Have you attempted to monetize your website or blog? Have you defined a goal for your monetization efforts?
Since this blog began I have made a few attempts at monetization but I have never really defined a goal or purpose behind those efforts. Without taking the time to define a goal, I believe that my efforts have lacked any real direction or purpose.
When I posted yesterday about pursuing your passions, I realized that I want to attend Chopper College to pursue my passion in motorcycles. Unfortunately the cost of the tuition is beyond my budget, therefore I have decided to define a goal that all monetization efforts of this site will be directed towards the $1150 required to attend the Chopper College boot camp.
In order to pursue that goal, I am going to experiment with PayPerPost to make money blogging.
This post will be my first venture into writing a sponsored post as my site was just approved on June 14th. Since I have just signed up and am writing my first post, I have yet to make any money with PayPerPost but there are plenty of opportunities.
Signing up for PayPerPost was not an easy decision for me because I am aware that many people are opposed to the idea of writing sponsored posts. In my opinion, there are two dangers or risks with writing sponsored posts:
- Ability to Remain Impartial :: One common complaint about writing sponsored posts is that the author cannot remain impartial due to the fact that they are being paid.
- Frequency of Paid Posts :: When people realize they can be paid per post, there may be the temptation to post like crazy in an effort to earn as much as possible.
As I thought about how I would like to implement PayPerPost in this experiment, I believe that I have addressed the two risks that I just mentioned.
In an effort to remain impartial while writing sponsored posts, I feel it is best to only accept the opportunities that allow a positive and/or negative tone unless it is for a product or service that I fully endorse. While I was waiting for this blog to be approved, there were a few opportunities that I saw which required a positive tone for something that I did not believe in and that is the type of opportunity that I will not pursue.
Regarding the frequency of posting, I understand this can be an area of concern and I will do my best to find a healthy balance of non-sponsored posts in-between sponsored posts. I’ve seen some sites that alternate between a sponsored post and a non-sponsored post but that is way too much in my opinion. Even though I would love to rack up the sponsored posts and earn my $1150, I understand that would likely drive all of you away and that is not worth it to me.
Up until this point I had not defined a goal to pursue with this blog and I am looking forward to the challenge of using this website to cover the cost of Chopper College tuition. This new found direction and purpose behind the monetization of this website has me excited.
One thing that will not change is the value that I place on all of you and the goal to deliver quality content to all of my readers. Therefore, I encourage all of you to share your thoughts and opinions on the use of sponsored posts.
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
wow…
it’s like you’re inside my brain today. seriously… i just had a conversation with someone about this. i put up a “sponsorship” page today on my site, actually like 10 mins ago hahaha, and i toiled over whether or not to include sponsored posts as a sponsorship option. i opted to leave it out, as i’m still on the fence. and you hit the nail right on the head about your considerations, i thought the same exact things. my thinking is, how can i monetize my posts and also appease the reader and the advertiser? it’s a delicate balancing act, but i think it can be done. i actually like the way john chow breaks down his sponsored posts because he really gets into the site and gives the reader more benefit than what the advertiser is paying for, i think. i think it’s a matter of delivering the highest quality review that you can and not just seeing it as a way to make a quick buck. i mean, they are really paying good money for your opinion, might as well give them the most honest opinion you can. wow i could have written a post about this! LOL sorry for the rant.
Your sponsorship page is something I should probably add here as well to give people the opportunity to buy advertising direct. Just today I sold my first TLA spot on this blog so I am excited about that.
I’ll be keeping a close eye on how my sponsored posts go and what the readers have to say. While I agree with you that John Chow does a great job (as does Michael Kwan since he seems to do most of the paid review posts) with the detail on their reviews, I have felt at times that he has been doing too many paid posts.
Thanks for sharing your feedback Danielle!
I’ve enjoyed using PPP. Sure there are some review opportunities that are completely random…and unrelated to your blog. But there are also many that you will find fascinating, and actually learn from. I have to admit, I’ve taken a couple of those review opps because they paid alot, BUT I did attempt to do a thorough review. Plus many times, I’ve adopted new traffic from Google and Yahoo! due to the SEO benefits of the sponsored posts (i.e. student loan consolidation, secure online backup, and travel destinations).
I’ve seen some of your sponsored posts and I imagine you are making a decent amount with them.
When you signed up with PPP, how long did it take for your blog rankings to be reflected properly? As of right now my rankings still list N/A but obviously that is not accurate.
I was poking around the site and didn’t see a way to manually refresh the rankings like some sites have so I am not sure how that is completed. As a result of my rankings not being correct, I am not qualified for quite as many opportunities right now.
Yeah. That’s one frustrating aspect of PPP. You can’t refresh manually. There are some tricks…something to do with loggin off and back on…yada, yada. Your stats should update soon though. The best place for those answers is at the PPP forum.
Thanks for the heads-up. I was poking around and about to send an email to PPP when I saw the FAQ that mentioned logging out and then back in to refresh the stats.
I’ll check out the forum as well. Thanks.
To be honest . . i haven’t even set up a monetization goal for myself yet since my site isn’t really seen as a big money maker for me. I guess I’ll take yours and danielle’s lead once you guys figure it all out. 🙂
I’ll be happy to share my lessons learned once I have successfully met my goal! 😉
Wow, you hit the nail on the head. For the last few weeks, I’ve been contemplating monetizing AffiliateWatcher. I just haven’t been able to decide how..lol
Adsense doesn’t do well on the site plus I don’t like the looks of the ads on that blog.
I really like my readers and I’ve been worried about them leaving if I started putting paid reviews up. Then I read several articles over at Steve Pavlina’s blog where he says ads really didn’t affect his readers.
So for now, I’ll continue to build traffic. Meanwhile, I’m going to get to work building a plan to monetize that blog. Thanks for posting this article and getting me to think about it again!
Don
You’re welcome Don and thanks for stopping by to share your thoughts and feedback!
With this site, I haven’t been focused on any one topic so the Adsense ads are a little too random. I’ve been experimenting with a small AuctionAds placement that has received a handful of clicks but no revenue yet.
In addition to that, I just sold my first TLA spot on this site and have now made my first PPP post. I’m looking forward to the challenge ahead of me.
Best to you on your plan and I look forward to hearing how you do with your plan.
Why is everyone so up in arms about PPP?
I don’t have a blog (at least not a real one anyway)..but I could give a flying fark about ‘hey this is sponsored..don’t do that, don’t make money. give us your content for free! nooo!’
Give us the ads, heck we like ’em more than the free stuff anyway a lot of times!
Personally I don’t have a problem with others doing PPP or any other form of monetization as I hope everyone can be successful with their site and make a little coin.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.
I tried the IM thing and am still looking into it more. It looks cool so far.
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