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Blog Income Report 2022 – Making $272,712 From Blogging

Tom Blake — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 17:49:09 +0000

Every year, it's hard for me to believe that another full year has come and gone.

I also can't believe that I'm writing the fifth blogging income report for WebMonkey.

Five years is a longer time period than when I was in college. And I've never even had the same job for close to five years during any point of my life.

This year has also been a bit all over the place in terms of making money online, career changes, and living situations.

In 2022, I joined the workforce for the first time in a few years and then quit it once again. I also spent time living on five different continents, diving into the digital nomad and blogging lifestyle.

From Lions Head hike in Cape Town, South Africa this year.

Overall, it's been a wacky, weird, but awesome year. And I have everyone who reads WebMonkey to thank for it.

Five years ago, I thought WebMonkey would just be a fun side project that talked about phone farming and passive income apps. I would never have guessed that the blog could turn into a full-time business and reach millions of people.

So, thank you to everyone who reads and follows along each year. I'm truly grateful for it all, and I hope that these blogging income reports help other people out there find their start in earning money online.

Time to dive into the 2022 blog income report!

Want to follow the journey from the beginning? Checkout:

Why I Write Blogging Income Reports

Like last year, I want to start off with a quick disclaimer before getting into all of the blogging income and expenses for the years.

Every year, I write a blogging income report for the sake of transparency and record keeping.

I love sharing data with other people about the process of growing a money-making blog. And I also like to look back on previous years to track the ups, downs, and lessons along the way.

I don't want these income reports to ever come across as an opportunity to brag or to push blogging down people's throats for the sake of affiliate sales.

Really, I want these reports to provide an honest look at what growing a blog can look like, as well as some tips for other bloggers.

There are so many blog income reports out there that promise quick results, big income, yet never share any income proof or screenshots. That's why I think it's important for more bloggers to be transparent so people know what to expect.

Of course, plenty of blogs earn way more than WebMonkey or have very different approaches to making money.

But, hopefully, some of the strategies and lessons I've learned over the years help you find success in whatever blogging niche you happen to be in.

2022 Blog Income Report – Making $272,712 From Blogging

In my 2021 blogging income report, I said that it was the first year that WebMonkey truly felt like a business. But in hindsight, I guess 2021 was really the year for testing proof of concept.

As for 2022, it was really the year of scaling that proof of concept on all fronts.

My two income sources are still largely the same: display ads and affiliate marketing. But there's been some exciting updates for both sources that I'd like to share.

Note: The following figures are in USD, but some affiliate income has been converted from CDN to USD for the purpose of this blog income report. Additionally, I'm sharing all major screenshots of earnings but have omitted a few smaller programs so this post isn't stuffed with images.

Mediavine Income – $152,297.74

In 2022, Mediavine ads made over $152,000 for WebMonkey. This is more than double the amount of last year, and I'm consistently blown away by the quality of Mediavine's network.

This income is equivalent to making $400 a day or so. And for the entire year, my average Mediavine RPM was $40.88, which is pretty remarkable in my opinion.

For newer readers, Mediavine is a premium advertising network that's known as one of the best in the blogging business.

When I started blogging, I was using Google Adsense and then Monumetric. But after switching to Mediavine in 2020, my display ad revenue on the site has been steadily increasing year-over-year.

This year, Mediavine also had a massive announcement with the release of Mediavine Pro.

This program is for Mediavine publishers who earn at least $100,000 per 12 months. It provides a 10% payout boost, alongside some other perks, which has been a really nice surprise for WebMonkey.

All-in-all, I think Mediavine is the best display ads publishing option out there for bloggers. It's tech is amazing, it's working on first-party data collection for when cookies are no more, and it pays publishers extremely well.

Mediavine requirements have changed since I joined, and you need 50,000 sessions to apply now. But if you're a newer blogger and need a major goal to set your sights on, I definitely recommend aiming for Mediavine.

Affiliate Income – $116,915

Affiliate income is the second main category for WebMonkey. And in 2021, it only made up about 33% of my total blogging income.

This was a massive improvement from prior years. But since advertisement rates are highly seasonal, I wanted to boost my affiliate revenue in 2022 for diversification and scaling purposes.

Now in 2022, WebMonkey made approximately $116,915 from affiliate income.

Most of this income came from gig apps like DoorDash or paid survey sites like Branded Surveys. I promote these offers through Impact Radius, which is my favorite affiliate marketing network that has thousands of brands for bloggers and influencers to promote.

I also promoted more passive income ideas in 2022, like rental platforms like Neighbor or investing apps like Fundrise.

Overall, the content strategy was largely the same as 2021: write long-form listicles and reviews that are packed with research and real user experiences to gain trust with readers.

However, I'm really happy with the number of new partners I'm working with since I think diversification helps reduce income risks.

Anyway, Impact Radius was the main affiliate network I used. But I also scaled income on other networks like Aragon Premium and MaxBounty.

Here's a snapshot of my Aragon Premium revenue, which totals to $13,792 for 2022:

And here's some MaxBounty payments coming in. I earned just over $15,000 with MaxBounty in 2022, but it's hard to get a report from the dashboard that shows all the payments in one tab.

Both of these networks have excellent offers for finance bloggers. And MaxBounty has thousands of offers in other niches and a great team as well.

Aside from that, some other small affiliate income channels I used in 2022 include:

Rakuten ($2,550 total) – My favorite cash back extension that pays $30 per user you refer.
Printify ($2,127 total) – This is the print on demand company I used to launch my Etsy POD store, so it's what I suggest to readers.
Adbloom ($1,980 total) – Another affiliate network with lots of nifty reward apps to promote.

I'm not going to include a screenshot of every single affiliate program for the sake of space. And the combo of Aragon Premium, MaxBounty, and Impact Radius is where most of the income comes from anyways.

Plus, like last year, affiliate networks like Amazon Affiliate only paid about $300. And I didn't make much from promoting blogging platforms like SiteGround or BigScoots either.

I'm totally okay with this since WebMonkey's goal is to help people start making money online or with the gig economy. It's not a blog about blogging or one that's meant for Amazon Affiliate.

Sponsorship Income – $3,500

I had massive plans in 2022 to launch some digital products like ebooks and courses. And, while they're in the works, I completely failed at reaching this goal this year.

Honestly, the blame is fully on me and for procrastinating this long.

Living in about seven different countries this year certainly didn't help on the steady content production front. But I'm going to emphasize digital products in 2023 and actually pull something off.

I know, I know…I say this every year! But I mean it this time

That said, WebMonkey still landed two small sponsorships this year resulting in $3,500 in income. This isn't massive, so sponsorship opportunities are also something I'm keen to scale with the new year.

Blogging Traffic & Growth

In 2022, WebMonkey earned almost 300% more than in 2021. The main reason for this is increases in traffic for the site throughout the year.

Here are some quick stats about WebMonkey's 2022 traffic:

3.1 million users
3.8 million sessions
Approximately 220 posts published

The fact that WebMonkey reached over 3 million people in 2022 is mindblowing to me. And I think publishing a lot of new content played a massive role in this.

Publishing 200+ posts in 2022 took a lot of resources and time. But a lot of this content is ranking and growing now, so it was well worth the effort.

I've also stepped up the update schedule, averaging about an update a day (or sometimes more) during the week.

Updating content is incredibly important for giving readers the most current, valuable information. And Google also likes freshness, so that's an added bonus.

Aside from that, the blog was on the winning and losing side of the many algorithm updates that seem to come regularly these days.

After going through plenty of updates, I think the lesson remains the same: writing well-researched, valuable content wins at the end of the day.

This was actually a large part of my content strategy in 2022. I spent a lot of time and energy writing reviews about various gpt sites and apps, often taking the contrarian view of other blogs by calling out scammy apps.

Sure, this approach isn't great for getting affiliate income from companies like Solitaire Cash, Bingo Cash, and the dozens of other apps some finance bloggers shill.

But in terms of building trust with readers and providing the best content possible, I think honesty is the ultimate guide bloggers should stick to.

2022 Blogging Expenses & Profit

Like last year, my main blogging expenses for 2022 are from content creation costs. But this is perfectly fine with me since I view each article as an investment that has the potential to pay itself off, and then some, over the coming months.

Here's a snapshot of my main blogging expenses for the year:

Content Writing: $13,132
BigScoots Hosting: $624.
Sucuri Security: $300.
Pinterest Marketing Help Plus Tailwind: $740.
Various Plugins: $250.
TOTAL EXPENSES: $15,046
TOTAL PROFIT: $257,666

This is actually about the same operational expense as what I spent in 2021 on WebMonkey. So, I'm pretty happy the profit margin has scaled so well.

I'm also immensely happy since the WebMonkey team has grown by a few people. And I'm very grateful to work with such awesome bloggers and freelance writers.

But other than this content expense, everything else is more or less the same. I'm still with BigScoots, and my plugin stack has actually gotten smaller which is pretty nice.

I ended up scrapping my Pinterest marketing help and Tailwind subscription. It simply wasn't driving enough traffic despite tons of testing and solid designs.

I think the lesson here for other bloggers is to not be afraid of reinvesting some income into growth.

For me, paying for a blog redesign in 2021 and paying for content writing help has been a game changer. And I plan to invest similar amounts into the site for 2023.

2022 YouTube Income & Expenses

I didn't include YouTube income or expenses in the blog income report data above since they're separate businesses. But I like to mention YouTube in these reports since both platforms promote one another.

For some context, I started my YouTube channel in 2020 to diversify income and to also try something fun and new.

Since then, it's grown to over 15,000 subscribers. And it earns about $30 to $50 a day in advertisement income while funneling about 1,000 to 1,500 readers a month to WebMonkey.

Here are my YouTube income and expense stats for 2022:

YouTube Adsense Revenue: $14,451.
YouTube Views: 750,000.
Videos Published: 19.
Editing Expenses: $4,500.
Thumbnail Expenses: $320.
TOTAL EXPENSES:
TOTAL PROFIT: $9,631.

The profit margin for YouTube vs blogging is much lower in my case. But I'm okay with this since YouTube is largely chugging along as a semi-passive side hustle at this point.

And spending money on an excellent video editor has been a massive help in publishing more videos. Same goes for working with a talented thumbnail designer.

I've fallen very short of my 2021 goal of 50,000 subscribers and $20,000 in income. So, I don't think I've cracked the YouTube code quite yet. But I also need to publish videos more regularly and go for some trending content to grow faster.

For 2023, I think adding in some short-form content and, regrettably, a bit more clickbait content, is going to be keys to growing faster.

Tips For Other Bloggers

Now that the blog income and expenses are out of the way, I want to wrap up this blogging income report with a few tips for other bloggers that I've found helpful this year!

Honesty Is Key

I always want WebMonkey to provide honest information about side hustles and ways to make money online. And I think this has helped a lot of my recent reviews rank well since they provide real information about various money-making apps and hustles.

It does feel a bit weird having so many 1 and 2 star reviews on the site. But at the end of the day, I want to make the best content possible to help people, so I think this is inevitable.

Doesn't always help for landing sponsorship deals, but hey, I still think this is a must-have for any blogger.

Author Authority Is Becoming More Important

If this year has highlighted anything for me, it's that author authority is becoming more important than ever for bloggers.

Blogging competition increases every year. And content production is ramping up as people use AI tools. So, the only way to stand apart from the crowd (in my opinion) is to develop personal authority in your blogging niche.

This can be done in several ways, including:

Getting more backlinks
Gaining more real world experience and accreditations
Being featured in videos, podcasts, and other forms of media

I think this goal is especially important for newer bloggers, and it's also an area I want to continue developing over time.

Keyword Research Is Still Important

In 2021, I think most of my blogging gains came from increasing my publishing schedule and targeting low-competition keywords.

In 2022, it's pretty much the same story. A lot of large wins and posts that generate thousands of visitors a month are posts from this year. And the only way I found the topics to write about was through consistent keyword research.

Personally, I use SEMRush for my keyword research needs, and it's what I suggest to other bloggers.

An example of an SEMRush keyword report.

I've also used free tools like Google Keyword Planner and UberSuggest in the past, so you don't need to spend money to get started with keyword research. And I've been lucky to get an SEMRush account from work and a friend.

However, if your blog is earning income or you're willing to invest, keyword research is one of the first investments I'd suggest.

The amount of time you save by using premium keyword research tools is significant. And again, if organic traffic is your main traffic source, finding winning keywords is how you can scale and earn more.

SEMRush has a 7-day free trial, and the free version also lets you make up to 10 keyword searches a day, which might be enough for beginner bloggers.

A Personal Update

Like I said in the intro, 2022 has been a very interesting year for both business and personal changes.

At the start of the year, I was living in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico. It was a fun way to practice some Spanish while living with friends, and I scooted back to Colombia and Florida before heading home for a Canadian summer.

I also learned how to surf during this time, and the first half of the year was pretty jam-packed with travel, family time, and new adventures.

From the Mexico trip in August 2022.

During this time, I also paused freelance writing and actually accepted a regular job offer as a commercial writer for a company called XLMedia.

At the time, I was feeling pretty burnt out from so much freelancing and blogging. So, I thought a stable job, benefits, good pay, and vacation time was a much-needed change.

And don't get me wrong: it was an awesome change. I got to pump out content for a site called Investor Junkie, all while working with some of my best friends that I've come to know after a few years in the personal finance world.

I even got to attend another conference this year and headed down to FinCon 2022. It was an awesome experience to meet my fellow teammates and to meet some famous finance bloggers and YouTubers.

But after a few months in Canada, I started to get the itch for new scenery again. And I was actually feeling even more tired from working a 9-5 job while putting in a few hours a day at WebMonkey.

So, for the last part of the year, I went all-in on blogging once again and quit my job after about 6 months. I guess I'm still allergic to having a rigid schedule.

I also booked a one-way flight to Cape Town, South Africa. And it's hands-down the most beautiful place on earth that I've ever seen.

If you like nature and hiking, Cape Town should be on your bucket list. And the time I spent exploring mountains, meeting other people, and surfing out there was one of the happiest times I've had.

A sunset view from Table Mountain, Cape Town.

After a month of that, I meandered over to Portugal for a few weeks to focus on work while checking out some new cities. And then it was time for another 20-hour flight to spend a month-and-a-half in Thailand and Indonesia.

One of the most popular waterfalls in Bali, Indonesia.

It's been a pretty wild year with a lot of flights to say the least. But for now, I'm really enjoying the digital nomad lifestyle and roaming around random places, making money with a laptop.

I think 2023 is going to contain a lot of travel as well. But I'm excited to have more time to blog while I'm on the road, and I'm hoping to document more of the travel fun on YouTube if you feel like joining along!

Extra Reading – The Best Easy Online Jobs.

Final Thoughts

Well, that about does it for this 2022 blog income report.

I honestly can't believe how 2022 turned out, or the fact that this is the first time in my life I'm just blogging for a living.

When I started out blogging, earning $1,700 in that first year was amazing to me. That was money to help cover groceries and other expenses, and it came from writing words on the Internet!

I never would have guessed that I'd be blogging for a career one day. But I hope that this 5+ year process highlights how it's very possible to grow an online business over time if you stay consistent.

Yes, there are wild ups, downs, and plenty of mistakes. But at the end of the day, I believe there's so much immense opportunity to make money online if you play to your strengths and keep at it.

And for everyone who has read this year or from the beginning, thank you so, so much for the continued support. It truly means the world!

Now, I like to wrap up every blogging income report with some goals for the new year since I like to hold myself accountable and work towards something,

My 2023 blog and business goals include:

Scale blogging revenue to $400,000 (I'm hoping for half to come from Mediavine and half to come from affiliates and sponsorships)
Scale YouTube to 50,000 subscribers and $25,000 in income (the same goal as always)
Launch and sell an eBook
Launch and sell a course
Start posting short-form shorts and reels

I really think and hope diversification will be the name of the game for 2023. And I'm excited to finally launch some digital products, assuming I don't procrastinate for another 12 months lol.

Anyways, that's all for this 2022 blogging income report.

I'd like to wish everyone who's made it this far a year full of health, happiness, and financial success. And to my fellow bloggers, I hope this income report has provided some useful tips or information to help you scale your own blog this year.

Thank you, and I'll catch you guys in the next one.

Tom from WebMonkey.

Want to start making money online? These posts are a great place to start:

The post Blog Income Report 2022 – Making $272,712 From Blogging appeared first on WebMonkey.

Blog Income Report 2021 – Making $92,000+ From Blogging!

Tom Blake — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 17:14:33 +0000

I'm always a little stunned when the end of the year rolls around and it's time to write another blogging income report.

WebMonkey is somehow celebrating its fourth birthday!

It seems like only yesterday when this blog was nothing but a small college side hustle and ramble of articles on phone farming.

This year has definitely been insane, both for worldwide events but also for this blog and some personal changes.

In 2021, I took the complete plunge into freelance writing and blogging after quitting a startup I was working at (no more paid advertising work, woohoo!)

I also lived abroad for about half the year, jumped out of an airplane, and met even more awesome bloggers and writers along the way.

2021 also marks the first year in which WebMonkey has really felt like a full online business and main income source, not just a little side hustle.

So, to anyone who reads my content or checks in on what's happening at TOW, thank you.

This past year has been absolutely incredible, and I have all of you to thank for that.

I never thought life would end up like this when I started blogging back in college, and I just hope that these income reports serve as a useful resource or source of inspiration for anyone else who's trying to make money online.

So, without further ado, let's dive into my 2021 blogging income report!

Want to start from the very beginning? Checkout:

Why I Write Blogging Income Reports

One quick note before getting on with my blog income report.

The reason I write one of these reports every year isn't to brag or to try and promote anything.

Rather, I think it's important to write these reports in the name of transparency.

I remember reading about blogging and other side hustles when I was in college and really wanted to make more money. It was nearly impossible to find accurate information, let alone blog income reports that even shared screenshots to prove the earning figures.

In my opinion, this lack of honesty and transparency is one of the main problems of the side hustle niche.

So, I hope that by providing my blogging income data and actual screenshots of everything important, you get an idea of what's realistic and possible after four years of consistent blogging and work.

With that out of the way, let's dive into the numbers!

Blogging Income For 2021 – Making $92,614 From Blogging

I'm going to cut to the chase here and start with the total amount WebMonkey earned in 2021.

WebMonkey made $92,614.42 in 2021.

I'm honestly still blown away by this figure since this is about a 400% increase from last year's $22,000 year.

There were quite a few factors at play that explain why revenue jumped so much, as well as some sheer dumb luck.

But before getting into all that, let's break down each income source for a bit more granularity!

Mediavine Income Report – Making $61,807.94

I've been using Mediavine ads to monetize my blog since 2020.

And, in 2021, Mediavine earned $61,807.94 for WebMonkey.

This income is a result of:

1.44 million sessions
A $42.68 average RPM

Mediavine is a premium ads network, and it's honestly an amazing company to work with.

It's a way higher-paying advertising network than something like AdSense, and it's also earning much more than when I was with Monumetric, another ads company.

Mediavine is excellent to work with because it's always improving its ad tech, so bloggers can effectively monetize with display ads without ruining user experience.

It also offers amazing publisher support, and I don't think I know of many ad networks that could deliver such a high RPM!

I mean, earning $45 to $50 RPM during quarter four is just insane, and I even had a five-figure month with Mediavine in December which was crazy to see.

Affiliate Marketing Income – Making $30,806.48

The second source of blogging income for WebMonkey is affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing has always been something I've struggled with because I don't want to sound too salesy in my content.

However, 2021 was a massive improvement from 2020's results, during which time I earned about $6,000 in affiliate income.

In 2021, WebMonkey Earned $30,806.48 from affiliate marketing income.

Here are the main affiliate networks I use to find and promote offers, as well as how much each network or offer paid me:

Impact Radius (my favorite affiliate marketing network): $26,848 Canadian, or $21,057 USD.
Aragon Premium (great for finance bloggers): $5,143
Max Bounty: $1,346
Rakuten (my favorite shopping extension): $831
Printify (my favorite print-on-demand company): $1,458
AdBloom: $514
SiteGround Hosting: $100
Shopify Hosting: $87
Amazon Affiliates: $76
Flex Offers (I use this affiliate marketing network much less now): $194.48
Total Income: $30,806.48

Now that the income is broken out by affiliate network, here are some screenshots just to verify the earnings are legit!

Note: I'm including screenshots from the main earners just so there isn't a wall of images for ones that barely made $100 in income.

Here's a snapshot from Impact Radius, my main affiliate marketing network:

And here's the revenue from MaxBounty, which I joined halfway through the year (this network has lots of awesome offers!)

These are the affiliate payouts from Printify:

Here are some PayPal payments from Aragon Premium (I can't capture all of them in the screenshot since Aragon pays with PayPal cash):

And finally, here's the Adbloom income:

As for what offers I'm promoting, some of my highest-paying affiliates for 2021 include:

DoorDash: I write about this gig app a lot in posts like my DoorDash driver review or post on DoorDash tips and tricks.
Fundrise: A nifty real estate investment platform that I mention in posts on passive income ideas.
Instacart: Another driving gig I talk about in content like my Instacart Shopper pay article.
Mistplay: A popular app that pays you to play games I mention a lot.
Drop: One of my favorite reward apps.
Steady: Another gig economy app that helps people find new side hustles.

I think the thing I'm most happy about with affiliate income in 2021 is that it's way more diversified than any previous year.

I've also written a lot of listicles this year that are sort of cash-cow articles.

For example, posts like the best gpt sites or the best beermoney apps and websites are basically full of various affiliate links, so they're very valuable posts once they rank.

I've also spent more time working on content that meets user intent.

For example, a post like DoorDash driver tips and tricks, while useful, is only catering to readers who have probably already signed up for DoorDash.

But, my content like how to DoorDash for the first time or DoorDash vs Instacart are probably capturing people who are still deciding if they should sign up to Dash, so there's more affiliate income potential.

So, if I can give one tip to other bloggers, it's to consider the user intent for articles when doing keyword research.

Reviews and listicles are great, but targeting specific question keywords is also a very lucrative strategy if you get people right before the buying stage.

YouTube 2021 Income – Making $7,158.67

I don't include YouTube money in my blog income, but I think it makes sense to add it in at the end here since YouTube and WebMonkey funnel traffic to one another.

Here are some quick stats about my YouTube channel in 2021:

Views: 498,800
New Subscribers: 4,800
Total Subscribers: 12,737
Revenue: $7,158.67

This was honestly another great result in my opinion, and the channel is trending upwards so I'm very excited for what 2022 has to bring.

I'm also excited since YouTube and blogging made about $100,000 in revenue for me in 2021.

This is also in USD which is even better when living in Canada or abroad where the strength of the U.S. dollar can get you pretty far.

Now, the channel did have some expenses for video editing, thumbnails, and YouTube SEO software.

Here's how the costs break down:

Video Editing: $1,270
Thumbnails: $400
Tubebuddy SEO Software: $108
Total: $1,778

This brings the channel's total profit to: $5,380.67

I set a goal of hitting 50,000 subscribers in 2021. I don't think this was unrealistic, but I don't think I made nearly enough trending content to deserve getting close to this goal.

I'm very excited to have crossed the 10k mark, but until I make more trending content or better content in general, I think getting to 50k might be a bit slow.

That said, I still think I made some cool videos in 2021.

My favorite is probably my Dubai vlog since that's where I lived for a few months this year (more on that later!)

I also had some videos pop off a bit, and overall, I'm happy with the 1,000 to 2,000 sessions YouTube sends my blog every month as well.

I've started paying for video editing help as well, so this has really sped up how fast I can create videos and my whole enjoyment of YouTube as well.

For bloggers, I think video content is only going to become more important every year.

So, if you want to stay ahead of the game, I recommend starting your own channel. You can also check out some content I have on YouTube like:

Blogging Expenses For 2021

Alright, now that the fun part is out of the way, it's time to dive into the bookkeeping part of all of this.

I've started treating WebMonkey like more of a business this year, but I also had a goal of improving the profit margin from last year.

Anyway, this year was much better in terms of my blogging profit margin, and here's how my blog expenses look like:

Content Writing: $12,702
BigScoots Hosting: $634
Pinterest Virtual Assistant Help: $1,875
Tailwind: $119.88
Sucuri Website Security: $299.99
Website Redesign: $450
Total Cost: $16,098.87
Total Blogging Profit: $76,515.13

Content writing was my largest blogging expense by far, but working with Daniel and Selena on WebMonkey has been a great experience since they are both very talented writers and are awesome to work with.

As for hosting, BigScoots has been performing way better for me than SiteGround. If your blog is growing and you want to invest in speed, I definitely recommend making the switch.

My website redesign this year has finally gotten WebMonkey to look and feel like I wanted it to.

The homepage has way more high-value static content, and being on Gutenberg and Genesis also helps with speed and performance.

My redesign actually coincided with my blog benefitting from a Google core algorithm update (more on that in a tad), and I don't think that's entirely a coincidence.

Anyway, other costs were pretty much the same as last year in terms of website security and Pinterest marketing.

I'm going to ditch Tailwind next year since Pinterest traffic has fallen off a cliff since the company went public, but hey, that's $115 less in annual costs so perhaps it's for the best.

For next year, I definitely want to double-down on content production and to reinvest more earnings into some other blog projects (more on this down below!)

Strategies That Helped Increase Blogging Revenue

2021 was a massive leap for turning WebMonkey into a business.

So, I wanted to cover a few of the factors that contributed to my blog income growth in case any other bloggers are struggling with monetization currently.

Way More Content Production

Something finally clicked in 2021 that honestly took me way, way too long to realize.

Here's what I learned: most blogs have a traffic problem, not a monetization problem.

I used to be so fixated on finding new affiliate programs, optimizing my placements, and figuring out how to squeeze as much money per pageview as possible.

But here's the thing: the simplest way to earn more blogging income is just to get more traffic. So, naturally, this means pumping out more SEO-rich content.

So in 2021, I basically updated or published a new blog post every day or so. WebMonkey is now at 410 posts!

Every post targets a low or medium competition keyword I think I can rank for in 2 to 6 months.

The result has been a steady increase in monthly traffic, and right now, WebMonkey gets around 200,000 monthly sessions and 250,000 to 270,000 pageviews.

This is basically a 4-5x increase from last year, so for now, this content production strategy is working!

Playing The Google Game

Google had a series of minor and core algorithm updates in 2021.

In Summer, there were also two updates: one in June and one in July.

Like other core algorithm updates, these updates basically help content that better matches search intent perform better on Google.

These updates have also considered metrics like site speed and author authority as well.

Anyway, June is where WebMonkey began taking off, so I was clearly on the winning side of the Google game this year.

Here's a snapshot of how my traffic looks, and you can see it's been ramping with the subsequent Google updates since this past summer.

The moral of this story is that long-form content with valuable content and proper keyword research still works.

I think adding in more primary research and testimonials/reviews from real users is also helping my content rank better, but that's just a hunch.

YouTube might also be playing a role, and I've started writing for a lot more personal finance sites, so perhaps my authority has gone up in the eyes of Google.

Whatever the case, I urge other bloggers to keep an eye on Google updates and to play the Google game if you can.

Email Marketing Improvements

One improvement I've made to the blog near the end of 2021 is to actually start email marketing.

I'm still awful at consistently sending email blasts. However, I finally built some simple email automation flows so new email subscribers at least get a few weeks of emails and content delivered to their inboxes.

I also created a blogging SEO checklist downloadable report that I'm using as a new pop-up to capture emails for readers who want to learn about making money with a blog.

This email capture and automation flow is growing and slowly delivering more traffic, so I'm excited to keep testing new email ideas and to grow my email list in 2022 and beyond.

If you're running your own blog, I definitely recommend using some email marketing provider to at least set up a basic automation flow.

You can use ConvertKit or MailerLite to get started. I use MailerLite for WebMonkey and have used ConvertKit on client websites back in the day, and both are very beginner friendly and quick to set up!

Better Keyword Research

Another factor that helped WebMonkey make more money in 2021 was using a new keyword research approach.

I used to use Keywords Everywhere and a lot of manual searching to find new keywords.

This method is decent, but after using my friend's SEMRush account for the past year, I have to say I'm blown away by this SEO tool.

SEMRush gets you so much useful keyword data, and you can also spy on your competitors to poach their keywords and attack areas of weakness they might have.

I actually recorded a SEMRush review video for a new YouTube channel I'm starting with my friend Ben called Bunny Media:

I've been using SEMRush to collect hundreds of blog post ideas, and it's also helped me find many of my now most popular blog posts.

SEMRush is pretty expensive at around $120 per month, but you can always use the free trial or pay for a month to do all your research and then cancel after.

Anyways, this tool was a massive time-saver for 2021, so I definitely recommend trying it out!

If you want to support WebMonkey, you can always sign up for SEMRush with my link as well.

A Personal Update – A Year Of Nomadism & Adventure

I didn't really have set plans for 2021, but I have to say, I'm really happy and grateful for how the year turned out.

The start of the year wasn't easy due to a poor work-life balance and some personal problems. And I think the last two years have also put a lot of people in a general funk anyway.

After quitting the startup I was at in late January, I booked a one-way flight to Dubai since I had heard it was fairly open and not locked down.

Honestly, I had no idea what to expect when heading to Dubai.

For one, it's a city that receives a lot of criticism for being built off the back of cheap labor.

On the other hand, Dubai is pretty much a vacuum where insane skylines, nightlife, and opulence is around every corner.

Whatever the case, it was nice to explore somewhere new…to try new foods, to work remotely in a different part of the world, and to just go somewhere completely alien for a change.

Anyway, I lived in Dubai for nearly three months, blogging in random cafes while drinking way too much Arabic coffee (with cardamom, of course!)

I also got to see some frankly breathtaking landmarks like the Burj Khalifa and the Palm Islands.

The view from atop the Burj Khalifa, the highest building in the world!

Seeing the desert was surprisingly beautiful. It was also nice to try new foods and see what another part of the world is like.

Plus, meeting people from all over was pretty cool since Dubai is such an international hub.

My Dubai trip was also when I really felt like this blogging thing is a reality.

It was sort of like the culmination of going all-in on blogging and freelancing and confirming that it's really possible to just make money with your laptop!

To me, this is the coolest part about blogging and trying out the digital nomad lifestyle; you can truly make money from anywhere and live your life the way you want to.

Anyway, after Dubai I headed back home for several months before heading down to the land of the free…AKA Florida!

Florida is honestly my happy place, and it was nice to wrap up the year with another trip somewhere warm.

Overall, this year felt like the first true leap into being a digital nomad and working for myself.

I also feel much more secure than I did during my Colombia adventures when I was just dipping my toes into this whole digital-nomad-blogger thing.

I still plan on diversifying income more in 2022, but if there's one thing the last four years have taught me, it's to trust the process and to do more of what's working.

I'm hoping to spend a bit less time working in 2022 since 2021 was an absolute grind, but then again, I find this stuff exciting so it's nice to put in the hours.

It would be nice to spend more time with friends and family as well since I'll admit, traveling alone for a while can get a bit lonely.

But hey, I think your early-mid twenties is a great time to grind and explore and occasionally do stupid things, so I'm sure 2022 will have plenty more of that.

Career & Blogging Plans For 2022

Alright, so what's around the corner for WebMonkey, other blogging plans, and freelancing for 2022?

Well, for WebMonkey, the plan is going to follow a sort of “if it isn't broke, don't fix it” approach.

This means more steady content production, focusing on SEO, and affiliate income diversification.

I'm also going to finally launch my blogging course (this was a goal for last year, but I procrastinated and got caught up in other projects…keep an eye out for this course coming in Q1, 2022!)

Aside from that, I also plan on growing my YouTube channel to expand WebMonkey's reach.

My 2021 goal was 50,000 subscribers, and again, I hope to hit this next year but I know I'll have to change my content style to accomplish this goal.

I've also started a few new fun side projects and some new professional projects as well!

The one I'm most excited to announce is that I finally started a new blog!

Yup that's right: there's another blog in the mix now, and I'm actually running this blog with my friend Daniel from Modern Teen.

The blog is called Manly And Modern, and it's a dude blog that covers topics like fitness, dating, and lifestyle topics.

Honestly, it's been refreshing to write content in a niche that's not personal finance.

Manly And Modern has been on the backburner for about one year, and it's sitting at around 30 posts right now and is actually in Monumetric!

If anything, I think this project proves it's possible to start and monetize a blog in a short amount of time, even if you don't have much spare time.

Anyways, that does it for most of my personal projects that are going on.

This past year has also been exciting on the freelancing front, and I'm working a lot closer with clients like The Motley Fool and some awesome crypto websites like Cult of Money.

Overall, I feel very lucky and happy with how 2021 has gone. If you're thinking about branching into freelancing to diversify your income, my advice is to start now!

It can be intimidating to start a blog or freelance side hustle, but with time and effort, I firmly believe you can grow both types of income streams into meaningful ones.

Wrapping Up

I honestly feel like last year was a complete blur.

But, I'm also extremely grateful for all of the growth this blog has experienced. So, once again, thank you to anyone who takes the time to read my content or watch my videos!

My goal with these blog income reports has always been to remain transparent and to prove that it's possible to make a full-time living online.

It might take months or, in my case, years to become a reality, but I think there's more opportunity to make money online than ever before.

So, if you want to start a blog, YouTube channel, or some online business, my advice is to take the plunge!

What starts out as a small side hustle might become a full-time job one day, so you never really know where you'll end up after trying something new.

Anyways, I also think it's important to set professional goals when a new year roles around, so here's what I'm hoping to achieve with WebMonkey and other properties in 2022:

Blogging Income: $175,000 (I want to aim for $150,000 in blog revenue and generate the rest from courses and digital products)
Course Launch: Quarter 1, 2022 is when I plan on launching my blogging course, and I really mean it this year!
YouTube Subscribers & Revenue: I still want to aim for 50,000 subscribers which I hope will bring in $20,000 in revenue.
Freelancing: I want to maintain my freelance writing relationships this year and also branch more into freelance video production for clients.
Travel Plans: Mexico is coming up soon, and I think this year will have more travel than any year before, which is very exciting.
Personal: I want to spend more time with family and friends and work fewer weekends.

Anyways, that's all for my 2021 blogging income report!

I hope you've found some of the income information or blogging tips helpful if you're looking to grow your own blog this year.

I really think blogging is a marathon and not a sprint, but hey, the results are worth it if you put in the effort and have some patience.

Thank you again for your readership. I hope everyone has a 2022 that's full of health, happiness, and wealth.

Sincerely,

Tom from WebMonkey.

Looking for more blogging-related content? Checkout:

The post Blog Income Report 2021 – Making $92,000+ From Blogging! appeared first on WebMonkey.

Blogging vs YouTube – My Experience With Both Platforms (Pros & Cons)

Tom Blake — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 16:09:49 +0000

Let me start out by saying that I have been blogging for more than two years, while I only started my YouTube channel two months ago.

I absolutely love blogging, and I think it's an awesome way to make money online and to learn more about the world of digital publishing and SEO.

But, at the same time, I am having a tonne of fun making my first YouTube videos. Plus, I think starting a YouTube channel is also an excellent way to learn about video editing, shooting, production, and YouTube SEO (which is important).

So, today I thought I'd write a bit of a blogging vs vlogging, or blogging versus YouTube post (since YouTube is pretty much where everyone vlogs anyway) to share my thoughts on both platforms.

Spoiler:?I think starting both platforms is worthwhile, but I think it's critical to approach these projects in the?right?way and at the?right?time.

Time to break down the whole blogging vs YouTube debate and some facts that beginners should consider.

Blogging Vs. YouTube – What's The Difference?

Blogs have been around pretty much since the dawn of the internet.

What might surprise you is that vlogging, or video logging, has also been around for ages. Although, it's important to note that vlogs really took off in 2005 with the dawn of YouTube.

The main difference between blogging and vlogging comes down to medium; blogs are their own site (when self-hosted, which is ideal), whereas vlogs are typically hosted on YouTube or other streaming platforms.

You can blog or vlog about anything, so content isn't the differentiating factor here.

It's really all about if you produce written content or video content. Given the popularity of YouTube for vlogging, this is again why this is more of a blogging vs YouTube debate for content creators.

Personally, I think the most interesting bit of data between blogging vs YouTube boils down to this interest-over-time graph from Google Trends:

It's clear that as an income source, starting a blog dominated the first decade of the 2000s.

But, it definitely seems like we are living in more of a YouTube era now.

The question is: does this make sense, and what should beginners know about the monetization and growth potential of each platform.

Let's get started by comparing my first few months of blogging to what I'm seeing with my new YouTube channel.

Blogging vs. YouTube – My Early Results

Let's take a little trip down memory lane and look at the first few months of WebMonkey in terms of traffic?and?revenue.

Within the first 2 full months of blogging, I hit approximately 3,500 total sessions:

And, if we look at the traffic breakdown, I'm actually pretty surprised at how diverse it was and how much organic traffic had already developed back then:

Additionally, I even earned a little over $60 in that time from a SiteGround referral and some Amazon Affiliate income.

By August, I was starting to average 20,000 page views a month and was steadily making $300+ a month from blogging. Now, there's a few things I want to clarify first about these early blogging days since I think the results are, in all honesty, quite lucky.

Firstly, I was lucky to start my blog about phone farming because this turned out to be a catalyst for getting a base of organic traffic and tonnes of backlinks.

Secondly, thanks to my friend Peter from Dollar Sanity's advice, I got onto Quora marketing very early on.

Aside from these two facts, I also worked like an absolute dog and completely neglected my college studies during this time to focus on growing my website (#NoRegrets).

So, all-in-all, we're talking dozens if not possibly over a hundred hours for the first two months of result, some niche selection luck, and stellar mentoring from Peter. Please keep this in mind

Let's take a look at how the first 2 months of YouTube have gone for a quick comparison.

Early Signs From YouTube

As I'm writing this, here are some stats about my channel:

Videos?– I have published 7 videos within the first 2 months of my channel.
Subscribers?– I have 61 subscribers.
Views?– I have approximately 1,600 views.
Watch Time?– I have over 91 hours of watch time.

Now, I want to clarify a few things quickly since obviously, you?have an advantage with whatever you start second?since you can use your prior knowledge, audience, and resources to spur growth.

Firstly, I have spent way less time on my YouTube channel within the first 2 months than my blog. If I had to guess, it's probably been about 25-35 hours to learn the ropes, record, edit, and upload everything.

Secondly, only a small portion of traffic has actually come from WebMonkey or my social media pages:

Now, I will say that my pages and blog have helped to get subscribers off of the ground. My friend Ben has also been invaluable in teaching me how to get started on YouTube.

But, shamelessly link dropping on Reddit has done the majority of heavy lifting in terms of getting views.

Again, my prior knowledge about how to market on Reddit has helped, but I digress.

One other important fact is that?my YouTube channel has generated $0 revenue on it's own.

It's driven some traffic back to WebMonkey and had an affiliate conversion. Additionally, I also converted one of the videos to a Mediavine video and show it on my Medium guide (where it makes money with ads).

But, for a new channel, none of these options would be on the table, so let's consider this a zero-revenue channel so far.

So, where are the other views coming from?

Well, let me tell you, the following YouTube SEO facts are going to BLOW YOUR MIND!

Blogging Vs. YouTube – SEO & Organic Reach

Today was honestly the first time I dove into my YouTube analytics, and I have to say, I'm shocked.

YouTube is immensely beginner friendly for two reasons.

Firstly,?your immediate organic reach as a YouTuber?is pretty impressive. These are the stats for my first videos:

5.500 people have seen my thumbnails somewhere?on YouTube.

If I actually knew how to design decent thumbnails, we might be getting somewhere in terms of traffic!

YouTube does a pretty decent job at getting your content out there if you follow simple practices like using low-competition, highly searched for keywords. Nothing ground-breaking here.

I use TubeBuddy, a keyword and SEO YouTube research tool, to plan out my videos. This freeium tool is perfect for beginners, and I mention it here just to show that I'm not using any top-secret tool to find keywords or anything like that.

What is shocking to me, however, is the?types?of keywords that my content is slowly ranking for:

Go on and steal my keywords already!

I say ‘ranking' generously of course since this isn't a lot of traffic, but just?take?a look at those highlighted terms.

Passive income ideas? Are you KIDDING me? I can't even rank for this now on WebMonkey.

Surveys for money, or online surveys for money..again, competitive keywords.

And don't even get me started on how to make money on Medium. I legitimately had to make over $1,000 on Medium, re-write that post 4 times, and build dozens of backlinks to rank high on Google for that term.

It has been such a battle over the last 2 years to compete with these other 2 articles (both of which are hosted on Medium, by the way. Cheaters!).

The point is: YouTube is competitive, but not as competitive as Google Search.

You can get traffic from YouTube search on more competitive keywords faster than you can with a blog. I've already gotten search views on videos I posted a few days ago.

On average,?this means that starting a YouTube channel is more beginner-friendly?than starting a blog. In terms of the blogging vs YouTube debate, I give YouTube the edge here, and this is a pretty massive edge.

But, let's break down more of the pros and cons between each platform.

YouTube Vs Blogging Income – 2021 Update

It's been a while since I've updated my blogging vs YouTube progress.

But, things have changed quite a bit since I originally published this post!

For starters, in 2020, WebMonkey made over $22,000 in revenue!

Most of this income came from Mediavine ads, with the rest then coming from affilate marketing and writing on Medium:

However, my YouTube channel hasn't been slacking either!

Since publishing this post in 2020, my YouTube channel has grown to nearly 10,000 subscribers and?earned almost $4,000 in 2020.

A snapshot of my earnings from the last year.

All in all, I have to say I'm amazed at how?fast?YouTube was able to turn into an additional income source just from one video taking off.

As I'm about to dig into in the pros and cons section below, YouTube has immense snowballing potential; a single video can launch your channel to a point you wouldn't have thought possible.

So, for the whole blogging vs YouTube income debate, I think blogging is?faster?income because you can start monetizing with ads and affiliate links more quickly.

But, I think YouTube has more earning potential, more volatility, and is likely more profitable in the short to medium-term for people.

Pros & Cons – Blogging Vs YouTube

A quick side note: there isn't a right answer here of course.

Ryan Scribner, a finance YouTuber with 600K subscribers, started his YouTube channel before getting into blogging.

My friend Ben is also crushing it on YouTube, and his other project is a digital marketing agency and podcast.

The main point is really?to stick with something?until it reaches a point where you can outsource a lot of the workload to continue growing while taking on a new business line.

Since I outsource a lot of my content writing now, it's a good fit to try out YouTube. I imagine Ryan is investing into his new website as well.

But, if you are starting from scratch and want to decide between starting a blog or starting a YouTube channel, here are some pros and cons to consider.

Monetization Speed – Blogging Usually Wins

To make money on YouTube through ads, you now require 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time.

It took my friend Ryan 4 months to reach 1,000 subscribers, and he was?grinding?on Twitter to get followers. The reality is, most channels will take a while to earn?anything.

Ryan's subscriber growth over time for the first 1,000 subscribers.

Yes, you can place affiliate links in the description box, but some premium affiliate networks want you to have a website or significant traffic to get started.

In contrast, blogs can get approved for networks like Google Adsense fairly quickly, as well as affiliate networks. The first $100 a month in blog earnings isn't unattainable at all.

Scaling to my first $1,000 took quite a while, but blogging also has a wide range of ways you can make money, which is nice:

You can make money on YouTube with affiliate links and sponsorships as well, but I think getting your foot in the door as a blogger is a bit quicker for each of these methods (I started getting emails for sponsored posts within the first 3-4 months of starting WebMonkey).

Startup Cost – Blogging Definitely Wins

Blogging and YouTube both require an investment to start.

There are some content creators who disagree, and state that you can start a YouTube channel with just your phone or begin with a free blogging platform, but I don't think this is the case for most people.

Realistically, you will have to put?some?money into either a blog or YouTube channel to keep up with the competition.

Let's take a look at some costs to expect:

Blogging Costs

Hosting –?Expect around $120 for two years of SiteGround hosting (if you use their promo for signing up).
Domain Name – If you buy a basic domain name that isn't aged or super premium, you're probably looking at around $12.99 per year.
A Paid Theme – This isn't a requirement, but many bloggers buy a paid theme to avoid some of the limitations of free themes. This usually ranges from $29 to $80 or so.

Total Cost – $150 to $200.

YouTube Costs

Unless you create content that is purely animated, you'll need a camera and microphone to start a YouTube channel.

Again, some people find success with just a phone, but I think 720-1080p is already the standard, and you place yourself at a disadvantage out of the gate if you don't use any equipment.

Note: the only exception here might be if you have the latest iPhone or a phone with an unreal camera. Then, you could start your channel for a cheaper amount since you'd just need a simple microphone and maybe some lighting.

Anyway, here is my current budget YouTuber setup:

Sony A6000 Camera?– $495.
Audio-Technica AT2005 USB Microphone – $80.
Wondershare Filmora for Video Editing?– $60.
Joby GorillaPod Camera Stand?– $15.

Total Cost –?Approximately $650 for my budget YouTube setup.

Again, you can probably find better deals or a slightly cheaper setup, but the camera cost is definitely a major expense to consider.

If you can start your channel by borrowing a camera from a friend, this is a great move.

Scaling Speed – YouTube Probably Wins?

Based on my early experiences, my bet would be that starting a YouTube channel is probably a faster route to views than starting a blog.

I got lucky with the start of WebMonkey, and I'm also blown away by the types of keywords I'm already getting traffic from on YouTube.

Again, I think blogging is a faster route to income, but I think YouTube has a higher chance of snowballing. Besides, we hear of viral videos all the time, but viral blog posts? Definitely not as common.

The potential to snowball is why I think getting into YouTube is worthwhile for content creators. But, the next two reasons are why I'm most happy to have started blogging first.

SEO Benefit – Starting With Blogging Helps YouTube Growth

There's actually a lot of effort that goes into proper YouTube SEO from what I've heard and learned lately.

Here are a few elements of YouTube SEO that are important:

Keyword research – again, I recommend checking out TubeBuddy.
Increasing audience watch-time/retention on your videos.
Comments, likes, shares, and subscriptions following a video.
Your video click-through-rate (CTR).
Video length – longer videos give you more opportunity to retain users, get more watch time, provide more value, etc.
Tags, video description, video title, and even?saying?your keyword during a video to let automatic captioning use the keyword.

These are all factors you control?on?YouTube.

However, embedding your YouTube videos on other websites, forums, or social media also helps your video. This is because you can get more views, increase engagement, and drive traffic to your channel.

Here's an example of embedding one of my videos in a recent blog post. I also embedded a video earlier in this post!

Therefore, having a blog or presence on a platform like Quora is very useful as a beginner YouTuber since you can help boost the SEO profile of your first videos.

If we consider the flip-side, starting a YouTube channel first lets you place links to your blog in 3 places: your video descriptions, your About Page, and in your channel links box.

However, only the first link in your links profile is a?do-follow?link. The rest are?no-follow.

Now, no-follow links still have value. They can drive traffic just as well as do-follow links, and getting a link to your blog is never a bad thing (unless it's a spammy link).

But, YouTube channel with very few views won't do too much to help a blog grow. On the flip side, a blog is, in my opinion, a much easier way to embed YouTube videos on highly relevant blog articles and to drive traffic to a new channel.

Exit Strategy – Selling Your Work

People sell websites all the time, often for multiples of 20-50x monthly average profit according to Ahrefs.

I know a few people who have sold their blogs as well for some hefty figures.

You can checkout my first ever Young Money interview for an example or read how my friend Marc from VitalDollar sold blogs for more than $1 million.

The point is, it's relatively easy to sell a profitable blog.

Selling a YouTube channel on the other hand is much more unlikely. In fact, it's against YouTube/Google terms and services.

People still sell YouTube channels on forums or backdoor deals, but it's risky, and it also depends on the type of channel you have. If you're a vlogger, you're the face of your channel, so good luck getting rid of it down the line if you want fast cash.

Networking Potential – Blogging & YouTube Are Tied

There's no clear winner in term of what's better for building your network or opening the door to more opportunities.

Finding your place in a niche with blogging or YouTube is awesome either way.

Meeting new and highly talented people is an awesome way to learn, and you can also pass on your knowledge to others to form new partnerships.

Plus, as mentioned, both blogging and YouTube teach you a wide variety of skills that are useful for the world of digital publishing and marketing. There's really no downside from an education perspective for either medium.

Should I Start A Blog Or YouTube Channel?

Ultimately, your content and preferences go a very long way in deciding if you should start with blogging or YouTube.

If you make how-to content or are starting in a niche that perhaps lends itself well to going for that viral hit, YouTube might be worth starting out with first.

If you love writing, cover in-depth topics that you're very knowledgeable in, and don't want to get into videography/editing/buying a camera, blogging seems like a better fit.

Now, competition is probably a factor as well.

Based on the early signs I'm seeing for my YouTube keyword rankings, if you want to cover a highly competitive niche, YouTube might be easier than starting a blog.

Extra Reading – Should I Start A Blog Or Podcast?

Final Thoughts – Why There's No Right Answer

Originally, I wanted to write this post about why blogging wins out in the blogging vs YouTube debate for anyone sitting on the fence. However, this was just my initial bias clouding my vision.

There are so many benefits to starting a blog or starting your YouTube channel, and each platform has a variety of pros and cons.

Blogging is cheaper to start, easier to sell, and I think the route to earning your first online paycheck is faster too.

In contrast, YouTube is easier to snowball, less competitive for organic views, and has that element of virality that you just can't dismiss.

From a SEO perspective, I?do think that having a blog in your back pocket helps a new YouTube channel get up and running faster compared to the reversal situation, but again, there?are?exceptions to this…if your channel goes viral, you can probably start a blog pretty quickly.

The only critical part to remember is this:

In my opinion, the?worst?thing a content creator can do is to stretch themselves too thin when starting out. This is why I have avoided starting a YouTube channel for so long.

I wish I had started YouTube?sooner, like when I began earning more money from Monumetric and started outsourcing some content writing, but hindsight is always 20-20.

The simple truth is that your time is limited.

Until you can outsource tasks with resources from a blog or YouTube channel, you simply won't be able to compete at the same level as someone spending 100% of their focus on a single platform.

You also have to accept that everything has an opportunity cost, and diverting some attention from one business to start another inevitably hurts both in some way unless you can truly outsource everything.

But, as you start to make money with a blog or YouTube channel, life gets easier.

You can outsource content writing, marketing, or video editing to free up more time for entrepreneurial endeavors. In my opinion, this is the turning point where it makes sense to start diversifying.

Ah, right…diversifying. That's sort of the entire point of all of this in the end.

Algorithms, affiliate programs (lol Amazon), and trends change all the time. Having multiple irons in the fire is truly the best way to mitigate the risk that your income disappears overnight.

It doesn't matter if you blog or vlog, you will have ups and downs.

The key is to move 2 steps forward for every step backwards and to continually insulate your businesses from external sources of volatility and damage.

I have no idea how long this blogging thing or YouTube experiment will last for.

But, what I do know is that both platforms have been incredibly educational, have opened new doors, and are worth pursuing. I'm just excited to see where everything ends up in the future.

Do you currently blog, run a YouTube channel, or do both? I'd love to hear about your experiences, which one you prefer, and what you think is the best option for beginners.

Catch you guys in the next one!

Extra Reading:

The post Blogging vs YouTube – My Experience With Both Platforms (Pros & Cons) appeared first on WebMonkey.

Mediavine Review – How I Grew My Blog To $20,000+ Per Month

Tom Blake — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 15:59:10 +0000

Like many bloggers, I started out with dreams of creating a money making blog and generating a significant online income.

And, like many other bloggers, I ended up realizing this process takes an insane amount of time…like, multiple years sort of time (unless you're some sort of marketing guru or SEO god).

Now, as I've shared in many of my blogging income reports before, WebMonkey was stuck at around $500 of monthly income for quite a while. I found it incredibly hard to scale my website, and I could never afford to outsource that much work or to pump money back into growth.

All of that changed the second I got approved for Mediavine.

Within a month, I doubled my blog's monthly income from display advertising and surpassed $20,000 per month!

Some of my Mediavine income for the last 30 days.

If you want to learn more about why Mediavine is my favorite ad platform, Mediavine's requirements to join their network, and my tips for getting approved, be sure to read this Mediavine review until the end!

Let's get to it!

What Is Mediavine?

Mediavine is a full service ad management platform that aims to “build sustainable businesses for content creators.”

In a nutshell, Mediavine acts as a website's ad manager, allowing the website owner to focus on content. Once you're approved for Mediavine, you simply have to install its script and let their tech team handle the ads on your website. It's as simple as that.

In return for this service, Mediavine splits advertisement revenue with its publishers. This symbiotic relationship is what has enabled Mediavine to partner with thousands of publishers and become one of the largest ad management services around.

Mediavine has also been in the publishing game since 2004, so they understand where bloggers are coming from. Mediavine brands include The Hollywood Gossip, TV Fanatic, Movie Fanatic, and Food Fanatic.

After Food Fanatic launched in 2013, Mediavine opened the doors for other publishers to come along for the ride.

Mediavine Income Report – My Results After 3 Years

I joined Mediavine in December of 2019. In my first few months, I was able to make over $1,000 per month just from Mediavine display ads. And since then, my Mediavine earnings have surpassed $20,000 a month and let me become a full-time blogger.

In fact, in 2022, WebMonkey made $272,000. Mediavine income accounted for approximately $152,000 of this income.

I made a YouTube video that shares more insight on my Mediavine income report and my other blogging streams. But for some context, here are my all-time stats in terms of Mediavine income as of June 2023:

Sessions: 8.8 million.
Mediavine Income: $354,800.
Mediavine RPM: $40.14.

My all-time Mediavine income and rpm.

My Mediavine income has been life-changing. I'm now a full-time blogger thanks to the company, and I now get to travel the world, making money with my laptop, blogging along the way.

I also have to say just how impressed I am with Mediavine's performance and how quickly it scaled my blogging income.

When I switched from Monumetric to Mediavine, my RPM increased significantly and I started making over $1,000 per month in Mediavine revenue. It wasn't long before I was making $10k a month, and more recently, I've passed the $20k a month mark quite handily.

My Mediavine RPM is around $35 to $40 depending on the time of year and what pages people read on my site.

It's been an insane experience to watch the ad revenue grow as my blog scales, and honestly, Mediavine has been the best company to work with along the way.

Its publisher support is incredible, and I always get timely responses when I ask questions over email.

Furthermore, Mediavine continues to innovate, adding new ad optimization settings and other tech to help publishers make more money while keeping readers happy.

I have to say, Mediavine changed my life and helped me create a career, and I truly believe this is the best ad network for bloggers (I'm obviously a bit biased, but still!)

I hope this Mediavine income report inspires you to grow your blog if you're not currently a publisher, or to even scale your traffic if you're currently with Mediavine!

Need help finding winning keywords? I suggest using SEMRush for all your SEO needs.

Mediavine Requirements

Mediavine has several requirements in place to ensure only high quality sites are allowed into the program.

However, Mediavine is not just for massive websites, and I believe it is possible for hobby bloggers to get into this ad network with 1-2 years of smart, hard work.

Traffic Requirements

As of June 15th, 2020, Mediavine has new requirements for publishers looking to join this ad platform. Mediavine now requires 50,000 sessions per month to apply, which is double the previous amount.

This is for applications moving forwards, so if you've already applied and are waiting, you're not subject to these rules.

And, if a website changes ownership, the new owner must re-apply. This is a big deal for anyone considering website acquisition, although clean sites shouldn't have a problem getting in again.

According to Mediavine, recent events have accelerated applications to the point where customer support and existing publisher support was slipping, hence the change.

Mediavine already has 9,000+ publishers and turns down 72% of applicants, so you can only imagine how many applicants they get per month.

Mediavine requirements might seem tough, but they're fair: this traffic restriction is in place to view how engaged a website's audience is, as well as monetization potential (Mediavine needs to make money too, after all).

If you're far-off from these session numbers, I definitely suggest taking a look at my Monumetric review to consider another advertising alternative!

Quality Requirements & Site History

Mediavine considers other metrics besides a simple session count.

Here are some other Mediavine requirements publishers should make note of:

Original & Engaging Content – The Mediavine support team analyzes your top-performing and recent posts to analyze engagement.
Clean Traffic – Potential publishers submit a Google Analytics PDF which outlines user acquisition and behavior. This is to remove sites with heavy bot traffic or fraudulent practices from consideration.
Good Standing With Google Adsense – Mediavine doesn't work with Adsense-banned websites.
Brand Safety – Mediavine has to protect their advertisers. Therefore, if your site contains anything that could tarnish their image, you won't be accepted. Basically, don't have radical, hateful, racist, or just generally terrible info on your site a brand wouldn't want to touch with a 10 foot pole.

Outside of that, having a high level of organic traffic will help your chances of getting in. This is because organic traffic is naturally more engaged than social media traffic. I suspect that having traffic from premium advertising countries (i.e. North America, Europe) will help as well.

Additionally, your site must be compatible with their ads. This won't be an issue for many WordPress websites or normal themes, but wonky sites might have to make some changes.

How To Apply To Mediavine

One of my favorite parts about working with Mediavine was just how simple everything is on the publishing side of things.

Here are the general steps that take place for becoming a Mediavine publisher:

Submit An Application – Use this form to apply for Mediavine. This takes a few minutes.
Send A Google Analytics Report – You'll be asked to send over a specific report from your Google Analytics if you pass step one.
Partner On Google Ad Manager – Submit consent to let Mediavine to manage your ad inventory.
Wait For Approval – Mediavine's various ad networks will have to approve your site before you're allowed in.
Select A Launch Date – Choose when your Mediavine ads will go live!

Here's some of the data that was included in my report when I applied. Pretty standard stuff, so don't get freaked out by the request!

If you partner with another ad network, be sure to read their Terms of Service before making the switch. Many networks require 30 days notice before leaving, and you don't want to jeopardize your earnings by leaving early, even if it is for Mediavine!

This process was incredibly easy to follow. It took roughly a month and a half from application submission to becoming a Mediavine publisher, which isn't too bad!

And let me stress this: Mediavine has amazing publisher support. I receive amazing responses and help whenever I reach out, and they've been such an amazing company to work with for the last few years.

Other Mediavine Features

Another aspect I love about being a Mediavine blogger is just how much the company continues to innovate.

Mediavine is a massive publishing network, and it keeps coming out with new features to help publishers make more money and nurture their audiences. Here are some of my favorite parts about working with Mediavine:

Mediavine Performance – Website Speed & Dashboard Control

If there's one thing you should know about Mediavine, it's that they are obsessed with speed.

In fact, Mediavine has invested into their tech so heavily and focuses on speed to the point that they claim to be 200% faster than their competition.

Mediavine accomplishes this largely by lazy loading their ads, as well as focusing on optimizing ads for desktop and mobile page speed.

It's also easy to set ad preferences, limits, and to adjust spacing through the Mediavine Dashboard.

The ability to tweak your display advertising frequency and to play around with various speed settings is why I like Mediavine more than any other ad platform (plus the added revenue is awesome).

With Adsense, you have to figure this out yourself. For Monumetric, you have to email their support team. With Mediavine, you just have to check some boxes.

Plus. the Mediavine Site Health Check feature lets you constantly monitor your website to ensure you're ‘staying teal:'

Mediavine Dashboard

I'm editing this post as of 2020-05-07 because the new Mediavine dashboard is absolutely unreal. It wouldn't be a fair Mediavine review if I didn't mention how awesome these new changes are.

First and foremost, the new dashboard now provides a breakdown of RPM by page level:

This is incredibly powerful for boosting your blog revenue and figuring out what's working and what isn't.

As you can see in the post above, there's a huge RPM discrepancy between my post on apps that pay you to workout and my post on trivia apps that pay.

This can vary for a few reasons. Engagement, content, and what advertisers are specifically bidding on all have an impact.

But, having more granular data is always better. With the new Mediavine dashboard, you can now prioritize backlinks and social media promotion for the posts that bring home the bacon.

The new dashboard looks more sleek overall, and there's also a handy RPM by country chart as well:

Ultimately, all of these changes to the new dashboard just give publishers more power and control over how they make money. Pretty awesome stuff!

Mediavine Grow.Me

I'm updating this review one more time because Mediavine recently released Grow.me, a new user engagement suite that's already driving some cool results.

In a nutshell, internet privacy standards are changing. Collecting first-party data, which is data publishers (bloggers) provide to advertisers, is going to become more important to help keep RPMs up and serve relevant ads.

Expanded widget is highlighted in red. You can see some readers have already saved this article.

Thankfully, Mediavine's Grow.me is starting to solve this issue by collecting first-party data as third-party cookies are phased out.

This has two implications.

Firstly, you now make more money today since third-party cookies are being phased out on IOS. Secondly, it will enable Mediavine publishers to thrive in the future when privacy standards change.

Anyway, Grow.me has other cool features too, including:

Letting users favorite your site or specific articles
Social share icons
A search bar for your site
Recommended content

I've enabled Grow.me and have seen some promising results so far in Google Analytics:

A snapshot of Grow.me events in GA…it might look like jargon, but it's all good. More content reads, social shares, and favorites.

It's these sorts of innovations that are why I love being a Mediavine publisher. The internet is a volatile place, but the tech advancements at Mediavine seem to be one step ahead of the game.

Plus, these sorts of plugins and changes are better for user experience, blogger revenue, and privacy laws. Win, win, win!

Tips For Getting Into Mediavine

In my opinion, the best way to get into Mediavine is to consistently create quality content that focuses on SEO. This is how I got into Mediavine, and by publishing long-form blog posts that target specific keywords, I also got another niche site into Mediavine in 2021.

That said, getting to 50K sessions might seem daunting, and honestly, it is…it took me two years to figure out how to do it.

The main tips I can give are similar to ones I have outlined in posts like my Road to $500/Month Blogging:

Learn SEO – Write content that targets keywords and focus on building backlinks.
Diversify Traffic – Nail SEO to develop organic traffic, and focus on 1-2 other platforms for additional readers. Personally, I outsourced my Pinterest marketing and used Tailwind.
Reinvest Your Earnings – If you make solid money from platforms like Monumetric, reinvest the money into more content, outsourcing, better hosting, or something that will benefit your blog. Your website is a business, after all.
Use Data: When researching what to write about, keyword data is your best friend. Personally, I use SEMRush to find all of my post topics and juicy low-competition keywords.

And, lastly, if you really want to get into Mediavine, I suggest dedicating a month to absolutely push your website if you're sitting around 30,000 to 40,000 page views

In October of 2019, I decided to work on WebMonkey every single night. I published a ton of content, promoted my posts on Reddit, grinded out Pinterest, link-dropped on Facebook groups/Quora, and did whatever I could to reach the sessions

Taken in the midst of the Mediavine binge month. Sweaty.

After a month of long nights, it finally worked. If you're getting close to Mediavine's requirements, I say go all-in.

Focus on SEO, great content, and one social media source. The rest comes with time!

Note: I got into Mediavine when the requirement was 25K sessions, but I think the same logic above still applies.

Mediavine Pro & Premiere – Two New Tiers For Bloggers

On August 31st, 2022, Mediavine announced it's releasing Mediavine Pro in October 2022. This new tier is for high-performing, full-time publishers and provides some incredible perks like:

An 85% base revenue share (doesn't include your loyalty bonus)
A dedicated Pro Support team
A private Pro Facebook group
The ability to add other sites you own to Mediavine with just 25,000 sessions

Your site needs to earn at least $100,000 in Mediavine revenue for the last trailing 12 months to qualify for Mediavine Pro.

Thankfully, WebMonkey meets this requirement. Since I've joined Mediavine Pro, I've noticed an immediate spike in earnings. And I've even made $1,000 a day or more from Mediavine ads alone.

In their announcement, Mediavine also released news about Mediavine Premiere, an even higher tier that provides perks like a 90% base revenue share and annual premiere retreat. However, you need to earn at least $500,000 in Mediavine revenue for the trailing 12 months to qualify.

It's programs like Mediavine Pro and Premiere that make this ad company so amazing to work with. And if you can't qualify for Pro yet, don't sweat! You can set your sites on the $100,000 mark and chip away at it with new energy!

Frequently Asked Questions

Mediavine Vs. Adsense – Which Network Is Best?

In my experience, Mediavine pays significantly more than Google Adsense and is a superior advertising network. I also like that it gives publishers more control and pays a high rpm.

I mention the difference between a managed advertising platform and Adsense in my Monumetric review, but I'll break it down here as well.

If you run Google Adsense on your blog, you will only show ads from companies advertising within the Google ad network.

This has implications for your website's RPMs, or how much you earn in advertising revenue per thousand visitors. This is because running with one single ad network is not as competitive.

I mean, just take a look at my all time Adsense earnings from WebMonkey…it took several months to achieve what Mediavine can produce in 15 days or so (granted I have more traffic now, but my RPM used to be around $7 compared to $28 now).

So, why the difference in RPM?

Well, when publishers opt-in for ads from platforms like Adsense, they're only opening the door to a single pool of advertisers. Additionally, platforms like Adsense ram ads onto your site almost 100% of the time, and don't have much of a bidding floor.

In contrast, Mediavine uses a variety of ad exchanges to ensure that the highest paying advertisers across a wider pool of competition are placing their ads on your website.

Plus, Mediavine doesn't use a 100% fill rate. This means a Mediavine publisher's website doesn't always show ads. In fact, Mediavine's fill rate fluctuates between 70% to 99%, but it's never 100%.

This is actually a good thing. A 100% fill-rate (which you basically get with Adsense) means that just about anyone can advertise on your website…there's no price floor advertisers have to cross to compete to show ads on your website.

Just take a look at those device-level RPMs!

Mediavine implements a pricing floor to ensure that only premium advertisers who are willing to pay well can show ads on your site.

This increases your average RPM and actually results in a much better user experience than clogging your website with tons of lower paying ads absolutely 100% of the time. It's a win-win!

Mediavine Vs. Monumetric – Which Network Is Best?

It wouldn't be a fair Mediavine review if I didn't compare Mediavine to some of the other ad networks I've partnered with.

Obviously, managed ad networks are a step above platforms like Google Adsense. But, there isn't a cookie-cutter solution for what's best for your website.

Personally, Mediavine has emerged as my favorite partner.

Don't get me wrong, I really like Monumetric. I had a great experience with them, and the earnings from their network helped push WebMonkey to a new level.

However, from a revenue perspective, Mediavine is performing twice as well:

Monumetric had an average RPM of $13.57 versus the near $27 with Mediavine.

The revenue is stable, and the ads aren't clogging my website. Frankly, I'm kind of blown away by how great Mediavine is. Plus, from an onboarding and support standpoint, Mediavine is unmatched.

Granted, Mediavine has some boosted December RPMs, and I am also more aggressive with my ad layout than I was with Monumetric.

Ultimately, I think publishers should try both ad networks to see what works best for them.

Besides, Monumetric only has a 10,000 monthly page view requirement, and I think they're a great company to work with as long as you explain exactly what you want for your site during onboarding.

How Much Does Mediavine Pay Per 1,000 Views?

How much Mediavine pays per 1,000 views depends on your niche, how long advertisers have to get used to your website, and on-page RPM optimization. My historical average RPM is around $40. I've been with Mediavine for just over three years.

Your blogging niche is one of the main factors that determines Mediavine's RPM. This is because advertisers in certain categories pay more on advertisements each quarter than others.

Seasonality also plays a massive role…just check out my near $60 RPM during Black Friday last year:

Based on my experience and everything I've heard, I think any website should see strong RPMs with Mediavine, but again, your niche matters a lot.

Additionally, you can increase your Mediavine RPM by doing things like:

Writing longer content.
Adding images to your articles.
Embedding ads in videos you place in-article.
Using a theme that supports high-value ads (like your sidebar).

Is Mediavine Free?

Yes. There is no setup fee to join Mediavine.

How Much Does Mediavine Pay?

How much Mediavine pays depends on your traffic level, RPM, and ad settings. Different blog niches pay more than others, and Mediavine also lets publishers tweak their ad settings to show more or fewer ad units per session.

Personally, I scaled my Mediavine income from $1,000 per month to $26,000 per month at my blog's highest point. But I know some publishers who make even more than me, so the sky's the limit.

Ultimately, Mediavine is regarded as one of the highest paying ad networks for bloggers, and this has been my experience as well.

What Is Mediavine's Revenue Share Agreement?

Publishers start at 75% revenue share and increase by 1% for every year they are a publisher as part of Mediavine's Loyalty Bonus up to a max of 5%. However, sites with more monthly traffic use the following percentages:

5 million ad impressions in 30 days – 80% rev share.
10 million ad impressions in 30 days – 82.5% rev share.
15 million ad impressions in 30 days – 85% rev share.

So, if you have a massive site and stick with Mediavine for 5 years, you'll be at 90%, which is nuts. Even 80-85% is pretty high for the display advertising industry.

Also note that you can get higher revenue share percentages through the new Mediavine Pro tier.

Does Mediavine Have A Referral Program?

Nope! Mediavine states they don't want to skew reviews by offering a referral program.

Isn't Mediavine Just For Food & Travel Bloggers?

Mediavine does cater a lot to these two blogging niches through systems like their Create plugin, but this network is not exclusive to these niches. The main Mediavine niches include:

DIY
Health
Fitness
Fashion
Travel
Crafts
Education
Finance
Lifestyle
Entertainment

However, Mediavine still accepts and encourages sites outside these niches to apply.

Extra Reading – How To Start A Food Blog.

When Does Mediavine Pay You?

Mediavine pays in net 65. Payments are $USD and publishers choose between PayPal, check, wire transfer, or local bank transfer for deposit.

How Many Pageviews Do I Need For Mediavine?

Since Mediavine requires having 50,000 monthly sessions, you probably need 60,000 to 70,000 monthly pageviews to apply. However, this can vary depending on how well you interlink and how many pages your readers view in a single session on average.

What If I'm Not Exactly At 50K Sessions?

Apply if you're close. If you have a strong traffic profile, engaged audience, and are trending upwards, you might be let in.

What If My Site Is Brand New & Went Viral?

From my understanding, Mediavine doesn't really let brand new websites in. Plus, they want to see traffic diversity and to have confidence that you can maintain 50K monthly sessions or more (and aren't just banking on viral posts once a year).

Note, you won't get kicked out if you drop below 25K monthly sessions. However, I'm not sure what would happen if your blog just died.

Final Thoughts

When it comes to making money by blogging, there are a few approaches (or combinations) people use to start generating revenue…affiliate sales, selling products, sponsored posts, and advertisements.

At WebMonkey, running display ads has always been a core component of my monetization strategy. Whether you love them or hate them, ads are simply a part of the online ecosystem at this point.

Plus, when managed properly, ads should help companies promote their products/services to relevant users without significantly detracting from user experience.

Currently, Mediavine is my absolute favorite managed ad network. I can't say anything bad about them, in truth. I just feel lucky to be a part of the publisher network.

For anyone pushing towards Mediavine, hang in there. As long as you keep things simple and produce the best content out there, you'll get there eventually. And, in the meantime, there are other solid options like Monumetric out there that are a great way to make money online with your website.

Hopefully, this Mediavine review has helped clarify why this company rocks, as well as what to expect from the application and onboarding process.

That's all for now. Catch you guys in the next one!

Looking for more money-making ideas? Checkout:

The post Mediavine Review – How I Grew My Blog To $20,000+ Per Month appeared first on WebMonkey.

How To Make Money On Medium – Ultimate 2024 Guide!

Tom Blake — Fri, 09 Feb 2024 14:56:57 +0000

I started writing on Medium on March 25, 2018 after someone recommended I try publishing on Medium to drive traffic to WebMonkey.

All I did was republish my phone farming guide and write one more short post on personal development.

And within 24 hours, I made $100 from republishing my content on phone farming. I couldn't believe the screen when I saw how much I had made from just one story.

Over the next few months, I also continued to earn money for my Medium writing, and have recently passed the $1,000 mark and now earn passive income every month from my articles.

If you have ever wondered how to make money writing on Medium, this is absolutely the post for you.

I'm sharing how anyone can earn money writing on Medium, my tips for getting started, and some advice I've learned along the way to find more success on the platform.

What Is Medium?

If you haven't heard of Medium, I can only describe it to you as being one of the easiest, minimalist blogging platforms out there.

Medium is a publishing platform that was created by Evan Williams, the former CEO of Twitter, and officially launched in 2012. The platform offers publishers and bloggers alike to share their works or create new articles entirely.

All in all, the Medium platform is one of the simplest ways to get into blogging or to read some great content.

The most popular topics on Medium (as seen on their homepage) include:

Technology
Culture
Entrepreneurship
Creativity
Digital marketing
Self
Politics
Media
Productivity

How To Make Money On Medium

As mentioned, I've earned over $1,000 by writing on Medium. And since I joined the platform, it's been a nice way to earn money on autopilot, even for articles I wrote years ago.

In my opinion, Medium is one of the best ways for new writers to grow an audience and earn money online. However, the process of making money on Medium has also changed a lot over the years.

So, this guide is covering how you can make money writing on Medium as well as some critical tips I've found helpful to grow your profile.

1. Meet The Medium Partner Program Requirements

In the past, anyone could join Medium's Partner Program, which is the program that pays you for writing on Medium. But these days, there are new requirements for becoming a Medium Partner Program member:

Publish at least one Medium story
Be 18 or older
Be a paid Medium member
Publish a story every six months to stay active

If you meet these requirements, you can apply to the Medium Partner Program. You should get a response within a few days, and if you are an active and engaging writer, you should get into the program.

Also note that the Medium Partner Program isn't available in every country. Check Medium in your country to see if it's available.

Update: Medium just announced some major changes to how it pays writers. One of these changes is the removal of the 100 follower requirement, but you now need to be a paying Medium member to join its Partner Program.

2. Start Writing On Medium

The main way to make money on Medium is to write stories. That's because Medium pays writers when other members spend time reading their work and engage with it.

That's right: how much money you make with Medium depends on how many paid members read your content, how long they spend reading, and how they engage with your content.

Mediun's 2023 payment model update is also now factoring in more engagement-based metrics like claps, highlights, replies, and follows. So, the longer people read your content and the more they interact with it, the more you get paid.

Medium's latest payment model for writers.

As you can see in Medium's graphic above, the new payment model factors in engagement points, follower bonuses, boost bonus, and then multiplies it by the read-through rate.

Note: If someone spends less than 30 seconds reading your article, it doesn't generate any revenue and doesn't count as a read. So, maintaining a high read ratio and getting engagement is the key to earning more money.

This is part of Medium's on-going effort to reduce clickbait content that just generates views but doesn't add anything of value.

When I first joined Medium, how much you got paid depended on how many claps, or likes, a story got from people.

However, the new Medium author payment model rewards engaging content. So, the more paid members read your work, the more you get paid.

Just note that this means you have to mark stories with the “meter my story” box if you want to earn from them. This also means that free Medium members won't be able to read your metered content if they use up all their free reads in a month.

3. Refer New Medium Members

The other method to make money writing on Medium is to earn referral bonuses by inviting new paid members to the program.

This program pays you for converting your readers into paying Medium members. The Medium referral program pays you half of a reader's membership fee. This works out to about $2.01 per month per referral.

I've seen a lot of Medium writers pushing this heavily, encouraging people to become paying Medium members with links in their bio.

But, I don't know many writers who make meaningful income from this referral program. And I haven't been able to convert many readers with my stories either.

It's nice that Medium is adding more ways for authors to get paid, but this program feels a little spammy to me.

Plus, Medium is becoming more saturated, and if every author starts clamoring for people to sign up with their link, I don't think it's a winning strategy to chase after given the noise.

UPDATE: Medium is retiring its referral bonus program and now pays authors more if their articles get more followers. This new follower-bonus program is designed to once again reward engaging content.

4. Earn Boost Bonuses

Another change to how Medium pays writers is its addition of boost bonuses.

Medium's curation team can select certain stories that it thinks are high-quality and engaging and boost these on the platform. Boosted stories are seen by more readers and appear on more places on Medium, so it's a massive benefit to authors.

With the new payment model, boosted stories also get a boost bonus multiplier on engagements, which ends up with writers getting paid more.

This is good news since Medium is retiring its referral program. All-in-all, it's clear that engagement is the name of the game now.

5. Earn Author Bonuses

Occasionally, Medium pays out author bonuses to certain writers for making great content. In fact, this is how I got my $100 bonus from submitting my phone farming guide to the platform.

This was such a random but wonderful email.

All of this started when Medium announced it would be paying out bonuses to Medium Partners for quality work.

Now, you shouldn't rely on Medium bonuses as a reliable source of income since Medium Editors will only be rewarding bonuses to a few dozen stories every week, as they explained in a Partner Program email to me.

However, you have to admit that if you're looking to make money by writing, choosing a platform that actively rewards quality submissions should seem like a no-brainer.

Ultimately it's really promising to see Medium making an effort to reward quality, pay their authors, and encourage interesting content.

Here's some other stats Medium included in one of its Partner Program email:

48% of authors or publications who wrote at least one story for members earned money. The average amount earned for the month was $77.04.
$7,924.22 was the most earned by an author, and $2,400.40 was the most earned by a publication.
$1,744.21 was the most earned for a single story. 10.6% of stories that earned money made over $100.

The fact that a single story on Medium earned $1,744 blows my mind. And one single author earned $7,924!

6. Get Paid

The last step in writing on Medium for money is to actually get paid.

Your Medium earnings get paid out by the 8th of every month. You get paid for the previous month of reading time from paid members, and payment can take about a week to actually settle in your bank account.

Medium also uses Stripe to pay authors. I've been paid on time for years by Medium, and I've never had issues with getting my money on time.

If you want an online job that pays you daily, Medium isn't for you. In this case, something like freelance writing or using gpt sites might be up your alley.

But if you want a free platform that has the potential to reach millions of readers and pay a lot, Medium could be worth the delayed gratification.

How Much Money I've Made Writing On Medium

As mentioned, I joined Medium in early 2018. Since that time, I've written or republished 22 stories and have amassed about 1,400 followers. I've also gotten nearly 100,000 views on my content and have earned over $1,200 from my stories:

My Medium earnings.

I don't write full-time on Medium. In fact, I haven't published a story there in over a year since blogging is my main side hustle these days.

However, my Medium stories still make a few dollars a month to this day. And some of my main stories earned hundreds of dollars, which just goes to show the power of the platform.

To make a lot of money with Medium, you need to write engaging content. And, you need to get a bit lucky. Plus, most writers won't make $5,000 a month or anything crazy from their work.

However, I think my experience is proof that anyone can start making money on Medium, even with a handful of articles.

Can You Make Money On Medium?

Yes, you can make money writing on Medium if you join its Partner Program and write engaging content consistently. In fact, anyone can begin earning with just a few stories, and my first story on Medium made me $100.

Granted, I think Medium is intimidating since it's now over 10 years old and has thousands of writers on it.

But the name of the game hasn't changed. If you create excellent, engaging content, you can make money on Medium.

Tips For Making Money On Medium

Now that you know how to make money on Medium, I want to share some of the most important tips I've learned over the years to help increase your odds of success with the platform.

1. Promote Your Blog & Brand

Medium is a great way to earn income from your writing. But the Medium Partner Program is just one way you can leverage Medium's audience to make money.

In fact, many of the top Medium authors make most of their income through other means, like:

Affiliate income
Selling sponsorships
Selling their own products like eBooks and courses
Selling coaching
Building email lists

As you can see from my Medium page, my profile promotes this blog as well as my new YouTube channel. So, all of my Medium readers have a chance to come to my other properties where I can then earn more money.

I also know plenty of Medium writers who make $10,000 a month or more just from affiliate marketing on Medium, so you have a lot of options!

2. Submit Stories To Publications

If you're struggling to gain views or to make money writing on Medium, you can also reach out to various Medium publications and request to write for them.

Medium has an incredible amount of popular publications, and many of them regularly accept guest writers or regular contributors.

Currently, I'm able to contribute to 3 different publications, and I actually didn't have to apply to 2 of them (one of the editors reached out via email to ask me to share some of my work):

The best part about writing for Medium Publications is that you can still earn money for your work, even if your story is syndicated (like most of mine is).

Once you've been approved to contribute to a publisher, you can edit any of your published stories and send in a request for them to be added to a publication:

If your story gets accepted, your story can be seen by everyone following the publication, and you might find your work gets a nice boost in views, claps, and ultimately money!

So, don't be afraid to apply to Medium Publications or to send out some emails or DM's. You might find the process increases how much money you make on Medium every month.

3. Design An Eye-Catching Medium Profile

Another tip for making money on Medium is to redesign your author page to create a more personalized feeling for their profile.

Thankfully, you now have more control over how your profile looks, and Medium is definitely making the push to help writers build loyal followings and to become less of a clickbaity volume game.

Don't get me wrong: compelling titles and volume are still important if you want to make money writing on Medium, but it's slightly less pressing than before.

Additionally, one recent tip I've learned is to build your email list with your Medium profile.

As you can see from this profile (August Birch is a pretty stellar writer on Medium), you now have more real estate to collect emails and generate outside sources of revenue:

This isn't a change to how earnings are calculated, but don't be afraid to get creative to put your profile page to work!

4. Write Consistently

While this should go without saying, writing consistently is also a key to earning money on Medium.

Any online side hustle takes consistency to find success. This is because you need to test what works, doesn't work, and to ultimately learn the ropes.

My advice is to come up with some sort of publishing schedule you can stick to. Even if it's one story a week, consistency makes a massive difference in the long run.

I talk about this concept, as well as nine other tips, in my first ever YouTube video that shares advice for how to write on Medium and get paid.

5. Engage With Other Medium Authors

If you want more views on your Medium content, try engaging with other authors and people on the platform first.

I've found that calling out other excellent writers in your own stories can often get writers to do the same for you. And the same goes with commenting on other people's stories.

In other words, don't be afraid to help others first. Karma has a funny way of always coming back to us!

6. Focus On Engagement

Medium's July 2023 update to how it pays writers makes one thing clear: engagement is now what matters most.

This means it's important to avoid clickbait, misleading readers, and writing short content that doesn't provide any value. Tactics like asking readers questions and trying to foster engagement and discussion is also a good idea.

Avoiding AI writing that's clearly not unique is also a must. In short, focus on quality over quantity and give people a reason to read your stories from beginning to end.

7. Cover Trending Topics

One final tip to earn money writing on Medium is to cover trending topics and niches.

Medium is great for evergreen content. But it also has a social nature to it, so writing about pressing issues in your niche can get a lot of traction quite quickly.

Extra Reading – The Best Ways To Make Money Online For Beginners.

Medium Vs WordPress – Where Can You Make The Most Money?

In my experience, it's easier to make money on Medium than it is to make money with a WordPress blog. However, blogging has a much higher income potential since you own the platform and have more control over how you monetize.

For example, I earned about $1,000 from Medium in 2020. That same year, I made $22,000 blogging. And fast forward just a few more years, and WebMonkey made $272,000 in 2022.

In fact, my blog now makes $50,000 a month or so between running display advertisements with Mediavine and by using affiliate marketing. And this sort of income isn't something most Medium writers are earning.

A lot of this stems from how limiting Medium is. You can sort of do affiliate marketing, but you can't do too much of it. And running display ads just isn't possible.

So, I think it's possible to make money on Medium, and it's likely faster for new writers than starting a blog from scratch.

But, never discount the power of owning your own platform. It lets you get more creative with monetization, build a brand, and even sell your website down the line for an exit strategy.

My final advice is to give Medium a try and put some content up to see what happens. But, never be afraid to start your own blog either. You never know what can happen, and it's so low risk I figure it's something everyone should try once!

Ready to start your own blog?

I always recommend using SiteGround hosting for new bloggers.

SiteGround is incredibly affordable and reliable. It's also the host I used to scale WebMonkey to 50,000+ monthly views per month, so it has my vote.

Extra Reading – The Best Side Hustles To Start With No Money.

Frequently Asked Questions

How Much Does Medium Pay Per 1,000 Views?

How much Medium pays you per view depends on if paying Medium members read your story and for how long they read. Since there are multiple factors at play, Medium doesn't have a set rate per 1,000 views. Some stories might earn more or less than others, so focus on increasing read time by writing engaging content.

Is Writing On Medium Worth It?

Yes, writing on Medium is worth it if you want a free and quick way to get your writing out there. It's also worth it if you want to monetize your writing without creating your own blog.

However, making money with Medium is becoming harder each year as more writers join. Personally, I think running your own WordPress blog has way higher income potential than Medium does, so this is where I spend most of my focus.

You can still use Medium to create a freelance writing portfolio or to dabble in online writing. But I think blogging is a better business model if you want to earn a full-time income online.

How Much Can You Realistically Make On Medium?

I think most writers can set a realistic goal of making $20 to $50 per month if they consistently write great content. It's also possible to scale to $100+ per month, and some Medium writers write full-time.

However, most writers don't make over $100 per month; this is a competitive environment with lots of writers, so you need to grind to increase your income.

How Does Medium Make Money?

Medium makes most of its income from paid memberships. Free readers on Medium can only read five metered articles per month. If readers want to enjoy any content past that limit, they must become a Medium member for the price of $5/month.

Interestingly, traditional advertising practices haven't been too successful for Medium.

Between their commitment to quality and minimalist design, crowding the platform with banner ads just isn't an option. So, Medium has ultimately come to rely on monthly subscriptions and rounds of fundraising to power their platform thus far.

It will be interesting to watch Medium move forward as a business, and I am genuinely curious to see how they will monetize their platform.

For now, however, it's all about content quality and Medium members.

Extra Reading – How To Make Money With Your Laptop.

Final Thoughts

I hope this guide on how to make money on Medium has helped explain how the platform works and how anyone can begin earning money with it.

At the end of the day, you can make money on Medium and also use the platform to promote your other websites/businesses. All it takes is some time, patience, and work (like everything else worth doing!)

I mean, I made over $1,000 on Medium without much effort. And I truly think it's a powerful platform for bloggers, writers, and creatives alike.

Once again, to learn more about how you can optimize your Medium profile and gain more claps, check out part 2 of this post!

Also, be sure to read my post on the best sites like Medium you can also try to make money with your writing.

Thanks for reading!

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The post How To Make Money On Medium – Ultimate 2024 Guide! appeared first on WebMonkey.