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As I promised, today I am starting my series on making money blogging. Today I want to focus on one of the more common and basic ways of making money with your blog, and that is through advertising. I’m strictly speaking about Google Adsense, Chitika and other similar advertising platforms.
It’s one of the quickest and easiest ways to advertise, and there are plenty of options. Here’s my video of your options below and the rough transcript is at the bottom:
Making Money Blogging Video Transcript
Good morning, evening, afternoon; whatever it will be for you. It’s 9am here and not the greatest day weather-wise; albeit a lot better than yesterday!
Today is the first day in my series on making money with your blog, and the first part of the series is with probably one of the most obvious ones; through Advertising. Now I’m not talking about finding companies to advertise through your blog. I’ll come to that later.
I’m talking about AdSense, Chitika and other companies that allow you to sign up for accounts. All you then do is add the code to your blog and they come up with the adverts for the people reading your blog. Sometimes they’re linked to the content on the screen, other times they’re based on the search terms that someone has used in the past.
There are a few options out there for these types of advertisements. Some are images, like the Google AdSense one that you will see to the right of this blog underneath the search box. Others are text based, which I have on my Student Survival Tips website. I use Infolinks for the text based advertisements, but I’ve got to be honest and say that I don’t rate it that highly. I’m considering getting rid of it and looking for something else. In the last two years of having the site, I’ve not made a penny from it; whereas Google AdSense has made me money.
I would suggest checking a few different options out and finding the one that works better for you. While Google AdSense is the most popular, it’s certainly not the only one out there. I know people who are having a lot of success with Chitika.
This is probably one of the quickest and easiest ways to start making money from your blog. It will take time to see a lot coming through, but it is a form of passive income. Once you write the blog post, the adverts will continually be shown on the page. People just have to click them and you earn a little bit of money from them.
But there are rules. You can’t ask friends and family members to click on the ads for you, and you certainly can’t do it yourself. The companies will know! This is one of the most common reasons for Google to shut down AdSense accounts; and once you’ve lost your AdSense account, you’re not going to get it back unless you win an appeal. I don’t hear a lot of that happening.
All the rules you need to follow are in the terms and conditions of any of the sites that you sign up to. Most of them state no pornography, no explicit content, nothing illegal etc. Really, the content should be suitable for all ages and nothing too controversial. I know a writer who had her AdSense account closed because she was talking about some riots somewhere. So it’s a good idea to stay away from anything you think could cross the line.
I’d love to hear if you have experience with any of them in the comments section below.
I’ll be back on Thursday with a new video in my making money blogging series, and I’ll be covering another more obvious one: affiliate marketing.
When my blog was on Blogger, I tried to sign up for Google’s Adsense. They turned me down saying my blog didn’t get enough traffic. I guess you have to build up your user base and learn the ins and outs of SEO’s before they’ll be willing to monetize your blog.
I don’t think it’s the traffic. I have a test blog that gets few views and it qualifies. I think time is more important. Keep posting and waiting.
When my new blog wasn’t approved, I posted ads for my books on the sidebar.
Gershon
Hehe. This would rule me out then because I make comments about news articles. Today I mention cannabis. Although I make the point that the weed has been proven to cause harmful effects, that would definitely get me kicked off.
Hehe. Possibly. I’m not sure what the whole rules about them are. I think the content is sometimes taken into consideration. You weren’t promoting cannabis, but talking about the harmful effects.
In my view, adsense has its’ pros and cons.
On the plus side, it can just be set up and left there, but the downside is that it won’t bring in a whole lot of money unless you are sending a whole lot of visitors to the blog.
My own view is that when a visitor clicks on adsense, they are being taken away from your blog, so if you can get them to click on an adsense ad, you can get them to click on something that *you* own instead, whether that’s a sign up form, or a link to one of your own products. This increases the chance of more money per click further down the line,
cheers, Gordon
That’s very true, Gordon. But when someone is just starting out, AdSense and others are the quickest and easiest ways to monetize a site. That’s all some people want at times. Some may have no interest in creating their own products and simply just want to blog.
I did have a google adsense account for a very short time, then they shut it, I emailed them asking why as I had adhered to all the rules, but I didn’t get a satisfactory answer, so to this day I do not know what I did wrong!!!
I must check out Chitika as I have not heard of that one!
I’ve heard a lot of people say that, Lisa. There seemed to be a mass cull of accounts back in July 2012, and people never really heard why their accounts were closed. I’ve heard good things about Chitika for those who can’t get AdSense accounts.
I have been thinking about signing up for google adsense, but I guess I would have to have have volume of traffic for them to accept my blog. Is it possible to find out somewhere what traffic volumes they would be satisfied with?
Hi Beata, I’m not sure about the volume of traffic. Google wants to see that you have enough content and looks into the length of time your blog has been online. These are things that nobody knows the real answer to except Google, but you may find what others say now online. When I signed up for AdSense it was much easier.
Once again, Alexandria, you are showing me how making money from blogging is a whole world in itself and become a full-time job if this is the way someone wants to go. And, I have a feeling, we have only begun to scratch the surface of the possibilities out there! THANKS for the info and eyeopener! HUGS <3
It really can become a full-time job! It has for me, and it’s one that I love. You’re welcome. There are certainly a lot more options, and I have videos for three days a week for the whole month covering the different options that I can think of.
I used Adsense in the past. Got to the $50 threshold several times but I don’t have it on any of my sites anymore.
Thanks, Victoria. I’m assuming that you’ve found better ways to make money with your blogs. I know you do well with affiliate marketing.
I have had adsense on a blog I had a few years ago but I never made any money with it. I was just starting out and it was a copycat site that I bought to get started. That in itself was a big mistake and waste of money. I do need to add something to bring in a little income and am looking forward to reading other ideas you might share. Thanks for todays information, I may try one of these on one of my blogs just to see if, now that there are my own blogs, I might make a bit of money.
Thanks for stopping by, commenting and sharing your experience. Maybe one of my future videos will help you find a system that will really work for you.
I’ve never heard of Chitika. I do use Adsense. In the last few years, I’ve earned about $100 per year. LOL But hey, it’s residual so I’ll take it. This year I’ll probably average $200. I have Adsense on all of my sites, and utilize it on You Tube.
At first I didn’t like the advertisements popping up on my videos, but it’s currently how I’m making more money with Adsense, plus viewers have the option of closing out the ad.
Great video Alexandria!
That’s definitely not bad, especially if it’s residual. Over the course of a few years, it adds up. And I see it’s growing then. I use it on my YouTube too. The ads annoy me when I’m watching them, but some people really don’t let them bother them.
Awesome video share and post Alexandria! Thank you 🙂
Thanks, Sean.
I’ve used Chitika, but I am a bigger fan of Google AdSense. I have one site, that I cannot put Google ads on because they said my content was lean,(it’s a horoscope site). But because I have several other sites, I’m going to keep working with the AdSense.
I hit my $100 payment with AdSense for September, but its hard to say when I’ll see the next one. I think Chitika and AdSense are both slow-drip systems for smaller sites, but they are still worth using until your site grows.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts and success, Denise. They are both certainly slow drip systems, but then all residual income is really 🙂
I look forward to your posts on making money…. I need to learn how to do this for real. I will check out the sites you mentioned and get rocking and rolling with them 🙂
Thank you for the information.
Thanks, Tamala. I’ll focus on a different way with each video. Hopefully you’ll find one or two that really resonate with you 🙂
It’s not something I’ve tried for any of my sites ever. I’ve just heard from too many that there’s not enough money in it anymore.
That is a good point, but it can be a good way just to start out. At least until people have their own products up and running.
I’ll be keen to follow this series, Alexandria. Have to say I’m not interested in ads for a number of reasons but mainly because its earning potential is limited by your traffic and most blogs do not get enough to earn. I’d rather use that space for something else but I can see your point.
I understand that. The earning potential is low, unless you got an amazing blog; and then you might as well charge more for advertising slots. I think to start out with, it can be useful just to see something trickle in.
One of the things that you have to really watch if you use Adsense on a blog is that the comments that you are getting fall within their guidelines as well. Most people moderate their comments anyway, but if you don’t, you could find yourself in some hot water.
Also, depending on the subject area of your blog, you might make more money with affiliate offers or product based advertising. The trick is to test the options available to you and find one that works.
That’s very true. It’s something a lot of people forget about. I’m weary about some comments on my blog, and have something to catch all the spam. Everyone who leaves a comment first time will be moderated, and then those who have been approved once are usually able to leave a comment straight away afterwards, but I’ll always check what those comments are to make sure they’re suitable.
I’m doing a full series on the various ways to make money with a blog, and affiliate marketing came up in the second one. I do have one coming up with product-based advertising. There are just so many different ways to make money with a blog, and it’s important to find the one that suits you 🙂 Thanks for stopping by, Marc.
i have prove chitika is fake chitika not given money don,t wast you,r time only earn money with adsence if u want to prove contact me innocentfake1@yahoo.com
I’m sorry to hear you’ve had a negative experience. You’re the first person to tell me about it. I know a lot of people using Chitika because they cannot get Google AdSense and they have all be paid on time and as expected.