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It is a common presumption that your blog needs to have a huge following to make money from it. Allow me to debunk this totally misleading myth for you.

Loyal following matters the most

Having a large number of followers does not really translate into proportionate earnings. What you need is a loyal following, even if the number is low, to make any money off the blog.

I have just about 5000 followers, yet I make a decent amount of money from my blog. Let me teach you how to earn money with less number of followers, too.

Genuine engagement

Duh! This sounds like the most basic thing to ensure your blog’s success. But many people do not engage with their audience and let go of potential conversions. If you engage with your readers by replying to their comments, answering their questions and generally maintain a good vibe, it will keep your followers loyal and happy with you.

This means your followers will not be people who just take the freebie and move on, but stay with you and support you with all the content you put out because they simply adore your genuineness. Even a layman can see that this will lead to more conversions and profit the blog.

It is better to have 100 genuine followers you gained organically than to have 10,000 followers that are bought unethically. In the end you just lose money to buy followers that do not engage with you or profit your blog. Do you need such a useless following? NO!

Go ethical and you will see 100% ROI for the time you invest on your blog.

Affiliate links in posts

Sign up for a few good affiliate programs like Amazon. Add affiliate links to relevant products on your blog posts. For example, if you are a travel blogger like me and write about different things you need to pack for a specific destination, you can add affiliate links to those things.

This will help you give helpful information to your audience as well as earn any affiliate commission if they click your link and buy any of the products. Win-win, right?

Keep in mind that people tend to come to your page only if you have useful relevant information that solves their problems. For a sample, check out my wildly successful post on “Useful gifts to give your traveler friends that they appreciate”. This helps people find good gifts for travelers that are loved by the recipients and also I get numerous clicks on the products that convert to affiliate commissions.

Reach out and pitch when you are ready

Don’t wait for the brand you love and have been following for a while to reach out to you. Reach out with a good proposal and be proactive.

Brands recognize quality and prefer to work with someone who is already their fan and can produce quality content. Once your proposal is accepted, over-deliver. Give them excellent content and promote the heck out of it.

This will help you in the long run as the brand would come back to you for more promotions and recommend you to other brands in the business. You will be the first person they would  think about when they need a quality blogger.

Harness social media

As you might have realized already, social media has become very powerful with improving technology. Harness its power.

Promote your blog on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and any channel you can use. Your reach would increase ten fold. Creating videos on Facebook is especially powerful in the current social media scenario.

Create a good page for your blog on Facebook treating it as a business and promote it. Promote the posts that have affiliate links to the right audience. Join relevant groups on Facebook and find your tribe there. But don’t just self-promote yourself always. Help others and they will help you.

Freelance writing

There are many agencies and publishers looking for quality writers. Look up potential jobs on solid work related websites like Upwork and LinkedIn. Create a powerful profile showcasing quality writing from your blog. You will be sure to land good writing gigs that earn you well.

Never take up more work than you can do. Because only when you deliver quality, you will get repeat clients and build a solid reputation.

eBooks and other digital products

Create eBooks and other digital products that would be useful to your audience. Use your blog to advertise your products effectively.

For example, I have written a budget guide to Sydney ebook that does well on Amazon. I promote it through my blog posts related to Sydney throughout my blog. A reader interested in finding budget things to do in Sydney is bound to read my post and through that find the book. Bingo. More sales and more revenue through your blog!

Hope you find these tips useful and start raking in the well-deserved moolah through your blog. All the best!

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