My blog is nearing a year old, but I am still an extremely small blogger. My page views aren’t nearly what most people have after one year. This is mainly because this past year has been busy (having a newborn is a little time-consuming) and I wasn’t able to give my full attention to blogging. This year I have HUGE goals for my blog and I am willing to do what needs to be done to get there.
This post contains affiliate links to products that have helped me in my blogging journey. I hope you get success from using these products too!
Last year I was aimlessly blogging. I knew I wanted to turn my blog into a business and even knew how to do that, but what I didn’t know was what the steps were in between. I owe my 2016 blog strategy exclusively to the BlogPreneur course by Business2Blogger that I took in December of 2015. This is a video course (enrollment is open now!) with step by step tutorials on how to market yourself on your blog and social media. I can’t even get started on the topics I have mastered due to this course because I will be writing for days. Here is my recent testimony that I sent in to the Business2Blogger team:
“What I loved about BlogPreneur is that Holly, Becky, and Paula are literally opening up and giving out every secret they have for becoming successful. I almost thought it wasn’t possible for them to give out any more information than they already have in their webinars, but I was so wrong. From this course I have developed an extensive step by step plan for growing my Facebook reach with tools from Holly, I have learned exactly how to make images that will capture reader’s attention via screen shares from Becky, and have learned how to optimize my blog posts for going viral from Paula. Those are just the highlights that stood out to me and not even close to the amount of valuable resources offered in the course!”
Anyway, because of this course I now know exactly where I am going with my business and how to get there. The course is taught by 3 bloggers who have a slew of children (I have learned awesome time management skills from them haha!) and still are able to get over a million page views and earn almost $40,000 in one month!
But how did I sustain a business and make an income before this course? In 2015 I broke 2,000 page views in only 3 months out of the year (according to Google Analytics). For the majority of 2015 my page views were 1000 or below! If you are a blogger you know that is NOTHING compared to most of the bloggers who make money in this business, but I was able to make a total of $1,520.00 in 2015 with only 12,000 page views for the entire year. Here is the breakdown of where I made this money from:
Sway Group (2 Sponsored Posts): $750.00
Acorn Influence (2 Sponsored Posts): $625.00
Sverve (Sponsored Social Media Shares): $4.00
IZEA (Sponsored Social Media Shares): $25.00
BlogHer (Sponsored Social Media Shares): $75.00
ShareASale (Affiliate): $30.00
Google Adsense: $11.00
Obviously by these numbers you can tell that the majority of my income this year came from sponsored posts which have allowed me to put some of the money back into my business and pay for hosting fees, get a blog theme that I truly love, and take the BlogPreneur course. Since becoming a blogger, I have heard countless bloggers say not to even focus on sponsored content until you’ve reached 100,000 page views per month, but I want to debunk that theory for bloggers like myself who need to make money in order to keep their business and household going. We didn’t have the extra money to throw at this new adventure I decided to take. This was something that I was determined to do and I knew that I could succeed at if I gave it my all.
The ideal situation for a blogger is to use those first couple of months to a year to create a solid foundation on both your blog and social media and then after that is established to start monetizing. My story is a little bit different though. I set up my blog with all of the boring stuff, like Google Analytics and sitemaps. Then after I created my layout, wrote one or two posts, and set up my social media accounts, I immediately started monetizing.
I am no expert and I am not saying this is what you should do, but this is what worked for me.
The first thing I did was create a Google AdSense account, then I added my blog to as many influencer networks that would accept me (usually based on page views). I knew based on the fact that I had just started I wouldn’t get accepted for many offers if any at all! The first post on my blog was written in March of 2015 and by August I had received my first substantial sponsored post offer for $400. I truly believe that the reason why I was offered a sponsored post so early in my blogging career was because of my consistency and willingness to apply to EVERYTHING. I still apply for every paid opportunity I see, even when I know that no company is going to offer me that kind of compensation for so little exposure. In August, when I received that offer, my page views were only at 2,069 and because of a huge dip in traffic for a couple of months due to me having to cut back on blogging I am still under 3000 views a month so far in January 2016.
I am actually pretty nervous to be sharing my income and page views with everyone because they aren’t even close to where I want to be, but I wanted to share the proof that everyone starts somewhere and for small bloggers not to be afraid to put themselves out there. Approach companies, apply for sponsored posts, and be relentless! Don’t let them forget who you are.
I love this post! It give a small blogger like me some hop in actually making some money!
You can do it! 🙂
This is wonderful! My blog is a similar size (a little bigger, but I have been blogging about 6 months more than you), and I get very discouraged by page views bc I desperately need to be making money too. Thank you for this encouragement!
How much is that course?
I am not 100% sure how much it will be, but it is opening back up in February. I think the price is around $500, but they were talking about running a $100 off special sometime in February. If you click on the link in my post I believe you can opt in to receive an email when it opens back up. The course is invaluable. Since I joined they have added 3 or 4 more bonuses and we are all part of a Facebook group who has 24/7 access to the course instructors. They give incredible advice through that and have made tons of extra videos to help us with whatever we need. I’m so glad I joined!
Thanks for sharing! Very clean blog like the look and glad you were persistent with the monetizing right away. Good list of who to talk too!
Thank you for the compliments 🙂
Love this post. I especially love that you are sharing your page views. We all have to start somewhere and it’s never too early to apply for paid gigs! I look forward to watching you grow!
Thank you! It’s a little scary to share your numbers before you are where you want to be, but you all have been so encouraging!
I love that you shared this! I’m a “small” blogger I guess you could say as well based on my pageviews. I’m striving to reach 5000/month, but after 5 years of blogging, I’m still not there. Now, I know where I went wrong and so wish I could go back and change things around, but I’m learning from my hindsight and growth is happening. I make over $300/month these days and it’s the best feeling ever! You really don’t have to have the numbers, just the consistency and quality. The numbers follow after that.
I totally agree. I’m learning that consistency will get you far in not only your blog, but in social media too. $300 a month is awesome…go you!
I can totally related because I was in a similar situation when I had my travel blog a few years ago. We were getting approached for sponsored posts and were able to monetize it after the first year. I believe we made about $5k in 2 years which isn’t so bad considering we were learning as we went. Then we ran out of content 🙁 But now I just launched a new blog called Motherly Adventures with Nara and we’re so excited! We feel like we know what we’re doing now (more or less!) and we’re hoping it won’t take too long to monetize it.
Great post!
That’s so fun! Someday I plan on launching another blog too so you’ll have to let me know if it is easier the second time around.
Love this!!! Often sponsors are looking for YOU and want YOU no matter how many page views you are getting on OTHER content.
Thank you Holly! 😀
This is exactly what I was googling this week but found nothing useful; were you reading my mind (or google history?). Thank you so much for your honesty and for showing your stats – it really helps me to relate to you and feel hopeful for a smaller blogger. I started 8 months ago and am really happy with where I’ve grown to now but have bigger hopes for the future. For Massive Sway, I just signed up this week, and when I log in it says there are no campaigns. How often will you be eligible for campaigns?
LOL! I promise I’m not that creepy! I am so glad that you can relate to this post, that is what I was hoping to do. They usually have new campaigns every week, but I have noticed they are a little slow this month. Hopefully they will pick back up soon. I love working with them!
I love this post! You prove that numbers aren’t the most important! It’s so discouraging when companies turn me down because I don’t have a huge following, 10k page views, etc. are those networks you listed the only ones you’re a part of or just the ones you have paid posts with?
Those are just the ones that I have worked with last year. I am a part of several others. At the bottom of this post there is a link to another post called “How to get sponsored opportunities as a blogger”. I am apart of most of them on that list 🙂
Thank you so much for being so open and sharing all this information. It’s so great to see someone with a smaller blog is still able to make money. I’m small too, and really need to start applying for more things. Thanks for the inspiration.
It’s so encouraging to get opportunities like this as a small blogger. It keeps you going on the days that you just feel like quitting 🙂
That’s amazing! I’ve only just started looking for sponsored posts (I’ve had one so far but they found me) but thought I needed loads more pageviews. I get around 5000-6000 so fingers crossed I’ll find something!
I’m sure you will! Good luck!
What a great post!! Definitely gives us small bloggers hope! Thanks for the tips!!
Good luck with your blog!
Looks like you are doing awesome!! Thanks for sharing your tips, and go you- totally rocking it, especially with a newborn!
Thank you for the kind words!
This is such a great post! SO informative and so helpful. Thanks for sharing such great resources. 🙂 I love when people help each other! 🙂 You go girl!
I love reading posts like this so I figured I might as well write my own! Thank you for the encouragement <3
This is awesome. Love this post and how it can help smaller bloggers out.
Hi Michelle! I’m super fingerling over here that you have checked out my post. I LOVE your blog and get so much inspiration from your income reports. Thank you for being so transparent! <3
Thank you for this post! I was starting to get discouraged and this gave me some hope!
Yay! Don’t get discouraged, blogging is a long and bumpy road but has great payoffs. If you ever want to talk bloggy things feel free to email me 🙂
Thank you very much!