How to Monetize a Blog Even if you are New

Can you really earn money from your blog? It almost sounds too good to be true.

You may be having doubts if your blog is new and doesn’t get too much traffic yet. You can learn how to monetize your blog even with low traffic volume.

The mistake that most bloggers make is giving up because they don’t see results in a minute. You can create a nice income stream through blog monetization but you have to remember that it takes time.

I’ve been earning money through blogging for many years so I know it works. The first few months were tough and I didn’t earn a penny.

I didn’t give up. I learned the necessary skills and focused on the best blog topics for making money in my niche market. Sure enough, I started earning an income and turned it into multiple income streams with multiple niche markets.

If you feel disappointed with your results so far, I recommend that you adjust your expectations.

Many bloggers are led to believe that they will start their blog and earn money in a short time. That is simply not true.

It takes time and patience because blogging is a passive marketing method. But it sure is fun to wake up to commissions every day!

Setting yourself up for success from the start is important. Don’t be one of those bloggers who thinks you have to get “established” before you start monetizing.

Here’s a secret. You have to teach your audience from the start to take action on your content. If not, once you are established you’ll have attracted an audience who are not action-takers!

This article will help you understand how to monetize your new blog as it evolves over time.

1 – Why Use Self-Hosted WordPress to Monetize your Blog

By now, you are aware of all the various blogging platforms that are available. It’s tempting to go for the free blogs like Blogger, WordPress.com and Wix.

If you are serious about earning money from a blog and building a business online, I highly recommend that you start your self-hosted WordPress blog. That’s exactly why this is first in the list!

You are here because you are serious, right? Then invest in your business. Your blog is an asset on the Internet. This is not some little hobby (unless you want it to be.)

When you use free blogging services, you do not control your own content. Be sure to read the fine print on their policies.

The free blog company can remove your content and some restrict ads or affiliate links. Worse yet is many merchants frown on these free platforms making it difficult for you make money with a free blog.

You can learn more in depth here about free vs self-hosted blogging to completely understand it. When you are ready to get your web hosting, I recommend the same web host I’ve started using for many of my blogs. They have the best deal and customer service. Check out SiteGround here.

2 – Offer Your Services to Blog Visitors

What is your expertise? You can turn your expertise into coaching services. Giving your readers the opportunity to learn from you is a great way to make money.

I see a lot of bloggers who monetize their blogs by offering a variety of services. You may not get a line of customers at first but you can grow over time.

When you first get started, spend more time in social media.

Join groups that align with your expertise and be the most helpful person in the group. Direct people to your high-quality blog posts to get their questions answered and make sure you have information about your services.

People are always looking for help and accountability with problems they face. For example, if your expertise is Paleo based eating, you can offer consulting to people who struggle with their health.

The Paleo Mom is a great example of this. She turned her expertise in Paleo eating into a very lucrative online business. She is now a best selling author, has a syndicated podcast, offers consulting services to individuals and companies and teaches about functional medicine.

Another great example is life coaching. It’s  fast growing because it serves personal, relationship and business. Do you see yourself fitting in here?

It doesn’t matter what your expertise is. There is likely a need for it and people who are willing to pay for your services.

If you decide to make money from your blog on this path, here are three tips:

• Write high-quality blog content that is helpful to readers so they can clearly see your expertise.
• Create engaging posts that lead your readers to take action in their lives. This will increase their confidence that you can help them succeed.
• Help people see that you are a problem solver they can turn to when they feel stuck.

People will appreciate and pay for the value you can bring to their lives. Just be sure you understand your target audience and how to identify their needs through research.

What is your expertise and how can you help others by offering it to them?

Mine is blogging and you can learn more about my services here!

3 – Create a Money-Making Online Course

If you are good at teaching, creating an online is a great way to monetize your blog even if you are new.

Let’s say that you specialize in social media marketing. You can create a course to help people master the skills needed to market on those platforms with ease.

Your course content should include your best information exclusively for paying customers.

What I love about course creation is that you create it one time and use it over and over. It’s a great way to get recurring income from something you did one time.

Online courses are complementary to your blogging. On your blog, you offer a certain amount of value driven content for free. If you did your job well, your readers will want more and be willing to pay for it. People love online training because they can do it on their time and at their own pace.

Delivering Content via a Teaching Platform

There are some great platforms for you to deliver content. A very popular one is Udemy. It’s the world’s largest online learning marketplace. They have topics that cover everything from business to health and marketing. With Udemy, you use their teaching platform to deliver your content. The advantage is that people who don’t visit your blog can find your courses on Udemy.

Of course you can make your Udemy courses available on your blog by having them click a link. A great way to do this is to create an informative posts about a topic with a call to action directing visitors to your course at Udemy.

As of 2016, over 10 million people took online courses at Udemy and over 20,000 people distributed their training through the platform.

You might be wondering how much money you make with online courses.  I’ll turn you over to Corbett Carr who explains in this video how ten instructors made $1.6 million in year!

Online courses are a great way to help monetize your blog even if you are starting out.

There are other platforms you can use to create courses that are complementary to your blog content. Some that come to mind are Zippy Courses, Thinkific and Teachable.

As a blogger, you don’t have to create some huge expensive course that covers everything under the sun. You can start with something small that people have a need for and grow from there.

4 – Use Affiliate Marketing to Earn Money from a Blog

Affiliate marketing is pretty simple. A company rewards you with a commission for each visitor that makes a purchase through a link on your blog or in social media.

Many new bloggers turn to ad programs like Google AdSense. This is not a good idea if you want to monetize your blog as a beginner.

While AdSense is a great program that can pay you in the long term, it requires a high volume of traffic to your blog in order to make any money.

That being said, affiliate marketing can be more lucrative for a beginner if done correctly. Most new bloggers make the mistake of only placing affiliate banners in the sidebar.

Most people read your blog on a mobile device. They may never see that banner because your blog takes a vertical format on a mobile device. Trying to monetize a sidebar that most don’t see is not the best option.

There’s something even better! In addition to the sidebar, include links to affiliate products in your content. Don’t be obnoxious about it.

Be sure that your affiliate product recommendations fit within the natural flow of your content. For example, if you write a high quality blog post about weight loss for  busy moms over 40, you might have a call to action for a meal replacement shake.

Makes sense since it’s a product that can help them lose weight and it’s convenient! You get the idea.

One thing I want to caution you on with monetization through affiliate marketing. Ready?

It takes the same amount of blogging work to make a 4% commission as it does to make a 40% commission. Keep that in mind when you are choosing which products will align with your blog topics.

Final Thoughts

Earning money from a blog is very doable but it takes time. I’ve given you some ways that you can monetize your blog from the start. You can incorporate any of these monetization methods in your blog for people can take action on.

Even though you will have a small audience, if you were to provide coaching services or online training, you would earn more than you can with other monetization methods like ads.

Which of these resonated with you?

My favorite is affiliate marketing although I love teaching too which is why I opened up my blog help services. It’s very rewarding to help others reach their goals.

Struggling to make money blogging? Then Affilorama is a great place to learn everything you need to know!