7 Things To Stop Doing If You Want To Make Money From Your Blog

I love teaching beginning bloggers to make money from their blogs.

But what I don’t love is seeing new bloggers do things that sabotage their ability to make an income.

Making a sustainable income from your blog isn’t a piece of cake ­ but it is doable, as long as you approach it in the right way.

Which means not doing any of the following things.

1. Expecting Google Ads To Bring In A Lot Of Revenue

I see so many new bloggers open Google ads accounts within a month, or even a week, of launching their blogs.

They put banners in their sidebars and even above their blog content. The ads look tacky and take away from the content.

Big no­-no.

When you have more ads than content, you are actively driving people away from your blog with your fancy ad banners.

Not only that, the payout is so tiny that you won’t make an income from ads even if you have a very large readership.

For example, one of my clients gets 110,000 pageviews a month. And he told me he was barely making $700 from his ads. 110 thousand pageviews! It would take you years to get to that!

So if you’re a beginner blogger, ads won’t be a real revenue generator for you. In fact, they just give readers a chance to leave your blog ­ and never return.

2. Wanting People To Hire You To Write Sponsored Posts Before You’ve Gained Enough Traffic To Make It Worth Their While

Companies who pay for sponsored posts want to work with bloggers with large audiences.

That means that if you’re a new blogger, your chance of being paid at all, let alone well, ­for a sponsored post ­is very small.

Instead of trying to make an income from sponsored posts, in the beginning, write posts about products and companies you love, and then share your blog articles with those companies.

If your content is good, you can build relationships with your favorite companies, start getting products in return for reviews, and then, as you build your audience, ask to get paid.

3. Waiting Too Long To Sell Something

While many bloggers want to earn money from ads right away, even more of them wait too long to sell anything ­ which trains their audiences that everything they create is free.

It’s important to sell something ­, even if it’s small, ­soon after you start blogging.

When you sell things with your blog, you train your readers to buy from you.

If you only provide free content, your readers never expect you to sell to them ­and then when you do start selling, you will lose subscribers.

4. Selling Something That Your Audience Doesn’t Want

Another huge mistake I see beginner bloggers make is trying to sell something that your audience isn’t interested in.

Instead of creating a product based on helping their readers experience a transformation in their lives (which is the key to making money from your blog), many beginner bloggers create a product that they think is a good idea, but that their readers don’t want.

Before you put a product out there, make sure it’s something your audience wants and cares about.

Do the necessary research to find out what your readers need help achieving.

In the first email that I send out to my subscribers, I ask them what they’re struggling with in their blogs.

I receive dozens of answers to this question each day, and they help me decide which products and services to launch, ­which is why I’m able to make a steady income from my blog.

5. Spending Too Much Time Creating Content For Your Own Blog ­ And Not Enough On Guest Posting And Promotion

I always tell my clients to write 4 blog posts a month, ­2 for their own blogs and 2 guest posts for other blogs.

When you’re a beginner blogger, one of the most important things you can do to make money is to grow your blog traffic. No one is going to find your blog if you’re not getting out there and guest posting.

If you’re writing more than one post per week for your own blog, I bet you aren’t doing enough guest posting and promoting.

When readers can’t find your blog, they can’t buy from you, either. So promote and network 80% of the time, and write for your own blog 20% of the time.

Your efforts will pay off and you will grow your readership and your customer base.

6. Selling Affiliate Products That Don’t Match Your Blog’s Niche

You may love having BlueHost as your web host, but if your blog is about cooking, you probably won’t be getting many people who want to buy website hosting from your affiliate link.

Before you decide to partner with an affiliate program, make sure that their products are aligned with your brand and your niche. Otherwise, no matter how great their products are, your readers probably won’t be interested in buying them.

7. Not Having A Clear Niche For Your Blog

People buy from people they trust. And it’s very difficult to build trust when your blog is all over the place.

Many beginner bloggers want to blog about everything from dog food to fashion. So when someone new shows up at their blog, they don’t know what the blog is about, and they leave and never come back.

It’s great to have a lot of interests, but if you don’t focus on one topic that helps a specific group of people, you will have a harder time knowing which products, whether they’re your own or an affiliate’s, to sell to your audience. You also won’t build the trust and authority you need for people to buy from you.

Find a niche and stick to it. Then create a product that you know your readers will love. That’s the best way to make money from your blog in the beginning.

If you’re a beginner blogger, and you know that you do some of the things I mentioned in this post, don’t worry. You’re not alone.

If you want a step-by-step system to make your first $1000 blogging, jump over and check out Profitable Blogging Simplified. You will learn exactly how to monetize your blog, and you’ll stop wasting time focusing on things that don’t make you money.