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Making Money Blogging

Your blog can make affiliate income or you can sell advertisements on your blog.   Today is going to cover a few more ways to make money with your blog.   Some may be things you haven’t thought your blog as using!   The last is the one that any rockstar blogger wants!  Who doesn’t want to be given free samples?

Craft Blogs Build Business

If you are into crafts or homemade products, you can sell them with Etsy.com. I am constantly amazed by the number and variety of goods available on the site.  Perhaps you make quilts, or fancy dolls,  wooden pens or crystal balls.   On Etsy, you will see those and more, even things for your door.  (It started rhyming and I had to go with it)

Auction Blogging

Some people discuss the items they have for sale on eBay.com. If you regularly auction things then you should blog about your auctions!  Even in you don’t regularly auction, there is no reason not to discuss when you do have an auction running.   If your blog is focused on something that might be offered on eBay, you can affiliate with them and post links to related items.

What about Services ?

You can offer your services on a site like elance.com and then further discuss services or provide additional services on your WordPress.

Are you too cool?

Some people have blogs so popular that websites, stores and more look for them. If you build a site like that, and they will ask you to let them advertise on your website. They may ask you to review a product or service and they will give that item to you free. Plus this gives you more material to discuss in your blog.

So no matter how you choose to make money with your blog, make certain to write about your experiences.  Write about what you do.  Writing posts is what puts new material on your page, and new material gives your readers more reasons to come back to your site.   And that’s the goal!

Tomorrow what your readers see…

Blog Advertising

Yesterday we discussed ways to make money on your blog as an affiliate, but that is not the only way.  It is ever amazing to me to see all the different ways that someone can make money with their blogs.  While not everyone creates full time income with their blog, any money can add to your current income.   So today we are going to cover another way to add income!

Banner Ads on Your Blog

A popular way to make blog income that we all see is with advertisements.  You could have banner ads on your website.  These you can blog money makers from being an affiliate.  At their affiliate pages they will have images you can use as banners or square ads.   They may even have a blog post you can add to your site.

Ask for more!

Another way to get advertising is by asking similar blogs or business owners you know.   You could post an article asking for advertising or place an ad on your site saying “your banner ad could be here.” Some people get advertisements on friends they meet in online forums.

AdSense and Blogs Make a Great Combination!

You can register to add a block of Google Ads to your site.  The site will walk you through the process.  You get paid per click, which means each time someone clicks on one of the ads you make a few cents, however that can add up!  Plus there are times when words sell for even more.

Tomorrow will be another post about how you can make money with your blog!  Funny it seems my posts have been coming in sets of three.  Maybe that’s just in my head. 

Benefits of Hosting Your Blog

Allowing Wordpress.com, blogger.com or another blog website to host your blog gives up some of your control.  As discussed in the history of blogging, those who used blog websites sometimes found their blogs had gone away without notification.

What could they do?

Rockstar Guide

But as this was happening some blog owners had already left the community websites. This created Wordpress.org a self-hosted, meaning hosted on your own website, blogging program. For writers who found the community too small and limiting they could manage their own.Other writers who didn’t like that readers distracted by other blogs or ads could control what was seen by their readers.

And for the above group, those whose blogs were abolished, by controlling their own blog program the freedom to write about their passions was greatly expanded. Those people did not have to worry about the blogging site disagreeing or disapproving of what was written or if they wanted to post an ad.

What can you do?

Once you host your own blog, you can have an ad, discuss whatever you want.  You do not have to worry about the blog site dissolving your website without forewarning.   In addition, the blog programs are easy to use.

After they are installed, you can use them like a regular website.  The biggest advantage is the ability to quickly make changes and add new information. Many big companies are switching to blogs for those reasons and more!

History of Blogging

Yesterday, we learned what blogging is.  Today is some of the history of  blogging.

How did it begin?

At first there were websites like blogger.com, Wordpress.com and other such sites that allowed, and still allow, anyone to get started without owning a website or domain name. These sites started as diaries for people, yet soon people realized it was a great way to share articles and information about their passions. While people started exploring their passions publicly online, a small problem emerged.

What was the problem?

Sometimes those sites didn’t like what people shared. Since people who joined the site agreed to follow the blog site’s rules and regulations and the blog site could discontinue or even pull a blog from their site. So people who had spent months or even years writing posts could log in and find their blog gone! Even worse, their readers might contact them to ask what happened and the blog owner would be left scrambling to find their blog was abolished!

But fortunately a solution was already building.  Self-hosted blog programs were already available, and with this Titanic people were quick to see the benefits.  Blogging websites are still popular because the ease of use.  It is great advantage to those who are not tech-savvy to be able to get started just by writing.

Yet more and more people are converting to self hosted blogs.   Also see the “Benefits of Hosting Your Blog“

What is Blogging?

Well, here I am talking all about blogs and you may not know much about them.  Nothing like putting the cart before the horse. Blogs have become  the new and popular way to share information.   The people who have blogs range from famous names to people in your own neighborhood.

What is blogging?

Blogging is the “verb” of what people do in their blog, and a blog is a combination of the two words, “web” and “log.” Logs being the chronological journals often thought of as something written by captains of ships.  Like computers keep changing so have blogs.

How have blogs changed the Internet?

Blog writing and blog programs have changed the face of the internet. Once a website was a hard thing to bring to life, and once the site was created it was almost as hard to make any changes to the site. The creation of blogs and blogging has almost leveled the playing field.

What made it easier?

Blog programs suddenly allowed people who were non-technical to create websites and change things on their sites.  putting it up was the biggest hurdle.  But then and even now, blog sites are the fastest way to get online.  I’ll explain that tomorrow with the History of Blogs.

What do Your Blog Posts Need?

Yesterday I explained what to write about in your blog posts.  Today is going to cover some more particulars, more of the behind the scenes type of stuff.

What are you writing about?

Decide on what you are going to write about. Think about other terms that might cover the same subject.  You want to use good keywords.   A keyword tool can help you find other terms.  Finding other terms and long terms can help you come up with additional posts.

What is your Category?

Now that you have written your post, select a category over on the right. There is an “Add new Category,” if your post does not fit into your previous categories. Select only one, otherwise it will cause complications. If you do not select a category it will go into “Uncategorized,” which is not what you want.

Do you remember this important aspect?

Click “Save Draft” every so often, so you don’t panic if something happens to your electricity or Internet. It’s also great if something interrupts your writing. If writer’s block or the busy activities didn’t keep the children busy enough, click “Save Draft” and log out and you can finish later.

Are you tagging?

You will want to add tags to all of your blog posts. They should overlap the keywords you used in your post and category.  For example a post about dogs digging might have terms like dog training, digging, bad behaviors, and other tags.

These little tips will help your blog stand out and get more people interested.  Plus help you keep focused and keep your sanity.  We’ve all had problems where the computer decides to stop working right in the middle of something important.