How to Earn from Advertising and Sponsorship

By Wendy Piersall from Mom Blogging For Dummies

One of the five common business models that most successful mom bloggers use to earn their revenue is through advertising and sponsorship. Advertising and sponsorship revenue suits a blog best when the blog gets a lot of traffic or when the blog attracts a very specific interest group.

When the blog gets a lot of traffic: This is the “strength in numbers” approach. If you have a product or service that a lot of people want, an advertiser gets to put a message in front of a lot of eyes.
When the blog attracts a very specific interest group: This is the “target marketing” approach, and it’s all about catering to specific needs. For the record, “moms” is not a very specific interest group. Instead, “moms with newborn infants under 6 months” or “moms who are interested in photography” are good examples of the kind of specific groups advertisers are looking for.

Blogs focused on advertising revenue should be built to encourage people to stay on the site and view as many pages as possible. There is a reason there are so many slide shows on very large websites — those slide shows serve up an ad impression for every photo in the series.

Other ways that blogs have increased their ad views is by adding forums, multimedia content, or by hiring more writers. This increased interaction makes the website more profitable.

Your most effective content will be on topics that are popular and generate a lot of consumer interest. Advertisers love to have their ads appear by related content, so it helps if your blog topic is related to the consumer goods and services that advertise frequently on the Internet.

Quantity is just as important as quality on these blogs, because the more content you have, the more advertising you can display. That means that you need to be willing to write a lot or hire writers.

If you have a smaller blog, advertisers will be most interested in you if you’re very tightly focused on a niche topic that attracts a large percentage of their potential customers. If not, most advertisers prefer to work with larger sites with a more influential presence.

Because the goal of this type of blog is to increase ad impressions, it’s helpful to have an eye for design. The idea is to place as many ads on your pages as possible without letting them become overbearing or distracting. You will also want to encourage readers to view your related blog posts with suggested links at the end of your entries and/or in your sidebars.

One effective way to diversify your income on this kind of blog is to work with an ad network that will allow you to sell your own ads, too. Plus, take advantage of affiliate marketing techniques to create new ways to generate revenue from your existing content. Depending on your blog topic, syndicating your content might be an option for you as well.

One of the best ways to promote this kind of blog is to spend the time necessary to learn intermediate level search engine optimization, because it can be a very huge source of traffic. Additionally, you’ll need to set aside time regularly to build incoming links to your blog.

Ensure that there are plenty of ways for your readers to share your content with their friends. Add Facebook Share and Like buttons, Tweet This buttons, or use a service like AddThis to give an even wider range of sharing options. And work on building a loyal following that returns to your blog again and again.

Here’s the short list of ways to be successful with a blog that earns revenue from advertising and sponsorships:

Maintain a high quality and quantity of content that appeals to a large audience and gets updated frequently.
Aim for a very high-traffic site or a smaller site that attracts a very dedicated niche audience.
Use various sources of advertising including ad networks, selling your own ads, and affiliate marketing.
Learn search engine optimization.
Set aside time to promote your content to other bloggers and websites.

For a good example of this kind of website, look at MoneySavingMom. Blogger Crystal Paine earned enough from her blog advertising to pay for her home in cash in 2009.