You're (Probably) Not Going To Be a Pro Blogger 120
ThousandStars writes "Contrary to what the specious Wall Street Journal article Early Transition to Blog Pro says, You're Not Going to be a Professional Blogger argues that not that many people can make money through web advertising. The WSJ article 'doesn't discuss how people actually use their blogs to make money, which is by selling ancillary services.'"
Wake me up when.. (Score:5, Insightful)
..web advertising rates have risen to the point where they accurately reflect the value they can provide clients rather than being bogged down by the dinosaur media forms of print and tv commanding increasingly outdated and thus artificially inflated prices.
Until we wake up to the future, we'll still be uselessly dreaming of the past.
Re: (Score:1, Interesting)
There's too may ups and downs and the sentence construction is too crap for me to even guess what you're trying to say.
Re: (Score:2)
.web advertising rates have risen to the point where they accurately reflect the value they can provide clients rather than being bogged down by the dinosaur media forms of print and tv commanding increasingly outdated and thus artificially inflated prices.
That and lack of a decent micropayment solution.
Re: (Score:2)
Oh come on. Seriously - I thought we'd all agreed years ago that micropayments were doomed to failure [typepad.com]?
The lack of a decent micropayment is the lack of micropayments as a decent solution. [shirky.com]
Macropayments dammit! (Score:3, Funny)
Yes some are comics, deal with it.
I buy
Your book, (Schlock Mercenary)
Your mug (Glow in the dark messiah of the moment)
Your stupid grin on a signed photo.
Your MOM
Signed pictures of your cat (Hi Kyle Cassidy and Roswell!)
Your T SHIRT! (Yes you Dr. McNinja!)
Your verbally abusive T- SHIRT! (NUKE THE MOON!)
Your wordless T SHIRT! (WWWBatmanD)
Your rather funny T Shirt (Blogger, novelist of Better to Beg Forgiveness) -> BOOMY
Your hysterical mug if you had a damnable CLUE (Some comic that had a banner ad with a c
So, in other words... (Score:2)
... wake you up when the market starts preferring the internet to newspapers or TV?
Re: (Score:2)
Things are only worth what people are willing to pay for them. Just because you think your Magic: The Gathering card collection is worth $100K doesn't mean it is.
Re: (Score:2)
TV as we know it, and print media are dinosaurs in the sense that they are going extinct, and nothing can save them. It's a shotgun approach/one-to-many relationship which categorised the vast majority of 20th century communication.
Now we live in a universe where many-to-many communication is the norm, and rapidly expanding our ability to store, process and filter information. With many-to-many, a soap company can tell exactly how many house-spouses in Delaware are interested in their product, rather than p
Re: (Score:2)
True, but it doesn't seem like a scalable solution for financing web-content in general - significantly increasing the percentage of "professional bloggers" who can actually earn a living by doing so.
Not true at all (Score:5, Funny)
Get your blog posted as a Slashdot article and watch the money come in.
Re: (Score:1, Informative)
Slashdotters will use adblock plus and you won't get any revenue. ;)
That and your web service will drop out and be unreachable for awhile.
Re:Not true at all (Score:4, Funny)
You must be new here (Score:3, Funny)
That is, if your servers can withstand being slashdotted in the first place.
503-b Ad Revenue Unavailable
At least everyone has a share (Score:2)
Um, news? (Score:5, Interesting)
Getting paid to blog is like getting paid to write. You don't just produce stuff and get paid (unless you're a novelist... good luck!), you produce stuff and get hired to MAKE SOMETHING LIKE IT.
It points out (correctly) that if you wanna make money blogging, you sell something that isn't just your content. Even if you're only a writer, you can still sell frickin' e-books at a few bucks a pop instead of always giving it away. (of course, holding ALL your work behind the golden door doesn't work either. You've got to strike a balance, even if the balance usually leans towards "give away most of it".
It's stunning how few people realize this.
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
This isn't that different than what I said before, or even what most webcomic artists do after a year or two in terms of selling dead tree versions of their work.
Again, he made the blog, then he sold books based on what was on that blog, and used the profits to go from there. He didn't put it up and then "hope" to get enough from ads and amazon referrals or something; he actually produced work that attracted people and got them to buy his other stuff. That some of what people bought was also content already
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Actually a number of Sci-Fi authors give away their books, or at least some of them. Oddly enough they usually see a jump in the sale of their dead-tree versions.
Imagine that.
Anyway, check out Baen's Free Books if you want more info, I'm too lazy to look it up but a quick google will find it for you.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm with ya, guy; *if* you can provide content, you've got to find that balance that provides a sample for the unitiated to try, while keeping your heavy-mover content protected, more or less. It's a balancing act most don't have the strength or maturity to achieve.
But long before that...content. Remember the sexually-ambiguous guy screaming "Leave Brittany Alone!"? That's not actually content. Whining, peeing, sleeping, talking about computers while drunk...those are all bodily functions, not entertainment
Re: (Score:2)
It's interesting that the Wall Street Journal would publish a story trying to discourage individuals from making money on the Internet.
You would never see an article discouraging corporations from doing the same, however. An individual who writes a blog and tries to have advertising and eke out a living is a "loser" but a corporation that spends millions to start up some cockamamie Web 3.0 nonsense and lasts a year and goes down in flames, losing their investors' money is "visionary" and "too far ahead of
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
This is impressive. Not only didn't you read the RTFA - which doesn't discourage people from blogging, but instead interviews someone who has successfully created a career from blogging - you didn't even RTFS, which is attacking the WSJ for saying that you can make money just from ad-blogging
Jesus. Forget about engaging brain before posting. Engage eyes before posting!
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, Folks who work in newspaper comics certainly believe that webcomic folks like myself are killing their business... never mind that there's very little stopping them from taking advantage of the exact same channels.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not the FREE aspect that's killing newspapers, even if people had to pay for Reuters feeds, it wouldn't help newspapers. What's killing the newspapers is DUPLICATION of content. There's simply not enough room in the (even worldwide) market for lots of newspapers which offer 90% identical information.
The only way they might be able to survive
Re: (Score:2)
Not only would they publish such an article, the WSJ actually faces the digital convesrion conundrum [businessinsider.com] under Murdoch.
What they point out is that in the world of blogging, much like iTunes app store publishing [gamasutra.com] a creator faces perfect competition. Facing an industry with 0 economic profit, differentiation and other services are needed for economic profitability. That's why sel
Re: (Score:2)
I hate to break it to you, but the WSJ article implies that you can make money blogging. My article on Grant Writing Confidential [seliger.com] argues otherwise. You may want to read the articles on which you're commenting with more care.
(Cue jokes in 3... 2... 1...)
Re: (Score:2)
Sure, it tells you that you can make money blogging, as long as it's from doing something besides journalism which they believe is solely for "professionals".
So, "if you want to make money blogging, sell t-shirts".
I still call shenanigans on WSJ.
Well . . . . (Score:5, Funny)
"The WSJ article 'doesn't discuss how people actually use their blogs to make money, which is by selling ancillary services."
What ancillary services are we talking about here? 1/2 hour, 1 hour, or 2 hours "donations" for services rendered?
Re: (Score:1)
BTW, it's now a gold hat with a 0.1 micron filter that advertises for ISP balloons in Africa while blogging.
Re: (Score:2)
The primary is advertising, you nitwit. Blogger blogs, gets lots of people to read blog. Blogger then sells ad-space to advertiser, so the people who read the blog also get to see the ad. A small number of people purchase items from advertiser. Blogger, advertiser, and visitors all win.
Was that simple enough for you?
Other ancillary services would include merchendise (t-shirts, hats, books, etc), or perhaps an additional service related to the blog (i.e. you blog about organization tips, then offer organ
Re: (Score:1)
Do you have a donkey's dildo up your ass?
I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your ancillary services
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Like the AC mentioned, I was simply trying for some light hearted humor. Sometimes I get modded up and sometimes I get trolled.
Nice article though.
More to the point, who wants to do so? (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not sure many people want to be professional bloggers. I have a blog that has a small number of readers and having more readers is always nice, but blogging to me and to most bloggers is a hobby or a side element. Blogging professionally would involve a tremendous amount of stress as if every post isn't just perfect, readership, and hence profit, will suffer. Blogging would cease to be a relaxing activity. In fact, many so called professional bloggers such as say most of the bloggers at http://scienceblogs.com/ [scienceblogs.com] aren't professionals in the sense that they get large income streams but rather that is a convenience to have a small income stream in addition to their day jobs.
Also, apparently Firefox includes the word "blog" in its default spellchecker and "blogger" but not "bloggers" although "blogs" is included. Weird.
Plenty of suckers out there (Score:2)
Nevermind that the sucker needs a time machine to go back to the period when they needed to start their blog to make decent money on it at this point (2000 as the article points out in its example).
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Er, why?
You do know what the terms "profession" and "professional" mean, right?
A profession is essentially the task or series of tasks you perform to supply your living. Anything you can do and get people to pay you for qualifies as a profession. Hell, I could be a professional water dumper if I could get someone to pay me to dump water.
If what you do is blog, and someone pays you for it, that is your profession. It makes you a professional blogger. The opposite of course is the amature blogger (or amat
Re: (Score:2)
What you said is not necessarily true. "Blogging professionally" does not necessarily directly equate to "blogging as a profession". It could mean "blogging with professionalism". The grandparent poster could then be criticizing what he perceives to be the unprofessional nature of blogging.
Re: (Score:1)
Indeed I do, and so does the dictonary [merriam-webster.com].
Perhaps you should read meaning 1 c (2) in the above link: "exhibiting a courteous, conscientious, and generally businesslike manner in the workplace".
You can then reflect on the fact that words have more than one meaning, and some people derive amusement from mixing them up.
Do you work in military intelligence?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I think that people fail to realize that Mark Frauenfelder has been writing in this more casual style (with 'zines then blogs) for more than 20 years now. He was building an audience for more than 12 years by the time he decided to blog. It's not like he was starting out with nothing. This was an evolution in his career, not a catastrophic event.
That's what they all say. (Score:1)
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:1)
I need to find some more gullible readers...
Re:Not true (Score:5, Funny)
So basically what you are telling us is that Google ad sense has payed you almost nothing?
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:1)
OBVIOUSLY, getting the clicks is the hard part.
Haven't you been paying attention around here? All you have to do is ??? and you can profit without those pesky clicks.
Re: (Score:2)
Some content is worth more than others. (Score:2)
It depends on what you're offering.
If your blog talks about education (like yours seems to) or other high-profile niches, there's money in it. If your passion is in something more obscure like knitting in the round, don't expect people to pay you $.30 a click.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Google is a shitty way to monetize compared to direct ad sales, ad sales from a large network, or affiliate marketing. You might get $0.30-$1.00 in a high paying niche, but that same high paying niche will do much better with other monetization methods.
The problem is people think that blogging about their boring lives for a weeo and throwing adsense up there will make you a millionaire. It doesn't work like that.
Heh "professional" blogger (Score:2, Troll)
Is that what they are calling armchair journalists these days?
Re: (Score:1, Troll)
You get paid for being a twit?
Do it out of love first (Score:5, Insightful)
I've kicked around the prospects of making mula from blogging before. Generally it's not worth it. Blog for love of the subject, and if it eventually clicks with an audience, THEN consider the mula aspect.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Absolutely seconded.
I've blogged mostly about gaming -- tabletop D&D a few years back, and old-but-awesome PC games this year. It's a lot of hard work to do it, and I only put out a new show once a month. If that.
If I were depending on the blog for money, I'd he hanging by my necktie off the balcony rails of my cheap-ass apartment right now. I probably have, like, twelve people in the world I can count as an audience. I don't have any swag to sell and I'm not on the speaking tour circuit.
I keep comi
Re: (Score:2)
Which is the rule for all good art. If you always seek to please everyone, you will lose, or create stuff like Britney Spears and Electronic Arts.
The point is that great leaders give a lead, and make you believe that this is the best thing ever. If you seek to please everyone, you do not lead.
It's also the same rule that makes the men that know what they want more attractive, and defines the unspoken hierarchy in a group (where a tramp can be above a queen).
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Extend the concept (Score:2)
Hear hear. This can be applied to most careers and hobbies.
I have a blog devoted principally to sharing my experiences of learning Japanese. I do this because
I have all sorts of reasons for writing a b
Building a website takes time (Score:3, Interesting)
It's like any business, it takes hard work and time before you see any revenues. I have a blog at http://blog.magicode.org/ [magicode.org] (http://mirror.magicode.org/ [magicode.org] if it goes down, as it's hosted on my server in my home office) and I can tell you this, I'm not making a living on the ad revenues. ;)
I code for a living. Having a good, professional blog is a way of showing people what you can do, and it inspires confidence, unless you put up pictures of yourself partying down, or post derogatory comments abour your ex-boss (or ex-wife, which is mostly the same thing, hehehe).
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
or post derogatory comments abour your ex-boss (or ex-wife,
I don't know, tales of Evil-X a few years ago at K5 gained me lots of fans. No money, but I wasn't after money. Now I mostly blog here at slashdot about hookers and other women, and drinking.
I've come to realize that hookers are popular among my fellow nerds. And blackjack. Wait, forget the blackjack.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed, and that's the point of the second half of the original post [seliger.com]: you're not going to make money through selling ads, or whatever. Rather, anything you might make is indirect through signaling your expertise in a way that's exceedingly difficult if not effectively impossible to fake.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, you can always pick up your revenue stream by inserting subtle endorsements for your blog in popular tech forums...
Isn't this kind of obvious? (Score:4, Insightful)
True, but so what? (Score:1)
Step 2: ???
Step 3: Profit!
People who believe they will make their fortune from a blog need to read up on the internet bubble. Eyeballs are not dollars, as investors discovered. A blog is just another kind of website. If you are selling your services, a blog is a great way of showing your expertise. You must make your money by actually doing something, though, not by writing about it. The blog just shows prospective clients what you know.
page views (Score:1)
Good blogs required a lot work (Score:1)
Oh come on... (Score:1)
[since 1989] the only companies that have really made money from shrinkwrapped software are Microsoft and Adobe
Yeah, Symantec, Autodesk, et al. are merely figments of our imaginations.
Learn your history before you write a blog post describing it.
2 cents (Score:1, Interesting)
1. Including /. and (now) the blog cited here (and the WP article that it refers to), I've been "told" by at least 4 media outlets about how boingboing is one of the most popular blogs in the universe, yet I've never visited it and have no plans to do so at any time in the future. So the blogger could be right--the author is not making very much money--or maybe the WP article is right--he's cleaning up.
Either way I'm still not going to visit.
2. It seems like it would be a good thing if blogging is no longe
Blogs never could make money (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm not sure why people ever thought blogs could make money.
I've been writing a blog for years but I was never so deluded to assume that millions of people would want to read my rantings and sponsors would want to shower me with money. I just do it because I like it. There may be some people who enjoy what I write, but not nearly enough to warrant an advertiser spending $2000/mo on me.
Putting some Google Ads on your blog always struck me as sort of desperate looking, like you were imagining yourself as the next Ann Landers or something. And face it, you're not. Even if you are a great writer, part of the problem is there are so many blogs available. Even if we assume only a million of them are properly active and not shit, who in their right mind would think that the world (or in my case, the English speaking world) could possibly support a million little magazines with advertising? Multiply $2000/month by one million and the number that pops out is 24 billion dollars a year. A pretty big price tag for citizen journalism and obviously the advertising market isn't going to pay it.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm guessing because articles like the WSJ one I linked to stoke the idea. Hence the importance of Penelope Trunk's comments (and, less humbly given the source, mine) as a counterweight.
Re: (Score:1)
Nothing has changed (Score:4, Insightful)
To be a "professional blogger," which is really just a professional writer who publishes on the internet, you have to already be interesting and well known enough to attract readers or start from nothing and prove that you are interesting and talented enough to be worth reading. Then you can either sell ad space/content from your own site or get hired to write for someone else. Both of those scenarios are possible and there are examples of each. Writing is just like any form of artistic expression. The majority of people simply aren't good enough at it to make enough money to survive without also having another source of income. Even many who are talented don't get enough recognition to allow them to quit their day job.
But I think that is missing the point entirely. I suspect the vast majority of people who blog aren't doing it to make money and they never hope to. Blogging is essentially free, and at that price point there are plenty of voices that are worth checking out that wouldn't be worthwhile at any other price point, and maybe some of those people will even mature into successful writers in the traditional sense.
So yeah, you probably won't ever be a professional blogger, or novelist, or painter, or musician but that doesn't stop people from enjoying those creative outlets for their own sake.
Thank you Captain Obvious! (Score:2)
Who would have thunk of that?
And guess what: This is the case for all websites, which do not sell real products or services that are worth money.
I also add: http://navid.radiantempire.com/pub/danke_hauptmann.jpg [radiantempire.com]
Conflict of interest (Score:3, Insightful)
Wouldn't it be in the best interest of someone who makes money at their blog to dissuade people from becoming competition? Perhaps by writing a blog about how difficult it is to make money at blogging, regardless of what the Wall Street Journal says?
Blogs!? What the hell? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Blogging for a living is hard to do (Score:4, Interesting)
at best the web ads would help pay the ISP bill, but doubtful they will make someone a millionaire. Remember that most ISPs that host web sites charge per bandwidth. That means the more people that visit your web site blog, the more bandwidth they will eat up. You have to figure out a formula or use accounting software to figure out if your web ads are bringing in a profit.
Basically if you are going to blog professionally you have to have a blog about something interesting enough to get a majority of people to visit it, and deliver content on a daily basis that is original and entertaining or interesting enough to keep people coming back to it. Not only that but you have to try and avoid offending people so that you don't lose your audience. Plus it has to be something legal or else your blog can be shut down and you face criminal or civil charges.
The blogs that have been successful have used affiliate adds that advertise to sell a product from say Amazon.com or Barnes and Nobel or some other company that you link to a book or product that has something to do with what you are blogging on and they pay you back a fraction of the purchase. That means your loyal readers will have to keep purchasing the products you advertise on your blogs in order for you to earn money. Some readers will be annoyed that you have web advertisement and some will use adblock plus on Firefox or adblock pro on Internet Explorer to block out your web ads and you don't earn anything from them.
Some people claim that the free web is over, and that professional blogs only show most recent blogs and then charge a fee for membership access to look at the archive of blogs. Many newspapers are starting to do this, while others are going with eBook readers like Kindle to sell electronic versions of their newspapers. Basically a professional blog is like a newspaper, because you expect the writer to be more of a journalist that checks facts and cites sources and is more professional than the armature bloggers out there who don't always check facts and cite sources.
Some professional blogs blog by serving up audio and video files of themselves talking instead of writing text and then insert advertising into the file in order to pay for it. Others only serve up those audio and video files by membership fees.
Since the problem of people not wanting to pay for a membership or only want access to a few blogs or files, some professional blogs take micropayments in that it costs $1 to $5 per article or file to download it to your computer.
But the problem comes in that when blogs and other web sites go to membership only, how do you cite a link to their material when only members can access it and you cannot share your account? Sure you cite and link to the web site, but then people who cannot afford membership will refuse to believe you or ask you to cite a "free" web site that says the same thing.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Even those don't make much. Joel Spolsky has said that referrals from Joel on Software make ~$100 a month. Megan McArdle of The Atlantic [theatlantic.com] says she gets about enough to fund her book habit too. Both are very well-know
It's a full time job (Score:1)
OutputLogic [outputlogic.com]
I get a few 1000 readers a month..... (Score:2, Informative)
It's the way for the future.
It takes alot more time then a regualr day job (Score:1)
probably? (Score:1)
Probably?! Despite years of steadfastly refusing to blog the best you can offer me is probably? I demand certainty! I will not be a professional blogger!
hard work (Score:2, Interesting)
Paid = !Blog (Score:2)
If you're being paid for it, it's not a blog. A blog is where you whine about how uncool your parents are, or what that dick at work did. If you're being paid for it, it's an article... or something still not a blog. If you are writing a daily/weekly article for your job, it's not a fracking blog, even if you use wordpress to write it.
Knock me down with a feather (Score:2)
The WSJ published an article that didn't contain the word Socialist and the name Obama? Am I dreaming?
You're probably not gonna... (Score:2)
You're probably not gonna:
But, if that's the life you want, there's nothing wrong with trying! Just don't assume that, because you work hard, you're going to succeed.
Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)
WTF is that shit?
Re:Yep (Score:4, Insightful)
"Secret Money Machine"? He writes a book on how to make money, sells it, and makes money? Is his book only one page with the following typed on it: "Write and sell a book describing how people can make lots of money."
Re: (Score:2)
Said author probably bought a book from another author with the same message.
Re:Yep (Score:4, Interesting)
"Secret Money Machine"? He writes a book on how to make money, sells it, and makes money? Is his book only one page with the following typed on it: "Write and sell a book describing how people can make lots of money."
I realise you're making a joke, but it's interesting to note that the only reason that this doesn't work exactly as described is that people realise they're being fooled straight away.
You don't walk up to someone you want to cheat and say "Hey can I cheat you" and expect it to work. Likewise the one page book won't work. Instead what has really worked is to draw this one page out into about 200 pages and convince people that there are deep insights. By the time they've worked out what's happening (if in fact they ever do) they'll have recommended the book to friends and family and be talking about those deep and life altering insights, which in turn drives sales of the book.
The only real problem is that creating such a vibe is very hit and miss and you're much more likely to have a book that flops before you can achieve the critical mass through word of mouth. Fashion is fickle. However many self help books that have happened to succeed and make their author rich are exactly what I've described.
Re: (Score:2)
The book itself is a little dated, but the concepts are good, and he's translated them to the web well. By writing magazine columns, he's basically been blogging since the 70's.
The secret is to find something that you are good a creating, and make that your job in a self employed sort of way. You'll be a lot happier t
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
That's our solution to the global recession right there!
Re: (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)