers for your product and give you honest feedback.

BONUS TIP: Create your sales page as a page on your blog that you can direct the reader to. This will also help you increase your page views.

Have a promo

Sometimes it’s not a bad thing to have a sale on your product to help get the word out about your product. I recently had a sale on my e-course in December and I received over $3,000 in sales.

Not only did I make more sales but I also got more people to buy my product and hopefully enjoy it to the point where they will share it with others.

BONUS: Learn how to Master Sales with this course

Have affiliates

You can also see that I have affiliates for my product. If someone purchases my course via their link, they get 30% commission. They help me make a sale and I help them make money, it’s a win/win! I use Teachable for all of my courses and they make it so easy to set up an affiliate program!

Link to your product in your related blog posts

If you have a blog post where you can name drop and link to your product, do so! You can also do a dedicated blog post that talks about what one can expect if they purchase your product. I always try to create content that I can easily mention my e-course in. It definitely helps.

Create a pin for your product

Just like you did for your blog posts and affiliate links, you can create a pin for your product as well! Promote it with good Pinterest strategies and you will see those sales increase.

E-mail Marketing

Use e-mail marketing strategies to try and sell your product. You can also create a freebie that is related to your product and offer a link to your product at the end of it. Include a blurb/ad about your product in your weekly/monthly newsletter. You can also offer exclusive discount codes to your e-mail list to entice them to want to purchase your product.

Erase limiting beliefs

If you want to have a money making blog you need to erase your limiting beliefs. There are so many limiting beliefs that I see bloggers practice.

Here are some limiting beliefs holding you back:

“My niche can’t make me money.”

Hold up, if you are thinking this you better STOP. Is it true that some niches are more difficult to monetize? For sure, but that doesn’t mean you can’t monetize. Even if you grow your blog traffic you can get Mediavine ads and make money blogging. Every niche can be monetized. Creativity is also key. Don’t limit yourself by thinking you can’t make money with your niche because you definitely can if you try. Will it be immediate? NO. It takes time and hard work. But it is possible.

“My niche is too saturated.”

Oh man, I see this limiting belief A LOT. So many bloggers decide not to start a blog on a topic they love because they think its “too saturated.” Here’s the thing, there are billions of people in the world. There is PLENTY of room for you. Those who are meant to find your content will find it if you market your blog properly.

There are billions of people who don’t know about my blog but i’m sure they know about a different blogger in the same niche. Does that mean that i’m not being heard and can’t make money? NOPE! Stop letting that hold you back.

“It’s too complicated.”

There have been so many times that I notice bloggers not wanting to implement a money making strategy or learn how to make something work because it’s “too complicated.” Majority of bloggers who are working full time had to LEARN.

It was complicated in the beginning but they didn’t let that stop them. It was their passion so they learned how to make it work. If you feel like WordPress is too complex so you give up and go with an easier platform like Wix, you might not get the results you wanted. Sometimes the most complicated things can lead to the best outcomes. Take the time to learn because I promise, the learning never stops and it’s always worth it.

“My content isn’t good enough.”

Self doubt and comparison are some of the main reasons why bloggers give up on their blog. They believe their content isn’t good enough and feel like that’s why it’s not getting seen. This is almost never the case, it’s just that you are still in the learning phase. You are still learning how to market your content and get your content seen.

I have looked back at my old content and cringed before. I am CONSTANTLY updating my old posts because I am constantly learning. That’s part of blogging. I can also promise that if you don’t have solid content marketing strategy in place you will never get the results you want. Instead of thinking your content isn’t good enough, believe that your content IS awesome and take the time to continue to better your content and strategies as you go.

“I don’t have the time.”

The number one limiting belief and excuse I am always hearing is, “I don’t have the time.” The truth is, creating a money making blog is a lot of work. It’s not easy, and it does take time. However, you make time for what matters to you.

If you really want to make this work, you will find the time. You may have to prioritize your time differently than you were before but once you find your groove, it gets easier. If this is what you really want, make time for it.

Be willing to continuously learn

If you want to make money blogging you need to be willing to learn. You can’t stop learning. Algorithms change and you need to learn how to change with them. Try out new strategies and have a growth mindset. That’s the biggest tip I can give you.

It’s so easy to get to a point and feel like you made it far enough. For me, I am proud of every step I make but I will continue to keep growing. I don’t limit myself. Celebrate every mile stone but be willing to grow and learn more and you will see positive results.

Be active

If you want to make money blogging you have to be active with everything you do.

Actively working on your blog
Actively engaging with your audience
Actively showing up on social media
Actively testing out new strategies
Actively setting and working towards new goals

BE ACTIVE.

Invest in your blog

If you want to make money blogging you need to invest in your blog. You have to ditch the “I don’t want to invest money until i’m making it” mindset because it’s holding you back.

This is the most limiting belief. There are so many bloggers who are afraid to invest money into their blog. They would rather wait until they are making money. If this is you, please listen.

I started investing in my blog two months in and I haven’t looked back. In fact, last year I invested $6,000 into my blog and business. It was worth it. When you make investments you have to just do so wisely. Do your research and make sure the investment makes sense for you.

PLUS all your blog investments can be used as tax write offs. That’s freaking awesome!

I don’t know why but when I invest in my blog it ignites a flame under my butt. It makes me want to work that much harder because I have money invested. Without the investment i’m not as motivated to work at it because if it doesn’t work out, i’m not losing much, right?

Here’s a list of investments I made last year for my blog.

Manage your time wisely

If you don’t have a set plan for what you want to do for your blog every month, week, and day you are only making it harder for yourself when it comes to making money blogging. I definitely recommend creating a content schedule and prioritizing your time as a blogger to make sure you are making the most of your time.

I share my blogging schedule for success here.

That wraps up today’s post on how to have a money making blog! I hope you found these tips helpful.

Would love to hear from you in the comments!

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