Making Money As a Human Resources Blogger: Part II
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You are correct, unfortunately. Teh story is a little different for general business blogs. According to Technorati, the average blogger earned $6,000 last year, and some earned as much as $75,000 writing business blogs.
Personally, I have yet to receive my first check from Google.
I agree, you can’t get rich blogging. If you get an advertiser with a higher return than adsense that helps. I am by no means rich, but I am slightly less poor because of the BlogHer ads on my “blog”. It bought me my new ipod. and macbook.
Yeah. I agree. Most “get rich and happen to blog”….well, they don’t HAPPEN to blog, they use it as a part of a strategy. But while there are plenty of examples of people making good money blogging out there, most were ‘early adopters’ and built up a huge following over years. (Steve Pavlina comes to mind as someone who makes money blogging, but now he has a book too….and even he says it takes 5 years to make any serious money at just blogging.)
It happens.
But it’s rare.
Besides, there are plenty of other really good reasons to blog that have little to nothing to do with money.
All the best!
deb
I made 75 cents via Google Adsense, so far. *Somebody* clicked through. It happens. I waited for it to happen again the next day, but it didn’t. Maybe the Googlers figured out that I work for the competition, and diverted traffic from my blog. Oh that’s right, we’re in a partnership now. Oh well, visit my blog and make me rich!
I
I’m late to chime in, but I know this: Blogging is no way to make money. Neither is writing books. It’s a lottery…for every people you hear about that made it big there are millions who suck along with stupid Google ads thinking they’re gonna be the one. I think it’s just embarrassing.
I know some people who have made, and are making, millions with their sites. Want a hint? Affiliate marketing. Sell something — a CD, a course, content. An have a million people in your mailing list — people who have left you their name, email addy, and a lot more.
Other than that, blogging is a fun exercise. It’s good for writers and it’s good for exchanging ideas. If you consult, it’s a living resume of your thinking.
Anyone who says they make a living by blogging in non-political, non-litigation areas is lying.
I agree with everyone that you can’t get rich writing a blog, only someone gives you money because of your blog. Look at Bill Simmons, Ana Marie Cox, and Will Leitch. They all started blogs and are getting rich from creating a blog. Maybe SHRM might pay you a lot for blogging (or not).
And I blog for the fun of it and release my fury on the keyboard. Also, I;m worried Google might accidently give me a check for adsense. I swear, some have search my name and put the word porn next to my name. I’m not taking chances, I’ll just use word-of-mouth.
@Michael I don’t know anyone who has made 75 cents on a Human Resources blog.
@Bethany Oh man, I love your new iPod. I went to the Apple store & checked them out. Love the purple one.
@Deb I think you’re right that ‘celebrity’ and ’success’ happen — but it’s rare.
@Peopleshark That video you sent me? It will be up on my blog, tomorrow. The discussion continues. PS — I’ll click on your google ads forthwith.
@Corey I’m going to make you a t-shirt that says I BLAME GOOGLE.
@Frank I cringe when I hear about people who obsessively watch their stats and count their google nickels & dimes. Give me a break. It feels naive to me. Also, you can get so caught up with creating your brand that you forget about CONTENT and MESSAGE. I guess it’s true for all businesses, though. You become irrelevant if you forget about your mission & values.
@Tracy I think it’s weird how people expect to be paid for their blogs. If I call you up on the phone and you tell me about your day, it’s a conversation. If I read about your day on your blog, it’s your brand? PS — SHRM couldn’t pay me at this point.
I wonder if some blogger will make I BLAME GOOGLE tee shirts and actually make money selling them on their blog.
You are right. Human Resources is probably not a good money making blog niche like say a “how to make money blogging” site.
However, one strategy you could use is to partner up with someone who’s put together an HR product to sell (course, book, etc). Your site drives the traffic, they worry about sales and you both split the money. Also, consider finding HR products to review on your blog. I’ve got one page on a blog I run that has made $500 – $900 a month for the last year. It simply answered the question, does X product really work. Get 3 or 4 of these kind of posts and you can pay your mortgage, retire from corporate America and write (mostly) whatever the hell you want.
Laurie -
Making money as a human resource ________ (fill in the blank). You don’t get rich doing anything HR related.
@Dan That is so true.
When I made my first blog, I used a very good template and made some really great posts. The templates was very much optimized for adsense, I made it look very good for the niche I was going after. But, for some reason the click through ratio was very poor. I sold the blog and moved on, I’m thinking about trying it again, but this time with affiliate products. All I know is it isn’t as easy as some people say it is online.