1. Sell ad space on your blog
2. Write articles for other companies/blogs/individuals
3. Syndicate your blog posts to other blogs/Sell Blog Subscriptions
4. Sell your own things on your blog
5. Sell third party goods online

1. Sell ad space on your blog

One of the most popular ads is GoogleAds: https://www.google.com/adsense (although they pay you only when someone actually clicks on the ad) and the Yahoo Publisher Network https://publisher.yahoo.com/portal/login.php

Selling ad space is fairly easy to do; just create a section on your blog that describes the benefit for companies/individuals to place an ad on your blog. 

One word of advice though: When you start this adventure, do not fill your blog to the gills with ads – it will not look very professional. Your readers need to see what you can offer first before they will buy anything from you or off your blog. 

You can spot a newbie, right-away by the imense number of ads running on his/her site, trying desperately to make some dough. People do not respond well and they will leave your site fairly quick before you can even write about your expertise. 

Here’s an example from the highly acclaimed blog called doshdosh (http://www.doshdosh.com/advertise) 

Dosh Dosh Advertising Page

Same can be done for a website. The more traffic you have the more you can charge. 

If your blog has low traffic you can always go to TextLinkAds or TextLinkBrokers. Even better connect with your network in Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter and let them know you are offering ad space on your blog for a minimum of $XX amount per month. You will be surprised of the response you get. 

2. Write Articles for other companies/blogs/individuals

This usually frightens some people but you don’t have to be an expert in a particular field.

You’ll have to show proof that you: 

 - are a creative blogger
 - have articles you wrote and published on your blog, ezines or squidoo lenses
 - comment and are active on other blogs as well
 - are proficient using social media, plug-ins and add-ons
 - have a basic understanding of simple SEO rules

The best way of all is to show that you are a pro is creating, maintaining and actively contributing on your own blog. You should have at least 3-4 months under your belt and a minimum of 30-50 good articles consisting of 250-500 words each .

The core subject or theme of your blog does not matter as long as you write frequently and professionally. Obviously check for grammar. Write well and write often. 

3. Syndicate your blog posts to other blogs/Sell Blog Subscriptions

If the information posted on your blog is in high demand you might want to think about syndicating your blog.

You can accomplish this through 3 easy steps:

 a. Find out what your blog’s feed is (it should look like this: http://feeds.feedburner.com/your-blog-name-here)
 b. Customize your feed through the feed dashboard
 c. Finally – publicize your feed to your readers.

Others have started blogging and got so popular that know they sell subscriptions. See problogger.com 

Again, based on how popular your blog is, the amount of money you can charge can vary. Initially start small and as you add more value you can increase the dollar amount you can charge.

4. Sell Your Own Things

In the fortunate even that you already have something to sell on your own, you’ll have to have some additional tools along side your blog: 

 - If you are selling digital assets (e-books, art, photos, music, etc.) you’ll need an ecommerce shopping cart and a PayPal account.

The alternative is http://www.payloadz.com or http://www.payloadz.com

 - If you are selling physical, tangible products you’ll need all of the above, a FedEx account and…lots of boxes.

The majority of bloggers sell their ebooks and books, usually directly from their blog using a simple PayPal account.

5. Sell third party goods online

This is the part where beginners make the mistake of selecting products that they enjoy disregarding their reader’s likes and dislikes. Chose the products your reader base enjoy and look for. If your site is about web design don’t post ads for MP3 players or mortgage adverts. 

People that come to your site seek your advice in whatever you are writing about so offer them the things that augment your articles and the entire theme of your blog. 

Look for products to sell by signing up as an affiliate. For instance I host my blog with JustHost. I love their customer service and I think it brings a lot of value to every webmaster out there; I therefore promote their company on my site, of course getting a little money for that. 

Other sources where you might find good affiliate programs: 

Clickbank: http://www.clickbank.com 
Commission Junction: http://www.cj.com 
Hydra Network: http://www.hydranetwork.com 

Once you set this up, you’ll need to promote your blog so it increases in traffic and thus your chances of selling directly from your site. How can you do that? See below a list of articles talking about that. 

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There are several steps when designing and creating materials for creating good Case Studies and Press Releases. Simply follow them closely and you’ll have awesome promotional material for your web site as well as other marketing materials you plan on displaying on your marketing panoply (i.e. brochures, newsletters, etc.).

Gain Online Recognition

Case Studies & Press Releases

These 2 types of materials are not only the most powerful in your marketing panoply but they are also the most time consuming. This is, in part, due to the fact that the customer is involved in the process and believe it or not you’ll have to sync with his schedule. Nevertheless the end result can and will deliver very high returns for your website rank, company prestige and ultimately for your bank account.

Steps in Producing Case Studies & Press Releases

Select a Happy Customer

Go over your list of clients and select the easy going ones; the ones you know you won’t waste your time. Select the client that has a good story, an experience that needs to be shared. Just selecting the first ones that agrees to your interview doesn’t necessarily mean that’s also the best choice.

Once you selected the client ask yourself these 3 simple questions:

1. Will this client sign off on the final draft of your material and be willing to put his name on it?
2. Does the story carry an interesting streak or the reader will be bored to death with yet another off the wall example of corporate robot behavior?
3. Is this the story you need or maybe there is someone else out there you’d rather buy coffee for and write theirs instead?
   If you answered “yes” to all 3 – then you got yourself a winner.

Conducting the Interview

For this section here are the rules of engagement. Follow them closely and you’ll have a good interview and plenty of material to write from.

Establish a time to meet and the amount of time reserved for the interview. This way everybody’s schedule will be free and unobstructed.

Always tape the interview. I don’t care how fast you can take short-hand or that you have the memory even an elephant would be proud of – the reality is that you’ll miss a lot of important details. Let the client know in advance about your intentions. He/she might not like the idea of going “on-record”.

Prepare open-ended questions and do not assume the client has all the answers. Plus you need to be in charge when conducting the interview.

Select a place where both you and the client are comfortable but in the same time away from interruptions, emails, friends or colleagues dropping by, etc. Make sure you check that with your client beforehand.

Produce the Content

Gather all the materials and design the structure of your material. Best route in creating the bulk of the copy is hiring a professional who does this for a living. Assist him/her with all the necessary materials. Communicate clearly what your intent is with the material and what key marketing targets should be hit.

For Case Studies use at least 2500 to 3500 words. Press Releases are less than that – somewhere around 500 words. The Press Release should target media’s interest and it should contain plenty of facts, numbers and other details.

Seek Client’s Approval

When the material is completed, contact the client and present it; ask for their approval. Please use a clean material and not some flimsy piece of paper even it’s only a draft. You still need to show the client you are serious about this and most of all appreciate the time he/she spent with you to produce the material.

Before showing up, contact the client and make sure the interviewee still works there. In this “dynamic” economy, it’s not rare to find out that one might not be there a couple of weeks past the interview. Hopefully he is still there… Now – make sure they agree with the accuracy of the quotes they provided. Same for the statistics, certain details about the business, etc.

Once the client approves you are good for publishing (either print or online). If it’s online (your website or blog) make sure the text has plenty of links to your site or blog, wikis, etc. If you put all the work into this and the whole purpose of a case study is to promote yourself as well as the client, then take advantage and produce a link rich material that can give you plenty of brownie points with Google.

Next step – Testimonials

Now that you wrote about the client and she/he is very content with the outcome, ask for a testimonial from them and emphasize the fact that you’ll publish it on your website, on brochures even. In fact you are advertising for free and that should make them very happy.

A testimonial usually will come in the form of an email (at least that’s what I ask my clients to do so I don’t have to sit there and retype it all over again. Cut & paste is a wonderful thing). Just make sure that your request for a testimonial follows the below rules:

Indicate where and when the testimonials provided by the client will appear (type of publication, what exactly will the copy include, etc.).
Point out other similar testimonials so the client will not think you are starting with them first. For some reason no one is willing to take that place.

Once you publish the Testimonial, send an email to the client thanking him/her again. Provide the link if the published material is online or send a snail mail letter with a copy of the offline material (brochure, newsletter, etc.). Clients love to see their names in print.

Conclusion:

All the elements described above can bring superb value to your company’s website. You are in fact promoting your brand while writing a happy story about one of your client’s experiences with…you. What can be better than that?

In the same time you are giving comfort to new web visitors showing them you are appreciated and looked after by other business owners just like them. The end result – more traffic to your site, more clients for your business and finally more money in your coffers.