Note: This blog post is a sponsored conversation written by Lynn Smythe, the Founder and Chief Blogger for The Creative Cottage lifestyle blog. The opinions, thoughts, ideas and text are all mine.
Have you been blogging for a while but can’t figure out how to monetize your blog? If you are a blogger or have been thinking about starting a blog as a way to make a little extra money, then this post is for you! Here’s my review of Get Blogged, an amazing blogger outreach service I just started working with.
Monetizing your blog is not a get rich quick scheme. You can’t expect it to be like 1989 Kevin Costner movie Field of Dreams – build it and they will come. Contrary to popular belief, just because you’ve built what you think is the bomb diggity of all blogs doesn’t mean that brands will magically appear with wads of cash to pay you to talk about their business, brand or services.
Blogger Outreach Horror Stories
There are many different ways you can try and make money from your blog. Some people use affiliate links, digital ads, while others create and sell their own digital products, use blogger outreach services, or provide reviews in exchange for free product and/or a small monetary stipend. I call it The Good, The Bad and The Ugly of Blogger Outreach.
I am contacted on almost a weekly basis by various PR agencies, marketing firms and even brands themselves wanting to work with me. Most of the opportunities I run far away from. There are certain topics I will never cover on either of my Creative Cottage or Sloth Athletica blogs. These topics including vaping, alcohol, gambling or anything to do with adult entertainment – in fact, I think I’m blushing just typing this!
Most of these opportunities are a big waste of time. I reply to the email, thank them for reaching out then ask a bunch of questions to get a feel for what they are looking for. Do they want to do a Paid Guest Post, where they provide me with the content, a paid product review or would they like me to write the post?
My day job, when I’m not blogging, is: Marketing Content Specialist. So, I usually opt for #3, Sponsored Content opportunities. This gives me control over the specific content that appears on my blog. While the brand, PR agency or blogger outreach service may give me some direction on what they would like me to cover, I still have the final say in what to write in the post.
The problem with posting content that has been written by someone else is that, although you can do some basic edits; the person creating the content may not be a great writer, the content may sound too much like a sales pitch, or English is a second language for the writer and the final product is barely legible. I don’t want to spend 3 hours editing someone’s 1,000 word blog post, I’d rather write the content myself!
How I Make Money Using Blogger Outreach Services
The most legitimate way I’ve made a few dollars from my blogs is via Blogger Outreach. As I mentioned above, sponsored content is when a brand or blogger outreach service, such as Get Blogged, has you create an original post for their client. You pitch the opportunity and if chosen, you have a certain number of days to create the content and publish the post on your blog.
The blogger outreach service will assign a member of their team to review the content, to make sure it meets their quality control standards. Once they approve your post, they submit payment to you usually within a day or two. I use PayPal as it lets me accept money in just about any currency, convert it to USD, then transfer to my bank account.
You research and write the content so you have control over the length, quality, tone of voice, etc. The brand, or client working with the blogger outreach service, asks for one or more links back to their website. But this is more than link building, you are writing a good, informative, helpful article and including a few natural links in the content.
Fees are negotiable and depend on a number of factors such as the DA (domain authority) ranking of your blog, how old the blog is, the quality of content on the blog, number of blog posts, etc. They will also take a look at your social media accounts and Google Analytics to look at things like number of followers, page views and engagement rate. The number one thing to look for when working with link building services is to only work with brands or write about products and services that you believe in, that you already use, and that your blog audience is interested in reading about.
If you have a health, fitness and wellness blog then you probably don’t want to write about anything to do with smoking, gambling, dating – that’s not the audience you are trying to reach. However; if a brand approaches you to write about their RV/camper client – that might be a good fit if you have an outdoor niche blog and are already covering specific locations and destinations where you like to go camping, hiking, cycling, and running.
Another example of a good fit is a general lifestyle blog, such as The Creative Cottage, that includes many articles on writing, blogging and communications. My blog is the perfect fit for writing about a blogger outreach service such as Get Blogged as Writing & Blogging is one of the main topics I cover on the blog.
Behind the Scenes with Get Blogged
Get Blogged is the perfect solution for bloggers interested in monetizing their blog. It’s also a Blogger Outreach Service so they can help brands and businesses looking to outsource their blogger outreach services in a cost effective manner.
Although I’ve been blogging for many years – first on Blogger, then Typepad, now on WordPress.org for my two current blogs – I’ve just recently started to look for opportunities to monetize my blog. I discovered Get Blogged shortly after I started researching blogger outreach services. I registered in the middle of September for a free blogger account, started submitting pitches right away and was accepted for my first assignment in October. Payment varies depending on the assignment and the domain authority, DA, of your blog. A higher DA means higher payments.
I recently had a chance to sit down with Lucy, a member of the Get Blogged team. The first question I asked her was; How and why did Get Blogged come into existence?
Lucy mentioned that the Get Blogged team are also site owners and had been working with bloggers for a few years on a one-to-one basis. She said, “Every month we discussed a better way of doing our Blogger Outreach. Eventually, we had too many bloggers and too many brands. Our team sat down and planned the creation of a platform that would allow Bloggers, Influencers, Brands and Site Owners to all work together – hassle free!”
The team behind the scenes at Get Blogged includes Lucy whose background is in UX design, web development, marketing as well as blogging as a side gig. Ben is a PHP and marketing wizard and also owns lots of websites. While Joey is a paid advertising master with a love of fancy socks. Lucy went on to mention that, “We launched Get Blogged in February 2018, and have paid over £50k in Blogger collaborations. We’re pretty proud of that fact, and we’re just starting.”
Although Get Blogged is based in the UK, and many of their assignments are from UK clients, they are actually a worldwide blogging platform. I’m in the U.S. and there are quite a few assignments I have been accepted to so far. Lucy mentioned that, “At the moment, most of our blogging opps are for UK Bloggers, but we do have a good proportion of paid opportunities going to worldwide Bloggers. We have bloggers situated all over the globe, and we have plans to try to include everyone in the near future.”
So, in conclusion, if you are looking for legitimate ways to monetize your blog, try a blogger outreach service such as Get Blogged!
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