Passive Income from Blogging Part 1

 Blogging  No Responses »
Jun 102011
 

Is there a better form of income than passive income?  I can’t think of one.  Whether it is owning high quality stocks and bonds and watching the quarterly dividends roll in, or blogging for ad or product income, passive income always makes you smile.  It keeps adding up when you are at your day job, when you are asleep, even when you are on vacation.  Some people make so much passive income that they no longer have to worry about work.

Let’s get a few things straight.  There is no absolutely free lunch.  Passive income requires work too.  If you are investing in stocks and bonds, you need to do your due diligence to understand the investment and know if it is a good value.  And blogging is work too.  It’s pretty fun work to be honest, but it is work and not everyone has what it takes to be a writer.

I assume you have what it takes to create a successful blog.  You have read about SEO, you blog consistently, and you are growing your audience.  The next step is to begin making money off of your blog.  Today we will look at placing ads on your blog to increase your passive income.

Growing Ad Income

Ad income is one of my favorite types of passive income generation from blogging.  There are many reputable sources of ads, with the most popular being Google Adsense.  The “Monetize” button in Google’s Blogger can have your ads up and running in mere seconds.  Other blog publishing platforms can access Adsense with a few cuts-and-pastes of simple HTML code.

But don’t stop looking for alternatives.  AdBrite is a worthy addition to or replacement of Adsense.  AdBrite has fewer advertisements than Adsense, but they have more relaxed Spring Flowerterms and conditions about which websites or blogs they will allow their ads to be on.  They also have inline ads, which have excellent click-through rates, and are therefor arguably superior to Adsense offerings.  AdBrite offers a 75/25 commission spread with you, and yes, the 75 goes to you.

When your readers click on the ads in your blog, your account has money added to it.  Some ads bring more income than others, but the key is to get your readers to click on them.  Any ad program worth its weight increases the chances for a click by basing its advertisements on your content.

Another way to make Ad Income is through Amazon’s excellent affiliate program.  Signing up is easy.  Once a member, you have access to the entire Amazon product lineup.  You may choose to specify what you wish to advertise on your page, or you may allow Amazon to use your content to determine which ads will do best on your page.

A suggestion – choose image ads instead of text ads.  They seem to perform much better for most bloggers and webmasters.  The ad does not have to be huge to attract attention.  I have had plenty of success with 250 pixel ads.  And inline ads vastly outperform ads on the sidebar or near the title bar.

Content Remains King

Interesting content is by far the most important factor in selling your ads.  Passive income from ads is a numbers game.  The more visitors you have, and the longer those visitors remain on your pages, the higher a chance for ad clicks.  Uninteresting content will derail any ad program.  Focus on delivering exciting content that your readers will enjoy, and the money will follow.

In Part 2 we will look at product sales for passive income.  Product sales potentially deliver much higher income than typical ads.

- Dan Padavona, Warmpicture

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Watching Online Ad Trends

 Blogging  No Responses »
Mar 162011
 

Last week we discussed monetizing our blogs and websites in a two-part series.  While we recommended blogs and websites continue to experiment with various ad revenue sources, we favored selling our own products to maximize profits and give our readers something “a little different.”  We proposed an easy plan for using abstract and conceptual royalty free images to create products which could be sold through a store front.

Many high profile websites and blogs have noted decreasing ad revenues over the last year.  A popular theory is that a poor economy has hurt marketing budgets.  If this is true, a rebound in ad revenues may be in store if recent improving U.S. economic indicators are to be believed.

But there may be a larger problem.  Are internet readers beginning to tone out online advertising, the same way Eurosthey tune out traditional advertising in greater numbers?  I believe this is a trend worth following.  We have established that modern businesses are more effective at cultivating customers by becoming thought leaders, than by using traditional hard sell advertising techniques.  Most online ads which I see from leading ad providers such as Google appear to be using traditional hard sell advertising.

Even if this trend is a figment of our imaginations, can we quantify what the economic cost is of losing a reader when she clicks on an ad and goes to the advertiser’s website?  If our primary goal is to funnel readers toward a more profitable purchase of our own products, perhaps the traditional ad sources are taking more revenue away from our sites than they are generating.

I am interested to hear what strategies you are employing in 2011. Are you engaging in direct sale advertising, or do you prefer Google AdSense?  What successes have you had with your own e-books and product creations?

- Dan Padavona, Warmpicture

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