To publish or not to publish, that is the question
I debated whether I should publish this article for two months. I talked to friends, family, acquaintances — all have given me different responses. I tweeted to fellow personal finance bloggers, too. Everyone had a different answer.
Frankly, I’m nervous to share this article. Unlike my weaker points and budgetary failures, this article is a highlight. It was easier for me to write and confess my student loan debt to you all, but successes are more difficult to share — ironically.
After much consternation, I decided I’d finally publish an answer to a big question I’ve been getting: “How much can bloggers make?” Or, more specifically sometimes: “How much did you make, Sam?”
Even as I type these words, I’m debating whether I’ll push the publish button. It’s really challenging to share this number. I’m proud and embarrassed in a weird way.
Well, here goes nothing! Today, I’m going to share with you how much I made over the first year of Frugaling, and what led to that success. My goal is to both inspire those who are thinking about starting a blog, but also to provide info about where the greatest revenue can be made. I know of quite a few people right now who want to get paid to write or need some push to start blogging.
This one’s for you.
A trickle became a torrent of funds
I started with Google AdSense
I began Frugaling on May 4, 2013. Motivated out of a desperate need to share my story with others and begin my journey back to zero debt, I wrote my first article. These first few months I only had Google AdSense. I stared at $15-20 a month and thought this was pointless, but that quickly doubled, and doubled again.
For those who’ve never heard of the platform, it’s an easy and very popular way to start making revenue. Google handles the advertisers — all you do is publish them. Easy as can be. Nobody becomes rich from AdSense, though (hardly anyone at least). It’s an entirely automated and algorithmic ad network that pairs relevant advertisements with consumers. While creepy sometimes, the ad network is the best in the industry — for everyone involved in the money making process.
I looked up affiliate opportunities
As a member of the personal finance blogging community, I was fortunate to be exposed to various money-making experts. Many had done well adding affiliate programs to their sites. Affiliate programs usually host a bunch of companies that are looking to give publishers a small commission for products sold. Let’s say you run an apparel website and link to Macy’s, you can count on a certain amount of revenue kicked back to you in the referral process. Or, if you blog, it can help to advertise your web host.
I decided to throw my hat in the ring and joined a top-notch network called LinkOffers. Two months after being approved to hawk some bank-affiliated products, I looked at my account and noticed a strange number: $500 in sales. It was early in the summer and the number shocked me. I was making ridiculous amounts of money! Over the ensuing months, I received an atmospheric amount of affiliate commissions (I’ll address monetary specifics in the proceeding section).
I partnered and linked to Amazon.com
I timed articles to important holidays, your recommended books, and/or tax season. Most bloggers seem to struggle to make much money with Amazon’s affiliate program. I found it to be incredible.
You can link to nearly everything in the Amazon store and make a commission on that item and anything else that’s purchased during that visit. This primary and secondary commission style is very generous. For instance, if someone buys the product you advertised and a new Macbook Air, get ready for a kickback of $40 or more. These purchases added up quickly. One article netted me over $200 in two months.
Flappy Bird-style wealth creation is definitely scary
The Apple Store was slammed earlier this year with millions of downloads of one app with a ridiculously simple premise and name: Flappy Bird. The creator was a mysterious and private individual based in Vietnam. Not much was known about him until Rolling Stone magazine tracked him down and got one of the best interviews yet. Rolling Stone reported that:
By February, it was topping the charts in more than 100 countries and had been downloaded more than 50 million times. Nguyen was earning an estimated $50,000 a day. Not even Mark Zuckerberg became rich so fast.
This level of attention and wealth prompted Nguyen to take down the app and buck the demand for his work. Within a couple days of his decision to remove the app, it vanished. Many criticized his decision and questioned why anyone making $50k a day would optionally take down their application. Frankly, I could relate on a tenth of the scale.
In December, January, and February I saw earnings that blew my mind. Every day I checked my earnings, I was looking at another couple hundred dollars. I was closing in or crossing $5,000 per month. I was scared about whether the affiliate company would actually pay me. Every month — before I got paid — I’d get nervous. I’d think, “Are my earnings going to be revoked? Am I actually going to get paid that much?” Month after month would pass, and the earnings would clear — right into my bank account. It was like magic.
Average these earnings over 12 months, and I’d be making over $60,000 per year. Meanwhile, I’m a full-time graduate student working 65+ hours a week. With all my earnings combined (regular work, too), I was nearing a six-figure salary. My debt was disappearing and life was looking up in a crazy way.
The earnings eventually slowed. The bulk of the money was earned. I paid off a $25,000 student loan and stopped taking out loans for school entirely. Suddenly, I was paying in cash for the deficits in my graduate assistantship budget.
Marketing and advertising affects everyone
You’ve now read nearly the entirety of this article, but I still haven’t shared how much a blogger can make. Or, more specifically, how much I made in my first year. Before I say that value, I want to mention one thing: advertising tends to taint perspectives.
As a personal finance writer, there’s a wealth of advertising opportunities. It’s a direct consequence of the powerful financial services sector. Trillions of dollars are managed within financial companies, and consumer credit products are just one of the many revenue sources they have. It can be easy to be swept up with the possibilities and ignore the initial purpose for starting a blog.
I got swept up by it. I was deeply affected by it. It changed how I speak. It swayed my opinions.
After you see this value, I hope you take great care with your site and visitors. Please don’t let this inspire you to morph into a credit-card-hawking-affiliate-driven-market-maven. The personal finance world needs personality and reality. Credit products aren’t right for everyone.
Still want to know how much I made?
I made about $35,000 in my first year of blogging.
Related post: Make An Extra $10,000 In 6 Months!
It can be really tough balancing personal conviction with the need/desire to make money. I started out as a deal blogger and quit that because it just didn’t mesh with my values. I often turn down paying opps that would seem hypocritical or that I think would otherwise turn off my readers. Yes, there’s a lot of potential money out there, but there’s a trade-off to get it.
I appreciate your honesty, and that kind of success in your first year is amazing!
Jen,
Thanks for recognizing that piece. That seems like the most important part for me, but also the most difficult to maintain in this context. You’re right that there’s a delicate balance between personal needs and public desire. I do need to make money to pay off my student loans, but I also want to help others in the best way I can. 🙂
Thanks for your comment,
Sam
Wow, your income just blew my mind, I am very impressed!
Aww, thanks Anne. That’s very kind of you. 🙂
Wow, congrats on your success in your first year of blogging. I’ve been thinking about adding Adsense to my blog but I don’t have a business established for it. Thanks for sharing.
Raquel,
Well you should! It’s effortless to join and Google is very reliable. You never need to worry about payments or finding advertisers.
Hope you share your successes when you get there!
Sam
Thank you thank you thank you for sharing this Sam. I really have not capitalized on the affiliate sales as much as I should. I’m currently bringing in about $1,000/month from blogging and most of that is from freelance writing, which at $30 a post is A LOT of writing. Getting commissions off of affiliates is SO much easier.
Wow. You are amazing, first of all.
I have dipped my toes in to affiliate advertising and haven’t really liked what I have seen. I just have issues with myself being in debt and advertising more debt. So you’re right, it’s not for everyone. But I love reading stories about how people have made it work!
Thank you for sharing the story of your success (and congrats)! I haven’t monetized my site yet, even though it’s been a year of blogging for me. I do try to stay to the personal side with my blog, but now that I am contemplating making an income stream out of it, I hope I can introduce something that still keeps the focus in the right spot. Very smart moves with the Amazon affiliate program, too.
Hi Sam,
Would you take down the blog if you reach $50,000/month? 🙂
Joking apart I believe that until you create value your earning will ebentually improve.
If insted you start to think in terms of earnings you blog value could decrease.
Take care
Robert
Thanks for your honesty and transparency Sam. As a few others have said, it can be hard to balance your personal conviction and making money…especially when it starts to roll in. I’ve felt that myself and know how easy it can be to get swept up by it. That said, kudos to you for using it to kill your debt and take care of school costs!
John,
Thanks so much for your kind words. Really happy to have your input. 🙂
Yes, the money definitely influences things, but I’ve been trying to put almost all the profits to my student loan debt and current tuition fees. If I keep it up, I’ll be done with debt very soon! I can’t wait.
Sam
It takes a really special person to taste money and then walk away from it because it doesn’t align with his/her vision. Great job. And great job building an audience that would make you $35,000 – your readership is impressively large, regardless of if/how you plan to monetize it in the future!
I got too excited reading your post and when I reached the last line, I knew I had to go back to this again and again to truly absorb what it says. There can really be money in blogging, apparently. This can be pretty exciting.
Thanks for your transparency! I have been very impressed with the success of your blog as I know how demanding your PhD programs must be.
What a great and thoughtful post. I am very careful about advertising. Yes, I would love to make more money to compensate myself for the hours I spend helping people save more and spend less– but integrity is more important to me. Aside from AdSense, I choose to only advertise and promote products and services that I personally use. I think that helps add to the credibility of my website. At least I hope it does.
What kind of traffic one should have to start considering pushing advertising? I’m sure it’s pointless until you reach certain level of visitor numbers, right?
I don’t know if I’d ever say I push advertising. It really depends on the ad network. If you’re thinking about Google AdSense, you can put those on your site at any time. Your earnings will be small until you have the traffic, though. Many ad networks will decline your application if you don’t have enough visitors. You should be around 5k+ visitors a month before considering much beyond Google’s platform.
Hope this helps,
Sam
Wow.That’s a lot Sam. I hope I can reach that amount too. Great job!
Thanks for sharing this, Sam. My wife and I are just starting to dabble into blogging, and I’ve found it remarkable how monetization methods differ so widely between niches. My wife enjoy foodie blogs and many of them share their methods of monetization as well, but much of what they do don’t apply to personal finance blogs. I appreciate you opening up about your methods and also sharing the potential pitfalls of letting it get to our heads. Keep up the good work!
Thank you so much for being so open about this. I find it very inspirational. I blog about paying off debt and if my blog was to help me do just that I would be just as in shock as you were!