Felicia A. Williams is a full-time blogger, part-time author and one of our beloved publishers. She spends most of her time over at her first blogging love, No Job for Mom http://www.nojobformom.com. She is the first in a series of Infolinks bloggers to share her story and some tips for ongoing success monetizing a blog. We want to encourage all of our publishers to continue finding joy and a real income writing about what you love!
If you’re new to blogging undoubtedly you have already discovered that it’s not as easy as it appears. You’ve written 10, 15, 20 or even 30 posts, have had several hundred visitors and earned next to nothing or even worse, nothing at all. You start asking yourself, “What am I doing wrong? How do other people do it? Am I really cut out for this blogging thing? Can you really make money or is it all one huge scam?”
Before you start doubting yourself, there are a couple of things I discovered as a blogger and would like to share them with you. You see I’ve been doing this blogging thing for a number of years and have met with my share of frustration. Frustration ranging from, “Where the heck is my traffic?” To, “What is the best way to monetize my site?”
Gotta Love ‘Em
First of all, I strongly advise that your first blog should be on a topic that you love. Creating a blog is like having children. An adorable little baby can get away with things that a seasoned, less adorable adult can get away with. Why, because you love your child. Think about it. A baby will puke, pee and keep you up all night. All the baby has to do is gurgle, smile and coo and all is forgiven. Such behavior from a teenager is not so cute.
Blogs are no different. Your love of subject will take you through the lean times when it seems that no one is reading your posts or, if they’re reading, they’re not clicking on the ads. Blogs must be carefully nurtured to grow and reach their full potential. You’ve got to be in it for the long haul. If you don’t love your subject matter, you’ll quit after a few months.
Love and Money
If your labor of love is not a lucrative blog, instead of becoming frustrated because it’s not making money, create a second more lucrative blog. There are some topics that are better earners than others. Finance, insurance and technology for example bring in far more money than blogs on cooking or scrap booking. So, while you’re cultivating your first blog, create a second, more lucrative blog. Doing so takes the stress off of your first love while you learn and earn with your second blog.
Proper Monetization and Time
From personal experience, I’ve found the combination of AdSense and Infolinks to be a winning combination. Too many bloggers rely solely on AdSense as their major source of ad income. Those bloggers are missing out. Not only is Infolinks a great supplement to AdSense enabled blogs, on some of my blogs Infolinks dominates while AdSense is the supplemental income.
I feel it necessary to explain that while I’m happy with my residual income from my online sources, it didn’t happen overnight. I started out by creating one blog on a topic that I loved. Later I realized that it wasn’t a money maker so I created another blog. That worked out well so I washed, rinsed and repeated the process. Today my income is 100% residual and 96% of that income comes from my own blogs. I’m also happy to say that Infolinks is an integral part of my online earnings.