The Truth About Blogging For Money
By Eileen Hebert

With so many hopeful marketers diligently writing and publishing blogs, promoting products or running ads at the top or down the sides of their blog sites, you might be wondering whether it's really possible to make money blogging. Are all these people really blogging as a business? Is it possible to be blogging for money? And why get involved in blogs and blogging anyway?

The chief reasons why blogs have been so widely adopted by marketing folk are probably these: (1) blogs are easy to start. You don't need to be a web designer or know the ins and outs of HTML or PHP to get one going. In fact, if you decide to have your own blog, the steps to put it up are fairly straightforward; (2) blogs can be added to at any time. If you're unfamiliar with web design and run a website, you'll probably find yourself calling your webmaster each time you want to make a change to the site. Not so with a blog. Want to add a new entry? Just type it in and press "publish"; (3) the search engines have historically preferred blogs to regular websites. One reason for this is that the search engines get "pinged" (or "told") when you add an entry to your blog. This in turn, means the search engines "notice" the changes made to your site (i.e. your blog) more often, and re-index your site accordingly. The upshot is that your site can climb up the ranks of the search engine ranking pages (SERPs) quicker than a regular site; (4) people can easily subscribe to your blog and also be alerted when you add new entries. This keeps them coming back to your blog.

With the capacity to attract greater attention from both the search engines and blog subscribers, blogs naturally appeal to people who want, for example, a blog home based business. And there are, in fact, a few strategies to make money blogging. One of the most obvious is to promote, refer to, and include links to your own product offerings. These may have their own sales letters and exist on the same website as your blog or another website.

Another approach is to join an advertising or affiliate network and publish advertisements or affiliate offers on your blog. It is, for instance, extremely common to see blogs running Google Adsense ads on their sites. Each time a visitor to their blog clicks on one of those ads, the blogger gets paid a few pennies or dollars depending on how much a click on that ad is worth.

In terms of blogging "best practice" the number one consideration is to keep people coming back for more. That means having appealing content. This doesn't just mean the written word either. You can also include audios and videos on a blog. In any case, it's crucial to be individual, personal and meaningful so that the visitors to your blog find value in your content and are motivated to return. If you offer products or affiliate offers, this may well translate into sales. If you publish ads, this is likely to translate into people clicking on your ads, which brings you income.

Despite the immense appeal of blogging for money, earning big dollars is unlikely to happen overnight. It will take time to attract the search engines and build up an audience. But if you promote your blog, and ensure that the blog itself offers solid content, you WILL eventually make money blogging.

Eileen Hebert©
TrueCallingCareers.com
Make Money Doing What You Love

About The Author
Find out how to break free from the corporate world. Eileen Hebert is a happy corporate escapee who helps individuals create happiness without 9 to 5 jobs. Visit TrueCallingCareers.com for free tips on career change, home based businesses, and making money doing what you love!