Monetizing a blog by covering it in badly chosen adverts is one of the biggest mistakes that a blogger can make. How many times have you seen a blog plastered with adverts and just clicked the back button? Badly chosen and over saturated advertising doesn’t make people click the ads, it makes people run away never to return, often without even having read your content. And if they don’t see your content they have no reason to return or to bookmark you.
Advertising works best when it is appropriate, used in moderation with proper placement and as a compliment to your content.
People are increasingly resistant to advertising, they just don’t like it, because traditionally it is irrelevant and something that gets in the way of what they want to do. For example, commercial breaks on Television are such a pain that people are happy to pay for a device like Teevo to be rid of them. Never underestimate a persons ability to block out your ads if they don’t like them, they will always find a way, even if it means never visiting your blog again. After all, people have more than enough blogs to choose from. Your blog would have to be pretty special to be able to annoy your readers and still keep them.
So, how does a blogger make sure that their ads are clicked?
- Advertise products and services that you have positive experience of. This will make your recommendations genuinely credible.
- Make sure what you advertise is complimentary to your content.
- Place the ads somewhere that doesn’t annoy the reader. Always make it easy and enjoyable for people to read your blog without obstruction.
If you get the right ads and put them in the right place your readers will be happy to see them (yes, I did say happy to see them) and be much more likely to click them. Only inappropriate advertising is disliked. Appropriate and well considered advertising will enhance your blog and provide your readers with a more useful and rewarding experience. And, if you get the balance just right, you will make money.
Do you have any particular ad networks to recommend? I’d love to sell some space on my blog / related sites, but I’m looking for the 125px square ads that look particularly reputable - and it seems that the only way to sell those is to manage the ads yourself. Which isn’t going to work for me, as I don’t get enough hits :)
Josh - I think the easiest way to monetize your blog would be to use it as a publicity and promotional vehicle for your coding and web development business. The 125 square ads are all over the place and have reached a point where the most common ones are ignored. You need a lot of traffic to make those things work.
Try to think of complimentary products and services. I’m guessing from reading your blog that your subscribers are interested in web development, and, as such, they could be either potential customers or other web developers.
Complimentary products for web developers could be books on coding, so maybe the Amazon affiliate program would work well, or maybe computer hardware and software affiliate programs. You are the expert in this field - think about what products you would buy, and have bought, and then find affiliate programs that allow you to promote them.
For the potential customers you may find advertising counter productive since it could divert their attention away from you. Concentrate on turing these readers into clients for your own business.
Excellent advice (make your content easy to read). Fewer ads also helps to keep the page load time down, especially if you’re using the clunky Blogger/AdSense combo. :)