81. Make $100-$1,000+ per month – Make money with a blog or with your own website
Make money with a blog
You can earn several hundred dollars per month by creating your own blog, which you could also sell in the end for 10x - 12x its monthly ad revenue earnings.
Start your own blog. You don't have to have your own Web site, or install blogging software, or even figure out how to set up the advertising. At Blogger.com, you can set up a blog for free in less than five minutes without knowing a thing about web design, and Blogger even automates setting up Google AdSense so you can make money off your blog by displaying ads and getting paid when people click on the ads. To make even more money from it, set up an affiliate program for books, music, etc., (sign up at amazon) and insert your affiliate links whenever you refer to those items. You'll have to get a lot of traffic to become a six-figure blogger, but pick an interesting topic, write well, tell all your friends, and you're off to a good start.
Have expertise in a particular subject? Write regularly on that subject and give away your knowledge for free. People will bookmark your blog and visit regularly. The money is in allowing companies to advertise their products and services to your very eager audience. There are third parties like payperpost.com handle the finding of advertisers. Don't have expertise in a particular subject? That doesn't stop bloggers. Some of them blog on the most mundane things - from what they had for breakfast to how they spent their day. And still the advertisers come. So just be passionate about something and the advertisers will follow. Wordpress.org: Wordpress is one of the most popular blogging platforms there is, but for those people who want to personalize or monetize their blog by using the Wordpress platform with their own domain name and hosting, they will be looking for a blog theme that is more in keeping with their topic of choice.
Build a small niche website, then sell it or keep it to create monthly income.
You can create exclusive websites and sell your site to a customer for a higher price, like at Flippa.com.
Some marketers who sell exclusive sites simply create the site, load it with content and sell it directly to other marketers based on the traffic and profit potential. If you have a system for building sites very quickly, this can be lucrative.
Other marketers, those that flip websites, choose to spend a few months building the content, traffic and income – and then selling the site at a much higher price. Since the site is pulling in traffic and a profit (even if it’s a small profit), it commands a higher price because there’s proof that it’s profitable. People are now buying into proven profits rather than profit potential.
Here is an example:
My buddy, Ben Shaffer, taught me this method. I followed him as he created a blog, promoted it online and sold it for $1,440 in just 19 days. The only money he spend on the blog: $9.95 for the domain registration. This is what is called “flipping websites”. He should have kept the site for a few months and then sold it, but he wanted to prove a point to me which is his strategy worked.
The key is to find the right keywords that create the right amount of traffic.
If there are advertisements as you do searches related to the niche, then there is money to be made. Here are a few more: candle making; lacrosse; horse dressage; model trains; forex trading (super competitive niche); learning to play the guitar; and dog training.
Just because you don’t have an interest in something doesn’t mean there aren’t people out there who are paying to learn more about a topic or buy related items to their interests online. I’m sure you have a few hobbies or interest other people wouldn’t touch with a stick. This is about making money, so go in with an open mind and don’t limit your thinking about what people will pay for.
When researching keywords you want to find ones that have a decent amount of daily searches (usually 80+) and limited competition (less than 30,000 competing pages). But you want to make sure you have competition (because that means there is money to be made). If you see Google AdSense ads to the right of the search engine result pages, then you can be sure there’s money in the niche, otherwise people wouldn’t spend money to advertise. The more ads on the right, the better.
Once you’ve found a niche, and about five search terms you want to rank for. Register a domain name related to the niche, and set-up a Wordpress blog. If you use JustHost or BlueHost, you can set-up the Wordpress blog with the single click of the button, there is no need to program or figure anything out. Now, just grab a free theme and install it onto your Wordpress blog and write at least five posts centered around those “high traffic” and “little to moderate competition” keyword phrases you researched in the earlier step. If you don’t like writing you can outsource the task to someone who does on sites like eLance
Build backlinks to the blog from authority websites, directories, other websites within the niche and then monetize the website with affiliate products, CPA Offers, or Google AdSense ads.
If properly done, with about 50-100 articles on your blog, your website should pull in between $100 - $300 each and every month.
If you set 10 - 20 of these up within a two or three month timeframe each, you can essentially quit your day job. It really is that easy. And just like a property that cash flows, if you need a lump sum of cash, just sign up with Flippa.com and sell your site. A “good” price would be 10x - 12x monthly earnings. Don’t be like Ben though; wait at least 3 to 6 months before selling your site, that way you can command higher valuations.
Creating blogs is a great hobby for your kids.
The first year, you won't make much money (you didn't publish many articles yet), but then it grows steadily. This also presumes you do some SEO, search engine optimization.