Now that your new site is live blogged, socially connected, and search optimized, it\u2019s time to monetize the thing. The site is now a bulletin board on the information superhighway, so make it pay.<\/p>\n
Much of the income received from websites is passive. Someone clinks on your site, buys something, and you get a piece of the action. Easy.<\/p>\n
Active methods require some engagement with your readers\/customers, but in those cases, you are getting a whole or major cut of each transaction.<\/p>\n
Here are the top ways to monetize your site.<\/p>\n
Make it easy for people to give you money. The first thing to do is open an account with PayPal, since it seems to be the easy way to transfer money online. A secure credit card system requires the use of a Payment Gateway to provide that third party screen. Your hosting service may have solutions for you. Any service offers code or plugins to install in WordPress.<\/p>\n
Books are an obvious choice, since Amazon is such an easy program, and it\u2019s easy to offer the books of interest to your target audience. If you review these books, you can place text links (no follow perhaps) to sell the book.<\/p>\n
Got t-shirts, coffee mugs, mouse pads or pens with your brand name on it? Put an ad in the sidebar using a fulfillment plugin. Or use WooCommerce<\/a> to open a store.<\/p>\n Is there a service you perform that\u2019s related to your blogsite content? Put up a splash page, a portfolio, or your CV and link to it. Create Google ads to point to your services splash page. (see below)<\/p>\n Let companies give you money or perks in exchange for ad space or mentions. Watch out with links to avoid being frowned upon by Google. Like anything else, there is a whole school of learning related to navigating the Sponsorship waters.<\/p>\n Contests can make money both for non profits as well as for profit. Give away something that you provide or get a sponsor to pay for the prize. Here\u2019s some legal advice about running online contests.<\/a><\/p>\n You don\u2019t need to be a non-profit to ask for donations. Write an appeal as a Call to Action and give them a link to Pay Pal. See what happens.<\/p>\n Adsense<\/a> is the mother of all pay-per-click advertising programs, allowing sites to offer text, image, video or interactive ads targeted to the site\u2019s content and audience. \u00a0Site owners are paid based on the number of clicks per ad.<\/p>\n Conversely, to advertise with Google Adsense, use Google Adwords<\/a>. That is where the keyword tools live.<\/p>\n Affiliate advertising is somewhere between Adsense and sponsorship. It\u2019s an automated program, but you pick the advertiser. They give you the code to put in sidebars or on the page and pay you when your link is clicked and a sale is made.<\/p>\n Blogsite Studio is affiliated to companies with which it works, like Bluehost, Harvest, and Themeforest because it\u2019s easy to recommend them. Each of these has a program I applied to individually, and they give me ad code to post and online reports to check.<\/p>\n Affiliate Networks will hook you up with advertisers that suit your site. I\u2019ve worked with LinkShare and Commission Junction. Amazon sells everything these days and offers a good program. Here is a good review of affiliate networks<\/a>.<\/p>\n You\u2019ve got to have some kind of reputation and offer a lot of exclusive information to make people pay to read your stuff. Big city newspapers are still dipping their toes into making readers pay for information, but if you are Jancis Robinson to the wine world, you\u2019ll find people will pay for reviews and ratings that the hoi polloi won\u2019t. Good luck with that.<\/p>\n Passive or active, the first thing a site needs is subscribers. They are the base from which to build a following to which you can sell. All a subscriber need do is enter an email address, confirm via an email and boom! You have opt-in subscribers.<\/p>\n Put Subscribe Now! links around your site. The easiest way is to put code in a Text or Image widget and slap it in the top and bottom of the sidebar. Or in a footer. Or, in a plugin on the bottom of your page. Jetpack will give you code, as will any outside email services.<\/p>\n I recently started using a pop-up plugin, Lightbox Pop-up. I set the message down low on the screen and about 10 seconds into page load time. It works.<\/p>\n Everybody likes free gifts, so if you have an Ebook to give away, offer it as an enticement to subscribers. This series, Create a WordPress Website, will be an Ebook soon, to be offered to my subscribers. There are plugins to handle delivery of various types of files, like Paid Downloads http:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/paid-downloads\/, which I have used at Tasting Room Confidential.<\/p>\n As always, this is not the end of ways to monetize your site. New opportunities arise every day. But it\u2019s a beginning.<\/p>\n On Saturday August 17, I will present this Create a WordPress Website series<\/a> as WordPress in 10 Steps<\/a> at WordCamp Vancouver<\/a>. Hope to see you \u00a0there!<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Much of the income received from websites is passive. Someone clinks on your site, buys something, and you get a piece of the action. 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Someone clinks on your site, buys something, and you get a piece of the action. Easy.<\/p>\n","category_list_v2":"Create a WordPress Website<\/a>, Monetization<\/a>","author_info_v2":{"name":"Mari Kane","url":"https:\/\/blogsitestudio.com\/author\/fuckoffhackers\/"},"comments_num_v2":"0 comments","yoast_head":"\nSell Services<\/h2>\n
Sell Sponsorship<\/h2>\n
Run Contests<\/h2>\n
Take Donations<\/h2>\n
Monetize Passively<\/h1>\n
Google Adsense<\/h2>\n
Affiliate Advertising<\/h2>\n
Paywall<\/h2>\n
Start with Subscribers<\/h1>\n
Links<\/h2>\n
Pop-ups<\/h2>\n
Free Ebook<\/h2>\n
Next Steps<\/h2>\n