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John Chow dot Com rambles about many topics. However, the focus on most of the posts is to make money online. This is something I’ve been able to do with other sites but I have never tried it with a blog until seven months ago. That’s when I started a case study to see if you really can make money on the Internet with a personal blog. It has been a fascinating journey so far.

Starting with just Google AdSense, John Chow dot Com made $352.94 in its first month as a moneymaking blog. In October, blog income jumped to $1,361.64 as I added more revenue sources. And it continued to go up: $2,139.93 in November, $2,790.05 in December, $3,440.66 in January and $7,011.05 last month.

With six months of non-stop growth, one has to wonder when the party will end. Well, I’m happy to report that the party is still going on!

Total Blog Income For March 2007: $8,545.25

march-2007-income.png

I was actually skeptical about beating the February income because so much of it came from the 50% ReviewMe sale. There was no ReviewMe sale in March so advertisers had to pay full price for a review. However, it turns out advertisers like this blog so much, they buy with or without a sale. Here is the income breakdown.

  • ReviewMe: $2,400
  • Affiliate Sales: $1,962.20
  • Text Links Ads: $1,308.06
  • Google AdSense: $1,129.60
  • Direct Ad Sales: $625.00
  • Vibrant Media: $357.08
  • Kontera: $296.12
  • TTZ Media: $278.92
  • FeedBurner Ads: $188.27
  • Grand Total: $8,545.25

Blog traffic for March was 313,510 page views from 152,471 unique visitors, according to Google Analytics. This is a nice increase over February results but still off the 229,853 unique visitors and 360,967 page views posted back in October.

Blog expenses for the month was $480.75 for Google IM ads to other blogs and $197.45 in normal Google ads. John Chow dot Com is hosted on the TTZ Media servers for free. I estimate the hosting value at $25 per month. My friends at Bluefur.com has a $24.95 Enhanced Unix package that will easily handle the traffic this blog gets (use promo code JohnChowRock to get 15% off).

If you take the blog income and divide it by the blog page view, you get a site wide eCPM (effective cost per 1000) of $27.26. This is a crazy high rate for a blog. Most blogs are happy making a buck or two per 1000 page views. How much would your blog make if you can get $27.26 per 1000 page views? Here is how I do it.

Never Stop Tweaking

After posting over $7,000 of income last month, you figured I would leave well enough alone. In this business, you cannot stop tweaking - there is always something you can do to improve the blog. This something doesn’t mean just tweaking the ads. It also means tweaking the site layout and text. For example, I changed the title of the blog front page from John Chow dot Com The Miscellaneous Ramblings of a Dot Com Mogul to Make Money Online with John Chow dot Com. This helped me rank number two on Google for search term “make money online.”

For this month, I am switching out the TTZ Media ads for Auction Ads. It will be interesting to see how they perform. I also plan to go after the keywords, make money on the Internet. Right now, I am at the middle of page two on the Google SERP. Expect to see me on page one this month. Never stop tweaking!

Add More Income Sources

You must never place all your eggs in Google’s basket. If all you have running on your blog is Google AdSense, you are losing out big time. The key to making money on a blog is the revenue mix. Add as many revenue sources as you can while still offering a good user experience.

A few days ago, I posted about the partnership I set up with Kontera that will allow smaller blogs to use their ContentLink service. If you haven’t signed up for that, you should. It’s a great opportunity for lower traffic sites to take advantage of a revenue source that is only available to high traffic sites. Fill out this application and enter “John Chow Kontera partnership” into the Comments field. The application is sent to my personal account representative. He will approve you based on your blog content and not your traffic level. I made almost $300 with Kontera last month and I know it will make way more this month because I only had it on for 12 days in February.

I had nine sources of blog income in March. If I only ran Google AdSense, I would have made just $1,129.60 instead of $8,545.25. At the very least I think you should sign up for ReviewMe, Text Link Ads and Kontera. ReviewMe and TLA have fairly high entrance requirements, but anyone can sign up to Kontera through this blog.

For The First Time Visitor/Blogger

If you’re new to the world of blogging and want to know how to make money on the Internet, I recommend you read all the old posts from the Making Money From a Blog series. This will show you step-by-step, how I took this blog from zero to better than fulltime income. You should also check out the Top Posts. This is where I link to some of my best work with many articles talking about making money online.

I also recommend you read the comments left on this blog. John Chow dot Com has a very vibrant and active community of users with great ideas to share. Please consider joining it.

April is going to be a real interesting month. I have new ad sources running and AGLOCO is set to release their Viewbar. You think I’ll be able to beat March earnings? :twisted:

Find out what I am doing right now by following me on Twitter! If you like this post then please consider subscribing to my full feed RSS. You can also subscribe by Email and have new posts sent directly to your inbox.

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    196 Comments

    Comment by Tyler
    2007-04-01 20:23:45
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Nice to see you keep going up and up!

    I was accepted for Kontera and I have a little bit of tweaking to do I think with it.

    It’s also nice to see your ReviewMe reviews are steady and help with the majority of March’s income.

    Comment by My New Choice
    2007-04-01 21:30:31
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I also took advantage of the Kontera offer and have already seen some rewards. While not much compared to John’s numbers, I am seeing results already after only a few days.

    In addition to that, I have already sold 3 of 6 TLA spots (although my prices are dirt cheap) and I’ve had a couple of ReviewMe reviews come in. Top that off with increasing AdSense earnings and my blog is finally starting to get a little traction.

    Thanks John!

    Comment by Culture Shiok!
    2007-04-01 23:20:17
    MyAvatars 0.2

    :?: Hey sorry guys n gals, this is a bit out of the topic, but did anyone else notice the changing Technorati masthead logo?

    Someone’s messing up Technorati! :mad:

    and it’s not John Chow….

    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 00:11:54
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I just visited and didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary. Cant’ say I had their logo memorized though.

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    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 01:25:27
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I memorized it.. I don’t see any changes :razz:

     
    Comment by WesleyTech.com
    2007-04-02 06:45:14
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Congrats again on another record breaking month! John Chow, making money online whore. :lol:

    Thank you,
    Wesley Novack
    http://DVDRentalForums.com

     
     
    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:07:19
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Yea me 2! it’s like the same parin;)

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    Comment by derrich
    2007-04-02 08:22:58
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    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 08:29:26
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Rotatechin and Nicethroat rankings are very important these days.. :grin:

     
     
     
    Comment by Philomena Ojikutu
    2007-04-02 00:15:09
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Good news John from your corner.

    I beat you in page views for the first time this March (I had 350,000 with 41,000 unique visitors). The humble result however is trhat My Adsense income for all that was just a little less thaty 400USD, compared to your 1,129.60USD Adsense income, while my Kontera for the same period was 31USD, compared to your 12-day Kontera income of 296.12USD.

    Is there anything that I am not doing right? Please I need your invaluable and worthy advice.

     
     
    Comment by James
    2007-04-01 22:32:31
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I just placed Kontera on my blog. I hope it will provide a good option to Adsense.

     
    Comment by Stuart Hannig
    2007-04-01 23:38:35
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I got into Kontara as well. :)

     
    Comment by Scot
    2007-04-02 00:07:50
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I’m still waiting on Kontera! I plan on making April the month to start making some cash!

    – Scot

    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 00:12:20
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Planning on signing up for Kontera real soon, myself :)

     
    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:08:05
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Yea me 2!:) kontera has unique ads

     
    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 02:50:36
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Just signed up, I’m waiting for approval…

     
     
    Comment by Babak
    2007-04-02 01:07:01
    MyAvatars 0.2

    John,
    why did you switch from intellitxt to konterra? esp as itxt was giving you $600-500 vs konterra’s $300?

    Comment by John Chow
    2007-04-02 02:06:05
    MyAvatars 0.2

    IntelliTXT ran for the first 19 days. Kontera ran the last 12.

    Comment by Staska
    2007-04-02 07:29:52
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Congrats John, great month.

    Regarding Kontera, I signed up and have been running it for a few days now.

    My CTR on the ads is great and I like the number of clicks I generate. But the CPC for my Kontera ads is just awful, something 4 to 5 times lower then other CPC programs I run.

    Kontera says something about giving it a couple of weeks for tweaking but is CPC likely to increase?

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    Comment by Babak
    2007-04-02 12:35:21
    MyAvatars 0.2

    so how did they stack up? a review perhaps?
    :twisted:
    can you run both at the same time? or would that be too cluttered even if the tos allowed it?

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    Comment by Matthew Jones
    2007-04-02 01:52:39
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Kontera already accepted me andmy blog has hardly any traffic! - and I didn’t do it through your thing John :???:

     
     
    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-01 20:24:19
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Unbelievable, absolutely unbelievable.

    I predict that you’ll hit $10k within two months; you seem to have a tremendous amount of positive momentum right now, and a great mix of advertising.

    Comment by Yumcha Girl
    2007-04-01 20:52:25
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I concur. I think John will be able to hit that mark quite easily and beyond. Good on you John! Oh, and it’s nice to know you are still around here. I was really worried when I initially read your April Fool’s joke!

     
    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-01 20:55:56
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I wouldn’t be surprised if he hit 10k in two months either :)

    Comment by Jonix
    2007-04-01 21:22:30
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I don’t say two months, i would bet that the next month john will hit the 10k mark

    Comment by lyndonmaxewell
    2007-04-01 22:13:54
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Yea, I’ll be waiting for that to happen as well.. :D It shouldn’t be too far away.

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    Comment by James
    2007-04-01 22:29:11
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I agree with you, I think he will make it this month.
    He will be getting a bit more traffic from Google with the new keyword ranking.

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    Comment by Jauhari
    2007-04-02 00:03:12
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Yes… I think John can beat it :idea:

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    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 00:13:09
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I think next month is a bit too soon for him to be hitting the 10k mark.

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    Comment by Scot
    2007-04-02 00:20:24
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Once you start snowballing, it doesn’t get smaller :)

    – Scot

    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 08:07:51
    MyAvatars 0.2

    What needs to happen for John to catapult his income over 10k is $500 review me’s again. For that to happen, he needs to get back in the top 100 of Technorati, but that shouldn’t be a problem he’s up to 133 already :)

     
     
    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:09:12
    MyAvatars 0.2

    you said so!! I mean john’s income grows every month!

     
     
    Comment by Gregg
    2007-04-01 20:25:14
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I can’t wait until the AGLOCO viewbar comes out. I bet your monthly income jumps quite a bit :D Keep up the great work!

    Many of us could only wish to make as much as you do with a website and blog…

    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 00:14:15
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I wouldn’t classify Agloco income as blog income. Also when it does come out, that doesn’t mean money is going to be flowing right away either. Since the company is giving stock for view time, not money.

    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 01:36:58
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Agloco income is definitely classifies as blog income. Tell me, how many referrals would John have if it hadn’t been for this blog?

    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:10:15
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Where does john put his agloco links?

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    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 04:35:26
    MyAvatars 0.2

    He has a category devoted to AGLOCO and he posts about it occasionally..

     
     
    Comment by Marc
    2007-04-02 10:00:49
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I don’t know… I’d put it as “miscellaneous other”, but hey it’s John’s site and he can do as he pleases :)

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    Comment by Johnny_Cash
    2007-04-01 20:29:36
    MyAvatars 0.2

    John,

    Can you give me the link to your post about how you begin TechZone? I am reading it yesterday, but I forgot to bookmark it. Now, I couldn’t find it in your archive anymore.

    Comment by My New Choice
    2007-04-01 21:34:41
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Is this the post you were looking for?

    Comment by Stuart Hannig
    2007-04-01 23:41:19
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Very nice article :)

     
    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 00:16:50
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Very interesting read! :)

     
    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:10:47
    MyAvatars 0.2

    That’s nice! nice article john!

     
    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:11:18
    MyAvatars 0.2

    I want to congratulate you john for such a great site!

     
     
     
    Comment by Juan Francisco Diez
    2007-04-01 20:30:19
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Wow that´s great! :grin:

    You are close to achieve the 10k for dot-com mogulness only with your blog :shock:

    Comment by KidBlogger
    2007-04-02 02:12:01
    MyAvatars 0.2

    YEa.. I dunno with john! he just discusses his mogulness but still earns alot of greens!

    Comment by Dave
    2007-04-02 08:09:02
    MyAvatars 0.2

    John has some good posts about earning money.

     
     
     
    Comment by Aris
    2007-04-01 20:31:15
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Too busy to miss your April Fool joke, but glad to read your March’s numbers.

     
    Comment by Manthem
    2007-04-01 20:40:12
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Excellent work John, soon you’re going to have to recreate your Internet whores list.

    Comment by Alex
    2007-04-02 01:39:21
    MyAvatars 0.2

    It’s Google whores and he’s got a long way ahead of him to get on that one :twisted:

    Comment by Marc
    2007-04-02 10:13:59
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Yeah those guys earn at least 15 times more than John per month. John’s got a long way to go before then.

     
     
     
    Comment by Ed Lau
    2007-04-01 20:40:13
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Should be 10k before…June?

    Comment by Juan Francisco Diez
    2007-04-01 21:19:46
    MyAvatars 0.2

    Well he should be at Computex during June. Unless he doesn´t sleep, he won´t be able to post that much.

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