When people ask me what I do for a living and I reply, "I'm a travel blogger," I can pretty much see the confusion in their faces.
They're thinking, How can a blog make money? Isn't that just a hobby? Who pays you? How much can you really make?
Based on my own experience — and those of many other bloggers in different industries — I'm going to answer these questions (and more).
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How many blogs are out there?
According to WPvirtuoso.com, there is a blog created on the Internet every half-second. That's over 170,000 new blogs being created every single day! The same study also claimed that there were over 152 million blogs on the Internet in 2013. Given their calculation of a new blog every half second, in 2015, there would have been around 276 million blogs worldwide.
This may sound like a saturated market, and it is, but the vast majority of these blogs are hobbies, not careers. There are very few bloggers out there who are actively trying to earn a full-time income from their work, and thus, the competition is not as fierce as the above numbers would suggest. (See also: 22 Websites That Will Pay You to Write for Them)
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Who pays bloggers?
Typically, bloggers earn income streams from many different sources, but overall, their earnings can be roughly broken down into three main categories.
1. Direct advertising
This is when a company places a link or a banner ad on a blog. Typically, advertisers will pay a monthly or yearly fee for this placement. Banner ads can pay upwards of $300 a month, so if a blogger places three or four of these, the revenue will start to add up. Some blogs have 10-15 banner ads throughout their website, earning them thousands of dollars per month.
2. Affiliate marketing
Another common source of blogging income is through affiliate sales. Basically, a blogger links to a product or service from their website. When a reader buys that product or service through that link, the blogger receives a commission.
There are affiliates for all sorts of businesses, like Amazon, Expedia, Alamo, and many more. For mommy blogs, affiliates may be for children's toys and craft products. For tech review blogs, their best affiliates are probably through online electronics stores.
3. Sponsorships
This is when a company pays a blogger in exchange for continuous promotion. It is not uncommon for bloggers to get paid to review free gear, free travel, and free services. The sponsorship opportunities are endless and can be available in many different industries.
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How many hours per week do bloggers work?
This varies greatly from blogger to blogger. Many people claim that they work upwards of 60 hours per week on their blogs! In my case, I left a high-paying, 60-hour per week job so that I could have more time doing what I love: traveling.
I work on my blog just four hours a day, five days per week... at the very most. The great thing about an efficient blog is that you don't have to put much time into it. Once it's built with a passive income model, it can typically earn money without very much work involved.
See the rest of the story at Business Insider