John Chow dot Com started off as a personal blog to talk about whatever was on my mind. The blog was never intended to make any money and for the first eight months of its life it had total income of zero. Because one of the topics I talked about was how to make money from blogging I got many emails and comments asking me to prove that it can be done. That’s when I decided to do a case study on making money by blogging.
The goal of the case study was to make full time income ($3,000 per month) with part time blogging (2 hours per day). In its first month as a monetized blog, John Chow dot Com made $352.94. Four months later, it would hit its full time income goal. Today, the blog makes a bit more than full time income. How much more?
Total Blog Income for October 2008 – $34,350.93
While $34,350.93 is a nice income, it’s down by nearly $4,000 from last month. This is because I didn’t attend any shows last month so my appearance fee earnings went from $4,000 to zero. Here’s the income breakdown.
- Affiliate Commissions: $12,652.52
- Private Ad Sales: $10,290.00
- Shoemoney Tools: $4000.00
- ReviewMe: $4,000.00
- Text Link Ads: $2,112.91
- Kontera: $1,000.00
- RSS Ads: $295.50
- Total Income: $34,350.93
Affiliate commissions continues to be the blog’s number one money maker. Shoemoney Tools is part of affiliate commissions but I’ve separated it in order to show the residue income power of affiliate marketing. Shoe offers 20% for life on any sales you referred. Shoemoney Tools are sold by monthly subscription so you can make that 20% month after month. My income from Shoemoney Tools has double in one month because of new sign ups and renewals from old sign ups.
This is the beauty of affiliate marketing. I’m still being paid for sales I’ve made years ago and that income will continue to come in even if this blog is no longer around. If I were to shut the blog down today, it would still make five figures every month because of the residue affiliate income.
Blog traffic for October was 321,983 page views from 218,396 visitors, according to Google Analytic. Blog expense for the month was $335.58 for contextual advertising. Hosting for John Chow dot Com is sponsored by BlueFur Webhosting. They provided the quad-core server that powers this blog. Use coupon code JohnChowRocks for 15% off any BlueFur hosting package.
How To Be a Big Money Blogger
The key to making big money by blogging is to drive a lot traffic and then maximize the hell out of that traffic. It doesn’t matter how great your content is if nobody reads it. However, if you have a ton of traffic but only run Google AdSense, then you’re leaving a lot of money on the table. Do not put all you eggs in one basket. You need to run as many revenue options as possible while still preserving the user experience. Check out my recommended money makers to see what systems I used to produce my blog income.
I also recommend you download my free eBook, Make Money Online with John Chow dot Com. The book explains the methods I used to create content, drive traffic and make money online. You can get it for free by signing up for my free newsletter at the top of the page.