The Gluten-Free Homemaker

None of the bloggers I know are in it for the money, but earning a little extra cash helps to compensate for the time and expense of blogging.  After reading a post on Problogger,  I decided to be up front with my readers about my efforts to monetize this blog.  There are ways you can support me and other bloggers if you are aware of how it works.

How I monetize this blog:

The Food Buzz ads are pretty obvious.  One reason I chose Food Buzz is because this is a food blog.  Another reason is that payment it based on page loads.  You can help bloggers with these types of adds by visiting their web pages often.  However, I’m all in favor of using a feed reader and I purposely have my entire posts published in my feeds because I understand that sometimes you just don’t have time to visit every blog. 

I use Google Adsense in my feeds and on my customized Google search page.  This has not been very profitable because payment is based on clicks, not page loads.  However, I’m not asking you  to click on ads.  You should only click on those that are of interest to you.

I also use the Amazon Affiliate program.   The way it works is I receive a small referral free for  purchases made through a link on my blog, no matter what items are purchased.  I think this is a great way to support your favorite bloggers.  When you plan on buying something at Amazon, just get there through a link on one of the blogs you read. 

Unlike Food Buzz and Adsense, I have complete control over the Amazon products that are advertised.  I use the Amazon program in a couple of ways.  The “My Store” link at the top of the page takes you to a page that lists some of my Amazon picks in several different categories including books, groceries, and kitchen items.  These are items I can personally recommend. 

I also include links to Amazon products or pages in some of my posts.  These links are generally for sales on gluten-free groceries some of which I have tried and some I have not.  I will only post Amazon links that are relevant to this blog.

Making money on blogs used to be looked down upon, but things have changed and it is pretty common these days.   I hope this information was helpful to some of you, and please let me know if you have questions or concerns. 

Labels: blogging

# posted by Linda @ 8/23/2009