How do bloggers make money? If I had a dollar for everytime someone asked me that question, then that would be how I made my money! 

The reality is that bloggers are popping up left and right with courses, trainings and webinars teaching others how to start making money from virtually anywhere. Is it too good to be true? 

In this post I’m going to walk you through the various ways that bloggers make money and show you how to do it too. Blogging doesn’t have to be a pipe dream; you really can earn an income from it.

Disclaimer: this post may contain some affiliate links. When you make purchases through my links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you so much for your support!

Yes, bloggers really do make money

That’s right. It’s not too good to be true! There’s so much space online to grow and share your blog. It’s not easy, but it is very much possible. You just have to make sure that you take the right approach.

That’s why I’m going to share with you the various ways that bloggers make money. Some of these ideas might not be for you and you don’t need to exhaust yourself trying to do them all, but it’s best to know what your options are. 

Before we get into it, I want to remind you that making money blogging doesn’t happen overnight. This isn’t a get-rich-quick scheme. You have to put in the ground work and craft useful, relevant content. It takes some bloggers years to make their first hundred dollars, but with the right strategies in place you can start seeing a profit much sooner.

There are four main ways that bloggers make money:

1. Collaborations with brands

If you’re familiar with Instagram then you’ll know that influencers are always using the platform to collaborate with other brands. It’s a powerful tool but blogging can be even more valuable to the brands you’re working with.

An Instagram post is really only relevant for about 24 hours… but a blog post? It can be relevant for years. A well-written blog post will continue to show up in Google search results and attract new customers. Collaborating with a brand through a blog post can be more profitable for the bloggers and for the brands. 

(Tip: when brands want you to post about them on your blog, make sure you explain the value of a well-written blog post and charge them accordingly.)

2. Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketing is when you promote a product with a unique tracking link (called a cookie) that links back to you.

This way, the company can track how many sales you brought directly to them. You’re doing their marketing for them. In return, they pay you a portion of the revenue, at no additional cost to the customer. 

You can really become an affiliate for any brand these days. There are several ways to do this. You could become an affiliate with a brand directly or become a member of a larger affiliate site, which will connect you with products they think will resonate with your audience. You recommend your favorite products and you make money if your readers buy them through your links.

Affiliate marketing is incredibly profitable when done well. It’s not limiting to blog posts either: you can share your affiliate links via email and social media, too. This is a great way to generate multiple streams of income and discover which audience is most likely to buy the products you recommend.

There are a few important things to keep in mind, however. One of the biggest things to note is that you must always disclose affiliate links. Legally, your readers need to be aware that you are getting paid to promote a certain product. Make sure that you are always promoting products that you have tried and tested. That way you can build trust with your audience and make even more in affiliate income as a result.

3. Ads

I’ll be honest with you, unless you are getting a LOT of traffic, you won’t see a great return in ad revenue when you are first starting out. I highly recommend working on your affiliate income and brand collaborations before putting too much into ads. They’ll clutter up your site, which can drive users to leave instead of sticking around to see the amazing content you’ve worked so hard to create for them. 

My biggest advice when it comes to using ads on your blog is to be smart with the ad placement and frequency. There are bloggers who do a really good job of making ads blend into the site, and then there are bloggers who clutter up their sites with ads. 

4. Digital Products and Services

Offering digital products and services on your site is an amazing way to give back to your audience, earn an income and keep growing your blog. You can start by providing your readers with loads of free resources that funnel into a paid product.

Your content should answer a big question for your audience. Do lots of people ask you how you edit your photos? Go ahead and sell Lightroom presets or an editing course. If they want to land collaborations in a similar field, then sell brand pitch guides and templates. 

Products you can sell on your blog include:

• eBooks and Guides
• Presets
• Courses
• Wallpapers
• Prints
• Templates
  

You can also sell services on your blog. Blogging is multifaceted and requires many different skill sets. There are a lot of ways that you can turn everything you know about blogging into a profitable business. You could ghostwrite other bloggers’ posts for them or help them with the technical side of things. If you’re a keen photographer, offer your services to brands that love your style.

Which blogging platform is best for me?

The way you decide to monetize your blog should factor into your choice of platform. If you plan on earning money through collaborations and affiliate marketing, then you can start out any platform. However, if your strategy is centred around ads or selling digital products then you need to choose carefully.

Make sure the blogging platform you choose is going to make running ads easy. If you want to make money through ads, it’s a good idea to stick with WordPress because it already has plugins developed for running ads. 

If you’re going to set up an online store along with your blog, then you might want to look around. You can choose from Shopify, WordPress (with Woocommerce), Squarespace and Showit.co. The options are endless. What it comes down to is your level of ‘tech savviness’ and how much help you’re going to need along the way. WordPress can be quite difficult to get the hang of, but there are plenty of helpful resources out there.

There are many more ways to make money through blogging, but these are definitely the top four. Do you have any questions about blogging? Drop them down in the comments. I’d love to help!

In the meantime, check out my top 5 ways to increase traffic to your blog.