How To Make Money Blogging in 2020 by Ryan Robinson

How to Make Money Blogging in 2020 ($451,236+): Free Guide
If you’re here to learn how to make money blogging, then you’re in the right place.
Back in 2014 when I rst started my blog, I didn’t have a clue about how to make
money blogging, let alone how much money was even possible to make from a
blog. Flash forward to today, it’s even more shocking (still) that I’ve gone from
learning how to make money blogging to now earning in excess of

$50,000/mo from my blog.
If you’ve been reading my blog for a while now, then you’ve watched my journey
going from earning just a couple thousand dollars in monthly side income
supported largely by freelance clients, all the way up to now making more each
month from my blog than I made per year in my rst few jobs.
In 2019, my blog made $451,236—mostly on the side of a full-time job I held until
very recently. Last year, my blog generated $127,418 and the year before that, I
broke the $100,000 mark for the rst time.
So when my readers ask if it’s really possible to learn how to make money
blogging in a relatively short period of time, my answer is a resounding yes.
Now rst, if you’re totally new to blogging today, I’ve put together the ultimate
guide to getting started with creating your blog. Actually getting your blog online
and well-optimized is the rst step to learning how to make money blogging, and
my 25,000 word guide to starting a blog will position you best for going on to
make money blogging in the near future.

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While it’s great to start considering ways to monetize your blog now, this guide is
speaking more to those of you who’ve already built a blog and are looking to take it
to the next level. If you haven’t yet gotten your blog o the ground, then head over
to my ultimate guide to starting a blog.
So far this year, my blog has reached over 3.2 million readers (like you), and
there's still three+ months left in the year. It's having highly engaged readers and
an email list of 120,000+ active subscribers to my blog—that creates great

opportunities to make money blogging.
The more readers you have, the more options that'll eventually be at your disposal
to positively monetize your blog.
Now without further delay, let's get into my ultimate guide on how to make money
blogging.

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How to Make Money Blogging in 2020: 12

Proven Ways (Free Guide)
1. Sponsored Blog Content
2. A liate Programs
3. Blog Advertisements
4. Sell Online Courses
5. Physical Products
6. Release a Software Tool

7. Selling Your Own Services
8. Writing (and Selling) eBooks
9. Launch a Virtual Summit
10. Business Partnerships

11. Podcast Sponsorships
12. Freelancing
Disclosure: Please note that some of the links below are a liate links and at no
additional cost to you, I may earn a commission. Know that I only recommend
products, tools, services and resources I’ve personally used and believe are
genuinely helpful, not because of the small commissions I make if you decide to
purchase them. Most of all, I would never advocate for buying something that you
can’t a ord or that you’re not yet ready to implement.
Now, before we just dive straight into how to make money blogging, let's do a
quick overview of what's required to run a successful blog in the rst place.
Want to skip the introduction and jump straight down to my 12 proven ways to
make money blogging? Click right here.

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It's important that you have the key basics already taken care of rst, so that you
can be con dent in getting a return on all the work you'll be putting in to soon
make money blogging.
Having each of these components will ensure that you remain successful, and
continue to grow your tra c as you start monetizing your content.
Find a clear niche to blog about

Have you gured out the niche topic area you're going to blog about yet? Recent
blogging statistics show that needs to come rst (and is a necessary step before
you actually make money blogging).
Ultimately, your blog niche isn't only the topic or grouping of related themes that
you'll be creating blog content around, it runs so much deeper than that—and
having that cohesive theme is essential to eventually make money blogging—
because it gives your readers a reason to regularly return for more.
Here on my blog, every piece of content I publish somehow comes back to the
overarching niche of building a side blogging business (and ultimately teaching
readers how to make money blogging).

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This niche still gives me room to travel in a lot of di erent directions, while still
staying on message with my 100+ podcast episodes and long-form articles I've
written over the years.
Moreover, your niche explains the type of person that your content speaks most
clearly to. It’s a zoomed-in view of your expertise and experience. Ultimately, your
niche is what will help you discover and grow your audience, market your content
the right way, and monetize your blog successfully.
When you fully understand your niche and positioning within that niche, you’ll
begin to develop a very speci c (and engaged) audience, which makes it wildly
easier to get sponsorships, partners, advertisers and deploy all of the other major
ways to make money blogging.
A simple example of how to make money blogging

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If you run a DIY baking blog (your niche), companies that sell cookware are likely
going to be one of your top supporters when it comes to making money blogging.
You'll have a solid idea of who your audience is (at-home bakers) and exactly what
they're hoping to accomplish (looking to improve their skills, get easy baking
recipes, learn more about cooking in general). On the ip side, this also means that
you can con dently communicate with sponsors about who's consuming your blog
content—and more importantly—why they're likely to buy the advertiser's

product.
Listen to my interview with famous food blogger, Gaby Dalkin of What's Gaby
Cooking, to hear more about how she went from writing on the side, and learned
how to make money blogging on a massive scale with advertisers, book deals, her
own line of salsa products at Williams Sonoma and more.

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After hearing this example, now imagine what it'd be like if you didn't have a niche
to blog about. Maybe you write about caring for plants, but you also like to write
about psychology, with a bit of hiking sprinkled in. Not only is your audience all
over the place, but they're probably a little confused too. And that in turn will
confuse your advertisers.
Gardening companies probably won't want to advertise where someone is reading
instead about psychology-backed parenting techniques.
I know this might sound like an over-simpli ed example, but nding and sticking
to a niche will help you stand out amongst the crowd of unfocused content, and
will lay a solid foundation for learning how to make money blogging.
If you want to make money blogging... you have to

write (consistently)
So you've got a little bit of tra c coming in to a few blog posts that are beginning
to rank well in the search engines. That's a great start on your journey of learning
how to make money blogging.
Need some more inspiration on what to write about? 👉 Check out my epic guide to
the best blog post ideas you should cover today.
But once you're here, it's easy to think, "Well now that I rank #1 for this topic, I'll
just settle in there and reap the rewards."

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Trust me, I've been there. But as we've covered already, if it were that easy to make
money blogging, then just about everyone would be a rich blogger by now.
Once you're starting to get a little content success and begin ranking, you'll slowly
get more and more tra c every week, it can be easy to think it's alright to sit back
and relax. And while blogs can sometimes be argued as solely passive income,
ultimately if you want to make money blogging in a scalable long-term fashion,

you have to be very proactive.
Proactive looks like writing. A lot.
For me personally, I dedicate an average of 10 to 15 hours of time to writing for my
blog each week—and that's on the side of my day job still. If I could write more, I
would. It takes a bit of sacri ce, and because I've learned over the years that my
best thinking comes during the morning, I often get up at 5 AM to put in a few
hours of writing before switching over to the tasks of my remote job.

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I go into the nitty gritty details of all my blogging habits in my latest book, The
Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers if you want more.
Now, you don't have to follow my stringent personal writing habits in order to
make money blogging, but you do have to write very regularly. The most
successful, highest tra cked blogs post multiple articles each week—if not many
every day.
My success at blogging is due largely to consistently publishing highly tactical,
long-form content for my readers. That's how I've grown my email list to more
than 120,000+ subscribers tuning in to my weekly new articles. Having an email
list of this size has a orded me a lot of opportunities to make money blogging.
And while you may not be striving to be the next Buzzfeed, if you want to make
money blogging, you should aim for ramping up to a point where you're posting at
least two to three high quality, sizable word count articles (in excess of 1,500
words) each month. That leaves time to spend promoting your content too.

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Not only does publishing regular blog content generate more tra c, it brings
returning readers. And those are the people that'll help you make money blogging
over the long-term.
Moreover, it also shows your advertisers that you're active and involved with your
readers.
Nailing your blog SEO (Search Engine

Optimization)
It's really, really easy to write about subjects you care deeply about.
And it's important that your blog becomes a place to share about things that are
powerful to you, of course. But even more important (when it comes to learning
how to make money blogging) is nailing your blog SEO.

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Search Engine Optimization can send even the most experienced professional
marketers into a tailspin, but SEO is paramount to making money blogging.
Why? Because major search engines like Google can send you a practically
unlimited amount of free, organic tra c—if you create content that's worthy of
ranking high in search results.
Now, we're not going to do a deep dive into SEO in today's guide about how to
make money blogging (SEO is a major component of my paid course, Built to Blog),
but I will tell you this—it's crucial to always have a speci c keyword phrase in
mind for each blog post, and to always do your homework up front in order to
make sure that keyword phrase is something people are actually searching for
online.
Ensuring that you're following smart blog SEO best practices will not only help
grow your blog, it will make you stand out as a leading industry professional if you
can rank high in search results for competitive terms.
Plus, your audience will place more trust in you, as will your advertisers.
Find (and build) your engaged community of

readers
I'll always be an advocate of nding and building an engaged online community.
The most important thing, especially when you're just getting started with
learning how to make money blogging, is to focus your e orts on not just bringing
in new readers, but on establishing real, tangible relationships with as many of
them as possible.

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Having an online community—whether it's a forum on your blog, a Facebook
group, email list, Twitter community or otherwise—can do absolute wonders for
your blog. And ultimately, they're going to be the ones that help you learn how to
make money blogging in a way that's a mutual win-win for both them and you.
Develop real relationships with your readers. Learn about their likes and dislikes,
why they read your rst article, how they discovered you, and why they keep
coming back for more. Connect with them as humans, not anonymous readers on a
screen. The investment will be worth taking a few minutes out to chat over email
or on the phone every now and then.
When you have a community, you not only have a deep rooted support system, you
also have some very important relationships.

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It may turn out that one of your readers is an advertiser that wants to promote
their products on your blog. It may be a podcaster who wants to feature you on
their next episode with 2,000 listeners with a spot for your blog pitch.
When you get a feel for your audience, and get to know them intimately, you can
start asking them for support. You'd be surprised what you can get from a strong
community of like-minded readers.
For all of my best tactics on bringing in new readers & creating community, check
out my guide to driving tra c to your blog.
How to make money blogging from your readers —

(how the numbers scale)
How many readers do you actually need in order to make money blogging?
Well, the answer to that question depends on how you're making money from your
blog and what your conversion rate is for each channel.

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Of course, you’re not going to know your conversion rates right now, but once you
start selling a product, pitching your freelance services, launching an online
course, or reaching out to advertisers for blog sponsorships, you can calculate your
conversion rates pretty quickly.
Here’s a quick example expanding on what your conversion rate could be when
selling your own product—an online course—from your blog.
Let’s say you have 1,000 monthly readers. If 2% of those readers turn into paying
customers for your online course, that’s 20 buyers. If your product is $10, that's
only $200. However, if your course runs $100, then you’ve just made your rst
$2,000.
Now, you can also look at this in a much more simple way.
Fewer readers = less sales
More readers = more sales

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At the same time though, you can work on tweaks to get your conversion rate
higher over time, and you can play with your pricing to increase average customer
value as well. Sometimes math can actually be fun 😊
Of course, you need two key pieces of data in order to make these estimates:
Unique Pageviews
Conversions
To view the number of Unique Pageviews on your blog, dive into your Google
Analytics Dashboard, go to Behavior > Site Content > All Pages.
If you’re strictly using your website as a blog, then you should see your top blog
posts listed clearly with their corresponding number of pageviews.

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You can set a date range (like the past day, week or month) and see your pageview
count update. That’s how many people are reading your blog я
To get your conversion rate when talking about a direct product sale to a reader of
your blog, simply take the number of product sales and divide that by the number
of pageviews you're seeing on your blog for a given date range—that'll give you
the percentage of readers that became customers.
Alternatively to get a sense of how well your site is doing in the pursuit to make
money blogging, you can take your total blog income for a given date range, and
divide that by the amount of income you generated in that same period—that'll
give you the average value (in your currency) for each individual reader of your
blog.
Now that you have a basic understanding of what a blog is, how to start building
community, picking a niche to blog about, nailing your blog SEO and tracking
conversion rates, let's get down to business on how to really make money
blogging.

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How to Make Money Blogging in 2020: 12

Proven Ways (Free Guide)
Now we're nally getting to the fun part... how to make money blogging.
Thanks for hanging with me as we covered the foundational steps that'll help
you get ready to pro t from your e orts toward learning to make money blogging.
It takes a lot of time and work, but trust me—the investment is well worth it in the
long run.
In all honesty, there are dozens—if not hundreds of di erent ways to make money
blogging.

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I'd like to tell you that I've tested all of them, but I haven't. And after years of
experimentation, there are about a dozen that've proven to stand the test of time
and generate life-changing revenue for not only my own blog, but that of hundreds
of others I know. For that reason, we're focusing only on the most reputable,
proven, broadly applicable monetization channels in this guide.
And what I can tell you is these top twelve ways to make money blogging (that I've
both personally done and have been successful with) helped me turn this blog into
a source of $50,000+ in monthly income.
These are tried and true techniques used by the most successful, most popular
blogs you've heard of.
Getting paid for the content you create.
The rst overarching theme we're going to cover in this guide to make money
blogging is getting paid for your content. This is the easiest and quickest way to
start monetizing your blog. Of course, that's also why you see so many bloggers
pursuing this monetization channel.
The important thing here is to stay true to your blog, your expertise and to keep
your audience at the forefront of everything you create.
Let's dive in!
1. Sponsored Blog Content

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Sponsored content is a tried and true investment for brands of all kinds, and it
works wonders in the right scenarios. This makes it a clear win-win of the many
ways to make money blogging.
Over and over again, this method is not only proven to work for advertisers, it's
proven to help you make money blogging at the same time.
What is sponsored content? It's when company pays you a fee in return for you
writing an article that's either about them—or on a topic related to them, where
their product, service or brand is prominently featured as the go-to resource for
those of your readers that want to learn more.
It's one of those sweet deals between a blogger and an advertiser where you're
both truly bene ting from the relationship.

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Here are a few examples of sponsored content here on my blog:
35 Best CRMs for Small Business and Startups (sponsored by Close)
How to Build a Content Marketing Strategy (sponsored by Skillshare)
18 Steps to Pitch an Idea to Investors and Customers (sponsored by
Slidebean)
When sponsored content is done well (and not just a plain & simple
advertisement), it comes across as genuine, unique, and free of a high-pressure
sales pitch. In my opinion, if your sponsored post doesn't lead with providing real
value to your readers, then you've already gotten o track.
You've already built trust with your audience, so they trust you to recommend
products that you know and believe in. That's why I always recommend staying
true to your audience when making sponsored content.
So how do you get sponsored? If you run a popular, heavily tra cked blog, you
may already be getting sponsorship opportunities ooding your inbox. If that
doesn't sound like where you're at today, then let's talk about what it takes to get
sponsored content o ers.
For starters, identify a handful of products and their companies that t perfectly
into your niche.
Often, you'll nd that it's products or services you're already using yourself. Make
a list of at least 10 products you'd be eager to advertise and could passionately
support.
Next is the hardest part, and it's not that di cult (I promise).

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Go to the websites of your top 10 products and nd someone who works in either
marketing or PR at the company, and track down their email address using simple
blogging tools like Hunter or Voila Norbert. Keep in mind that many companies
who are open to sponsorships actively advertise a sponsorship email address
somewhere on their contact pages.
Finally, it's time to send them a cold email with your o er to partner up on
sponsored content for your readers—with a heavy emphasis on why they should
pony up the sponsorship dollars. Here's a sample sponsor pitch email you can use:
"Hi Mary,
My name is Ryan and I love [your product]! I'm actively running a blog over at
ryrob.com, and I'd love to see if we can partner up for a sponsored post on my blog.
I reach about [number] monthly readers right now and would also promote the
post to my email list of [number] subscribers. Everything I write about is related to
[your niche], and [your product] ts right into what my readers are looking for.
Do you have a few minutes to chat this week about if this would be a good t?
Ryan"
This is just a rough example of what you can say when reaching out—and keep the
focus on why the sponsor should be jumping at the opportunity to reach your
audience.
Remember to always keep it personal too, you're emailing a real person, not a
robot.

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Ultimately, if you're planning on going the sponsored content route, you'll need a
media kit to highlight your sponsorship opportunities.
Having a media package is incredible important to not only attract the right
business, but to set your prices up front. In this next section, I'm going to walk you
through the right way to make a media package that will attract and sell the right
companies.
Bonus: How to Create a High-Converting Media Kit (to Make Money Blogging)
If you’re taking the advertising and sponsorship route to make money blogging,
you'll need a media kit that provides advertisers with key metrics and insights
about your audience—to help them decide whether or not their sponsorship is
worth the investment (like my deck here).

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Don’t worry, a media kit is pretty simple to create using Microsoft Powerpoint or
Keynote and you’ll immediately reap the bene ts of having a concise single
document to share with potential advertisers.
Having a media kit listed clearly on your blog (I recommend highlighting it on your
contact and work with me pages) will let companies know that you’re open to
sponsorships. Another bene t is that a media kit also shows clear xed pricing,
which helps you avoid low-balling, bad t advertisers.

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Here are the essential elements you need to include in your own media kit in order
to really make money blogging and land quality sponsors:

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1. A quick blurb about yourself. After all, you and your blog are the product. Why
should sponsors invest in you?
2. A breakdown of your readership. Who’s your audience? What are their
demographics? What are their interests? What do they buy?
3. Your tra c report. This is where Google Analytics comes in. You’ll need to
show page view gures so advertisers will see how many people they're
going to reach.
4. Advertising opportunities. What are you selling? Ad spaces? Sponsored blog
posts? Podcast ads? A liate partnerships? Email marketing to your list? All
of the above?
5. Pricing. This can be the scary one at rst, but if you make sure you’re pricing
to t your audience size (and engagement level), then you're on the right
track. Check out other media kits from bloggers in your speci c industry to
see how they are pricing their opportunities and how you compare.
As far as pricing goes, I now charge $2,500 for a sponsored post to reach my
audience—but when you're just starting out, it's more common to command
anywhere from $100 to $500 if you've got an engaged, growing base of readers
that'll move the needle for your sponsor.
Make sure your media kit is clear, concise, and visually appealing. Advertisers will
want to download it and keep it while they’re making the decision to spend money
on you.
You’ll also want to have an easy way for sponsors to get in touch with you, so that
they can reach out and get the ball rolling with a quick email or contact form
submission.
2. A liate Programs

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Let's talk about a liate programs. Joining (and promoting) most a liate
programs is arguably easier than pursuing blog sponsorships, if you ask me.
Companies that have a liate programs already built in, are ready and willing to
pay you money in exchange for directing them your blog readers—which means
you don't need to pitch sponsors or invest time into creating your own product
before starting to make money blogging.
But, in order to generate a meaningful income from a liate marketing, it usually
takes a good amount of tra c to your blog rst.
For example, here's a snapshot of my Bluehost a liate revenue for the month of
February 2019 where I generated $43,510.00 in referral fees from them...

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What I like most about a liate programs, are that they skip the cold reach out
phase that other channels like sponsorships and freelancing require. Plus, a lot of
a liate programs like the best web hosting plans (even ones with monthly
payment web hosting plans) are well-automated to get you onboard and promoting
quickly.
Much like sponsorships, you're getting paid to recommend a product to your
readers. The best part about a liate programs is that many companies o er them.
From the Amazon A liate Program to Target to eBay, all the way down to your
little budding eCommerce companies with high-converting landing pages looking
to jump on the a liate train, there are tons of options for joining pro table
a liate programs.
For more on how to get started with generating a liate income, check out this
epic guest post about a liate marketing here on my blog.
What Are the Best A liate Programs for Bloggers?
The best way to make money blogging with a liates certainly depends largely
upon the niche you're writing in. Here are a few of my picks for the best blogging
a liate programs:
Amazon Associates
CreativeLive
Udemy
Bluehost
Shopify
HubSpot
and many more...

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There are a lot of a liate program options out there to make money blogging
from, I know.
To avoid getting overwhelmed with this channel as you're just starting to learn
how to make money blogging, my advice is to focus on just a few (proven) a liate
programs that have close topic tie-ins to the content you've been creating (like I'm
doing on my new blogging side projects, MoneyTalk and SmartWP)—and know
your audience is craving more of.
3. Blog Advertisements
Displaying advertisement space is arguably the easiest, most basic (and quickest)
form of starting to make money blogging.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying basic in a bad way. I mean that simple
advertising space is the core component when you're rst just guring out how to
make money blogging—and it's the rst channel I personally pursued. But because
it's so comparatively easy to do, it also tends to pay the least amount in nancial
return.
For context, this simple blog advertisement (pictured below) on my blog here
generates anywhere from $800 to $1,200 per month in blog income based on
around 300,000 monthly readers.

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Of all the di erent ways to make money blogging that I'm engaged in, this is one
of the lowest returns in terms of total dollars earned (especially for my amount of
tra c).
The trade o however, is that it takes me zero e ort on a daily basis to make
money blogging with this channel since I'm an approved publisher with the ad
platform Carbon Ads, that goes out and brokers deals with advertisers like
Atlassian, Adobe, Slack, and hundreds of other tech-related tool companies that
want to reach my audience.
Are blog advertisements still a legitimate way to make money blogging?

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In short, yes. Advertising space is still an active component in many digital
marketing campaigns, and for a good reason. First and foremost, it's mimicking
ads before the digital age—billboards, magazine placements, newspaper ads, and
such. On the right blogs (especially if you've followed my guide about how to name
a blog creatively), advertisements can be an incredibly easy way to get a brand's
name out and in front of the public eye.
And now that we're spending countless hours on the Internet (with the average
person spending 24 hours a week online), it’s easy to get ads in front of readers.
You can advertise on your blog and begin to make money blogging with this
channel in a variety of ways.
The most popular, of course, is by starting with Google Adsense. You simply sign
up, place a piece of code provided by Google on your site where the ad will go, and
advertisers will bid on reaching your audience with relevant terms.
Keep in mind that when using Google Adsense, you don't have a ton of control
about what is being advertised on your blog. If you want to stay very true to your
brand and keep your audience engaged, try another more industry-speci c and
tightly controlled ad platform like what I use (Carbon Ads) or look into other
options that cater more closely to the audience you have—or want to drive in.
The 7 Best Display Ad Networks for Bloggers
If you want to make money blogging by leveraging display ad networks, here are
my picks for the best ones to evaluate for your blog:

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Mediavine (All topics)
Carbon Ads (Business, Design, Development topics)
PropellerAds (All topics)
Google AdSense (All topics)
Taboola (All topics)
BlogAds (All topics)
Media.net (All topics)
If you want to maintain a deeper control of the ads on your blog, then I recommend
choosing to make money blogging with a channel like Sponsored Content (above)
where you're working individually with a sponsor who wants to reach your
audience.
Sure, you have to nd companies in your niche that want to advertise on your site,
but you'll almost always be able to broker higher-paying deals with this approach.
Plus, over time as your audience grows, companies will begin reaching out to you
for sponsorship opportunities.
Selling Your Own Products and Services
Asking other companies to pay you in exchange for sharing their products with
your audience isn't the only way to make money blogging.
When you're still guring how to monetize your blog, it's important to consider
what you're really excited about (probably not advertising other companies
products right?), as well as what you're personally skilled at to nd opportunities
where you can sell your own products and services to readers.

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Here's a real life example of one way I make money blogging—by selling my own
eBook, The Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers.
For example, if you're a parent that loves to share parenting tips on your blog, but
you have no intention of ever selling your own products to readers one day... then
going the sponsored content and advertising route may actually be your best move.
On the ip side though, if you're a chef who's sharing awesome new recipes and
you want to build a personal brand for yourself, then ultimately it may be a better
goal to start the process of learning how to make money blogging by selling an
eBook that's a simple compilation of all your best recipes with beautiful images &
step-by-step tutorials.

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Testing out learning how to make money blogging with an easy-to-create digital
product can also pave the way for many exciting new opportunities to come.
Maybe your eBook catches the eye of your favorite publisher and it leads to a
print book deal?
Perhaps a television network sees your growing following on YouTube and
Instagram & wants to bring you onto a popular show in your niche?
The possibilities that can come from rst taking the initiative to create your
own products and services are endless.
Hopefully by now, you have an idea of what you like to do and what you're skilled
at, because from here on out we're going to talk about how to make money
blogging without needing to rely on outside advertisers.

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Before we run through the many ways you can make money blogging with your
own content, I'd like to caveat this with a quick pricing discussion...
We've talked about how to price your sponsored content and blog advertising, but
this next section is a little di erent.
When you're pricing out anything you're personally selling, make sure you're
considering your overhead costs, rather than just choosing an arbitrary number
that sounds good.
If you're pricing a digital product like an eBook or online course, you may not think
there's any overhead at all, but it's important to understand the skill you're
contributing (how long did it take to master?), the time it takes you to create, and
what it's worth to someone who's going to consume and take action based on your
content.
You may need to try a few di erent prices before you hit the sweet spot.
De nitely look at what your peers are doing to gather inspiration. Diehard
followers of yours may buy regardless of the price, but others will certainly price-
check before hitting the buy button on your blog.
4. Sell Online Courses

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Do you have a skill you can teach others? Do your readers look to you for your
expertise in a particular area?
Monetize that skill by creating an online course and you'll be on the fast track to
learning how to make money blogging.
The best part? Creating an online course can be as easy as lming a series of a few
short instructional videos that teach your blog readers how to do something
meaningful based on your own skills, experiences and successes. If you've excelled
at something, there are people out there who would gladly pay to bene t from your
expertise and accelerate their learning curves.

Page 35
Major online course platforms like Udemy, Skillshare and CreativeLive all feature a
wide variety of courses that range in length from 30 minutes up to 30 hours or
more—with the longer courses naturally commanding higher prices because
they're often signi cantly more in-depth.
On the other end of the spectrum, an online course can be as time-consuming as
you'll allow it to be.
Here's a shot of me lming a course several years ago that turned out to be a very
in-depth, 30-day step-by-step process for students to follow along with. Needless
to say, it took a while to create all the content, but it was also one of the most
impactful courses I've ever launched for my students.
My advice as you're still learning how to make money blogging with online
courses, is to start with creating a short-form course (less than 60 minutes of
video content) on a very speci c niche topic that can be taught without too much
hand holding along the way.

Page 36
Take it from me... I've created 4 online courses over the past 5 years—all of which
have been di erent in size, scope and topics—you'll want to start with creating a
simple course your rst time around the block.
How Do You Create Your First Online Course?
First, you'll have to determine which skill or process you want to teach (and how
long it will take someone to learn it).
Then you'll need to validate that course idea with your readers, or otherwise go out
and start conversations with your target customers, to ensure there's actually a
paying audience for the course you want to create.
The social media marketing niche is a great example for how you can make money
blogging with an online course...
Let's say you're killing it on Instagram, and your readers want to know how you do
it. You can put together a course that teaches them step-by-step how to be an
Instagram pro. Di erent modules of your course could focus on distinct topics like:
The basics of shooting engaging photos
How to nd your ideal posting schedule for your audience
Writing enticing captions and leveraging hashtags
Going from 0 to 1,000 followers in 90 days
An online course like this would be a great example of an evergreen how-to guide
that students can run through and implement on their own time—meaning it can
be a relatively hands o "set it and forget it" style asset, rather than something
where students need to tune in for weekly live sessions.

Page 37
That makes this style of course a very attractive way to make money blogging.
Health and wellness plans are another great example of how you can make money
blogging in another niche with an online course.
If you're a tness blogger, bodybuilder, nutritionist, or anything of the sort,
consider selling something like a 30-day plan for your speci c practice. This could
include:
Video tutorials of how to do speci c workouts
Meal prep schedules and nutrition guidelines
Shopping pointers and cooking recipes
Weekly workout plans
Online community support
All of these di erent components would be designed to work together and get
students to a common end goal or transformation.

Page 38
The sky's the limit when it comes to selling online courses as a way to make
money blogging.
As always thought, make sure the course is actually relevant to your audience
before investing tons of time into creating it.
Validating your course concept can be as simple as tweeting about your idea,
talking about it on your Instagram story or sharing a short blog post that asks your
readers & followers if this course is something they'd be interested in.
Feel out their feedback, ask the most engaged readers to put their money where
their mouth is by pre-ordering the course at a steep discount (the only true
validation is whether or not people are willing to pay for your course) and then you
can con dently create your course based on the feedback you receive.
I'll soon be compiling my own guide to creating (and selling) online courses as a
way to make money blogging. For now though, here are a few more of the best
resources I've found when it comes to learning how to create your rst online
course:
Build a Six-Figure Business Selling Online Courses
How to Sell Your Own Online Course Without Marketplaces
How to Create, Sell and Pro t from an Online Course
Again, focus on keeping it simple for your rst online course.
As you get more courses out to your audience, you'll ne tune your process and
learn how to perfect this way to make money blogging over time.
5. Physical Products

Page 39
Right, right... I know you probably started a blog because you're thinking, "I don't
want to be in the physical product space, Ryan. I just want to write and make
money blogging without building products and shipping packages all day every
day."
And I get that. I personally don't sell physical on my website (anymore), but hear
me out on this one because a lot has changed over the past few years.
You no longer need to stock your own inventory—you can dropship your
products without ever having to print a shipping label or stock up on cardboard
boxes yourself. This relatively hands-o approach makes selling products a pretty
attractive way to make money blogging today.
What is Dropshipping?

Page 40
Dropshipping is a business model you can use to run an online store without ever
holding any inventory yourself.
Once you’ve made a sale from your blog, your supplier (a warehouse that packs and
ships orders for sellers) will ship your products straight to your customer’s
doorstep—for a fee of course. But, you’ll never have to worry about storing,
packaging, or shipping your products.
If you want to make money blogging by selling physical products, let's take this a
step further... you don't even need to actually create your own products anymore.
You can nd an existing product category on the market today (with proven
demand and paying customers), then nd a supplier on a site like Alibaba that'll
create a private-label a version of that product, so you can start selling it yourself.
Examples of just a few private-label products you could sell include things like:
Vitamins, protein powder and nutrition supplements
Yoga pants and women's activewear
Backpacks, speakers, chargers and other travel accessories
Makeup and cosmetic products
Check out even more ideas right here
And remember that you'll also need to quick set up an online store that's closely
connected to your blog in order to collect orders, gather customer information,
collect payments and update your orders along the way.
Oh! Now let's take this real-life example from my own former business into
account.

Page 41
Today, my friend Matt still runs the private-label phone case business we launched
together after college.
After nding a few online suppliers that could make us high-quality phone cases
with the kinds of designs we saw trending on sites like Etsy and Amazon, we
launched the business and grew it to a $160,000 side project within our rst year
by being good at marketing through Facebook and other online channels.
Plus, I'd started a company blog that was teaching other people behind-the-scenes
of how they too could build a phone case business.
And for those that were serious about getting started, we sold them equipment and
training on how to launch their own version of the business we'd perfected—
creating a new revenue stream and leading to one of the rst ways I learned how to
Choosing to sell physical products as a way to make money blogging is a personal
choice that you need to decide for yourself based on the niche you're in and the
kind of business you want to start.

Page 42
Physical products are great when you've got a diehard group of readers—or the
product aligns very naturally with your niche and there's proven demand for it.
If you've got followers that'd be excited to wear your brand, then you can even go
the swag route. I'm talking t-shirts, mugs, prints and other branded gear you can
host online & have dropshipped by a printer.
If the product ts your audience naturally, then start testing out this way to make
money blogging.
6. Release a Software Tool
Are you a software developer by trade? If not, maybe you've got a good friend or
former co-worker who is.

Page 43
In its most simple form, a software tool is something that people (your blog
readers or even freelance clients) can use to automate a process—or series of
processes—and avoid doing the task in more manual ways.
To give you a rather meta example of this in action right here, my blog runs on a
theme called OptimizePress (for my CMS, WordPress). That WordPress theme is a
software product I purchased, and because they release regular updates, they
charge an annual subscription in order to receive updates & premium support.
It's possible to run a blog without using WordPress or a theme like OptimizePress,
but the very visual nature of how this theme works, means I never have to touch a
line of code or learn any coding languages in order to operate my blog on a daily
basis.
When OptimizePress rst launched, they created a software product that
dramatically simpli ed the process of running a visually appealing WordPress
blog. That's worth paying for, and I've been a customer for going on six years now.
Software and other digital products in this vein aren't con ned solely to things like
WordPress themes. Other examples of software that can help you make money
blogging include things like:
Mobile applications
Productivity tools
Email marketing service providers
Customer relationship management tools (CRMs)
Even video games

Page 44
If there's a process or series of tasks people do on a regular basis, software can be
built to help automate or streamline those activities—and if you have an audience
of readers that share in this same challenge, you can quite easily make money
blogging by solving their needs through software.
The fun part will be working hands on with a handful of readers to create and
perfect your software before releasing it out into the world.
7. Selling Your Own Services
Selling your time, skills and expertise as a service aligns pretty closely with selling
online courses (and freelancing, which we'll expand upon later).

Page 45
However when it comes to selling your services, there's one major di erence from
selling courses—you're working either one-on-one or in a small group with a
client to give individualized help or deliverables.
The common theme though, is that you're once again nding a clear skill you
already have, and using it to make money blogging.
Services you can sell (amongst many, many other ways to make money online)
include things like:
Consulting with companies on an hourly basis
Designing logos on sites like 99 Designs or Dribbble
Coaching individuals on a monthly retainer
Writing copy or blog content for brands
Editing podcasts and using your audio engineering skills
Doing search engine optimization projects for online brands
Making websites or software tools for established companies
If you've got a skill, it can be o ered as a service...
As services are often performed on a more one-on-one basis, and include working
closely with one client at a time, that means choosing this way to make money
blogging won't scale in the same way that a liate income or course sales will.
However, it can still be very lucrative if you're charging premium rates to
established clients—making it well worth your time.
For example, let's say you're a business coach...

Page 46
You can sell a course on how to market your business that's priced at $150. If
you've got a large audience, this could be a phenomenal way to make money
blogging.
If your audience isn't huge yet though, you can take the approach of instead
o ering a smaller group of people a one-on-one coaching package for $500, or
even a done-for-you service where you charge a monthly fee of $3,000 to manage
all of their social media channels and grow their following.
It's a number's game, and it's up to your to determine your worth and your time.
That being said, here's my guide to pricing your freelance services in a way that
allows you to actually make money blogging & still put away some savings at the
end of the year.
Where to Find Clients That Need Your Services (and Expertise)
Later on in this guide about how to make money blogging, we dive much deeper
into freelancing (working with companies) as a speci c way to monetize your blog.
But for now, here are my picks for the best places to nd ready and able customers
for your service o erings.
72 Best Freelance Jobs Websites to Get Great Clients (Fast)
55 Websites to Find High Quality Work From Home Jobs
60 Places You Can (Quickly) Get Great Remote Jobs
While selling your services won't scale as beautifully as many of our other ways to
make money blogging here, it's a very easy place to start.
8. Writing (and Selling) eBooks

Page 47
We already touched brie y on why writing and selling eBooks (your own digital
product) is another great way to make money blogging—largely because of how

scaleable your income can be without the need to put in any additional expenses
after the book is written.
With each new sale you generate, the vast majority (if not all) of the pro t comes
straight to you, when selling an eBook from directly on your blog and collecting
payments via Stripe or PayPal.
No middlemen. No publishers. No distributors. No retail stores.
That means you'll keep the absolute maximum possible pro t margin on your
eBook sales.

Page 48
eBooks have been one of my dependable sources of passive income over the past
few years, and they've been crucial to my own personal journey in learning how to
make money blogging—in a way that bene ts my readers as much (or more) than
myself.
Here's a snapshot of a sales report showing how much I've made from just one of
my eBooks (The Habits of Highly Successful Bloggers) so far this year.
That's $2,422.00 in eBook sales that took next to zero e ort from me.

Page 49
This eBook is an asset I created almost a year ago. Aside from updating it a few
times a year, it's a pretty autopilot way of monetizing my blog just from the
readers that discover it after reading one of my blogging-related articles.
Not a bad way to make money blogging, right?
I've got one major disclaimer for you though... it's because I've invested a lot of
time and e ort into creating high quality, long-form articles (like this one you're
reading right now) that drive tra c to my blog from search engines, notable
publications and social channels that I have an engaged audience regularly buying
my eBooks.
Lastly, it's important to clarify that when I'm talking about eBooks, I mean digital
books in the form of downloadable PDFs. This eBook format is so simple to make
and sell these days.
That being said, you can go the extra mile and take the Amazon eBook route which
also allows you to sell Kindle formatted eBooks and audiobooks both on your own
blog and to the hundreds of millions of Amazon customers out there.
Cookbooks, ction, self-help, weight-loss, non- ction: you name it, there's a
market for an eBook on it.
If you're con dent that you have the knowledge to share, and can write well, then
an eBook could be one of your best ways to make money blogging given your skills
and experience. Just be sure to begin with writing an outline.

Page 50
The fact that you already have a blog with existing readers should give you the
con dence that you have something worth reading—maybe it's time to put that
content into the form of an eBook to make money blogging.
If you haven't yet gotten your blog o the ground, then head over to my ultimate
guide to starting a blog.
Still Need to Start Your Blog First?

Check out my ultimate guide 5 Steps How to Start a
Blog (on the Side) Today.
9. Launch a Virtual Summit
Yep, you saw that right. Little old me in the corner of each of these video
interviews 👆

Page 51
In 2017, I was hired by Close to single-handedly plan, produce, launch and
orchestrate a virtual summit—their Inside Sales Summit. Over the course of three
months, I recorded 55 video interviews with some of the world's most
recognizable entrepreneurs and salespeople.
I built a complete website using one of the best website builders around
(WordPress), to host the virtual summit here, created every page, edited the
videos, designed the graphics, established our promotional partnerships and wrote
the launch email sequences both Close and all of the partners used to promote the
event.
It was a lot of work. But, this side project netted me $30,000.
And it's only because of my blog that Steli and the Close team originally decided to
work with me.
Getting paid to interview 55 of my business heroes?
Now THAT is a pretty amazing way to make money blogging.
But just getting paid to produce a virtual summit for another company isn't the
only way to make money blogging with this monetization channel. You can host
your own virtual summit.
Like I said, virtual summits are a lot of work, but with that work can come wild
pro tability.

Page 52
A virtual summit is a live (or pre-recorded) event covering a speci c subject with
multiple guest speakers in tow. This is why I'm consistently harping on the
importance of nding your tribe.
If you have a group of like-minded readers on your email list, each with their own
communities that align with your messaging, then you've got the audience a
virtual summit just waiting to be invited.
A virtual summit is the culmination of all the above ways to make money blogging.
You're teaching, you're coaching, you're selling. Think about your audience and
what drives them.
What do they want to learn?
How can you help them?
Do you have enough content to create a summit?

Page 53
When you're feeling con dent in how you answered these questions, then start
planning the event.
How many speakers do you want?
Is this going to be a live webinar-based summit or in-person?
Who would attend and when should it be?
Make sure to give yourself plenty of time to put your summit together.
Then promote, promote, promote.
How Do You Make Money Blogging with a Virtual Summit?
Well, there are a few di erent ways to monetize a summit.
The most straightforward way (and easiest to execute your rst go-round) is
selling tickets for admission. Anywhere from $20 to $200 is common depending
upon your industry.
You can discount pricing for early birds. Ask all of your speakers to promote the
event to their audiences as well.
Another way to monetize your summit, is by making admission to watch "live"
free and then selling an all-access pass to anyone who wants the ability to watch
the speakers they missed (or watch again).
With both approaches, you can further make money blogging with your summit
audience by selling them another product after the event wraps up—maybe an
online course, eBook or coaching package that expands upon the concepts covered
during the live summit.

Page 54
At any rate, creating a virtual summit will probably be your main focus for the
quarter.
If you're going the summit route, you'll also want to make sure you have other
monetization in place while your attention is focused solely on this project.
Use Your Own Talent to Make Money Blogging
You're skilled. You're experienced. Your audience believes in you.
If you've made it this far learning how to make money blogging—and you have a
blog with real readership, you're golden, my friend. You've got talent and now
you're just learning how to monetize your blog.
Maybe the monetization channels we've discussed so far weren't the best t... or
maybe you're already using them and want some more ideas on how to make
money blogging.
Well, in this next section, we're going to talk all about selling yourself (in a good
way that monetizes your blog).
10. Business Partnerships

Page 55
When you have a growing blog, you have an audience.
And when you have an audience that's regularly coming back for more of what
you're giving them—you'll create opportunities for unique business partnerships
as a way to make money blogging and further monetize your audience.
Business partnerships can shake out in a lot of di erent ways, so it's di cult to
explain just one.
A business partnership can be as easy as an a liate relationship like we've already
covered above.
However, it could also mean...

Page 56
Working with a tech company to white-label their app and sell that version of
it to your followers
Partnering with another blogger to create a product together and market it to
each other's audience
Scoring your own salsa line with Williams Sonoma after your food blog takes
o (like Gaby Dalkin has done)
The point is, I keep talking about the importance of building your audience (long
before you focus on learning how to make money blogging).
This applies just as much to establishing win-win business partnerships.
Find other companies or individuals that align with your audience, your goals, and
most importantly—your plans for how you want to make money blogging.
From there, all that's left is nding a way to work together so that all parties
bene t.
11. Podcast Sponsorships
If you've been telling yourself just how much you need to start a podcast...

Page 57
Well, now is your chance. It'll be a lot of fun, plus it can signi cantly help you
My podcast is typically an annual source of anywhere from four to ve- gures in
sponsorship revenue, with sponsorships from brands like Freshbooks,
Monday.com and Skillshare coming in at around $500/episode to get in front of
my 30,000 monthly listeners.
Sure, when you're just getting started you probably won't be able to command
similar sponsorship rates because your show likely won't immediately have
thousands of listeners tuning in to hear what the show's all about.
It'll take time to build up your listenership. However, if you've already done a good
job of creating content and attracting regular readers to your blog—you can launch
your podcast with a bang by promoting it heavily to your existing readers.

Page 58
The best part about choosing to start a podcast as way to make money blogging, is
that it can be relatively low e ort once you've got the tools and process down
(compared to writing massively epic blog posts all day every day).
Start Small and Set Yourself Up for Success.
If you're short on time, you can start by taking your existing blog posts, turning
them into spoken word and starting to regularly post them as podcast episodes
that talk through all of the most popular content from your blog (and share
previews of what you're working on right now).

Page 59
Over the course of your rst few months podcasting, you'll likely attract more
listeners very steadily if your show is entertaining and you discuss interesting
topics or bring on exciting guests. Promote your show by pitching yourself as a
guest on other podcasts, guest blogging and building a social community to
regularly share new content with.
Once you've got a podcast with some regular listenership—then you can add
podcasting to your media kit and start charging sponsors for podcast ad
placements like 30-second pre-rolls, mid-rolls and post-rolls that plug your
sponsored products and services.
12. Freelancing
Freelancing isn't for everyone, but it's certainly a good option when you're still in
the process of deciding how to make money blogging.

Page 60
In fact, up until just two years ago, freelancing made up nearly 90% of my blog
income. And moreover, the relationships I built with freelance clients during my
rst few years of blogging, are what positioned me to make money blogging from
other (more passive) sources today.
As we've already touched upon, if you're a skilled writer (or at least enjoy it enough
to improve over time), then perhaps you could start freelancing on the side to
share your expertise with clients who are willing to pay.
👋 Want to learn how to start a freelance business on the side of your day job? Read
my ultimate guide on how to start freelancing.
Especially if you've already grown your own blog to a respectable level and can
demonstrate to clients that your content attracts & engages readers.
Now, becoming a freelance writer could be your shot at helping other brands,
startups and bloggers to do the same thing. That's exactly where freelancing
comes in to play. It doesn't need to just be writing though.
You can sell your services by:
Consulting with marketing teams at established companies and teaching
them how to create content
Becoming a hired gun that re-writes website copy and suggests
improvements to better attract customers
Coaching other writers and bloggers who want to achieve the same results
you have

Page 61
Never forget that you have skill that can be used to make money blogging—even if
that's simply from trading your time for a little extra side income today.
If you're not ready to dive into some of the more time-intensive ways to make
money blogging, or if just want to make some extra revenue while you chip away
at those larger projects, then freelancing may be your best call.
How Will You Make Money Blogging This

Year?
How are you feeling about your blog? Are you ready to take action and monetize
your blog?
Your speed to action will be the largest determining factor in just how successful
you become with learning to make money blogging. All the perfect planning in the
world won't make things happen.
So my call-to-actions for you today are this...
1. If you haven't already, launch your blog right now (follow my step-by-step
guide to starting a blog)
2. Decide whether or not you'll pursue a longer-term route to make money
blogging (with a higher return)
3. Begin taking small steps toward creating that asset, pitching yourself or
otherwise bringing it to life today
I highly recommend making a list of your personal picks for the best ways you can
make money blogging, based on time and e ort, as well as viewing these through
the lens of activating your own skills & interests.

Page 62
Once you have an idea of the time it'll take to bring your preferred route of making
money blogging to fruition—and an estimate of just how much money you could
potentially make from that channel—then it's pretty easy to decide what you
should focus on.
For many new bloggers, as you just get started—it's common to focus on low-
e ort, mid-pro t ways to make money blogging in the early days. It's a good way
to dip your toes into monetizing your blog.
Then once the rst dollar (or $100, $1,000 and even $10,000+) hits your account,
you'll have a better understanding of the work it takes to make money blogging in
your niche—and what it'll take to accelerate to the next level.
About the Author: Ryan Robinson
Full-time blogger, podcaster and side project a cionado. Join me here, on
ryrob.com to learn how to start a blog, make money blogging and grow a pro table
side business. I also write for publications like Fast Company, Forbes,
Entrepreneur, Inc, Business Insider and more. Let’s chat on Twitter about business
and side projects.

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What are some ways mentioned to make money blogging?

What are some ways mentioned to make money blogging?

What are the prerequisites for a successful blog mentioned?

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How to Make Money Blogging in 2020 ($451,236+): Free Guide

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an email list of 120,000+ active subscribers to my blog—that creates great

How to Make Money Blogging in 2020 ($451,236+): Free Guide

How to Make Money Blogging in 2020: 12

6. Release a Software Tool

8. Writing (and Selling) eBooks

9. Launch a Virtual Summit

10. Business Partnerships

can’t a ord or that you’re not yet ready to implement.

How to Make Money Blogging in 2020 ($451,236+): Free Guide

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Find a clear niche to blog about

you actually make money blogging).

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readers how to make money blogging).

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If you want to make money blogging... you have to