How Much Do I Earn from Blogging? A Reader’s Question Answered.
By Chris on Nov 15, 2007 in Earning Money, Entrepreneurship, Get Rich Project
Reader Question: You write about making money online, but I’ve never seen you post any actual figures. Just how much do you make from your blog?
Answer: not a lot, actually. There, I said it. Admitted live, for the whole world to read.
This may strike you as a strange admission, given as this blog is partly positioned as a “make money from blogging” blog, but I hardly make any money from blogging, at all. To be honest, my first ever AdSense cheque only just got mailed out a month ago. Text Link Ads bring in about $70 a month. So I’m not exactly living off the fat of the Internet Land.
Now, before you unsubscribe because I’m not the “expert” you thought I was, let me do some explaining. The Get Rich Project is about making money online, personal finance, and working towards financial independence. The personal finance bit has taken a back seat recently because I simply have nothing worthwhile to add at the moment.
So that leaves making money and working towards financial independence. Kinda the same thing, if you look at it one way.
Most of the online work I do is experimental. It’s trying out ideas. Some of these work, some don’t. It’s entrepreneurism., I’m looking to build a real business, not rely on advertising dollars. So I’m not making much just now. I don’t care. I’d rather make something worthwhile than have some short-lived “get rich quick” scheme.
The reader who asked the question above threatened to “out” me as a fraud if I didn’t tell all. Guess what chump, I seem to have outed myself. Oh dear, what ever shall I do? Keep on keepin’ on, that’s what.
You can still unsubscribe, if you like. I’ll be sad to see you go, but I think you’d be making a mistake. Would you rather learn with someone, or be preached at by Yet Another Guru (YAG)?
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Rob Lewis | Nov 16, 2007 | Reply
Good for you for coming out with a figure! It’s easy to look at people like Daren Rowse and think that it should be easy to earn thousands each month from blogging, but the reality is much different.
I earn a little more than yourself each month from blogging, mainly Text Link Ads with a little Adsense, and although it’s a nice little side income, I’m all too aware that it might not be a particularly stable source of income (I’m waiting to see the long-term effects of Google’s decision to reduce the PageRank of sites which sell links, plus their recent changes to the way that Adsense clicks are counted). The hope is that along the way there are other opportunities that pop up which may lead to a more sustainable income stream.
glblguy | Nov 16, 2007 | Reply
Thanks for sharing and for answering the question. There seems to be a common view that by becoming a blogger you can “get rich quick”. As I am sure you know, that is far from the truth.
The money you make is directly proportional to the amount of traffic you receive. Getting traffic takes a significant amount of work and time.
I’ve been blogging for 4 months and earn less than $100 a month. Now, I’m not complaining as it’s $100 more than I made before but if I were to break it out hourly it works out to be about .60 cents per article or .60 per hour as each article takes me about 1 hour on average to write. Be better off working at McDonald’s, but I love it and don’t do it primarily for the money.
Keep up the good work and Keep on Keeping :-)
louise | Nov 16, 2007 | Reply
I think lots of people want to believe they can get rich quick overnight with blogging. I blog because I love it and while the income is nice the hourly rate is appalling!
Not every blogger is only motivated by money thankfully! A concept some people don’t seem to get.
glblguy | Nov 17, 2007 | Reply
louise, I agree and would even say most successful and quality bloggers are not motivated by money.
bob | Nov 17, 2007 | Reply
I appreciate the honesty and “the get rich project” doesn’t imply to me that you are saying “i’m rich and i’ll show you how”.
and with a name like “the get rich project”, it’s pretty obvious that money is your main motivation… their are a lot of other ways to help people if not…volunteering at a soup kitchen for example but you are interested in getting rich or at least comfortable.
How you are going to get rich in this arena where so many people are selling the same old ad’s and the same old regugertated advice counting on random income based on random hits based on your ability to interest random readers who are probably advertising the same thing everybody else is, is… beyond me.
that doesn’t sound like a good plan really, does it? you have no control… if you are driving a car you want to have control over it’s destination.. stearing, brakes, accellerate all in your control… what would the road look like if nobody on it had a direction or control over their vehicle?
but, seems their are millions of people all doing it. are they getting anywhere or anything of permanent and real value?
For me, I’m not looking to make a nickle on some random click… great, for a nickle i get to send the guy i tried so hard to visit my site, I’m going to boot him out of my shop to make a nickle from my competitor?? get outta here. lose a possible customer for a nickle or dime???
better the customer find out where his local diaper service is on his own time but when he’s on my blog, it’s my time.
ANyway, keep plugging away, come and visit my blog and kick some ideas around… perhaps 2008 will be a year when you find something tangable to sink your efforts into.
Marvin Double | Nov 21, 2007 | Reply
Some think that blogging for money is a violation of the whole blogging ethic. Corrupt devious and perhaps evil. There were many that thought the same thing about the commercialization of the internet back when. I’m not one of those souls. Here’s my opinion on the matter, poverty sucks and everyone’s got to eat. If someone can make money blogging I say more power to them, even if they don’t get rich in the process. The internet, offers the average person to lift themselves up by their bootstraps and perhaps improved their lot in life. If a point and click blogging platform can do offer that kind of opportunity I say Bravo. So long as you make money honestly, so long as you aren’t being devious or dishonest I think that’s a good thing.
Rebecca | Dec 1, 2007 | Reply
Don’t turn your nose up at $70.00 that’s only $30 short of a $100 and $20 more than $50 and $70 dollars more than if you weren’t blogging. It’s better than standing on the street selling flowers. Keep up the good work. I certainly will not unsubsribe, but will keep right on reading. Enjoying your blog. Thank you.
Barbara Rozgonyi | Dec 27, 2007 | Reply
Thanks for being honest about your blogging income. Just this week, I got my first sponsorship offer for advertising on my blog. To me, blogging is mostly about outreach - as a blogger you’re opening minds and facilitating a conversation. While moneytizing every effort is a good end goal, publishing a blog often pays off in ways that can’t be measured by dollars and cents. For example, your content gets distributed via communities and search engines that are only open to blogs - good to find your blog through BlogRush.
Suze | Dec 28, 2007 | Reply
You’re making 70.00 more a month than I am, at this point anyway, so that’s not a bad thing LOL I really just started my blog, my internet money blog that is, my personal blog I’ve had for years but haven’t attempted to make any money on that one. Who cares if you’re only making 70.00 or even 5.00, as long as you have good content and provide some sort of information or help to someone and people like to read what you post, the big money would be nice, but it’s not the whole point. :O)
Zamri Nanyan | Feb 10, 2008 | Reply
Just keep doing what you love the most. The money will come naturally when you do the right things consistently. :)
$70 from TLA is not that bad for a start. The value is like over $200 in my country and many would still be happy to get it as a side income.
And keep it up!