How Much Do Bloggers Earn?
Let’s get the mystery and suspense over with. Bloggers can earn from $1,000 to $1,000,000 a year. But this all depends on the work and hours you put into building your blog in the niche where your passion truly burns and your mind is full of ideas.
Yes, folks, It’s very possible to achieve six-figure earnings from your blog. However, most do not make it. Why? Commitment. Your commitment level and focus are the two biggest reasons why blogs don’t make it.
How much do bloggers earn in the first year?
I hope this doesn’t dampen your enthusiasm but this is real and true; bloggers do not earn much in the first or even second year. Income in the first year is usually zero. But realistically blogs can get to $1,000 or higher. This depends on your chosen niche – the content you post, the frequency you post, the traffic you generate, and your methods of monetization.
So before quitting your regular job to start your own blog, stop right there. Think of the first two years of blogging as your training years. It is like riding a bike, first, you have training wheels to help you balance with four wheels, then three, and finally two wheels. So, it is practical and highly recommended to keep your regular 8-hour job while learning the blogging trade.
Photocredit: ProBlogger
First Year Goals
The reality is most bloggers are unable to replace their 9-5 income in their first year of blogging. So let’s take a look at what goals you should be looking to accomplish.
Education/Expertise
Like anything else in life, if you want to get good at you have to work at it. Education will be the biggest thing for you in your first year of building a profitable blog. Learning how to start a blog isn’t easy. However, having the right resources and team in your corner can help speed up that timeline for you!
Time
How much time can you log in a day blogging? Blogging isn’t just writing your thoughts. It also involves researching topics (that matters to you concerning the niche) and the keywords you use. As a beginner, you may find it difficult to be efficient with your blogging schedule. So, putting in the hours, per day or week is critical to profitability over time.
Elbow Grease in Blogging
Writing is just one-third of actual blogging. Research on topics and keywords counts for two-thirds of the effort. Researching the topic and keywords is vital so you’ll also be able to gauge how relevant and how much it has been sought by readers.
Profitability
Blogging opens doors to different ways to earn from your site. As you become an “expert” in your field of interest, your site will earn a following from readers. This will catch the attention of the Search Engine, related brands or businesses, and other bloggers or influencers in the niche.
Do not be discouraged by the low income in the first year or two. Instead, think of this time as your initial investment into the venture. The critical mindset of success comes from perseverance and commitment.
Whether you make it to the income bracket that you want with your blog or not, blogging is still a profitable venture in terms of creativity and supplemental income. Keep on writing relevant content that you think is beneficial to you and your readers, as well as for the niche.
Where Do Bloggers’ Earnings Come From?
There are two types of bloggers, freelance and bloggers with their own site.
Wages of freelance bloggers, including those working for corporations or other enterprises, vary. You can earn $10 to $100 per blog post. Not bad, right? This is like having a 9-to-5 job, with deadlines and submissions. The bottom line is you’ll be working for another person or a business, writing with the parameters given. It is also most likely that you’ll be ghostwriting for another person too.
For bloggers with their own site, average earnings are $1 to $100,000.00 depending on the years, niche, and activity, as well as postings per week. Alex and Lauren with Create and Go consistently make over 100k per MONTH with their blog. When you own your
Banner and Text Link Ads
You earn from banner and text link ads on your blog site. Google and other ad agencies will post text ads to your post depending on the keywords. If a reader clicks the ad, you can earn pennies to two dollars.
It all depends on the keywords. The keywords that you use for your post will determine the ads that will be placed on the page. So, when doing research, be mindful of the relevance and searchability.
Direct Advertisements
Direct ads are ad banners placed on your pages. Businesses put a banner on your page to advertise their products. The larger your viewership per month, the higher you will be able to earn. This is called RPM or Revenue Per Thousand Impression.
Again, this income channel will be available to you when you’ve gathered regular followers or readers. Investing time and elbow grease in research pays off here because you can earn from $5000 to $20,000 from the three banners allowed on your page.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing works by linking products that are connected to your content. You are paid an affiliate fee for referring a user to the website of the product you are affiliated with. Choose products that you think are helpful to your readers.
Choosing products beneficial to your followers will increase your credibility in the niche. Credibility works in building trust, and in rankings on search engines.
Post Sponsorship
When you’ve built a community and have acquired a substantial number of readers/followers/subscribers, enterprises will be interested in connecting to your community. You write a post related to their products, that links back to their own website. Sometimes, it does not need to a new post but to update a past post. You get to earn from $5 to $10,000.
Be careful in posting sponsored blogs, though. Search engines still look for originality in content. Do not make your blog a paper mill for ads and other people’s products.
Selling Your Product – Book or Course
Since you’ve immersed yourself into your niche, you might as well go for the gold and sell your own product or services. Write e-books or courses related to your niche; or share your journey. Your readers may pick hacks or lessons; enhance their own experience into your shared passion (aka niche).
This can generate well over $10,000 per month in profits – but of course, this depends on how timely, useful, and engaging your book or course is.
Not only will this generate regular income for you, especially if you keep the products up-to-date, but also help others. Again, this builds on credibility and trust. Trust results in referrals. Credibility builds your confidence and improves your search engine standing.
Social Media Influencer
Online events hosted or sponsored by big companies invite participants for specific niches through hashtags (i.e. #crossfit, #govegan, #sportsblogger). These online events are usually held on different social media platforms – Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and others. This will get you more audience coverage, plus you get paid by the hour.
Rate per hour ranges from $50 to $2,000. Not bad for sitting in front of the computer and answering questions. The rate depends on how large your following is on your social media accounts.
Private Consultations
As long as you’ve built credibility and know your niche inside-out as well as the passion for it whether it be stock markets or fly-fishing, someone will ask for your help. And you can monetize on it. The rate is up to you entirely.
PodCasting/Vlogging
Bloggers should not limit themselves to one platform. Podcasts and videos are natural evolutions from reading to audio and visual. Your followers aren’t all the same; some may prefer audio or video formats. Once you’ve ventured into these new ways to reach more people, ads will come in.
When ads come in, this means you’ve added another income channel to your endeavor.
The operative words are building yourself as a blogger – with passion and know-how in your chosen field. Over time you’ll be able to earn more as a blogger than your regular 9 to 5 job or augment your income.
The key is to hop into the bike, training wheels and all, and go for a ride around the block.
What are the Niches that earn a lot of money?
You do not need to be passionate about a certain subject or field to start blogging. You just need to be a little curious about something. From there, you can start. People who do not feel the burning desire for something can find this a stumbling block to blogging.
Creating the excuse of not being motivated or passionate enough is the first hurdle that you must overcome. No one is motivated or passionate every waking hour. You build both passion and motivation for a topic through curiosity and self-discipline.
Discipline trumps motivation and passion on any given day. This will give you the drive even when you don’t feel it or don’t feel like researching or writing. As long as you have the self-discipline or willingness to discipline yourself on any subject, topic, or niche, this will bring you success.
Now that we got that out of the way, here are the most profitable niches or field you can choose from:
Food
Of course, this is a no-brainer; everybody eats. Everybody loves to eat and needs to eat. There are more than enough angles take – food by culture, health preference, nutritional value, and lifestyle.
Specialize or target a specific topic within the food spectrum such as a certain region of the world, meat dishes, vegetarian, vegan, or low glycemic, etc. If you are a candidate or have a condition such as pre-diabetes or are already diabetic, blog about this journey. Discover foods that are appropriate for health conditions, and write about them!
Fashion
This is one of the most searched topics online. Everybody wants to look good with the clothes and accessories they wear no matter what age. If you have an eye for it, then go for it.
People can’t seem to get enough of what is the next big thing in fashion. Others want to look for ways to be stylish without going into the different trends.
This niche allows you to expand quickly to other media platforms and be available for sponsorships.
Personal Finance
This is an exciting topic. It affects everyone; we all need help resolving issues from time to time or for the long haul. Managing your finances can be a challenge, so a lot of people turn to personal finance bloggers to enlighten them about the confusing issues in money handling.
What’s more, there are so many interesting subtopics to immerse yourself into – saving tips, couponing; investments – stock market, foreign exchange, debt management, paying off credit cards, student loans; budgeting, and so on.
You can blog about the financial strategy you are using, your progress, and the setbacks you’ve experienced. People relate to this topic.
Technology and Gaming
If you are tech-savvy or want to challenge yourself to become a techie at any age, this can be a fun topic to dig into. Technology and gaming have become a part of our daily lives ever since the personal computer was invented.
Games and independent game testing are lucrative pursuits that have made millions of teenagers and young adults rich. Spending their days and nights playing, trying out games, and telling people of their experiences pays off.
Travel
People want a respite from working or to live a nomadic lifestyle. They want to be informed and hear the adventures of others to give them the courage to do the same. Travel has always been a great topic and of great interest to many folks.
For example, in travel, you can blog about the necessities, bags, shoes, and luggage; experience with airlines and hotels; travel tips.
There are many niches to tackle. These are just part of the tip of the iceberg.
The Last Word
I hope this blog answered the question of how much do bloggers earn and how they do it. Just like any job, you must start at the beginning. You can choose to have fun working, be creative and design your own life around it as you go along.
You are about to embark on a great adventure, just like riding a bike when you were five years old. Everything looked larger than life, but all were waiting to be explored.
