The promise of blogging is that anyone, but anyone can get published. The promise of PayCheckr is that any blogger, but any blogger can hope to make part or full time income blogging.
PayCheckr's beauty is that it economizes space. It is a button. It is small in size. It can be placed anywhere at your blog. I'd prefer to have it show at the bottom of all my blog posts, just like the Share This button.
It is so easy to create your particular PayCheckr button. Right now you don't even have to register. You pick and choose your channels, and, voila, your button is ready for you. Copy and paste your code.
I recommend the Amazon Affiliate program to all bloggers out there. I think your Amazon store has to go with the theme of your blog. If your blog is about digital cameras, your Amazon storefront will do brisk business if it displays digital cameras.
There is one bottleneck with using the PayCheckr button. You can't blame the button if yours is not a high traffic, great content blog. PayCheckr has not made me rich yet, but I think it is because my blog is not yet the high traffic, much linked to blog that I am working to make it. The onus is on me.
But you don't want to wait until you are a large traffic blogger before you put a PayCheckr button on your blog. Do it now. Do it right away. Get people into the Amazon store through your blog.
The PayCheckr button is beautiful for how little space it takes. It is so not intrusive.
I am obviously leading by example here. My blog Netizen was the very first blog to get a PayCheckr button. I want 10 million bloggers to follow my lead. That will allow you to experiment with various business models for your blog.
Every blog is a storefront. PayCheckr can turn every blog into a storefront. Take the plunge.
In a few months you should be able to have tens of revenue channels for your blog, and the button does not get fat in the process at all. Same small space, many different revenue models. You tweak to your heart's fill.
Go to PayCheckr and get your button now. In about 10 seconds, you will be in business.
Allan showed up in the comments section of my blog postNew York Times, Don't Die, Live. I replied. Then we switched to email. Now we are scheduled for a three way chat session tomorrow morning, him, me and someone from his team.
Right now I don't have a solid grasp as to the vision of this particular team, or how well they are going to execute, but the idea itself is a trailblazer. It is about time something like this got done.
Some questions that have popped up in my mind:
Who turns a blog into a password protected blog? Would that be a separate service?
Who will go seek the advertisers? If readers opt to pay for 99 cents or less through viewing ads, who makes sure to get those advertisers?
Can you get all the credit card options and still get paid only through PayPal as a blogger?
What would be PayCheckr's cut? A percentage? What percentage?
Just like Disqus takes care of everything to do with your blog's comments sections and Zemanta takes care of all your links, tags and images, PayCheckr should attempt to take care of all details to do with monetizing your no-longer-free blog. It could grow fast.
Mark Penn says in his famous Wall Street Journal article that at 100,000 unique visits per month, a blogger hits 75K in income. There is a suggestion that there is a direct correlation between how much traffic you get and how much you make as a blogger. So how do you go about increasing traffic for your blog?
There are three kinds of traffic:
Search Traffic
Referring Sites
Direct Traffic
If you focus solely on content creation and engage in no other marketing effort, all your traffic is going to come from search engines. If you become inactive for any length of time, you are still going to get residual traffic. Most of that likely might be search engine traffic, except if you get residual traffic of the other two kinds from your previous marketing efforts.
It is fundamental that you use Google Analytics or a similar tool to see how much and what kind of traffic you are getting. The tool also tells you of the keywords people use to feed the search engines to end up at your site, and what pages they visit. This helps you discover your niche, and to create ever more content for that particular niche. For me right now that seems to be Android.
More specifically "donut android" and "cupcake android." For those two phrases my blog for now shows up on the first page of Google search results. That is prime real estate. The reason I have to hone in that niche makes sense at many levels to me.
When I write new blog posts on Android, content creation and marketing are not two different activities. They are one and the same.
Android is no cottage industry. It is not some sub sub sub topic. It just might end up being the top technology news for this year.
Android so totally fits into my IC vision and my startup. The more I learn about Android, the better for me. I don't mind getting paid to learn. (Google's Newest Venture: Google Ventures) I plot every day to go back to working on my startup full time. Android is fundamental to the IC vision. The ground - operating system - itself has to move for the vision to become reality.
I feel lucky that the topic in technology that I find most fascinating right now is also my blog's prime niche according to Google Analytics. And I got told of that niche right after my first Android blog post. I find that amazing. My respect for Google's algorithms grew. And when Google gave me the number two spot after my first Donut Android blog post, my respect for the search engine really grew. (Taking The Number 2 Spot On Google Search For Donut Android)
Search engine traffic I think is the best kind, but working on the other two does not take away from your search engine traffic, quite the opposite, so don't ignore the other two either.
If I am a tech blogger, it makes sense that I visit TechCrunch, for example, or Mashable. And if I am going to visit anyways, why not participate in the comments sections? It takes but a few seconds. And because your name gets hyperlinked to your blog, those comments sections start sending a little traffic your way. What is there to complain?
Contrary to the stereotype, blogging is a social activity. You have to belong to blogging and online communities around your interests. You have to forge friendships in the blogosphere. And forging friendships with bloggers who are not so big name increases your chances of them putting you on their blogrolls. After traffic, those backlinks are what jack up your google rank. Those backlinks are key. And content creation alone will not do the work for you, especially during the early stages when you are still wondering how you hit 1,000 page hits a day.
Twitter is micro-blogging. And there is another: that would be the comments sections of other blogs. Got to participate.
Twitter is another great place to socialize. Don't just have a list of people you follow and followers. Got to make some time and visit their profile pages and respond to some of their tweets. These are real living, breathing people. Get to know some of them, or many of them if possible.
And there is direct traffic. Feedburner lets you put a box at your blog that gives visitors the option to subscribe to your blog with their email addresses. Seth Godin claims that mailing list is how he gets most of his traffic. But he probably became a star blogger first. But before you become famous and other people know you, when you are a small fish blogger, there are people you know. Once in a while it is okay to send out emails to people you know sharing a blog post or two with them. Look Ma, no hands!
Focus on great content creation.
Find your niche, and create great content for that particular niche, but also constantly be diversifying. You don't want to go out of business when one rainy day Google revised its algorithms and your blog ended up in Siberia.
Blogging is a social activity. Be in a habit of visiting other blogs and participating in their comments sections in meaningful ways.
Strive to generate a band of loyal visitors, people who want to lap up every blog post you put out because, oh, you are just so wonderful.
America's Newest Profession: Bloggers for HireMark Penn, Hillary 2008's top guy ... more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers ... blogging is an important social and cultural movement that people care passionately about, and the number of people doing it for at least some income is approaching 1% of American adults. ... a nation of over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income ... one percent of the nation, or three million people, can create new markets for a business, spark a social movement, or produce political change ... The Information Age has spawned many new professions, but blogging could well be the one with the most profound effect on our culture. ... Demographically, bloggers are extremely well educated ... It takes about 100,000 unique visitors a month to generate an income of $75,000 a year. ... Bloggers can get $75 to $200 for a good post, and some even serve as "spokesbloggers" -- paid by advertisers to blog about products. As a job with zero commuting, blogging could be one of the most environmentally friendly jobs around -- but it can also be quite profitable. ... Pros who work for companies are typically paid $45,000 to $90,000 a year for their blogging. One percent make over $200,000. ... Bloggers make money if their consumers click the ads on their sites. ... bloggers say they are overwhelmingly happy in their work, reporting high job satisfaction ... There are more questions than answers about America's Newest Profession. ... hard to think of another job category that has grown so quickly and become such a force in society without having any tests, degrees, or regulation of virtually any kind. ... a lot of interest now in Twittering and Facebooking -- but those venues don't offer the career opportunities of blogging. Not since eBay opened its doors have so many been able to sit at their computer screens and make some money, or even make a whole living. ...
This guy Dave Winer has an ugly looking blog, and he runs no ads, but he makes millions blogging. How?
To get excited about blogging is to "get" 2.0. And if you have been missing out on 2.0, it is not possible you are on the cutting edge.
(1) Value
The market rewards value. Are you meeting some kind of market need? Your blog adds to your value. It helps your marketing efforts. It is real intimate talk with your most important clients. Like A VC says, if you read his blog, and that of his five partners, it is like you sit with them in their office every day: that intimate.
(2) StartUp/Corporate
If you are a tech startup person, you breathe blogging. That rectangle on the screen is your office. And the blogosphere is a big chunk of it. Blogging becomes that fundamental, indispensable skill. It is like, can you type? Can you do that keyboard thing? If you can't, I think you are still beautiful, but how are you going to get any work done? Blogging is what typing was. Are you blogging literate? That is a fair question these days. (3) Lifelong Education
Blogging is to the brain what jogging is to your thighs. If you are an active blogger, chances are you keep up with the news in your chosen field. You think about the hot issues of the day. You are alert. You can still type as of today.
(4) Living Life To The Full Zappos says somewhere that because he tweets, he lives life more fully. Blogging makes you more alive as a person. You are more likely to squeeze that last drop out of each moment.
(5) Plenty Of Money
Write great content, regularly, jack up your traffic, and let the ads do their work.
Google Analytics tells me I am a Paul Krugman friend and a Cupcake Android expert. So I might as well deliver. I am going to visit Krugman's blog as often as I can. And I am going to write a whole bunch of blog posts about Cupcake Android. I have a reputation to keep up with. Looks like.
If you are a big believer in social media, and have an active blog, that blog perhaps is your resume gone alive. If resumes could have stories! People stay in touch with you through your blog. Like Larry Page said about a piece of code he wrote early on, it is not like you can answer a million phone calls, but you can respond to a million queries. You blog once, and it gets read about by many.
And here are some revenue streams, while you are at it.
If you absolutely have to write, if you have that urge, that fix, blogging is for you. But blogging is so much more than that. Hillary 2008's campaign manager Mark Penn wrote an elaborate article in the Wall Street Journal calling blogging "America's newest profession."
America's Newest Profession: Bloggers for Hire Mark Penn, Hillary 2008's top guy ... more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers ... blogging is an important social and cultural movement that people care passionately about, and the number of people doing it for at least some income is approaching 1% of American adults. ... a nation of over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income ... one percent of the nation, or three million people, can create new markets for a business, spark a social movement, or produce political change ... The Information Age has spawned many new professions, but blogging could well be the one with the most profound effect on our culture. ... Demographically, bloggers are extremely well educated ... It takes about 100,000 unique visitors a month to generate an income of $75,000 a year. ... Bloggers can get $75 to $200 for a good post, and some even serve as "spokesbloggers" -- paid by advertisers to blog about products. As a job with zero commuting, blogging could be one of the most environmentally friendly jobs around -- but it can also be quite profitable. ... Pros who work for companies are typically paid $45,000 to $90,000 a year for their blogging. One percent make over $200,000. ... Bloggers make money if their consumers click the ads on their sites. ... bloggers say they are overwhelmingly happy in their work, reporting high job satisfaction ... There are more questions than answers about America's Newest Profession. ... hard to think of another job category that has grown so quickly and become such a force in society without having any tests, degrees, or regulation of virtually any kind. ... a lot of interest now in Twittering and Facebooking -- but those venues don't offer the career opportunities of blogging. Not since eBay opened its doors have so many been able to sit at their computer screens and make some money, or even make a whole living. ...
So if blogging is more than hobby to you, revenue talk is important. Write good content, jack up your traffic, and let the ad streams take care of the rest is a decent strategy. But in one of my near future posts I am going to argue the big money is not in blogging but in how blogging helps enhance your workspace which better be 2.0 rich in this day and age.
So if your blog is integral to your work, your career, your latest blog post is what your resume looks like today.
There is research to prove blogging is good for your brain, like running is good for your thighs. Has to be. You can intuitively conclude. You don't need research for that. And by blogging, I mean blogging. That includes podcasting, that includes videoblogging. That includes micro-blogging, of course.
The Internet is the Ultimate Media. Every moment of every life can be recorded, technically speaking. But what if you are not interested in the mundane, what if you are only interested in ideas? What if you don't care if they are mixed up?
A blog is a web log. The web is the interweb - I got that word from Morgan Grice a few days ago - and it is the web that is key. How you log on to it, how you latch on to it, does not matter. Every netizen is a producer, every netizen is a potential consumer.
The netizens suck on the nipples of Mother Web for nourishment. Netizens produce knowledge, perspectives. Even when nothing groundbreaking is happening, even if it is just the proliferation of existing knowledge, something fascinating is happening.
Like I have said many times, you can not bring all Nepalis to MIT, but you can take MIT to everyone in Nepal. If all textbooks, if all journal articles, and all lecture videos are added to the soup called the social web, how much will you be missing if you are not on campus?
And the blog is the center of that action for each individual netizen. If nothing else, it allows you to display your ignorance.
The interweb is not just about putting faces in front of computer screens. It is about taking group dynamics to a whole different level. Barack Obama rode the internet all the way to the most powerful office in the world. How much more real does it have to be? Grassroots governance is going to be more exciting than grassroots campaigning.
The blog is where it gels for the netizen. That space is your space, and it has all the wheels of media. It has the feel of a classroom. It is in your face like a microphone. It is expansive like air, water, space. It is casual like gum. It is private. I mean, if you are struggling to get page hits.
I just added these buttons to my blog. I figured they will help spread the word out a little. Although my blog has best served me for small group communication purposes. This is no mass traffic blog. It is a communication tool. Helps me get my point across. And also speaks to my blogging hobby. It is both business and pleasure, like James Bond says in a movie: "Hopefully both!"
You do want a larger audience. You do want to build a community around your blog. Post it and they will come does not cut it. You have to go where people are already assembled.
You add the buttons and it is one step easier for visitors to help you spread the word if the spirit might move them.
One glitch for me now is the two buttons work for individual posts only. Otherwise your general blog URL is what gets tweeted. Still, no complaints. So if you want to tweet/digg a particular blog post, get on the web address with that particular blog post, then press the button.
The idea is to spill your stream of consciousness thoughts, ideas, perspectives into that collective stream. Curiously that also jacks up your blog's status with the search engines. Yesterday I googled up "sites that pay you to blog" and my post on the topic showed up in the top 10 results.
It is almost as if for the past few days I have been spending more time blogging than tweeting. But then I discovered something else. When you download about four blog posts in a row into your Twitter stream, suddenly you get 10 new followers on Twitter. That is not like Oprah getting 50,000 new followers before her first tweet, but it is something. Like they say, it adds up, and it is organic growth.
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