Hey guys! This is a question I keep getting constantly through email. And I think it deserves a proper answer.
The short answer is yes, you can make money from blogging. The real question is: in what terms?
I’m sure you’ve heard how people make money from blogging. They either sell merch, ebooks or courses, or they are getting paid by sponsors to do posts about specific topics (which is harder to do because you need a bigger brand to notice you), or through affiliate marketing, or through donations, or through displaying ads (Google Adsense, WordPress Ads, Ezoic etc), or even through guest posts.
The only real way to make money through blogging is by providing value to your readers. This is either through the content you’re posting (better content attracts more viewers), or through the products you’re promoting.
If you really believe in a product (a book from Amazon for example) and you want to tell that to people, you can earn commissions through Amazon’s Affiliate Program. However, this doesn’t mean your readers will jump into buying that. Maybe they don’t find value in it.
Overall, when you think about money through blogging, you need to think about your readers. What would they want?
For me, the money I make are through donations. And with this occasion, I want to thank every single one of my supporters on Buy Me A Coffee. You’re amazing people!
Are there any other ways you make money through blogging?
Love,
Elena
PS: If you want to get your work in from of my followers and have your name and/or website to every Short Wisdom post (past and future), join my coffee partnership!
PPS: If you want to read more of my thoughts, check out Elena’s Thoughts category!
Short Wisdom 
Interesting concepts. I don’t think I could convincingly present myself as a sympathetic person. My morning start coffee is a heaping tablespoon of instant coffee. I used to and sometimes still think of alcohol as a “writing tool” because I can sometimes write without inhibitions what I would normally think is very bad writing. But there seems to be a shorter and shorter time-window of opportunity to write (which sometimes is good writing[or a good start for later editing]) until I’m just re-inhibited, feel sick, and just want to sleep. Writing while you’re sleeping seems like a difficult task.
So, I don’t think I could do the coffee thing, but I’m thinking that if I were a sympathetic figure, I’d have to find a way to say, “Well, I don’t need you to buy me a cup of coffee but with that coffee money you could buy my latest book. ” A book sale would be less and more: the royalty payment is a little less, but the satisfaction would be a little more. Anyway, my stats page usually shows zero clicks on links, and zero everything else except for “likes”. I haven’t bothered with book links lately because people seem annoyed at them.
Blogs earn money if the authors have products to promote and sell, use affiliate marketing links, and put google ads. I post online for a long time but did not get rich. I was active for 2 years on my site and understood a thing or two.
I will never write what people expect me to earn the read. Authenticity is the way to move on. Donations are a popular way for blogs to earn but for me is like begging. Maybe I have a problem with receiving. On my website, I have only likes, but that is good enough for me. Someone found themselves in my posts. I do not have any expectation to earn big from the blog, so I focus on products I would like to create.
I only recently started my blog. I hear you have been in blogging for 2+ years, I hope to grow my audience. do you have any tips for me?
Interesting article, there are certainly ways to make money from blogging. You just have to stand out.
I post my writing online but the point for me is not the cash but the actual sharing of my work. I don’t want my kids saying their Dad just kept it to himself. That’s not me at all. So if people do want to pay me for consuming it, it would be nice but first I just want co-writers. 🤪
Interesting, I used to write a lot on my whatsapp status, and I still do. However, the word count limitations are very annoying. so this week, I decided to create a blog to expand my audience and enjoy the freedom of writing without restriction.
What do you write about? I am looking for potential blogs where I could write as a Guest writer. I also wanna grow my audience, if you have any tips, please kindly share.
Nice article, how does one promote a blog without ads?
I guess through advertising would be the main one, or promotion of other products through links ? Nice article. Thought provoking as always 🙂
I think the main thing to building up a successful business with blogging is to have consistency. Publish regularly and consistently and promote your work on social media (without spending too much time on social media) and little by little you’ll build up a community. That’s what I’m doing right now. And so far it’s been going well. We’ll see what I think in a year’s time hahaha.
Wonderful!!
Mam,
Your readers are dying to see your face. Okay okay, the truth is I am dying to see your face.
Please upload a portrait photo with the following attributes: DPI min 300, 4K Resolution 3840×2160 or higher, RAW or JPEG only format, an ISO between 200-400, with a backdrop within a botanic nature garden.
[Just kidding. I would of loved to have seen your face as you were reading the parameters. I had to look up every one of them. And as I did, wow…there is a ton of attributes and parameters regarding taking pictures.]
https://expertphotography.com/sp/p15-quick-capture-cheat-sheets-ad/?cf_1=blog-content-upgrade
Thanks for the support. I’ll return it and buy you a few coffees soon.
God bless.
Not at A L L creepy, dude.
Maybe i was up too long trying to be funny. Maybe it was creepy. To you and others, I guess nothing you’ve ever done in your life or spoken might could if been interpreted as …wait, how did you put it?
‘Not at alll creepy dude.’
I can tell you one thing- that’s not at all how i meant it. You didnt even have to speak a word, just by looking at your photo I felt the equivalent. CREEPY.
Elena, if my comment was creepy. I sincerely apologize. I was trying to be cute. And funny. But maybe I failed miserably. And if I haven’t already said it – it was a joke. Am I really going ask you for a picture then SPECIFY and demand all those different parameters. No. That’s absurd. Anyways, God bless.
Ben,
Your comment was not creepy. It was cute and funny. I got the parameter joke.
Mr. Serious back there just wishes he were cute and clever.
Keep being you. And don’t apologize or explain yourself.
I’m sure the amazing Ms. Elena thought it was cute too.
God bless you.
awwwwww… thank you sooo much. I felt like a real jerk, for being a jerk back. I appreciate you taking the time to comment. You made my day with this, God bless you!
Good read, thanks!
I feel like blogging is just like anything else (fiction writing, for instance). The top 1% earn the big bucks, the 10% make a decent living, and the other 89% are all over the place.
But I do believe in making money online. It really is a borderless world. We just need to present a brand or a product that solves problems.
Thank you for sharing.
Reblogged this on Internet Marketing (for "Non-techno beginners") and commented:
http://www.craigsblogs.wordpress.com
A wonderful read that makes me question the different ways that a person can make money through their blog. As a writer, I gravitated toward your mention of eBooks along with merch, courses, and other personal content. However, I’m curious to hear your experience, perspective, and thought on how you went about donations and what you made it easier for you?
Reblogged this on Poetry and other literature and commented:
How can you make money through your blog?— A helpful article that I enjoyed by Elena on ShortWisdom.Wordpress.com
I know you use buy me a coffee and I love that!
And you mentioned affiliate marketing, do you have any strong feelings about that, or have you done it before?
Great post Elena! Your positive and realistic take on making money through blogging is refreshing. It’s true, providing value to your readers should be the top priority, and the money will come eventually. I love that you mentioned how you make money through donations, it really shows how much your readers appreciate your content. Keep up the great work and I wish you continued success!
Hey there.
One area not mentioned, I’ll just call it “guest blogging”…. that is, you blog for someone else.
The only money I’ve made from blogging has been creating content for platforms that are using a “blog” to draw traffic to their site. In my case, these platforms are selling a service that I happen to know a lot about, so they “contract” me to produce content that will make the platform look like it’s got an active blog.
In some cases, there is a lot of freedom to write posts. As long as you keep on-topic and make sure your writing is friendly, informative and accurate, you’ll only have to endure the look of a sometimes over-zelous “editor”.
In other cases, as the blog is meant to draw traffic, you may end up following strict SEO rules about headers, keywords, paragraph length, word counts. Those posts are remarkably harder to produce over a longer period of time.
I’ve found the payment “reasonable” (though it could be better!) for both of these types of “guest blogging”, and if you’re quick to learn the style the “boss” is looking for, you can keep the rewriting to a minimum and make a reasonable amount of money for as long as the project exists.
“as long as the project exists” is important there, as this type of blog writing is often limited by a set budget and the set goal of drawing traffic. No matter what you may be told about the importance of your information, if it is not drawing traffic, or if the blog experiment doesn’t give the platform the results it was expecting, the project will be phased out. The longest I’ve been on one was maybe two years, the average seems to be about 12 months.
Now, our personal blogs may not make us money, but “guest blogging” will get some cash into our PayPal, you are often given a byline, and sometimes even a link back to your own blog. This type of “perk” has actually led me to getting at least two other gigs without doing anything, I was “found” through the guest post, I was read on my own blog, then I was asked to collaborate on this or that project.
With “guest blogging”, you’ll get invaluable practice and experience in blog writing, especially as having a “boss” or and “editor” or a “deadline” is something that a lot of personal blogs could use. I think the important point is that the blog itself is not a money-making engine; being open to diversity is and the blog is just one part of that diversity. (And selling t-shirts and coffee mugs is not “earning money from blogging”, sorry, that merchandising!)
Cheers!
revel.
This comment is so insightful thank you for sharing the information. I would love to find myself in the same position. I have a job and I am studying but I found that if I atleast stick to my blog, I will find information like you’ve shared and it will make a difference.
Thank you for posting this. It is well written and motivating. I am going to put effort into my blog and hopefully I can attract some opportunities.
I would love to live off of my blog! Maybe I could sell a photo-book eventually? I tried ads before and only made about $2.