So you want to make money blogging. That’s a great desire. But it is not always quite easy, isn’t?
You know that already. Otherwise you won’t be reading this post with so much interest (I really hope that you are reading this post with much interest! ;)).
One of the main reasons why bloggers (you) are unable to make money blogging, even if they have the desire, is that they (you) have some serious misconceptions about money making!
And these misconceptions are no joke because they actually pose a risk to your blogging career!
OK so what are the risks? That’s the topic of this post! Let’s dive in right away.
You think you know how make money blogging; but in reality, you don’t know how!
Don’t you realise that this is one of the greatest misconceptions associated with blogging and money making?
The mere fact that you want to make money doesn’t mean that you will be able to make money, right?
You should be able to DO what is needed in order to make money. Otherwise you won’t be able to fulfill your desire.
Alright I hear you saying: Jane not knowing something is not the end of the world. I will somehow learn how to make money.
I appreciate that!
But it is not very straightforward, you know. I’m not making you scared.
But the point is this – many bloggers still don’t make money because they “don’t realise” that they don’t know how to make money!
That’s a lot of “don’ts”!
It is like not realising that you are blind and you really hope that you are going to make it. But not realizing you are blind is going to cost you a lot.
Is this a serious thing? Is this a risk? Yup it is! Because you will be wasting your precious time, money and efforts on various money making activities.
But you don’t realise that those activities are not actually money making activities as you are blindly believing.
So what to do about this misconception?
Unless you start to realise this fact, you will be wasting your business resources.
You might be wondering how other bloggers are able to make it while you are just dragging your feet.
So you need to stop what you are doing and take a closer look at what you are doing.
Are your money making efforts paying? If not, you just need to change your strategies.
Most commonly, people choose the wrong money making methods.
If you are doing something for a consistent amount of time and if that money making strategy is not paying, you should stop doing it and find out what’s wrong.
You should specifically find out WHY you are unable to make money via that particular strategy while someone else is able to make it.
If that BIG BLOGGER is doing it, I’ll do the same to make money!
Well, don’t get me wrong here. Following a big blogger’s money making strategies is a good thing!
In fact, it is a smart thing because you don’t have to reinvent the wheel!
There are so many big bloggers like Pat Flynn, Darren Rowse, Neil Patel, and others who make a very good amount of money consistently via their blogging business.
Some of them (like Pat) even publish income reports – I particularly love Pat’s income reports because he clearly spills what he does every month and what contributes to every one dollar of his income.
His income reports are not only motivating to new bloggers but also give other bloggers working ways to make money blogging.
But that doesn’t mean you will also be able to make money like him following his ways exactly.
So what to do about this misconception?
Just because it works for that established blogger doesn’t mean it would work for you too.
Pat is making a lot of money and he publishing income reports where he explains how he makes that money.
BUT – blindly following Pat’s money making methods will not or may not give you the results that he is getting.
For instance, he is making a lot of money via affiliate marketing – but if you have just started a blog and want to make money via affiliate marketing (instantly), you might be wasting your time and efforts.
Why? Because people don’t buy Pat’s recommendations just like that or just because.
He has built a very strong trust factor! And this took him quite some time and a LOT of hard work!
So if you want to make money via affiliate marketing, you should first be prepared to put forth the hard work that Pat has put forth.
Without the trust factor you cannot simply casually mention a product in one of your blog posts (with your affiliate link, of course) and expect to make thousands of dollars, like Pat!
Hope you got my point. If you are thinking about making money with affiliate marketing, in particular, read this post.
https://www.savvybloggingtips.com/what-is-affiliate-marketing/
I have used affiliate marketing here as an example. It could be anything in fact.
Thinking you could make a full time income solely from Adsense
Well I’ve used Adsense here as an example – it could be any ONE income stream!
But before I talk about other examples, I would like to emphasise Adsense in particular.
Many bloggers (the very new ones included) think Adsense is the only and easiest way to make money blogging.
They think that starting a blog, publishing a few blog posts and then putting up a few Adsense banners is all that is needed to make a full time blogging income.
I am not against Adsense – in fact Adsense is indeed one of the easiest ways to make money blogging; but note that here I said “one of the easiest ways” instead of “the ONLY easiest way”!
And, Adsense will not be your easiest money making stream UNLESS you have a really popular blog that has millions of page views per day!
Even then, having Adsense as your ONLY income stream is not a smart idea!
As I said earlier, Adsense is just an example. It is in general not wise to have only one income stream!
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. It is not safe to do so.
What to do about this misconception?
Every money making stream takes time and effort. So don’t think anything is easy. I talked about Adsense above.
Similarly some bloggers think affiliate marketing is easy, just because they don’t have to create their own products.
And, there’s one more thing to realise before you can handle this misconception.
[clickToTweet tweet=”Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Don’t rely on only one income stream! @makemoneyblogging” quote=”Don’t put all your eggs in one basket. Don’t rely on only one income stream!” theme=”style4″]If you are into affiliate marketing, don’t do that alone.
If anything fails (say, the products you recommend go bad, or you stop getting search engine traffic due to a search engine update), your business will fall flat overnight.
There is no such thing as overnight success, but overnight flop does exist!
We all know about businesses that went back to zero just with one search engine update.
If you don’t want that to happen to your business, you should create more than 2 income streams for your online business.
Wrapping up…..
So what are the misconceptions that you have about making money online? Have you realised/identified those misconceptions?
What have you done to stop believing those misconceptions and change things for good? Please share your views/experiences/misconceptions related to “make money blogging” in the comments below!
Before you leave, check out this free guide of mine:
https://www.savvybloggingtips.com/make-money-blogging/
I disagree, blogging is not about making money but its a a passion for some who are not interested in making money through blogs!
Thanks for your comment Ayyangar. But this post is not telling you that you should make money if you blog or that you should be money minded. This post is actually not for those who blog for fun or passion (and don’t care about money).
This post is for those who want to make money blogging, yet unable to do so because of some misconceptions blocking them 🙂
S.R.Ayyangar,
People whose blogs are worthy to read always have sponsored and affliate ads lined up to them. People who blog solely for passion which i mean here is not giving a crap about the content that they are putting out will never earn money. Plain and Simple.
Hi Jane.
I loved that article.
It was very well explained, and realistic. It was good for you to put the truth out there for us to see.
Thanks for sharing that.
Nathan.
Yup, the truth 🙂 Thanks for stopping by Nathan!
Great Slideshare presentation, Jane!!!
Glad you liked it Ana 🙂 Thanks for stopping by!
I like to keep a ‘gun to the head’ mindset – if you only had 24 hours to get sales or optins, how would you do it? This makes you very results orientated and cuts out all the practices that don’t contribute to reaching goals.
Aw that sounds terrific lol. But if it works, I’m all in 🙂 Thanks for your comment!
A great slide share and I like this topic and your insight. I agree that one needs to review the strategy he uses to make money on his blog. There are many methods of making money on the blog but it takes time and patience. Thanks for sharing
The quick methods don’t work usually and even if they do, they only stay helpful for a while. When you build a money making stream with time and effort, it pays in the long run!
I really enjoyed this Jane. I think so many people assume that blogging for money means an adsense account and that is all. This gives some insight into what is really necessary.
Oh ya, Adsense is notorious in that sense 🙂 Thanks for stopping by Kostas!
Hey Jane,
This is one of those “easier said than done” things. Blogging look like it’s a really easy thing to do, but once you get into it, it requires a lot from you. You can either work really hard and follow everyone footstep who making tens of thousands of dollars a month, or you can work smart by taking their ideas, put them together and make it your own, and do a trial and tribulation thing to see which strategies work best for you. It would be best to do the latter. I may take time, but eventually it’ll work out! Thanks for sharing Jane! Have a good one!
Hey Jane,
Ah, if only there was a magic wand and we just jumped right in and everything instantly started working. The results and the money started flowing in. Oh darn it, I’ve got to wake up from that dream? Yep, that’s exactly what that is….a dream.
This is one of the things I don’t like about what a lot of people are promoting. They make it sound like it’s easy to do and you’ll have overnight success. I think if everyone faced reality and just understood that everything takes time then they would probably do so much better and stick with it until they started to see results. The problem is they don’t.
I’m glad though that you pointed this out and I hope that those still hoping to be the next Pat Flynn will realize this didn’t come overnight for him either. Just look at what he’s achieved though and isn’t that consist work worth it?
Great share Jane!
~Adrienne
Hey Jane
I vocally support your views about Google Adsense. It took me nearly three years to earn a decent amount of money with it from my green blog. It is also a point that it’s niche is not from the list of saturated niche like money making and technology gadgets.
Earlier it was quite common to gather a crowd around you and sell your product to a few of them. It was generally considered bigger the crowd, higher the number of sales. The same strategy was adopted during initial days of blogging.
But this is an era of consumer awareness. Buyers are quite knowledgeable and smarter than sellers. They don’t roam now but just go to the exact place where they get find the best solution of their problem. That is why it is must to build a community of your niche and sell to huge proportion of them your products and services.
Thanks for sharing this wonderful post of huge value.
Thanks hay Admin can you please tell me each time my Adsense got blocked. I am not doing scam what is wrong with it. Kindly tell me the solution
Hi Jane,
Adsense is proved the best monetization method in my case (though the niche makes is greater difference) because it is probably the only passive income stream for bloggers. Once you have a blog with good organic traffic, the monetizing is really easy and attractive.
Other methods such as affiliates, selling your own products and so on really requires heavy work on your part.
Hi Jane,
Oh yea, one of the biggest misconceptions many people have is that if big blogger A is making money this way, then I could make money this was as well. And then they try. They fail. Then they either (a) say that bloggers formula doesn’t work or (b) they quit.
I like your suggestion here a well, “Why? Because people don’t buy Pat’s recommendations just like that or just because. He has built a very strong trust factor! And this took him quite some time and a LOT of hard work!”
It’s so true because I tried to “copy” Pat’s formula as well when I started and quickly realized I didn’t have his same following, etc.
Also, I never tried Adsense so I don’t have anything to add to that, but I’d imagine that it’s not as easy as people think to make money from it.
Great post, Jane.
– Andrew
Hi,
This must be the longest article to read but for somebody who is practicing , its worth it.
I think you have just nailed it and to some of us, most of of these are still a mystery , we don’t totally get some of these facts.
thanks.