Last week, I wrote a post all about Working With Brands and Not Underselling Yourself As A Blogger.
I had decided to write the post after having a few experiences with brand work that I felt had surprised me and taught me something even after over 3 years as a blogger, and I thought that others may benefit from hearing about those experiences too.
I've been really overwhelmed by the feedback I've had on the post and it's been great to hear of situations where it has been helpful to people...some people have even made money by following some of the tips in the post already and that makes me so happy!
So after some questions and comments on the subject, I'm back to share a more in depth look at exactly how I earn money from my blog, and some suggestions for you to consider if you're interested in doing the same.
Now before I start - let me just point out that although I am being completely transparent here about how much I earn and how, I am not saying that these are the highest fees you can get (Plenty of bloggers charge far more than I do, take less work than me, do things differently to me and so on) and I'm not saying that my way is the best way or the only way to approach brand work...I'm also not suggesting that brand work is for everyone...all I am doing is sharing with you what I earn, and how I do that.
Every blogger is of course different, will have different earning potential, and different desires and objectives when it comes to brand work and should do their own thing in their own way.
My Half Year Income Report
To start off with, I thought I would share a little look at my earnings for 2016 so far in an effort to demonstrate how my approach is working when it comes to earnings.
It should be noted that earnings are NOT the only aspect I consider when taking on work - I also consider how my blog statistics are doing too, as although making money is something I am aiming to do with my blog it is NOT the sole reason for me blogging and was certainly never the reason behind starting - my main objective will always be to have a creative outlet and so it's important to me that my stats are doing well as well as my earnings.
I often see blog income reports around lately and I have often wondered about publishing them regularly myself, but I always worry that it may come across as tasteless or as though I'm bragging - I don't want to brag at all but I do know that when I was a new blogger I had no idea of my earning potential and so now I like to try to be very open about that side of things so that others are aware of the game.
So here is a breakdown of my earnings for 2016 so far (Please note, these figures are before deductions):
January - £1,395 cash, £150 in vouchers
February - £1,150 cash, £100 in vouchers
March - £1,030 cash, £50 vouchers
April - £1,142 cash
May - £1,775 cash
June - £1,424 cash, £200 vouchers
July - £1,133 cash, £50 vouchers
So as you can see, every month this year I have managed to earn over £1000 in cash.
My goal for the year is to exceed £1000 every month, so far for August I am doing well toward that goal as my figure currently stands at £975 for the month (I'm writing this post on August 10th).
Now it has to be said that my blog is very much middle ground - I am not one of the highest earning bloggers, not by a LONG stretch and the fees that I charge are very much mid-rate - I know bloggers earning WELL into the thousands for certain campaigns.
But my fee works for me at the moment - the thing is that although sponsored work is something I want and need for my family (in order to allow me to be a stay at home mum), it is not my main objective and I will always want to dedicate the bulk of my time and effort into writing my own organic content - if I was charging a lot more for posts then I would feel the need to be putting far more effort into them and that my own organic content would suffer as a result - and so I charge a little less, and feel that the input required isn't quite so overwhelming as it could be if my fee was into the thousands - therefore allowing me the time I want to dedicate to my own writing.
As I mentioned in my last post, knowing what to charge can be troublesome and sticking to your guns when a company makes it seem as though you are overcharging can be difficult - there have been plenty of occasions even in the last two weeks alone where I have turned down what I considered to be low payments because a company was telling me that my fee was too high.
It can be hard to do that - especially when money is tight and you could really do with the payment they're offering - but I am trying hard to stand my ground as rather than give my time and schedule space away for less than I consider it to be worth, I would rather hold off and allow myself more time to dedicate to perfecting higher paid jobs.
And sure enough, each time I turned a post down - another one came along offering a higher payment.
So as hard as it was to say no, I did the right thing in the long run.
Here is what I take into account when working out my fee:
*My DA score, my blog traffic and my social reach - as a rule of thumb a DA score over 25 is good, a DA score over 30 can earn you more. But DA scores are NOT the be all and end all - your blog traffic and social media reach can be just as important. If you have a lower DA but a lot of followers or good engagement on social media, you can still charge a decent amount.
*The relevance of the post to my audience - I don't limit myself to posting only about certain topics but I DO charge higher for posts that I feel aren't as relevant as I'd like because they carry a risk with them of alienating some of my readership. This is something I think carefully about and weigh up before agreeing to any post.
*The work involved - does it require photography or video in addition to writing? Does it require research? How long will it take me to write it?
*Do they want social media promotion included? - my standard fee includes one tweet. Any additional social media promotion is charged at an additional rate.
*The link included - I always charge much more for gambling links or any other links that can be considered controversial or could do my site harm (Many bloggers will refuse to do those links at all and that is something to seriously consider...every one has to decide for themselves what approach to take when it comes to risky links and whether it is worth it.)
So although my standard fee is £100 - this can fluctuate greatly depending on the work involved - this month, for example, my highest fee charged has been £500 for a post and social media promotion, and my lowest fee has been £80 for a stand alone post which I accepted as a lower rate due to repeat regular work from the client.
What To Charge For
So you've got your fee worked out, great! But what should you charge for?
After my post last week, I encouraged people to ask some questions if they had them and one I was asked was "Should I be paid for brand ambassadorships?"
I thought this was a great question and I know from experience that I have been paid well in the past for brand ambassadorships only to find out further down the line that blog friends of mine, people with an equal DA and following to me, were not paid at all.
This seems unfair but of course if a brand isn't asked about payment, they're not going to just offer it up - so it's all about asking the questions - ALWAYS ASK FOR BUDGET.
Even when it seems obvious that budget is not available - because as I pointed out last week with the experiences I shared, you just never know
Once the budget question has been asked and answered - if you find out that there is no budget, then you can decide if you still want to do the collaboration for product only - but at least you KNOW and you're not going to find out down the line that someone else was handsomely paid for the same work you did in return for a few gifted items.
When it comes to brand ambassadorships, I honestly find it a pretty even split - about 50% of the ones I'm offered are paid, and 50% are not.
Last year I took on 3 brand ambassadorships - One was unpaid but I felt that the value of the products offered made it worthwhile, and two were paid - one at £300 for a 6 month ambassadorship without exclusivity, and one at £1000 for a 12 month ambassadorship with exclusivity - looking back I feel I could have charged more for that last one given the work I had to turn down as a result of it.
When it comes to charging for ambassadorships, you need to take into consideration what the brand is asking for (how many posts and social promotions they want, etc) and whether they are asking for an exclusivity contract which will bar you from taking on any work/reviews from similar brands - larger companies such as Pushchair brands for example will usually ask for exclusivity and this can mean turning down a lot of work that you would have liked to do...so make sure that a fee makes this worthwhile.
So - onto the juicy stuff - where do I get my paid work from?
To start off with - and I KNOW this sounds like a cliche but is IS true - the work really does start trickling in of its own accord.
I received my first paid work offer about 6 months in to blogging - some people may not get one for a while longer, some may get them sooner - it all just depends.
There are THOUSANDS of bloggers in the same niche as you and companies can't offer work to everyone - but keep the faith. If you're growing your readership and putting out quality content regularly then eventually you're more than likely to get a work offer in.
Once the paid work has started to come in, I recommend keeping a spreadsheet of the contact details of those PR people you work with - and every few months or so, send a friendly email asking how they are, reminding them of who you are and where you blog (Don't assume they remember you as they will work with many bloggers) and enquire as to whether they have any current collaborative opportunities you could work on together - the worst thing they can say is no, but I find that I get around 25% of my work each month by reaching out to past PR contacts and reminding them that I'm here and available for work.
Another way to increase your paid work is to form a little "Helping Circle" with some blog friends - when you're offered a new collaboration opportunity, you can then politely let the PR person know of the blogs and the contact details of your little circle in case they happen to be looking for other bloggers to work with on that campaign or others - PR people are ALWAYS looking for more people for various campaigns and there is no harm in passing your friends details on - infact I regularly have PR contacts thank me for doing this.
Again, I would say that by doing this with a select few close blogging friends I have doubled my monthly income (as have they!) - a lot of bloggers have the attitude that if they keep contacts to themselves, there's more work for them but I find the opposite to be true - by introducing your friends to the PR people you work with and them doing the same for you in return, your list of contacts grows and your opportunities increase.
I truly believe that when it comes to blogging, the following statement is true:
If you are starting from scratch and have never worked with a PR person before, but feel that your blog is ready - you could try asking some more seasoned bloggers if they can point you in the direction of any companies to introduce yourself to - I know that this can be difficult and some bloggers may not be very forth coming with this kind of help, but lots are - personally I am always happy to be asked any questions at all, this one included, and will do whatever I can to help a fellow blogger.
Other Ways I Earn Regular Income From My Blog
So that's sponsored posts...but what about if you're tired of waiting for sponsored post opportunities to come to you?
Well there are a number of other things you can do in the meantime including websites and apps you can use to increase your earning potential - these are the ones that I regularly use:
*Takumi - this is an app that offers sponsored Instagram opportunities - payment depends on your IG following figures. I have just below 3000 followers and I earn £41 per post (goods are usually compensated if they are required for the image, too.)
*Buzzoole - This is a new one I've discovered and I did my first campaign for them last month, they pay in credits which are then converted into Amazon giftcards - I find these handy to save up for Christmas (more on that below) and the campaign was very straightforward (and didn't even require a full blog post, just a couple of social posts) - you can find out more and sign up here (This is my referral link)
*People Per Hour - this is a site that allows you to offer your writing services (or any other services - creating blog headers or layouts, social media management, anything you wish to offer!) to companies and/or individuals for purchase. You do have to keep your prices quite reasonable on here to compete with the competition but it can be a great way to increase your income each month.
*Affiliate Links - personally I don't make much from this at all, but it CAN be worth signing up to a few schemes and dropping a couple of links in to posts or on your sidebar - I only use Amazon Affiliates and Affiliate Window personally so I can only vouch for those, and in all honesty - most months I make pennies from them! However, around Christmas time, they do become a little more fruitful.
Minimum Review Product Value
A commenter on my last posts asked whether setting a minimum product value may be off putting to readers as it may mean blogging about products they can't afford.
By all means this is something to consider, but I have personally not found this to be an issue - I mean let's face it - how often do YOU bother to look up reviews for low cost items?
Do you ever look at reviews for shower gels before you buy them?!
Do you ever even look at reviews for low priced toys or are you just buying them because, regardless of how good or bad a blogger says they are, your child is nagging you for them!!?
Personally I find that my review posts are usually my lowest viewed as I know that my readers are here for my own content, rather than my opinions on products (And this is another reason why I now try to take on far fewer product reviews, and why I like to make sure they're worth my time - because I know they are not really what my readership want to see) - now if you are writing a review based blog then of course this will be different and you will need to think more carefully about setting a minimum product value - but I know that I'm not alienating my readership by only writing about higher priced goods because let's face it, the majority of items of interest ARE usually higher priced things like pushchairs, car seats, vacuum cleaners, holidays, etc.
That's not to say that NO lower priced items are worth reviewing - you need to use your head with this, and if you think that your readers (or people in general...) would really want to hear about a particular product of low value and that you have a lot to say about it - then by all means, review it!
As I said in my last post - I do sometimes accept reviews for lower priced goods if they are particularly interesting - but in these situations I usually ask for payment in addition to this (As I said in my last post, paid reviews are coming up more and more often) or I ask that more of the gifted product is sent in order to meet my minimum value (this works well for things like beauty products, cleaning products, etc.)
Another option is to offer to promote the product on social media only - I do this quite often for items that interest me but don't reach my minimum value or that wouldn't make for an interesting enough detailed review - and often companies are happy to gift them in exchange for promotion on Instagram or Facebook only.
Payment In Vouchers
You'll notice from my income figures above that I also accept payment for posts in the form of vouchers.
Again a lot of bloggers choose not to accept vouchers as payment for posts, but I personally find it very helpful as any vouchers I earn through my blog - I save up for Christmas.
Last Christmas, I had managed to save over £900 worth of vouchers from blog work - this meant that the cost of Christmas was pretty much covered!! I can't tell you what a relief that was and how much stress it took out of the holiday season, and I vowed from then on to always accept vouchers in return for posts when offered.
This year my voucher earnings are less (I'm at £350 at the moment) but it still adds up and helps - so by all means, ask for cash but if cash is not available - then don't be too quick to turn down a voucher as payment. It still spends just the same!
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So there you have it - this is how I earn over £1000 a month from blogging, I hope that some of this information will be useful to some of you starting out or wanting to monetise your existing blog.
And in closing, I do have to add - as great as it is to make money from your blog - never let money become the sole reason for blogging. If you lose the passion for it, it does show and nobody wants that - remember why you started and why you loved it before it paid!
Get In Touch!
If you have any questions about this or any other blogging topic, would be interested in regular income reports, or have any other comments or suggestions - let me know below or get in touch on Twitter @Sparkles_blog
Happy Blogging!
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