Marc's Blog

Destinee Berman is a modern marketer and a seven-figure launch strategist for experts and educators. With 15 years of marketing experience in Silicon Valley with clients like Twitter, HP, and Microsoft, Destinee left to step into her calling in 2014. She has since launched dozens of digital schools in the personal growth and spiritual self-help markets, generating 15M+ in revenue the last 5 years.

 

Here are the key links from the episode:

Destinee’s site

Crystalize Vision Training

 

Marc’s Links

5 Day Podcast Launch Mini Course

From $0 To $100K+ With Content Marketing

Schedule a free strategy call

Joshua Lisec is the world’s only award-winning, celebrity-recommended, #1 international bestselling Certified Professional Ghostwriter. Since 2011, he has ghostwritten more than 50 full-length books as well as 1,000s of articles, blog posts, speeches, and white papers for household name entrepreneurs, executives, politicians, public figures, and the breakthrough stars of tomorrow in over 100 different industries.

 

Here are the key links from the episode:

Subscribe to Joshua’s YouTube channel

Entrepreneur’s Word Smith

 

Marc’s Links

5 Day Podcast Launch Mini Course

From $0 To $100K+ With Content Marketing

Schedule a free strategy call

Stavros Mastrogiannis is the founder of Live Your Way Thin, an online and offline personal training & coaching company.  He is also the author of 3 books including his lates book Fat No More which helps readers lose weight so it stays off forever.

 

Here are the key links from the episode:

Live Your Way Thin

Get your copy of Fat No More

 

Marc’s Links

5 Day Podcast Launch Mini Course

From $0 To $100K+ With Content Marketing

Schedule a free strategy call

It’s important to establish blog monetization right from Day 1. It takes considerable time to grow a blog and cultivate an audience, and throughout that journey, you need to generate revenue to keep your dream alive.

It’s possible to start a blog without getting paid and keep at it, but if you want your blog to become your full-time work or significantly expand your business, you need to monetize it.

Blog monetization isn’t a one size fits all set-up. There are a variety of blog monetization strategies to choose from, and not all of them will be for you. You’ll have to experiment with some income streams and decide for yourself if you want to proceed with them.

Many bloggers look towards these 5 monetization strategies to get paid for their content.

#1: Affiliate Marketing

The easiest way to monetize your blog is promoting other people’s products with your affiliate links. You don’t have to create the product or have a big audience. Just get your affiliate links and get started.

Amazon offers one of the largest affiliate programs on the planet, but they’re not known for high commissions (most people get 4% commissions for what they sell as Amazon affiliates). 

Depending on your industry, you may find affiliate programs with more attractive affiliate commissions than what Amazon offers. If you don’t know where to look, start with Amazon as their affiliate program primarily serves as the excuses breaker. You’ll find something on Amazon that lines up with your content.

From there, use Google to find affiliate programs. If you talk about Peloton products on your blog often, Google the phrase “Peloton affiliate program” and see what comes up. Replace the word Peloton with your product, service, or company of your interest to see if they too have an affiliate program.

You can write product reviews, include affiliate links when mentioning resources, and stick some links on your blog’s sidebar. Affiliate marketing has no barriers to entry. You just have to find the right affiliate programs and get started.

#2: Google AdSense

Google AdSense is a popular stop for bloggers who want to monetize their content. You can display ads on your blog and earn income as people see and click on the ads. I recently ran ads on this blog and while the AdSense income isn’t life changing, it does add up.

I make more from Google AdSense via YouTube. Some bloggers create YouTube channels to expand their online presences, and it will help your AdSense earnings. To have ads run on your YouTube videos, you must be part of the YouTube Partner program. Becoming part of that program requires that your channel has 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time within the past 365 days.

It may take some time to get the initial set-up right, but practically any blogger can get started with Google AdSense…although you’re likely to earn more money through affiliate marketing.  

#3: Sponsor Placements

As your blog gains momentum, sponsorship placements can become a lucrative income source. Advertisers will pay top dollar to get in front of a targeted audience, and that’s where you come in.

Rather than use Google AdSense, you can invite sponsors to share their messages on your blog. It can be in the form of sponsored posts, giving your sponsors a placement on your blog’s sidebar, a social media shout out, or something else. 

The key to attracting sponsors is to demonstrate solid engagement and that they will get a solid return on investment from their efforts. 

For most bloggers, Google AdSense will make more sense, and you can try both of these monetization strategies. Eventually, it may be a better idea to fully embrace sponsorship placements.

#4: Create Your Own Products

Books, training courses, and Fiverr gigs are some of the many offers you can create for potential customers. You can use your blog to promote all of your new products and drive attention to your existing products.

The great thing about products is that they can continue generating sales even when you sleep. It takes considerable work to reach that point and you’ll have to continue working so you can maintain what you’ve built, but it’s an excellent income stream. 

#5: Ask For Donations

Based on what I’ve seen, entertainment type brands tend to do a better job in this area. I don’t see many digital marketers ask for donations because they promote their products and services instead.

If on the other hand you stream a video game or talk about them, it would make more sense to ask for donations. Some business models rely on donations and sponsorships to keep them running, and early on, you’ll get far more donations than sponsorships. 

Don’t be afraid to ask for some support if it allows you to fully embrace your work. Some people in your audience will be happy to help you. If you want to get more donations, keep showing up and give your audience the content they want. 

Want to learn how to make money with your content? Get your copy of Content Marketing Secrets today.

Self publishing books is a great path to making a full-time income and building your authority. While heightened competition has made it a little more difficult than it was a few years ago, it’s still possible for any new author can build up a full-time income self publishing brand.

A fear of saturation in the self publishing industry is one of the many myths that holds back would-be authors from publishing books and generating royalties. The self publishing journey is time consuming, but that’s true of all efforts worth pursuing. 

It would be very concerning to see someone shy away from a goal solely because it is time consuming.

Some of the most common myths dissuade people from self publishing their own books and entering this business. These are 3 of the common myths that hold writers back.

Myth #1: Writing A Book Is Hard 

When most people think of a book, they think of a 200+ page masterpiece with detailed research. However, that’s not most books. In fact, you can write a book that’s less than 100 pages.

Don’t focus on the amount of pages you have to write. Focus on the word count. For many authors, a 20,000 word book equates to 100 pages. 

Each word you write gets you closer to finishing your book. Seeing quick progress will make it easier for you to continue versus feeling like you have to fill up an entire page to claim a sense of progress.

You also don’t have to write the book in one sitting, and almost no author writes their book in one sitting. Think back to the 20,000 word example. If you write 500 words per day, you’ll complete the 20,000 word book in 40 days. If you decide to write 1,000 words each day, you’ll complete that same book in 20 days.

The average person types at 40 words per minute, and you will end up typing faster over time. At 40 words per minute, it will take you roughly 12.5 minutes to write 500 words and 25 minutes to write 1,000 words.

To avoid getting stuck in the writing process, create a detailed outline of your book before you start writing. This will help you maintain 40 wpm as your lower threshold and possible accelerate to 50-60 wpm. This acceleration becomes more realistic as you write more often.

Myth #2: I Have To Sell Many Copies To Make A Full-Time Income

The most common path for new self publishers is to publish $2.99 Kindle books on Kindle Direct Publishing. Although this is a common path for beginners, it’s also a common path the pros stick with. Why break something that’s working just fine?

For a $2.99 Kindle book, you’ll make roughly $2 in royalties for each sale. It will vary slightly based on the size of your book file, but most people will end up with a $2 royalty.

To make 6-figures, you’d have to sell 50,000 books each year. That adds up to 4,167 books each month. When you think of this scenario, it’s easy to see why Myth #2 dominates the conversation. However, there are three workarounds.

The first workaround is publishing more books. Let’s say you publish 10 books. Now, each book has to sell an average of 417 copies each month for you to hit 6-figures. Your odds significantly increase with this approach versus having to sell 4,167 copies of a single book each month. You can also publish book series to lead readers from one book to the other.

The second workaround is to also offer paperback and audiobook editions of your books. Authors typically earn higher commissions on paperbacks and audiobooks, but you’d still have to sell thousands of copies each month to hit 6-figures.

The third workaround is to offer services within your book. You can use a book to drive customers to your existing business rather than solely rely on the book royalties. If someone reads your book and proceeds to buy your $1,000 service, you didn’t make a $2 royalty from that book. You made $1,002, and someone who spends $1,000 for one of your services is likely to return in the future whether it be for a different service or to buy your next book.

You don’t have to sell as many copies as you think if you incorporate your book with your existing business or build a business around your book.

Myth #3: I’m Not A Good Writer

This is where self-doubt enters the conversation. No one starts as a good writer. Look at anyone’s first bunch of blog posts and you’ll see they’re very different from their current blog posts.

The only way you become a good writer is through practice, and why not get paid to practice? You can write books, blog posts, Medium articles, and other content that allows you to get paid to practice writing. 

Furthermore, not every reader looks for great writing. Some readers care far more about the takeaways from a nonfiction book or the plot of a fiction book. If those are good, some of your readers may overlook when your writing isn’t perfect. No writer is perfect, and it’s a skill you refine over time. 

Want to learn how to become a full-time author? Get your lifetime pass to the Wealthy Author Summit where you’ll get access to over 50 sessions. Use the coupon code AUTHOR to save $50.