There are millions of blogs on the internet, but not all of them are monetized. Sure, it’s fun to talk about things you’re passionate about as a way to boost your writing skills or to use blogging as a way to rank higher on search.

If you’re not learning how to monetize a blog, though, you’re missing out on a significant amount of possible earnings. And monetizing a blog is more simple than it seems. You don’t need thousands of readers to start making a bit of side money on your blog, and once you do start generating income, many more opportunities make themselves available.

All you have to do is commit to earning your first $50 or $100 from monetizing, then continue to set small goals until you reach a point of recurring income.

Here are a few ways to make money with a blog to go from earning $0 a month to something like $500 or even $1,000 and more!

1. Offer Ad Spots

Before there were big-money blogs and famous social media influencers, people made money online by selling ads. This practice is still used today.

Selling ads is a simple way to make a quick buck from your digital platform. It’s even better when you work with companies who are aligned with your business practices and related to your industry, rather than just picking random advertisers.

If you write about food, for example, you may want to reach out to the authors of cookbooks or companies who make kitchenware and see if they’d like to advertise on your blog. Think about working with hotels and travel sites if you write an adventure blog or reaching out to meditation gurus and specialists if you love talking about mindfulness.

Niche blogs and services can do this too. This goes for everything from medical marijuana to adult products to vaping – which you can click to see more about.

2. Create an Online Course

Not a fan of placing ads for other services on your blog? That’s fine, but it means you have to come up with your own online product to offer. It may be time to buckle down and create an online course.

This can be about pretty much anything as long as it ties into your business. Like, if you run a brick and mortar retail shop, you could create a styling course for the upcoming change of seasons. If you’re a construction contractor or interior designer, offer courses on home improvement and DIY projects to upgrade a home’s design.

There’s no limit to what you can come up with if you put your mind to the task at hand. Maybe even consider doing a soft launch of your online course to create a lot of buzz about it.

3. Become a Coach

Courses are usually downloadable packets of information for clients to work through at their own pace. You can tie in a one-on-one session as an extra incentive, but users shouldn’t expect to work with you every day via an online course.

When you offer coaching services, though, that’s exactly what people are signing up for. They want to interact with you on a regular basis and have you share your knowledge in a way that’s specific to their personal life and professional goals.

As such, coaching requires a lot out of you. You may want to start off with a small group of 5 or 10 coaching participants to make sure you have a handle on everything. This allows you to give them the best quality coaching, while still handling the other aspects of your blog and overall business.

4. Build Authority and Write for Others

Many people choose their online coaches based on authority. They’ve either read about your work or heard about it from a trusted source enough to come to you for whatever service they need.

But, you can take that same level of authority and use it to pitch your services to potential clients who’ve never heard of you. This allows you to use your blog as a way of proving your value.

When you’re able to show the kind of traffic and engagements you get on a regular basis, you can close all kinds of deals. These may be contracts to ghostwrite and guest blog for other people, or, it can be the reason you’re able to start charging guest writers who want to contribute to your blog.

5. Get Sponsorships

Maybe you want to think bigger than blogging for yourself and others. Are you interested in becoming an ambassador for a brand you love or using your personal brand as leverage to work with all kinds of products?

If so, start looking into sponsorships once you figure out the basics of how to monetize a blog. This can do wonders for your monthly income.

In addition to all the on-site efforts you’re doing to generate a cash flow, sponsorships may include in-person appearances, reviews, or features on someone else’s blog. These are things you can charge for. Or, you can create some sort of trade-off by writing reviews and sponsoring products in exchange for free merchandise.

6. Turn Your Blog into an Affiliate Blog

The final way to monetize a blog is to turn it into an affiliate site. This is ideal if your blog is mostly a part-time interest you work on whenever you’re not actually working.

You may be passionate about anything from credit card points to traveling to cooking or weightlifting and personal fitness. There are plenty of companies out there in these industries and more who are looking for affiliates. They’re willing to pay you to talk about their product or service to refer customers to their site.

Such interactions create more business for them, and it generates revenue for you, too. It’s the ultimate referral program.

Learn How to Monetize a Blog and Build Its Popularity

Once you start making a little bit of money here and there, you have to take monetizing to the next level. There’s no reason to stop at a little bit of side money if your blog has the potential to become your main source of income.

The trick is to learn how to improve your search rankings after you’ve learned how to monetize a blog. One way to do that is with the use of social media, which you can learn more about by clicking here.