PureBlogging

I don’t know about you, but I’ve always liked the idea that I could monetize my blog and make passive income. I’m going to write the content anyway, so why shouldn’t it make a bit of money? The trouble is, how do you decide which advertising system is best? Here’s what I’ve discovered so far on my blog advertising quest.

Adsense

I started out with Google Adsense. It was easy to get an account, and relatively easy to set up. In the few years that I’ve been using Adsense, ad creation has got even easier. However, it took more than 18 months to reach first payout. Why was this? Because when I started out, I had no idea what I was doing. I though I would stick some ads there and the income would roll in. I knew nothing about ad placement and hotspots. Heck, I was only just learning about blogging.

Adsense Placement

Since then, I’ve learned a lot about where to put ads so that people will see them and occasionally click on them. Depending on my blog theme, I may put an ad in the header (though usually I avoid this in favour of having information relating to my blog). I put a block in the sidebar, and I usually put some under the post title or above the comments on single post pages (not both, as I wouldn’t want the pages to look too cluttered).

What really made the difference to Adsense earnings was having the ads on a blog with great content. My first blog was fun, but had no identifiable purpose. With Get Paid To Write Online, everyone knew what it was about and the ad income increased quickly. Of course, Google keeps making changes and the income fluctuates, but it makes some nice pocket change. I don’t think I’ll get rich on it any time soon, though.

Kontera

That’s why I decided to try some alternatives. One that I’d heard a lot about was Kontera. Those are those hideous double underlined links that pop up all over blog posts. I have to be honest; I don’t like the look, but at least it means that they can’t be confused with Google ads. More people seem to click on the links and those ads are also bringing in pocket change.

Good features with Kontera are that it’s easy to make sure that the ads only appear in certain places. Although Kontera tells you how to do that with code, I find it easier to use the Kontera Integration plugin. I usually switch off the ads on current posts and switch them on again on old posts. After all, people still click on ads in the archives.

They’ve also got a new publisher interface which tells me which keywords attracted the most clicks in the last week, and which pages got the most clicks. In my latest report, it was a post on creating a writing portfolio. Incidentally, checking my analytics stats reveals that that was my second most popular post in the last week.

Affiliate Ads

Finally, I have also been experimenting with Commission Junction, Clickbank and others. So far, I am underwhelmed, but I know what I have to do to fix that. All the 125×125 ads bar one are for products and services that I have actually used. In order to get people interested, I need to talk about those services. Otherwise, why should anyone even bother to click? Some have, but I won’t hold my breath waiting for the next one.

That aside, it’s also a question of finding complementary products. For a writing blog, that might include ads about writing courses, self promotion and blogging. I’m still searching for those that are the best fit for my site (suggestions welcome). In the meantime, I’m trying out Project Wonderful, which was recommended to me. I’ll update you on how that goes in a few weeks.

My conclusion is that no single company has all the answers. Perhaps I should pay more attention to private ad sales instead, as these seem to be more lucrative. If you monetize, what have you found to be most effective?

Hey, want to make money blogging?

Normally I’d be writing some deeply philosophical post about blogging and What It All Means. But all I want to do here is show you something good to help you monetize your blog via advertising. I’ll get right to it:

Mark Wielgus of 45n5 is one of my favorite make-money guys online, because he’s the real deal: just a dude with a knack for programming and good marketing chops. A lethal combination (like ShoeMoney and Dillsmack combined). He really does make good money and he truly wants to help you make money too. He has a habit of simply building the tools he wished existed. Just so happens they’re great ideas.

Show Your Ad Here is the latest project. It’s a free ad server service. You can be a publisher and display ads on your site, or you can be an advertiser and run ads on the network. Mark’s got a dedicated server–blazing fast for this. He’s got a bunch of new features ready to roll and wants feedback for more.

And get this: 75% payouts! Not only that, but the payouts are instant and happen as soon as an ad is sold. See what I mean about building the tools he wished existed? It almost makes me want to put ads on my blog.

Here’s the deal:

• Free hosted ad server. Serve up affiliate banners, or any banner, all day long, on them.
• If an ad is sold, the publishers keep 75%. (plus they cover the PayPal fees).
• Instant Payments. When someone buys an ad, you get paid!
• Rotate your own ads with ease. (cuts down on banner blindness and makes split testing a breeze).
• GeoTargeting - You choose who sees your ad.
• Manage ads for multiple adzones and multiple sites all from one place.
• Feedback system. Buyers and sellers can leave messages for each ad.
• Social ratings. Add or substract from each person’s community score with each ad buy. See who is new, good, or bad to deal with.

By the way, Mark didn’t ask me or pay me to do this. These links are not affiliate links. I’m pimping this because he’s one of the good guys and because, well… everybody wants to make money blogging. I get nothing for this. I’m doing it to provide you with a new and potentially profitable resource for making money online from blogging.

So… is there a down side? Sure. It’s new, and doesn’t have big traffic yet, so you’re taking a bit of a chance with that. And although this may not matter to most people, it matters to me: I have to confess the site is pretty ugly. I’m sure Mark will get it spiffed up at some point. After all, 45n5 is a decent-looking site. I think he’s got other things on his mind, right now.

Again, that’s Show Your Ad Here.

For a long time now bloggers and website owners have been trying to find way to gain traffic for nothing, well really its a fact of life everyone wants something for nothing. What is the answer? Well I think Entrecard is the answer!

After the great review by Sharon on Entrecard, there was little point talking about Entrecard in more depth. Therefore, I thought I would write a little post and let everyone know about an Entrecard competition that will really boost your visibility within the Entrecard community and on other sites such as Problogger, John Chow, Tyler Cruz, Adii, Bloggingtips, Pureblogging and of course my site Crenk.

Currently, im giving away 500 Entrecard credits on Crenk. It is an easy competition to enter and best of all for entering you will receive a free link back from Crenk to your site.

So enjoy the competition and good luck.

How would you like to make more money with your business blog? You could use the extra money to invest in more supplies for your business, treat yourself to dinner or purchase some additional advertising.

I’m sure you’ve already read about each of the programs available to help you make more money with your blog, so instead of rehashing the old, I’m going to put my own twist on an overdone topic by revealing tips to help you use those programs effectively so you can make more money with your business blog.

Affiliate Programs

1. Create links in your sidebar with a heading related to your blog. Then, underneath each of the headings, link to products, ebooks, services and websites from your affiliate programs that are relevant to your business blog as well as the heading you plan to place them under. For example, in my blog about my life as writer, I have the following headings: Resources for Writers and Recommended Reading for Writers.

2. Login to your affiliate program(s) and choose text links to go with some of the text within your blog post. For instance, the Amazon Affiliates program lets you add a Quick Linker Widget, which allows you to create shorter affiliate links that you can use to link to search results, certain products or etc..

In my blog, I link text phrases such as freelance writing and paying markets to search results in the book category at Amazon. Alternatively, if you mention an ebook or other product in your blog and the affiliate program you’re a member of has a text link available for it, then you could hyperlink the title of that ebook or product.

3. Contact the author of the ebook or product with a review request. Explain to him or her that you’re an affiliate and believe your review of their product could help you sell more. They may refuse to send you the product for review, but it’s worth a shot and benefits you both.

Pay Per Post

1. Don’t fill your business blog with tons of pay per post ads. A few every once in a while is fine, but too many will drive your readers away.

2. When writing a pay per post ad, try to keep the message relevant with your blog. In other words, be creative. Here’s an example.

Private Advertising

1. Create a page listing your rates and advertising services, and include instructions on how a company or individual can purchase advertising on your blog.

2. Keep your rates fair, and include the average number of monthly visitors and page views that your blog receives. This information lets potential advertisers know the size of the audience they’ll reach. See our advertising page as an example.

3. Offer occasional discounts.

4. 125 x 125 buttons works the best for bloggers who sell private ads on their business blogs. The reason is because you can place these banners together in the sidebar, and they don’t take up much room.

Donations

If you ask your readers for donations to support your business blog, then in an effort to build a good reputation for your business, you could let those generous enough to support your business blog know that you’ll donate a certain percentage of what they donate to you to XYZ charity. Mention the percentage you plan to donate as well as the name of the charity, and place a link to the charity’s website so those interested can find out more about the charity.

Contextual Ad Programs

Successful bloggers who use Chitika and Adsense report that they’ve found the following contextual ads to be more effective for them:

Chitika

1. eMiniMalls positioned at the footer of your blog posts.

2. Related product units (RPU) placed at the end of your blog post.

3. Experiment to determine which Chitika product ads work best for you.

Adsense

1. Wide ads ranging from 336 x 280, 300 x 250 and 250 x 250 seem to be the most effective. Also, build those ads to blend in with your blog’s design, and set them to show both text and image ads.

2. Embed your Adsense ads within your blog posts. The best areas to place them are at the footer of your post or to the right of your post.

3. Place a search box at the top of your business blog. Set your Adsense Search up to allow your readers to search both Google and your blog. Every time a reader clicks on a sponsored ad from the search results, you’ll earn more revenue from Adsense.

4. As with Chitika, experiment to determine which Adsense ads work best for you.

I hope you found my tips helpful, and I invite you to share your own tips in the comment area. Join me again next Wednesday as I conclude this series of posts on Building a Business Blog with a list of ways you can promote your business blog. Stay tuned or subscribe to our RSS feed.

It’s been a long, jet-lag-filled post-holiday week here in the House of Kev, so my post this week will be devoid of the usual top-flight content-creation advice and Algonquin-Roundtable-worthy bon mots. Instead I’m going to point you to a potential moneymaking resource that I could see myself using someday. Mostly I’m curious to see what you all think of it.

It’s called WordHugger, and as I mentioned in my title, it’s not dissimilar to Squidoo, in that it allows users to create pages centered around specific topics. It bears one fairly major difference, however — it’s a paid service.

Collin LaHay, WordHugger’s developer, markets the site as a method of investing via microlending — he even offers a money-back guarantee. A page costs $60 for ten years; each page revolves around a single word, like Wikipedia or dating, and uses can do whatever they like with them — add clickthroughs or affiliate links, or fill them with random and seemingly useless information.

Overall LaHay seems pretty knowledgeable when it comes to SEO and online revenue streams; his blog is full of useful information, and one of his most recent posts, titled “Top Ten Reasons This Post Will Be Popular on Digg,” recently took the top spot on, well, Digg. So clearly this is a guy who’s got his head in the right place when it comes to monetizing and marketing.

What I’m having trouble figuring out is why anyone would choose WordHugger over Squidoo; the best reason I can come up with is altruism, since half of the profits from WordHugger go to Kiva, a nonprofit organization that offers microloans to entrepreneurs in developing countries (LaHay claims the other half goes to pay off his student loans).  I think that’s a great idea, but will it take off among an audience of Web-based entrepreneurs? My own dim view of human nature makes me wonder.

LaHay also recently introduced a new site called rssHugger, which is similar in scope. We’ll talk about that next week.

Not long ago the blogosphere was seeing a lot of posts about how Page Ranks were going down, apparently as a result of blogs using monetization techniques that conflicted with Google AdSense. Within a few days, there was an adjustment, and many of the blogs recovered their previous page ranking, it does make you wonder why it happened in the first place. It also makes me wonder, does Google reward blogs that use AdSense and/or punish blogs that don’t?

In many ways, and for a lot of reasons, Google rules the internet world. While it is possible to not do well on Google and still make money, it is a hard way to go, and I don’t recommend it. Ranking well on Google can send hundreds of paying customers to your blog on a regular basis. It’s hard to ignore that amount of trafic.

That being said, it raises the dilemma of how to monetize your blog. While AdSense is very easy to use, it certainly isn’t the only option that is available. It is a great place to start, and some bloggers claim to have seen a lot of income from AdSense, but most bloggers will agree that it isn’t good business sense to put all of your eggs in one basket. Just like investing, diversity is the smart way to go. Chitika and Text Link Ads are two very good options that you can use to compliment your AdSense campaign. There are also other options like Amazon, or one of hundreds of affiliate programs you could sign up for. You could also make money off of your blog by selling your services as a consultant or by doing paid reviews. There are many different possibilities.

If you are using one of the different as choices, remember to keep a log of the changes you make to your advertising. Experiment not only with the types of programs you are using, but also with location on the page, color schemes, and size of the ad. When you make a change, log it and then track the results. Don’t just track your click through rate; also track what it does to your Page Rank and your position on the search engines. If your position begins to slip, you need to ask your self if the change is worth making. You may have a higher click through rate, but losing your position will result in less traffic, and lower profits.

For those of you that have already experimented with your advertising, I’d love to hear your opinion. Does the type of advertising you use affect your position on Google? What has worked for you? We could all benefit from your experience.