All Calligraphy: How Blogging Makes Money

The advent of Internet has opened a whole new world of opportunities for everyone. Exponentially growing blogsphere and mushrooming paid to blog and affiliate services bringing marketers, advertisers and publishers together has made it possible for bloggers to become ad publisher. Result: walk across the blogsphere and you find so many people making reasonable money via blogs and many of them telling ‘us’ how to make money.

Let us start with certain empirical facts: Not everyone can make money as easily as it is generally perceived (it comes with hard work). Personal scouting reveals that most local bloggers don’t want to display ads on their sites. What to talk of knowing difference between difference between and , most frequently asked question still is, what is a blog? Outside the high end Internet users’ base, many people don’t know about blogs, ads, online busying and other activities. PayPal account is not available here and this closes so many money making avenues.

That said, getting paid for blogging is not a new idea in Pakistan. Like anywhere else, blogs are already being used as economical, effective and interactive marketing tool. Pakistani bloggers are exceptionally good (yes, we have anti-establishment, noncommercial write-ups and rants at mainly personal blogs as well). They have acumen for corporate and, promotional writing. Their language and blogging skills and networking capabilities can be compared with any bloggers' community in the world. Internet coverage and users base is constantly growing. Even trend to shop online is taking off. Given chance, all this can indirectly help in efforts to make making through blogging.

Local businesses have also started noting the growing readership and influence of these Internet postings and the buzz corporate blogging can create particularly as a process of Search Engine Marketing and targeted online segments of consumers. But this is not about how Pakistani businesses can harness the power of blogs to reach out. This is about the options available to Pakistan bloggers to make money for their work online.

Savvy Pakistani bloggers are already using all advertising paid posting and affiliates to make money from their blogs. Google AdSense advertising program being the first choice. Google pays through check and is liberal in taking small blogs in their program. Only recently, Google has started paying in Pakistan through Western Union and now bloggers here don't have to wait for 40 long days to get their checks cleared through normal banking channels or pay them $ 13.00 for every transaction.

Some of the sources that pay through check and I have experienced include Google's AdSense - a pay per click program that started in 2003 and pays Web publishers including bloggers based on how many times advertisements on their sites receive clicks. Google places the ads on participating Web sites using contextual text matching, in an attempt to ensure that the advertisements relate to the content on the page. Users' friendly AdSense also offers the opportunity to monetize site searches while providing a powerful, fast search engine for sites and blogs. Google places relevant ads along with search results pages. Clicks on these ads that come up with search results also earn revenue for the site owners. Earnings are not big mainly because there are not many local ads in Google's AdWord inventory. "Things are changing," says Badar Khushnud, Google country representative in Pakistan, "as Pakistan businesses have started using AdWord program." AdBrite and Bidvertiser - both pay per click advertising programs that make payments through checks closely follow AdSense.

Bloggers can also make money through "affiliate networks," which, in contrast to Google's automated system, allow blog writers to choose which advertisements to put on their pages. Affiliate mostly pay based on how often ads on their sites lead to actions like sales, sign ups or registrations rather than how often the ads receive clicks. I have experience with Text Link Ads (they pay through check) and Social Spark and it is fun working with them. They sell add space off my blogs and I have control over what appears on my multiple blogs.

Then, businesses and organizations from all over the world offer to pay bloggers for mentioning them, their products and or services in blogs in order to create an online buzz, get more traffic and better page rank. Many online services like PayPerPost, SocialSpark, PayingPost, Smorty, Sponsored Review, Loud Launch - PayPal required - and Reviewme and Link Worth to name just a few, have come up. These services manage growing demands by advertisers and arrange supply through interested bloggers. Few months ago, I had signed up for Reviewme and Link Worth because they also pay through check. Reviewme and Link Worth offer products or services for review. I write about whatever I like and they pay me fifty percent of what they charge the advertisers. This arrangement works fine for me.

I have tried merchandising through my blogs as well. Attempt to sell my own books (and the one am sure other bloggers can see this as an opportunity to make some money from blogs by selling products). That is not all. Bloggers can sell branded products whatever way their entrepreneurial heart desires using CafePress by creating and adding online store's link to blogs and CafePress will do the rest. There are so many more ways to earn money by blogging for those who are interested in earning using blogs. Driven by demand, more advertising programs, affiliates and sponsors and others are coming up every day. Bloggers can experiment with different programs that suit them and can create diverse stream of earnings.

A word of caution; But the truth is that money doesn't grow on blogs (alone)! Earning through blogging requires persistent postings of quality contents and blog promotion. Blog revenue is directly related to blog Page Rank and traffic. Best is to keep blogging for joy and monetize blogs on the side; keeping money making expectations realistic. It is a long and slow process. Only "17 percent of most popular bloggers in NYC earn more than thousand dollars a month. That leaves a whopping 83 percent earning less," revealed a NYC Blogger Summit Survey earlier this year. But again these figures are relative.

Blogging is a creative activity and fun. Most bloggers enjoy blogging. That is why they are blogging in the first place.

Given my personal experience in blog monetization and making money online, I have come across problems too. In the past decade since I started blogging for money, two of the paid posting concerns (eBuzzing and Snap Bomb) got the work from many bloggers and vanished. I tried to contact them via email but no reply and they still owe me money. Telecommuting and working online from home is a module that is based on trust. All concerns have payment schedule and they follow strictly. AdSense users are familiar when Google releases money in month’s time after anyone has made 100 US Dollars. Similarly ReviewMe sends out checks on the first working day of each month, Sponsored Reviews and Smorty pay twice a month and PayPerPost pays for each post after 30 days.

Another problem that Pakistani bloggers are facing is non availability of PayPal account. Most online advertising programs and affiliates make the payments to bloggers through PayPal - widely used online money transfer service. Ironically, PayPal is not available in Pakistan so far. This alone puts Pakistan bloggers at a great disadvantage because without PayPal account they cannot join most of the money making programs. Pakistani bloggers are either using PayPal of their family members or friends living abroad or they look for programs that have options to pay through check.

I suggest Pakistan bloggers take the opportunity and think more about getting paid for blogging. Explore, learn and never hesitate. But there are no short cuts and overnight plans. Making money through blogs is a long haul. Think beyond just displaying ads. There is a mature cyber culture and ads market out there.

Some of the major platforms for monetizing blogs (there are many more)

Payment through checks:

http://google.com/adsense

http://www.widgetbucks.com/home.page

www.linkworth.com

www.reviewme.com

Payment through PayPal:

http://www.blogadvertisingstore.com/