Are you ready to start generating serious revenue from your website? If you‘re tired of putting in countless hours of work on your site without much financial reward, it‘s time to get strategic about monetization.
Don‘t worry – earning substantial income from your website is more than possible with the right approach. In fact, website monetization is projected to be a $616.3 billion industry by 2024.
As a blogging and monetization expert who has helped hundreds of websites maximize their revenue, I‘m going to walk you through 12 of the most effective monetization methods that are working wonders this year.
Whether you‘re a brand new blogger or an established publisher looking to increase your income, there are proven strategies you can start implementing today to realize your website‘s financial potential.
Display Advertising
Display advertising continues to be one of the most popular ways to monetize a website, and for good reason. With display ads, you can start generating passive income from your existing traffic without having to sell anything directly to your audience.
How much can you realistically earn from display ads? While there are a lot of variables, here are some reasonable benchmarks based on data from top ad networks:
| Monthly Pageviews | Potential Monthly Ad Revenue |
|---|---|
| 10,000 | $100 – $300 |
| 50,000 | $500 – $1,500 |
| 100,000 | $1,000 – $3,000 |
| 500,000 | $5,000 – $15,000 |
| 1,000,000+ | $10,000 – $30,000+ |
However, not all ad networks are created equal. In my experience, the most lucrative options are as follows:
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AdThrive: AdThrive is widely considered the highest-paying ad network, with an average RPM (revenue per 1,000 impressions) of $15-$25. However, they have a strict minimum traffic requirement of 100,000 monthly pageviews.
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Mediavine: Mediavine is another top ad network known for its high RPMs, which average around $10-$20. Their minimum traffic threshold is 50,000 sessions per month.
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Ezoic: Ezoic is a great option for sites with lower traffic levels, as they have no minimum pageview requirement. With Ezoic, you can expect an average RPM of $5-$15.
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AdSense: Google AdSense is the most popular and well-known ad network, but it typically has the lowest RPMs of the bunch. AdSense is best for beginners or sites with very low traffic. Expect an RPM in the $2-$5 range.
To maximize your ad revenue, consider working with an ad management service like AdPushup or Sortable. These companies specialize in ad optimization and can help you get the most out of your ad slots by using header bidding, lazy loading, and other advanced techniques. They take a cut of your ad revenue, but their optimizations can often increase your overall earnings by 20-50%.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is another extremely popular monetization strategy that can be highly profitable if done well. In fact, affiliate marketing spending is expected to reach $8.2 billion in the U.S. by 2024, up from $5.4 billion in 2017.
Here‘s how affiliate marketing works: You partner with brands or retailers to promote their products or services on your website. You then earn a commission fee when one of your visitors clicks your unique affiliate link and makes a purchase.
There are a few different types of affiliate partnerships:
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Pay-per-sale: The most common type of affiliate relationship. When a sale is made through your affiliate link, you earn a one-time commission fee, usually a percentage of the total order value.
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Pay-per-lead: In this setup, you get paid a flat fee when a lead completes a specific action, like filling out a form, signing up for a free trial, or requesting a consultation.
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Pay-per-click: With this model, you earn a small fee for every click on your affiliate link, regardless of whether a sale is made. However, these types of programs are rare.
To get started with affiliate marketing, you can join large affiliate networks like Amazon Associates, ShareASale, Commission Junction, and Clickbank. These networks have thousands of merchant programs you can join, so you can find products that fit your niche.
The key to successful affiliate marketing is to build trust with your audience and only recommend products that you genuinely believe in. Simply sprinkling affiliate links throughout your content comes across as spammy and inauthentic.
Instead, focus on creating detailed, honest reviews and tutorials showcasing how you use the product. Explain how it has benefited you and why you think it‘s worth purchasing.
Be sure to disclose your affiliate relationship to be FTC compliant. You can do this by adding a simple disclaimer like "This post contains affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission if you click and make a purchase, at no extra cost to you."
Digital Products
Creating and selling your own digital products is one of my absolute favorite ways to monetize a website, for a few key reasons:
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You control the product: Since you are creating the product from scratch, you have full control over the content, pricing, and distribution.
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Higher profit margins: Without the costs of manufacturing or storing physical inventory, digital products often have profit margins of 90% or more.
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Passive income potential: Once you create a digital product, you can sell it an unlimited number of times without having to fulfill individual orders or do any extra work.
So, what types of digital products sell well? Here are a few of the most profitable digital product ideas I‘ve seen:
- Ebooks and guides
- Online courses and workshops
- Printables and templates
- Stock photos and graphics
- Software and web applications
- Membership sites
To decide what type of digital product to create, think about your audience‘s biggest needs, challenges, and goals. What kind of product would provide the most value and help them achieve a desired outcome?
For example, let‘s say you have a website about gardening for beginners. You could create:
- An ebook with 101 tips for growing a bountiful vegetable garden
- A downloadable planner and tracker for planning and documenting a garden through the seasons
- A video course teaching a foolproof method for starting seeds indoors
- A monthly membership site with exclusive content like expert interviews, live Q&A sessions, and a members-only forum
The opportunities for digital products are endless, but make sure you‘re always prioritizing quality and customer satisfaction. Spend time developing a high-value, comprehensive resource, gather feedback from beta testers, and provide stellar customer support.
When launching your digital product, I recommend starting with a small audience of buyers before doing a big public launch. This allows you to gather testimonials and make improvements as needed. Consider doing a 50% off deal or special bonus for your initial customers as an incentive for taking a chance on a new product.
Once you have a successful digital product bringing in steady revenue, you can focus on scaling up your marketing efforts. Some effective digital product marketing techniques include:
- Sending dedicated email promotions to your subscriber list
- Doing webinars or video series to give a "sneak peek" of your product
- Hosting an affiliate promotion or joint venture launch with partner sites
- Offering special discounts or bonuses for a limited time launch period
- Providing free resources or a mini course that leads into your paid product
- Writing guest posts on popular sites in your niche to get in front of new audiences
- Running paid ads to a high-converting landing page
If you play your cards right, selling digital products can easily become your website‘s biggest income stream. Just remember that success depends on having a high-quality, relevant product and an effective marketing strategy to get it in front of the right people.
Sponsored Content
Sponsored content is a type of native advertising in which a brand pays you a flat fee to publish a blog post, social media update, or video mentioning their product or service.
Usually, the brand provides talking points or a desired call to action they want to be included, but you have creative control over the exact content and how it fits into your site.
Sponsored content deals tend to be highly lucrative, with many bloggers charging anywhere from $250 to $5,000+ per sponsored post depending on the size of their audience. However, landing these partnerships often requires having a large, engaged following and a professional media kit showcasing your site.
To get started with sponsored content, consider joining an influencer network like IZEA, Linqia, or Aspire IQ. You can also reach out to brands directly with a personalized pitch explaining why you would be a great fit for a partnership.
When creating sponsored content, the key is to maintain your authenticity and editorial voice. Don‘t just regurgitate the company‘s ad copy, but put your own unique spin on it.
Disclose your sponsored relationship prominently to follow FTC guidelines. I recommend putting a disclaimer at the very top of your post, such as "This post is sponsored by [Brand Name]. As always, all opinions are my own."
Be judicious about which sponsored opportunities you accept, as doing too many can erode your audience‘s trust and lead to sponsored post fatigue. I suggest keeping your sponsored content to less than 5-10% of your overall content mix.
The Importance of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for Monetization
No matter which monetization methods you choose for your site, one thing is clear: you need a substantial, growing base of traffic to make them work. That‘s why search engine optimization (SEO) is a critical piece of the website monetization puzzle.
SEO refers to the process of optimizing your site and content to rank higher in search engine results for relevant keywords. When your site appears on the first page of Google for a query related to your niche, you can bring in hundreds or even thousands of highly targeted visitors per day without paying a cent.
To improve your site‘s SEO, focus on the following:
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Keyword research: Identify the search terms and phrases your target audience is using to find information related to your site‘s topic. Use tools like Ahrefs, SEMrush, or Google Keyword Planner to uncover high-volume, low-competition keywords.
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On-page optimization: Include your target keywords naturally throughout your content, headings, page titles, meta descriptions, image alt text, and URLs.
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Quality content: Create in-depth, well-researched content that matches search intent and provides value to your readers. Aim for articles of 1,500-2,500+ words to demonstrate depth and topic authority.
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Backlinks: Earn links from other high-quality, relevant websites pointing back to your site. You can build backlinks by guest posting, broken link building, skyscraper content, and original research. Use Ahrefs or Moz to measure your site‘s domain authority and track your link building progress.
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Technical optimization: Ensure your site loads quickly, is mobile-friendly, and has a clear navigational structure. Submit an XML sitemap to Google Search Console to help search engines crawl and index your pages.
SEO is a long-term game, so don‘t expect overnight results. However, by consistently publishing optimized content and building your site‘s authority, you can experience massive organic traffic growth over time.
As an example of the power of SEO for monetization, consider my colleague Ryan Robinson. Ryan runs a blog that teaches people how to start a side hustle and make money online. By focusing heavily on keyword research and creating epic, search-optimized content, Ryan grew his organic traffic from zero to over 500,000 monthly visitors in under three years. His site now makes over $35,000 per month, primarily through affiliate marketing and digital product sales.
Imagine how your monetization efforts could take off with that kind of targeted, organic traffic coming to your site each day!
Putting It All Together
We‘ve covered a lot of ground in this guide to website monetization. While there‘s no one "right" way to monetize a site, there are a few key principles that the most financially successful websites have in common:
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They prioritize serving their audience first. Before worrying about making money, they focus on providing tremendous value and building relationships with their readers. Monetization naturally flows from that foundation of trust and authority.
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They diversify their income streams. Relying on just one monetization method is risky. The most profitable sites have multiple streams of income from a combination of ads, affiliates, products, sponsorships, and more.
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They optimize their user experience. Successful sites are laser-focused on providing a great UX for their visitors. That means having a clean design, intuitive navigation, mobile-friendly layout, and fast loading times.
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They invest in their growth. Once you start generating revenue from your site, reinvest a portion of that income into tools, training, and team members that can help you grow even faster. Don‘t be afraid to spend money on things that will have an ROI, like premium hosting, an SEO tool subscription, or a virtual assistant.
To sum up, if you want to make life-changing money from your website in 2024, you need to:
- Get strategic about which monetization methods you use based on your audience and topic.
- Focus on growing your traffic with SEO and high-quality content.
- Prioritize serving your audience and building trust.
- Diversify your revenue streams to increase your income potential.
- Reinvest your profits into your continued growth and success.
By following this formula and staying persistent, I believe anyone can build a profitable online business around a topic they‘re passionate about. It won‘t happen overnight, but with the right strategies and consistent effort, you can absolutely turn your website into a full-time income.
I hope this in-depth guide has given you the information and inspiration you need to take your website monetization to the next level. Here‘s to your success!
