When should you start monetizing your blog?
I was reading a post just the other day that Mitch wrote on Harpzon.com, about the downside of monetizing a blog too early in it’s life. He has some good points, especially about progressing from publishing free information to selling ebooks.
However, I have trouble agreeing with the whole concept. When you first start a blog with the goal to earn money from it, you shouldn’t shy away from basic ads. In fact, I think you should have ads present – small and inconspicuous ads, perhaps only even one. Why? So your readers are clear on what to expect.
I’ve seen a few blogs that went from zero ads to ads overnight, and half the readership flipped out and caused quite a ruckus. Sure, some of these readers were probably the “holier-than-thou” type who abhor any sort of advertisement, and think blogging is some sort of superior publishing medium. But the others were probably just shocked at the sudden change.
If you monetize lightly from day 1, then there’s no question about your ultimate intentions. No, that one tiny Adsense block at the bottom of your sidebar won’t make you any money. But it will keep everyone from being surprised later, when you have real traffic, and advertise more realistically.
Shawn Knight said
April 13 2007 @ 3:21 am
You do make a good point about monetizing from the beginning. I wrote about this a few weeks ago also.
Im not sure what it is, but I have a thing against blogs that are only started to make money. 95% of the authors ditch their blogs in less than a month. Most offer nothing original or fun or personal; just recycled info. from other sites.
But, I do think that once you have a lot of good content archived, you could easily get away with introducing ads… but do so slowly. Dont go from no ads to 20 overnight. Maybe one new program a month or something, just don’t overload the readers.
Just my 2 cents
Leroy Brown said
April 13 2007 @ 7:43 pm
Yup, going slowly is huge. I still think that starting off fairly early with one small low-key ad is important. It almost completely rules out the possibility of people freaking out when they see slightly more prominent advertising.
Blogging is hard work, and I think anyone who thinks about it will understand that the blogger deserves to earn at least a little coin from his efforts.
Kevin said
April 17 2007 @ 6:59 pm
i actually just made the same point over on Brian Heys site. he mentioned that he isn’t going to add adverts til the content is higher.
i was concerned that if i had no ads on the site and then one day there were 4 banners and adsense etc readers would be pissed off
when i was designing my theme too it made sense to include advertising
im sure most people see it the way i see it. if i like a blog writers style or whatever and enjoy reading his posts then i hope he does make good cash through this ads. good luck to him i say.
Leroy Brown said
April 19 2007 @ 5:41 am
Exactly – you’ve got it figured out. Blogging is great, but it’s not holy. Bloggers aren’t high priests or monks who are above worldly concerns like money.
Especially if you’re designing a new theme, keep advertising in mind. Just one small, out of the way ad in the beginning – so there’s no outlash later.
Matt Huggins said
May 3 2007 @ 1:45 am
I’ve had my blog up for about 4 months now. I started with AdSense as the only source of income, and I’ve slowly added more advertising media such as Kontera ContentLink. I very recently started adding paid posts via Sponsored Reviews, PayPerPost, and ReviewMe.
Thoughout all of this, I haven’t had any complaints from my readers. However, I think that it is also expected given that the intention of my blog is to share information about making money. Given that the blog is about making money, the readers likely expect that I will try to make money through the blog itself.
Alternatively, if my blog was about something other than making money, I think I would have a much more difficult time making use of multiple sources of income as I’m attempting to do now.
Leroy Brown said
May 3 2007 @ 5:31 am
Right – if you were blogging about the habits of east Tibetanese Monks, then the ads might draw question. But a blog on the making money / entrepreneur topic would seem odd without some sort of advertisement. I think it would actually *lose* credibility. After all, how can you believe someone who’s telling you how to make money, when they aren’t even trying?