How to Make Extra Money for Doing Almost Nothing – Part 1
Imagine you’re a farmer who owns a good amount of land. On your land, you grow some crops, milk cows and raise pigs. Mmm…bacon. Anyways, you notice that you don’t really use all of your land. There’s a huge chunk of it that you know has really good soil, but you don’t really have the manpower or the energy to grow anything there yourself. If another farmer came up to you and said, “Hey! You have great land there. Can I use the land you’re not using to grow some of my own crops? I’ll pay you and you won’t have to worry about anything.” Would you let him do it?
Why wouldn’t you? It’s basically free money, and as long as his crops don’t ruin your own, there’s really no reason to not take the offer. The best part is – everybody’s a winner!
This is kind of like what happened to me on my blog at intheleed.com. Way back in July of 2008, I got an email that said, “I’d love to advertise on your website, what are your going rates?”
My first reaction was, “Uhh…what?” I wasn’t familiar with this kind of advertising on websites at the time, and really the only form of income I had was from Google Adsense, which handles all of the advertisements and money automatically. I never had to deal with the advertisers directly, and so I didn’t even know where to start. Honestly, I was a bit scared. After I worked it out, I now make up to an extra $750 a month for doing almost nothing. Here’s what you can do.
So, You Want to Sell Private Ad Space on Your Website
The most important thing to think about is: do you really want to sell advertisement space on your website? Yes, you’d be getting some cash for doing pretty much nothing, but if feel any advertisements you have would be a distraction from your content or annoying to your readers, then maybe it’s not for you. Your content and your readers are your most important asset, and you should never compromise your material or the loyalty of your readers for just a few dollars.
On the other hand, you may find that some advertisements may be helpful or useful to your readers, which can add value to your website. Most of the advertisements on my other blog are for services that are helpful to my readers, and they are for services and products that I trust.
How Do You Get Started?
Traffic
No one will want to advertise on your website unless you’ve got at least a little bit of traffic. Without traffic, there’s no one to click on the ads, so there’s really no point. You should have some kind of web traffic tracking device for your website, whether it be Google Analytics, SiteMeter, or the infamous WordPress plugin: WordPress.com Stats, so you can first prove you indeed have traffic, and secondly, gauge how much you can charge.
Usually, when I have an advertisement inquiry, I show them the stats from my website from the last year. If you only have a couple months under your belt, that will be fine too – they will most likely look at your last month since it will give them idea of what future months will look like. Here is a screenshot from the plugin that I mentioned above showing a year’s worth of stats:
The dip at the end is this month’s traffic (February 2009). Anyways, this is really helpful information to any advertiser who just wants to make sure he or she is going getting their money’s worth.
Finding Advertisers
I was lucky enough to have an advertiser find me first, but I don’t think this is usually the case. There are a few easy ways that you can find advertisers yourself:
- The Billboard Method: The billboard method is the easiest way to find advertisers because you don’t really do any gruntwork. What you do is create your own ad on your website that links to a page that explains more about advertising space on your website to anyone who is interested. You can put all of your stats on there and maybe a history of your website – it’s up to you. I mean, if you wanted to advertise on someone else’s site, what would you want to see? Note that it is in your best interest to discuss rates in private, and they should never be shown on this page – in my opinion (I’ll talk more about this later). Make sure to include a way to contact you as well. A contact form embedded on that webpage is ideal. Below is a sample ad that I once used as my “billboard ad”.
- The Headhunter Method: This is where you go out and find the advertisers for yourself. It can be a daunting task, and you may only get one or two takers for every 30 or more people you ask, but all you need is just one to get some kind of income. Just remember that you’re asking them to help them out too, just as much as you’re asking to help yourself. What you can do is email people and pitch them the idea of buying adspace on your website. Of course, if you blog about money, you don’t want to ask people who own diet blogs – that doesn’t make sense. A trick is to enter keywords for your blog into Google and see which websites come up. If you have Adsense Ads running on your website already, a handy-dandy trick is to see which websites they are pointing to (don’t click on Adsense Ads on your own webpage – that’s a no no!) and you can pitch to the owners of those websites.
In an effort to keep my blog posts a reasonable length, I will continue with private advertising in my next post. There, I’ll discuss the types of ads you can sell, how you can negotiate a reasonable price, and how to close the deal. I’ll also explain a surefire method to show your advertisers that they are getting their money’s worth, so they really have no choice but to advertise on your site. 
Until next time!
Posted on : February 10th, 2009
Related posts:
- How to Make Extra Money for Doing Almost Nothing – Part 2
- On Deck Online Money Making Ideas Part 1 – PPC Affiliate Marketing
- A Reader Asks: “Why Can’t I Make Good Money Online?”
- The Methods of Making Money From an Informational Product
- Three Questions Every Blogger Who Wants to Make Money Online Should Ask Themselves
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37 Comments (Click Here to Leave a Comment Below)
Good post. Thanks for the advice. I still have a long way to go in terms of traffic, but when and if it gets high enough, I will be referring back to this post for advice.
richerandslimmer.com´s last blog post..Savings Series: Save Money with Brown Bag Lunches
Nice post. It is a good balance of not only concept (farmer sharing his land) but implementation in our world (site banners).
In our world, posts like this are beneficial because they help us focus on working smarter, not harder.
Grant Baldwin´s last blog post..In Case You’re Bored This Weekend…
…I’ll be honest, this is a topic on about a couple thousand blogs. However, as I knew you would, you created a great, readable, actionable post.
I look forward to your next ‘parts’, but my 2 cents: remember the option of having private advertisers BID on your space… I have done this, and seen this frequently on ‘hot blogs’. As you mentioned though, it’s all about traffic, so that will take some time to develop.
As always, genius Pat
Jeff´s last blog post..eHowlity 5: eHow Questions Answered
A site at the top of the search results probably gets a lot of traffic that way, and their strategy may involve more SEO than advertising. It might be interesting to jump further down and look for sites that are trying to get to the top of the search results. They might have more to gain from advertising.
Another great post but I have one issue with what you said that it is basically free money. Technically it is not free money because you do have to work for it. Think about it do you think that anyone will advertise on a site that is not updated? Or how about all of the work you have to put into your site before you have enough readers/traffic to gain advertisers? The income you earn from a site is not passive or easy by any stretch because you have to work for it and spend valuable time promoting your site. That’s just my opinion and I’m curious to see how others feel.
Studenomics´s last blog post..It’s Not My Fault…
@Studenomics, I partially agree with you. It is so hard to define ‘passive’, for everyones language varies greatly. I won’t get into my philosophy of passive income but I will state that I believe that ‘passive’ qualifies as something that earns/profits with LITTLE effort/energy. So, I agree with you in that technically obtaining private ads contracts are not FULLY passive, since you have to work for several months in building and maintain a blog with tens (actually hundreds) of thousands of views, not to mention the daily work in order to maintain the integrity of the blog/site so you can keep the advertisers. However, passive(in most definitions) is primarily a rental activity… which is advertising.
I would like to say this is what Pat would agree with, but that’s up to him, so I’m eager to herehis philosophy on this discussion
Jeff´s last blog post..eHowlity 5: eHow Questions Answered
@Studenomics, I think the “passive income” debate has been around since people were using flowers as currency. It’s true, it’s not absolutely free money, but is anything really? I’m gong to be extreme here, but if you found a $20 bill on the ground, you still have to bend down to pick it up, right?
Using your example about a blog that doesn’t update, you’re absolutely right that no one will want to advertise on a site that doesn’t update (unless it’s getting traffic and it doesn’t need to be updated, i.e. intheleed.com). But if you have a blog that you’re be going to updating all of the time anyways, placing an advertisement (little effort/energy) and leaving it there (no energy) is a great way to earn some extra income, which in my book means it’s passive.
I know everyone has their own definition, and believe me I’m not saying which one is right or wrong. But think about this really quick:
Traditional income is like this: you work X hours and you make Y dollars. No work = no dollars.
Pat’s passive income definition: work hard at the beginning, then no work = dollars still.
I hope that makes sense! Let me know what you all think. Finally some debate on SPI!
@Pat, A definition of passive income should be different for each individual. I would offer up the following definition: Any form of income from an activity that I would do regardless of actually receiving an income. Although I would much rather make money for doing nothing, I will settle for making money for something I enjoy doing!
Start-Up´s last blog post..Comment on Back to the CVS and Walgreens Games by pfincome
@Start-Up, That’s another good way to think about passive income. Because even if you’re expending energy to do something, if it’s enjoyable, then it really isn’t work, is it? Nice
I have a general question regarding advertising that might be interesting for people to debate. I see that at Pat’s site intheleed.com he has advertisements for other leed test material. Is this smart? Sure he’s making money from the advertisements and those types of products are more likely to pay to advertise on his site, but could they be taking away potential customers? Are people going to pay for the leed exam prep courses that are advertised on his blog and pay for his ebook? The ebook is his main money maker, are his ads diverting potential paying customers? What does everyone think?
Also, I agree that you should not advertise for anything that you wouldn’t buy or don’t trust yourself. You will lose respect from your readers by advertising for poor products.
Start-Up´s last blog post..Comment on Back to the CVS and Walgreens Games by pfincome
@Start-Up, This is actually something that my dad (of all people) brought up to me, and it’s a good topic for debate, which is why I’m glad you brought it up. I feel that the advertisements on my site add value to my site as a whole, and although some potential customer’s may be diverted away, I don’t believe I directly compete with any of those products.
I can tell you that people are indeed paying for both my material and the courses as advertised. It’s pretty interesting, because with testing material, people will put down a lot of money to make sure they have all kinds of information.
It’s true, you have to be careful about who you advertise for so as to not lose so much of your own income if you sell a product of your own. If you have a blog and don’t sell a product, this method makes the most sense without any reservation.
@Pat, That’s very interesting that you say customers purchase testing material in bulk to make sure they have all kinds of information. Although I never thought about it, I would have to agree. Since I tutor on the side for ACT math, I find students coming in with numerous different prep materials. Additionally, the company I work for provides them with even more sources. I suppose in your niche the customers are paying for as much as they can get their hands on. That’s really good to know as if I wrote an ebook it would definitely be in the test prep arena.
Start-Up´s last blog post..Comment on Back to the CVS and Walgreens Games by pfincome
I guess you also need to carefully screen your advertisers so that their message is consistent with the central message you want your blog to put forth. Also curious, as a a side note, why did you state WordPress has an ‘infamous’ traffic plug in? Just curious, since I use Blogger.
Steve´s last blog post..Guaranteed Formula to Turn Failure Into Success
@Steve, I mentioned the wordpress.com stats plugin (which is the actual name of the plugin), because it does a lot of website tracking within the wordpress admin panel, which is nice and it’s pretty much the standard wordpress traffic tracking plugin that everyone uses. Are there such things for blogger?
I just started a movie related blog with a friend and this is one thing we would like to work towards over time. Hopefully we can slowly develop the traffic necessary to begin to have advertisers. What do you think about affiliate programs, and do you prefer affiliate or straight advertising?
@Craig, I should let Pat answer his own questions, but if he doesn’t mind me jumping in, I know Pat has mentioned using affiliate programs as one of his income streams. You can see it listed in his monthly income report.
Maria — WriterGig´s last blog post..Free Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Starter Guide from Google
Great tips on paid advertisements for a site or blog. I thin this is a good option when niche companies that would fit with your audience don’t have any type of affiliate program.
In reply to earlier comments, my definition of passive/ residual income is once I have earned a decent hourly wage for the time put into an income stream, everything else after that equals passive income. It’s my experience that passive income is not simply delayed pay, its much MORE pay, you just have a longer wait.
Maria — WriterGig´s last blog post..Free Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Starter Guide from Google
@Maria I am nowhere near the point to even consider this, but a lot of bloggers recommend this strategy over advertising. Do you have a preference?
For intheleed.com, I don’t use any affiliate links because, well, none exist. In many niche sites, it can be hard to find affiliate programs, which is why I recommend the straight advertising route, especially if you’re advertising a service website or something that’s just informational that probably hope to extend their email lists.
Of course (and I should of mentioned this), if affiliate programs for specific products or websites are offered in your online realm, then there’s a possibility to make a lot of money. However, there is no guarantee that you will make a dollar if you have an affiliate ad up. You are guaranteed money for straight advertising because you don’t place the ad until you get paid.
I hope that makes sense. It’s another good debate and one that I’m glad we’re talking about. Thanks for your insight Craig and Maria.
@Pat Do you prefer one set up stats over another? Is WordPress stats looked at higher than Google Analytics or Feedburner numbers or in any order?
@Craig, I just love how easy wordpress stats is to use in the wordpress admin interface. I can easily see the number of visitors per day, which posts people are looking at the most, where people are coming from, and a nice graph/chart thats all on a single page.
I also have analytics hooked up to my website as well, but I rarely go on it. I know it’s a powerful tool and I haven’t even touched the surface of it’s capabilities, but for now I’m happy with WordPress Stats.
For feedburner, I treat it as an entirely separate number from my traffic stats.
Do you have any other methods/suggestions as far as stats and feeds go?
@Pat I am brand new to starting my own blog, just went up this week actually. Still trying to figure out how to set up Meta tags and successfully submit it to the search engines cause I tried to submit and can’t see them.
I have Google Analytics set up and Feedburner (think I have it set up fine, only will use it for subscriber #’s). Now I am going to install WordPress Stats. Have developed a little traffic from FB, Twitter, and just telling friends I know. Really trying to learn more about stats and figuring it all out to hopefully lead to advertising or affiliate forms of passive income.
@Craig, Congrats on the new website, that’s awesome. Shoot us the link when you’re comfortable showing it off
For meta tags and keywords, you should use a plugin called: All in One SEO. After it’s implemented, you’ll be able to go into your setting > all in one seo tab and put the blog title, the description, and all of the keywords you want. Also, when you write a new page or post, you can add your own descriptions and keywords that are specific to that page or post. All of this stuff Google loves, and whatever you do in ALL in One SEO overrides what you put in your normal wordpress blog settings. It’s makes your website really Google Friendly.
As far as submitting your website, you should go to this website: http://www.google.com/submit_content.html
Before you do that, you should download the plugin called “XML Sitemap”. This plugin will generate a sitemap automatically for your website which google will use to crawl your webpage after you submit.
It probably sounds a little overwhelming, but all of those plugings have good instructions. Also, just shoot me an email if you have any problems implementing them.
Thanks Craig and good luck to you!
Wow – great stuff – I wish I could start pulling in traffic like that soon! Thanks for the good advice.
Contacting advertisers directly works the best for me on my other blogs. It also helps if you have an advertise page with the rates already on it.
Vik Dulat´s last blog post..How to eat a healthy and cheap breakfast
@Pat Thank you for the advice with the plugins. I am going to work on learning how to implement these. I have begun trying to slowly establish myself in the niche and slowly develop relationships, but if I can’t be found in the search engines, nothing is going to come of it. Do you know how long it usually takes Google to submit a site so you can actually see it on the search page?
Great post! I’m a newbie to blogging and am looking for as much info as possible. I look forward to part 2.
[...] at Smart Passive Income tells us how to make extra money doing almost nothing. Pat has learned how to make money online at a a very rapid rate. If you are going to listen to [...]
[...] wondering the idea for this post came from an article I read over at Smart Passive Income called How to make extra money for almost doing nothing part 1. After reading the article I started to wonder why passive income isn’t as easy as it seems. [...]
How much (roughly speaking) do you charge per month for each ad? Is $60/month too much to charge?
@Chris – Never mind. You have written a Part II above this. Thanks for sharing info. on pricing! Good stuff.
I will keep private advertising in mind for later. At the moment I am traffic wise at about the numbers you were Jan 2008
However, it’s good to see what can be done in year, quite motivating for me! I guess one has to keep in mind that your increase in traffic is not due to luck, but due to hard work promoting your site. And this is what I shall do for now!
Hi Pat,
I just want to drop in and say thanks for all of this great information and for the inspiration you’ve provided me. I look forward to all your posts, and the valuable insight you give. As I start my own quest, I hope to help others as you’ve helped me.
[...] I’ve talked about how I sell private advertising spots on my blog at greenexamacademy.com. It’s a great way to earn a little extra side cash for doing almost nothing. [...]
Thank you for providing valuable post about the topic. I am an admirer of your site. Keep up the great job.
[...] March 2009: A post I wrote got picked up on StumbleUpon and was shared between 2,500-3,000 people – How to Make Money for Doing Almost Nothing – Part 1 [...]
[...] people’s permission or any contracts to put these kinds of ads on your website, as opposed to selling private advertising space on your site. All you need is an affiliate link, and in many cases companies who are serious about their [...]