We suspect you’re still wondering... “Just how can I make money doing this?” It’s the question that puzzled us when we were starting out – until we grasped the amazing monetization potential of a content-rich website.
There are many, many ways to earn money from your website. Let us explain.You might have a product or service to sell. If so, a content-led website can help you reach a far wider audience of potential customers.
But, more likely, you don’t have a product or service. No problem. You can set yourself up as an “infopreneur”, providing highly sought-after information that caters to surfers who are seeking specific solutions.
For us moms, setting up a site based on information is an excellent choice because it’s low maintenance and easy. And we like the sound of that!How do we make money from providing information? Simple. We don’t sell the information – the content on our sites is given freely. Instead, once we have a solid flow of presold traffic, we use two very popular methods of earning revenue: “contextual advertising” and “affiliate marketing”. These are the perfect fit for content-rich websites.
We’ll discuss these two monetization models in a moment. We know you have another question: “How much can you make?”I started my first site – I have three – four years ago. My average monthly income is $1857 per month. Generally, there has been a steady climb in income each month. Tracy
My first year, I made all of $200 total; it takes time; but $300 month is attainable; and $1,000 a month isn't far off with the right niche, focus and content. It's all about focus. Debs
That figure varies enormously, depending on the niche you choose, the amount of time you have to spend on your site, how long your site has been “live”, and other factors.
Debs, from above, has limited time to devote to her site and yet her income generation continues. In our Case Studies section, other WAHMs tell their stories, and give you an idea of how much they’re making, following different monetization models.
But first, let’s take a more detailed look at some of the most popular ways to earn money from your content-rich website.• Contextual Advertising
Programs like Google AdSense or Yahoo! YPN have revolutionized the Internet business world. Take a peek at any of our sites and you’ll see Google AdSense in action. When visitors click on an ad, we earn a referral commission.
Here are two AdSense examples…
You’ve probably seen these types of little ads on sites as you’ve been surfing. Every day, hundreds of thousands of people click on ads like these. And every time they do, the owner of the site where the ads are displayed earns a referral commission. And that owner could be you!
It had taken me 2 years of working fulltime on my previous site to get the same amount of traffic I got from my SBI! site by just working around 2 hours a day for six months! I just received my 10th Google AdSense check last week and can't get over how you can get paid that much by simply cutting and pasting some html code on your pages! Rina
Contextual advertising programs are free to join, if your site’s content is good enough to be accepted. (Yours will be, of course!) You simply place the ad code on your site and, through the miracle of Internet technology, your visitors will view advertisements directly related to the theme of your website... and their own interests.
These programs work by analysing your keyword-rich content, so they can deliver highly relevant ads to your site. Let’s say your site is about cats. You’ll carry ads about pet supplies and cat care products. If your site’s about food, you’ll display ads about recipes or cooking equipment. That’s why it works. You build a site to attract targeted visitors. More than likely, these people are also interested in related advertising. And so, visitors click… and you earn.
Once in place, the ads require little maintenance. That’s another reason why, as time-poor moms, we love them. Yet, they make us money, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. It really can’t get much better than that!
• Affiliate MarketingAffiliate programs offer another excellent way to make money from your information-rich site. You don’t have to think about product storage, credit card transactions, customer support or shipping. The company that you are representing looks after all of that!
Imagine an online company selling toys. If you build a site about children’s games, you could become an affiliate to that company, which means that you would place a special link to them on your site. When people click through from your site and make a purchase, you earn a commission.
We’ve learned that a great way to make this work is to PREsell or warm up our visitors. We do this by recommending or reviewing the affiliate products we have on our sites. Of course, we act as affiliates only for companies whose items or services we feel totally happy to endorse.
Cate is an affiliate for various authors and software manufacturers, because she likes to showcase her favorite publications and software on her site, www.budget-and-prosper.com.
She utilizes a very successful method of PREselling by offering product reviews
on her site. Cate’s visitors appreciate the volumes of helpful info they get, and
because they trust the expertise she demonstrates throughout her site, they are
more likely to value her endorsements. When a visitor clicks on a product-link in Cate’s review and then makes a purchase, Cate earns a commission.
Affiliate marketing is a great monetization choice for you to consider, because it’s also low-maintenance. Yes, it does take time to find good items to represent, but once they’re in place on your site, most of your work is done.
Diversification is the name of the game…You may start out with the above two monetization models and then integrate additional ones as your presold traffic grows. Or…
You may begin your business with one of the following income streams and diversify later on when you are ready…
• Creating / Selling Hard Goods
This one is for you if you have a product to sell. It could be something you make yourself, like handmade greetings cards, or an item you’ve sourced from elsewhere such as children’s toys.
Either way, the secret of successful sales lies in building a theme-based site, which focuses on a niche related to your products. You’ll attract targeted traffic – people who are interested in your niche and want the information you offer. You PREsell, by offering lots of information that interests them, and then you offer them the chance to buy from you.
This type of PREselling means that you avoid offline marketing costs, you don’t need a store and you reach a broader audience world-wide.(If you are selling goods within a party plan or as an MLM distributor, the goal is to get people to contact you. Then you close the sale offline.)
• Creating / Selling E-goods
Take your knowledge, and package it into an e-good, like a downloadable book or course, which you can sell from your site. Make this product an extension of the information you’re already providing on your site.
Now that I have an e-book for sale, things are even cooler: I might not have a single moment to devote to my site in a day, but sales keep happening anyway! (No matter how busy I am, I always make time to check my daily sales. It's a real pick-me-up!). Ellen
So, if your site is about baking, you could create an e-book out of your chocolate cake recipe collection. If your passion is walking for fitness, offer your own eprogram of exercise plans, and so on.
• Selling Your Services, Locally and GloballyPerhaps you already have a skill that people would gladly pay for. Are you an accountant, a translator, an editor, a gardener? There are people out there who need your services!
If your skill is one that requires on-the-spot input from you, like gardening, you can raise your profile in your local community through your website. And if your skills can be utilized over the Internet, you can build a global client base.
Erin combines both these opportunities with her website,
www.homeorganizeit.com. Offline, Erin owns a residential organizing service. Now she’s taken her business online, and offers tons of helpful organizing advice (her “content”) targeted toward busy moms. Mothers from around the world visit her site for information. While they’re there, they might buy her products, or click on contextual ads or affiliate links. Result? They generate online income for Erin.
At the same time, local moms who find the site may decide to hire Erin. She’s received more local business from her Web presence than she ever did from her Yellow Pages ad! What’s more, she’s discovered an interesting new sideline. As moms have discovered her site, and seen how well she’s doing with it, they’ve hired her to help them start building sites of their own.
• Finders / ReferrersDo you live in a town that attracts tourists? Know of an undiscovered haven that could make a wonderful holiday destination? You can use your site to promote offline businesses for their owners who don’t know how to use the Internet to their advantage, or who would be happy to receive new clients via your site.
Build a site about your touristy hometown, or a place you know well. As traffic grows, you can start to send contacts to local restaurants, hotels and real estate agents, and charge a commission on the leads and sales you send them.
• Build a Range of Monetization OptionsNo matter what kind of website you build, it’s smart to spread your monetization choices around. Start with the easiest option, and gradually add others. By diversifying your revenue opportunities, you’re insuring that if one income stream isn’t performing well, you have plenty of others to pick up the slack. With all these options, remember that your first step is to build traffic, by creating carefully targeted PREselling content. Only then do you introduce monetization to your site.
If you’re first and foremost an infopreneur, start with contextual advertising. Gradually add a few well-chosen affiliate programs. You might then create an eproduct, or sell hard goods related to your niche. If you already use eBay auction selling in a way that’s related to your niche, you could consider adding this to your monetization plan as well, and cross-promote your auction activities with other monetizing opportunities on your site.
Likewise, if you are primarily selling services or goods, you can add contextual ads and affiliate programs to the mix. It all takes time to build, but the effort will pay great dividends in the long term. And where’s the hurry? Here’s one mom’s take on it, that we think makes good sense:
When I build my site, I'm not an employee working 9-5 and receiving a very small salary. I am a business owner, building an asset that would generate income, or cash flow, if you will, for years to come.
If you have a site generating an income of $300 a month, you have built, with your own two hands and your brain, an asset worth anywhere between $36,000 and $72,000 [assuming a 5-10% return on investment]. If you did all that in your spare time… I think you should be very proud and satisfied. Rachel
Truly, the only limit to finding ways to generate an income from your website is your imagination.