How much does a blog make???

[Texas Proud]

OK... with AZBob (or whatever his name was).... and the you know who mom both coming in to hawk their blog... (AZ said his was ad free... but might change)...


I was wondering how much someone can make with a blog As an example... THIS site has ads... I do a lot of clicking, just like others here... how much are they paid for each click? What am I worth to this site


PS.... the ads are getting tiring... I can not block them because am at work... and some freeze the rest of the site... and I have to refresh to get another ad so the site will come up!!! What a way to make money....


PPS... I also wonder why if I go looking for a site... find what I want... then go back to my normal business I get ads for that site I found for days on end What a waste of money to try and get me when you already got me!!! (as an example... I an getting a lot of Nissan ads since there was the Volt discussion and the Nissan was mentioned.... not a gottcha site, but I am not looking for a car either, so a wasted ad)...

 

[Rustic23]

I don't know but the movie Julie and Julia started as a blog. She turned it into a book and then a movie. That one paid off big time!

 

[RonBoyd]

I was wondering how much someone can make with a blog?

Her is probably a typical example:

Tioga George Blog

George has brought in a little over $5,000 so far this year:

http://vagabonders-supreme.net/BudgetInfo/2010Annual_IncomeExpense.TXT

On the other end of the scale is this:

Penelope Trunk's Brazen Careerist

Penelope supported herself, two pre-teens and a live-in Nanny (before she recently became married) and started an (apparently) successful company, one that now has a hired-on CEO. I am guessing that her income is in the low six figures -- $250,000 perhaps.

There are a number of Photographers with widely read BLOGs that I imagine are really raking in the dough -- primarily through image sales.

 

[dex]

PS.... the ads are getting tiring... I can not block them because am at work... and some freeze the rest of the site... and I have to refresh to get another ad so the site will come up!!! What a way to make money....

I'm taking a small break from posting but for you ...
Download Firefox you should be able to do this at work. And then download the privacy add-ons such as ad-block, taco and better privacy.

I do not see any ads on this site or and pop ups.

 

[Retch The Grate]

I'm taking a small break from posting but for you ...
Download Firefox you should be able to do this at work. And then download the privacy add-ons such as ad-block, taco and better privacy.

I do not see any ads on this site or and pop ups.

Yup AdBlock + NoScript == happy safe websurfing on my PCs. It makes surfing on my iPad a bit disconcerting (oh... THIS is why people say the internet has ads...).

 

[RonBoyd]

I do not see any ads on this site or and pop ups.

This site has ads? I use MSIE and have never seen any, other than that easy to ignore banner thing at the top. (oops! Today it is off to the side... but I had to go looking for it.)

 

[Texas Proud]

I'm taking a small break from posting but for you ...
Download Firefox you should be able to do this at work. And then download the privacy add-ons such as ad-block, taco and better privacy.

I do not see any ads on this site or and pop ups.

Dex,

Thanks... but I work for a software company that is Microsoft certified... we can not have it on our system or I would... every once in awhile they do a sweep on all computers to make sure there are not 'rouge' programs out there...

 

[Texas Proud]

This site has ads? I use MSIE and have never seen any, other than that easy to ignore banner thing at the top. (oops! Today it is off to the side... but I had to go looking for it.)

I am on the old view... and it is at the top... very easy to ignore except when it hangs and that is the only thing that is working..

I do not have this problem at home... I can use firefox... use ad block, but don't know what taco is...

 

[brewer12345]

Dex,

Thanks... but I work for a software company that is Microsoft certified... we can not have it on our system or I would... every once in awhile they do a sweep on all computers to make sure there are not 'rouge' programs out there...

So long as the rouge programs remember:

Whores use rouge, ladies pinch their cheeks.

 

[Moemg]

Interesting subject ! I did some reading on how much bloggers make and the top bloggers do very well ( 6 figures ) . Surprisingly most of the top ones are humor blogs and Millionaire Mommy is no where in site in the top money maker blogs .I was also surprised at the amount of hours the top bloggers put in ( a lot ) . In some way it is a lot like ebay the more time you put in the more money you make .

 

[harley]

OK... with AZBob (or whatever his name was).... and the you know who mom both coming in to hawk their blog... (AZ said his was ad free... but might change)...


I was wondering how much someone can make with a blog As an example... THIS site has ads... I do a lot of clicking, just like others here... how much are they paid for each click? What am I worth to this site

Her is probably a typical example:

Tioga George Blog

George has brought in a little over $5,000 so far this year:

I suspect the number is tightly dependent on the amount of skin shown in the blog posts.

 

[RonBoyd]

I suspect the number is tightly dependent on the amount of skin shown in the blog posts.

For sure, the big bucks are in Porn. Always has been, always will be.

 

[bbbamI]

Every time I look at the thread title, I think...How much wood would a woodchuck chuck...

yeah...I know........carry on.....

 

[Texas Proud]

OK.... let me try this a different way....

How much does one click get the blogger

 

[RonBoyd]

OK.... let me try this a different way....

How much does one click get the blogger

Well, back to George again. In his July 8, 2010 post he writes:

Google Ads

Yesterday I wrote to you about disabling Google ads on my blog site. I was frightened by my ad income suddenly rising. It is possible that some Readers may have been clicking on ads to help me earn income. So, I disabled the ads temporarily.

It seems that it might be a good idea for me to explain how Google ads work. You may not understand about the ads and this lack of understanding might cause confusion.

The ads that you see are bought and paid for by advertisers. When you click on an ad, the advertiser who bought the ad pays money to Google and Google shares that money with me. The rules that I have agreed to with Google, provide that I do NOT encourage you to click on ads. If I violate Google's rules, Google may terminate my account with them.

Google and I want you to read the ads that are published on my website. That is how both Google and I earn income. However, please do NOT click on ads solely to help me earn income. If an ad interests you, it is OK for you to click on it to read it.

So I guess for one answer to your question, you could go straight to Google:
https://www.google.com/adsense/static/en_US/Publishertools.html

Google AdSense enables website publishers of all sizes to display targeted ads alongside their online content and earn money. You can easily display AdSense ads on your website, site search results, mobile sites, feeds, and even your unused domains.

However, if you go here:
https://www.google.com/adsense/stat...ourceid=aso&subid=ww-ww-et-pubsol&medium=link

It appears you have to Apply for an account to get specific pricing data. (That makes sense because it probably depends upon what your traffic pattern/type is.)

 

[Moemg]

OK.... let me try this a different way....

How much does one click get the blogger

How much advertising money can a blog make? ~LUKLI~

 

[Andy R]

The amount a click is worth changes from site to site and topic to topic. The price depends on demand from advertisers, the supply of advertising inventory available, the performance of the ads (measured as the click through rate or percentage of clicks vs ads shown), and a slew of other factors.

Pricing also depends on the way the advertisers are paying. Some bid through auction based systems on a Cost-Per-Click (CPC) basis and others pay on a Cost-Per-Impression basis (CPM). When advertisers pay per click they don't have to worry about their ad being shown 10,000 times before getting a click, they just pay for the click so it's based on performance. When paying on a CPM basis they pay for the ad impression regardless if someone clicks or not (could be considered branding).

The type of site is a big factor because that also influences the type of traffic a site gets. For example, forums are high page view sites but very low click through rate. Viewers are engaged in discussions and don't click as often as readers of content sites where they might read a long article and be looking for the next place to surf, click on an ad, and continue their browsing.

Lower page view sites often have higher click through rates. These variables rarely scale. That means a huge site will probably not generate as much as tiny site when it comes to revenue per page. This is a generalization because the real big sites have huge sales teams where small sites depend on ad networks.

Forums still have a stigma among advertisers as unsafe places to advertise because of years of misinformation given to advertisers by content sites. For example, I felt that Vangaurd would be a wonderful fit to advertise here on our community. Unfortunately, I was told they did not want to advertise on user generated content sites. The stigma comes from the old usenet and BBS days when forums were primarily unmoderated. Ad sales people would point out the dangers of having your ad next to some white supremacy discussion or other improper content. The ad sales people were representing firms who pay a considerable amount to write articles and wanted to show the value of the content and use FUD on advertisers that user generated content was a dangerous place to advertise.

The tide is slowly shifting thanks first to MySpace and now facebook as the buzz has become how to interact with people through social media. Unfortunately most advertisers still don't get it and think that shoving ads in front of people is the best way to advertise on the net. What we have discovered is the best way for small businesses to use the internet is to show ads to targeted niches and join them in the discussions but don't try and be a sales guy. Just participate and develop a reputation among the members and when they are looking for that service they will come to you since they know and trust you. Recently we had some shills on another forum site posting as members and asking about a service, the service was also advertising on our site. We found out, I banned the accounts and canceled their advertising campaign, we don't want unethical dollars.

Sorry, I got off topic on the OP. The answer is, it depends on a lot of things. If you are thinking about starting a blog, do so going in that you are going to do it because you love the topic and not to make money. Spend a few years and probably 750-1000 hours building the site, getting links back from other relevant sites and you might start to make a few bucks. If you keep it up, in 5-10 years it could bring in some decent income. Research the niche first because some pay horrible and others are sky high. If you are an expert on topics where large class action lawsuits are happening those lawyers pay huge leads to find new people to include in their suits. So any of the topics you see on TV where they say things like "Are you or someone in your family suffering or died from mesothelioma, call us..." make huge money. I heard that mesothelioma once paid over $100 per click!

 

[Texas Proud]

How much advertising money can a blog make? ~LUKLI~

thanks.... this is what I was wondering...


It seems that if I do NOT click on an ad, there is no income to the site...

And reading Andy's post... that seems to be the case... mostly...


Andy, no, I was just curious why we get these people coming here to try and get people over to their site.. it seems that it is a numbers game... if you get 1,000 page views, SOMEONE will click an ad and they get money.. so they want lots of people visiting even if they can not help you...


This was a learning exercise... thanks

 

[harley]

Forums still have a stigma among advertisers as unsafe places to advertise because of years of misinformation given to advertisers by content sites. For example, I felt that Vangaurd would be a wonderful fit to advertise here on our community. Unfortunately, I was told they did not want to advertise on user generated content sites. The stigma comes from the old usenet and BBS days when forums were primarily unmoderated. Ad sales people would point out the dangers of having your ad next to some white supremacy discussion or other improper content.

Well, they don't have to worry about that here. The only supremacy rants we tend to have involve AA, LBYM, and paying off mortgages. Of course, that might be even more offensive to other (non VG) financial organizations who might be tempted to advertise here.

 

[Ronnieboy]

I check out Get Rich Slowly - Personal Finance That Makes Cents quite a bit and the author there has been able to quit his job and blog full time. I am not sure an exact figure, but I guesstimate he makes >$50k.

I wouldn't mind that as a PT hobby. But I get the feeling he puts alot of work into it. More than a FT job.

 

[clifp]

Thanks Andy very interesting post.

Could you give a range of CPMs that you get for your forums.

Just curious to see the changes from my old print and web advertising days in the last century..

 

[Andy R]

Could you give a range of CPMs that you get for your forums.

Just curious to see the changes from my old print and web advertising days in the last century..

$.05 to $1.50. That's right, $.05 for 1,000 impressions!

Blogs are very different then forums when it comes to the traffic profile. They are more "content sites" in that people are not so much engaged in conversations and more in reading/surfing mode. I don't have much experience with blogs but I know all websites take a lot of work to start and maintain. Probably like most business most fail in the first 5 years and the others are ongoing concerns.

 

[BigMoneyJim]

My blogs cost me about $400/year. OK, I'm not actually selling ads, and I could host my blogs much more cheaply or perhaps even for free.

It's hard to say how much. Google AdSense in particular specifies you shouldn't tell people how much you make. And in the case of AdSense income per unit varies based on the web page topic.

There are a couple of ways to go about trying to make money. (Or so I've read.) One is to create as many websites as possible with lots of ad-laden fluff articles targeting higher paying keywords. As a consumer of information I hate this idea, but a lot of people are doing that. Another is to regularly build interesting content to attract a regular viewership which at some point gains critical mass and attracts a lot of search engine and referral traffic. I like this idea, but it takes a lot of work and a lot of time, and there is no guarantee it will result in income or a decent income.

My big problem is follow-through, but I tried starting a few sites with the idea of making money, and at one time I was a volunteer administrator of this site. I decided that although I can maintain the mechanics of the sites effectively I am not interesting enough on my own to get a good site started, for financial topics, anyway. This site got started with people who knew Dory36 from other forums and people who came here to discuss Firecalc. At this point I think the forum is self-sustaining (to a point) as source-of-knowledge community and search engine target, but it took a few years of people being interested in Dory36 and Firecalc to get there. Arguably it also took some uniqueness in the Firecalc application and continual updates and support.

My thoughts are that it's better to start blogging a topic only if it's interesting to do so for free or at a slight cost, otherwise it may be hard to be motivated to keep on, and the content may not be interesting enough.

I probably wandered off on my own tangent there, but that's what I do. What is an individual poster here worth? Most of us, probably little or nothing. I think it's a function of the size and activity of the site, the topics discussed, and to a smaller degree the intelligence of the conversation. But if half the active posters suddenly left and established a similar site (see Vanguard Diehards -> Bogleheads) I think it would be a noticeable shock to the site income. Not immediately, but over time and less new content is generated.

As far as the ad targeting, I've noticed they've been more sticky about that lately. Just a handful of ad companies show you the vast majority of ads, so I'm sure they can and do track you to some degree from site to site, and they are tailoring their ads for you based on your browsing. And many website logon agreement have their privacy policy stating they may share your info with their "partners". Well, I haven't checked into it, but I presume anyone who signs an ad contract with them for any amount of time could be considered a "partner". So to me they are saying they won't give your information away unless someone pays them first.

 

[Andy R]

Hey BMJ, nice to see you, I hope all is well for you these day!

Re-targeting is the behavioral targeting technique that keeps showing you ads from websites you have already been to. For example, if you are on Walmart.com and then surf around the net you might see Walmart.com ads on other sites after that visit.

Behavioral retargeting - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Google just started allowing this a few months ago:
Google Opens Retargeting to the AdWords Masses Adotas

Although many people dislike ads, it's a lot better then having to pay for services. Just think if you had to pay to search with Google, to use free email services like Gmail & Yahoo Mail, facebook or sites like this. The Motley Fool refugees that came here with Dory did so because this site was free (and still is). MF had to change their business model because of competition from free resources. So even though ads might not be the greatest invention ever, they are better then having to pay.

Also, for the members of this site, don't forget you have some options available to reduce the ads. First you can disable the right hand column. Secondly if you like the right hand column you can turn off the top Sponsor Link box. Both of these can be found in the UserCP >> Options area of the software. As others mentioned, AdBlockers also do the trick for those who want to suppress ads on all the sites they surf to, although I am not a big fan of those

 

[ERD50]

So even though ads might not be the greatest invention ever, they are better then having to pay.

I agree. The problem is that many sites have ads that are so obnoxious and so intrusive that I can't get to the content. So even though it bothers my scruples a bit, I downloaded Ad Block Plus (ABP).

As others mentioned, AdBlockers also do the trick for those who want to suppress ads on all the sites they surf to, although I am not a big fan of those

I just noticed that ABP allows you to disable ad blocking an a site-by-site basis. So you are now enabled Andy , hopefully I don't find your ads too intrusive. I do think that just encourages use of Ad Blockers, which defeats the whole purpose. It's a line to be walked, I guess.

edit/add - but I do have Flash Disabled, so I don't see those ads anyhow w/o clicking them

-ERD50