One term that is often mentioned when it comes to online business is “passive income”. However, many newcomers to the industry do not really understand what it means or why you should work to create such a source of income for you. While the definitions will vary somewhat, passive income for me would mean income that will come to you without you having to make ongoing efforts to get it. Too many people get discouraged when it comes to operating their own online business for one main reason : it takes too much work. After all, who wants to trade a $15 an hour job to make $15 an hour online, even if you are working for yourself. Furthermore, nobody wants to spend their entire day in front of the computer to run their business.

There are many ways to make money online, some of which require more interaction from you on a regular basis, some less. Let’s explore some of the ways that you can create an online business that will not require you to spend 10 hours a day in front of your computer.

• Creating your own product

Of course, creating an information product and selling it will require a lot of time and effort in the beginning. However, once the product is created and you have sent some traffic to it, the amount of work that you need to devote to it will diminish as well. This is even more so when you have affiliates that are promoting your product. They will be the ones who will work to create advertising campaigns and get some sales for you, while you can simply sit back and spend an hour or so every day checking your stats and making sure that everything is going ok.

• Selling on eBay

While many would say that selling on eBay is not a “passive income” activity, it all comes down to what you sell and how you do things. Let’s say that you have found a product that is very popular and that you can sell for a $50 profit on eBay. If you get just 2 sales a day, that will mean $100 a day of profit. To allow this to happen, all that you need to do is to work with a drop shipper. The buyer pays for the item. You then place an order with the drop shipper and tell them to ship the item to the client. The deal is done. All you would need to do is to place the orders as necessary and also place new listings. All of this would take you less than an hour a day on average and can bring you very nice profits with little effort. For you to make this work, you would just need to spend some time at the beginning finding a product that is in demand and that can be shipped to your buyers by a supplier which does drop shipping.

Previous, we’ve talked about using a content locker to make some money from CPA offers. Basically a content locker is an application which lets you require that users fill out a CPA offer before they can access your content, hence the name “content locker”. However, many webmasters wonder as to exactly what kind of site this type of set up would be appropriate for. Those who want to build a website may also want some ideas as to what kind of content you can put on a website to make it work well with this CPA tool.

Obviously, if you have an e-commerce site or a site, using a content locker would be quite dumb, since you want to make buyers jump through as few hoops as possible before they could buy something from you. However, if you have a site that provides content for free, then using one might be a good choice. Here are some examples of sites where such a tool would work quite well:

• Free video game / arcade sites

These are websites where people can come to play free online video games, usually games made in flash.

• News portals

Sites where visitors come to read some news, which can be general or which can be specific to a certain niche. It is much better if the news focuses on a specific niche or industry, as this will increase the number of visitors that actually fill out the offer rather than just click out and go get what they want somewhere else. Remember, there are plenty of general news sites, in fact there are hundreds of them. However sites that offer updates on a specific niche are fewer in number.

• Templates / graphics sites

There are a lot of people who search the web looking for free images they can put on their site, or some free website templates that they can use on it. This is a great way to monetize such a site.

• Ebook download sites

If you created an e-book and want to monetize it without actually selling it, you can use a content locker to require the visitor to fill out a CPA offer, and make a few dollars for you, before they can access the download link to get their e-book.

Some Other Considerations

Of course, these are just some examples of websites where such a tool can be used. There are plenty of other things that you can offer on your site as well. The key element here is that all sites that are suitable to use a CPA gateway with provide some kind of free content to the user.

There is also something else that you can do to monetize your site and that is require a small PayPal donation of $1 or $2 to access all the content without having to complete an offer. Some users may not want to fill out an offer over fears that they will get spammed, etc. However many of them wouldn’t mind paying $1 or $2, especially if they think that what you have to offer will be useful to them.

Using article marketing is a good way to drive some traffic to your sites, as it works in two different ways. First, you can receive traffic from people who are viewing your article and then decide to click through to continue on to your site. You also have some SEO benefits from it, as every time you include a link to your site, it counts as a one way backlink which can be very useful in boosting your search engine ranking. But are there some things you should do to increase the efficiency of your article marketing efforts? Definitely. Here are some of them:

• Use Only Unique Content

In most cases, article directories only accept content that is unique and has never been posted anywhere before. It doesn’t matter if you wrote it, or if it has been posted on a site that you own. Your content needs to be unique. Search engines frown on duplicate content and so do visitors. If someone starts reading the article and notices that they have already seen the exact same information some where else, they will probably just move on to something else and not bother continuing.

• Avoid Making too Many “Salesy” Articles

There are way too many fake “reviews” of online products being posted all over the place and this is something that seems to be especially popular when promoting internet marketing related stuff such as e-books, membership sites and courses. The articles usually go like this: “Product X is a SCAM!! Arrghh!!! Oops… Actually, It’s Not, Buy It!!!!!” See, the thing is these might have been effective 6 years ago or so… but not anymore. The problem is that there are simply too many of them and the reader will automatically see that your “review” is completely bogus and you are just trying to make money by selling your own, or an affiliate product.

Articles that you post should always include useful information about your niche. For example, if you are promoting an “alternative energy” guide, you could post something about the different kinds of ways you can generate alternative energy and their pros and cons. Or, you could go into detail about how a certain method works and then explain why you think that it would be suitable as a solution for someone looking for an alternative energy generator for their home. Believe me, this is much, much more likely to result in someone visiting your site and buying the product you are promoting, as opposed to simply going on and on about how great the ‘ACME Green Energy Super Guide’ is and why everyone on the planet should drop everything that they’re doing and rush to buy it. Keep the sales pitch for your website. If a user has clicked through to it, then it means they are seeking more information about what you just told them in the article and now would be a good time to propose some products to buy.

Previously, we have seen how it is possible to make money from Fiverr by selling your services. But there are other ways that you can profit from this unique freelancing site and this is by being a buyer. While making a profit buying things may not seem very obvious at first, there are actually some ways that you can make this happen. Let’s take a look at some of these ways:

• Buying Traffic and Social Media Promotion

Let’s say you have a product or service that you are selling online and could use some traffic to get some exposure for it. There are many sellers who offer social media promotion on Fiverr, such as sending out Tweets or putting a link to your website on their Facebook fan page. Many of these people have tens of thousands of Twitter followers or Facebook fans, meaning that your message will be seen by a lot of people. However, it is still important that you check the reputation of the seller, just to make sure that their fans or followers are actually real people rather than bots. You can do this by checking their feedback and seeing what others have left as comments about the service that they offered. Still, for just $5, you are getting a lot of potential exposure and are not risking a lot of money if you don’t get the results that you were hoping for.

• Outsourcing Services

While I have mentioned it in another post some time ago, I will say it once again: there is a lot of profit to be made from what is referred to as “services arbitrage”. What does it consist of? Quite simply, you would sell your services at another place, such as an internet marketing forum and then outsource it to people on Fiverr for a lower price. So let’s say that you get paid $7 to write a 600 word article based on an offer that you’ve made on an IM forum. You would then outsource that article creation to someone on Fiverr and have them write it for $5. You keep the $2 difference as a profit. Sure, the $2 doesn’t sound like much, however this can quickly add up. So if you are outsourcing 10 articles a day, this can generate a profit of $600 a month. Not bad, considering the fact that you could spend less than an hour a day managing this.

Here again, the trick is to make sure that whoever you are outsourcing the work to will do a quality job so that you can maintain your reputation as being a provider that offers great services to your client. Check the seller’s past feedback to see if it is good and give them a small assignment to begin with. If you notice that they do good work and follow your instructions well, you can then send them more regular work and you will have found a great partner that you can outsource your work to.

Now one thing that many sellers of services on Fiverr want to know is: how do I get my gigs to become more popular and thus make more money from them? Obviously, this is a quite a valid question as the goal of everyone that provides services on Fiverr is to make as much money as possible. So how do you increase your earnings? Here are some very efficient ways that you can employ to make the most out of Fiverr:

• Give People What They Want

If your gigs are something that a lot of buyers on Fiverr want, then you will obviously get a better chance at making money from them. When you are on the Fiverr main page, you will see a section in the bottom right that consists of gig requests. If you can do some of the gigs that many people need done, then you should definitely offer them up for sale.

• Create a Catchy Headline

Unless you are offering a gig that is extremely unique, chances are that there will be many other sellers on Fiverr who will be offering the same thing than you. In this case, you will really need to do your best in order to make a good first impression and stand out from the crowd. Your headline, which is the title of your gig, should be interesting, unique and catch the eye of the viewer. Basically, it should stand out from all the other headlines and create interest in the mind of the viewer.

• Offer Samples of Your Work if Possible

If you do a gig where you can easily show a sample or two of work that you have done previously, then you should definitely include a link to it in your offer. For example if you design small web pages, you could include a link to some websites that you have built. This will make you appear a lot more trustworthy in the eyes of buyers, as they will have proof that you are capable of doing what you say you will do.

• Build a Good Reputation

Fiverr uses a feedback system where people can leave either positive or negative feedback, accompanied by a comment. If you want more people to buy gigs from you, then you will need to srive to build a good reputation on the site. This is very simple: provide good quality work on time and you will get positive feedback. Buyers are more likely to buy gigs from those who have a lot of positive feedback, so doing great work will pay off in the long run.

• Learn From Others

Look at some of the top sellers on Fiverr, especially those that are offering the same kind of gig than you. How do they word their headline? What do they put in their description? These are all things that you would need to consider, as you would be learning from those that are the most successful on Fiverr.

A lot of people have heard about Fiverr.com, which is a type of freelancing website that allows you to do two things: both hiring people to do certain tasks and doing the tasks yourself. You can actually profit from the site both as a buyer and as a seller. But first, let’s take a look at what the site is and how it actually works:

All the tasks, called “gigs” cost $5 and you cannot change that amount. So this makes it suitable for relatively short tasks that do not take much time to complete. Now some people wonder how Fiverr makes money from people who use the site. In reality, their business model is very similar to how other freelancing sites function. They take a small commission from the amount that someone gets paid when they do a gig. At Fiverr, that amount is $1. So the buyer pays $5 to have a gig done. The person who provides the service gets $4.

Fiverr uses PayPal as their (only) payment system as of right now. The buyer deposits funds and then can buy some gigs. As a seller, you can withdraw funds to your PayPal account when you have earned some money doing gigs. However there is something very important that you need to consider: as a security measure, the amount can only be withdrawn 14 days after the gig has been completed. So you don’t really get paid “instantly” as you need to wait 2 weeks before you can transfer the funds over to your PayPal account.

Now, as a seller, what kind of gigs can you provide that will allow you to earn some money?

The most popular ones are:

• Article Writing

Usually involves writing articles or blog posts that will be used as web content. Very easy to do, all that you have to do is to write an article based on the requirements of the buyer.

• Website Creation

You can create a small website that has a few pages for the buyer. Also, there are many buyers that need a landing or squeeze page done in order to market affiliate offers online.

• Social Media Marketing

Do you have a Facebook fan page or a Twitter account with thousands of followers? In that case, you can offer to put up a promotional message on your social media page to advertise the website of the buyer.

• Video Creation

This usually involves you talking about a product or service that somebody else is promoting online. However there are also plenty of other topics that buyers request videos to be made for. If you like making videos, this could be an interesting gig for you.

• Offline Marketing

This simple involves you printing out fliers and then distributing them in a high traffic location. This gig works really well if you live in or near a big city and doesn’t really require a lot of work, it’s just that you need to get out there and distribute those fliers.

Now that we have explored some ways to find dropshippers, let’s take a closer look at how you can evaluate a particular supplier to see whether they are legit or not. Here are some of the things to watch out for when you are looking at a dropshipper. These are not conclusive proof that the supplier is just another scammer, but should be seen as red flags telling you to proceed with extreme caution.

• A recent join date and low amount of feedback from clients

Many dropshipping sites and some online marketing forums have a feedback system that will allow people to leave feedback for each other after completing a transaction. You will also be able to see exactly when somebody became a member of the site.

One thing to watch out for is a member who has recently joined and has no or little feedback on the site. Scammers frequently create new accounts after they begin receiving negatives from clients that they scammed or get banned from the site. Also, don’t let the fact that they’ve completed a few transactions fool you into thinking they must be legit. Some will complete a few transactions successfully at the beginning to build up their “reputation” on the site and then when they see people are starting to trust them, they will simply turn to scamming.

• Insisting on paying using methods such as Western Union or bank wire

It is true that in some countries where suppliers are based it is not possible or practical to use a payment processor such as PayPal or Moneybookers. However you should be careful about using one that insists on being paid with a method that is not reversible such as by Western Union or Money Gram. Even bank wires are not really safe, as banks in foreign countries will seldom want to help you in the event that you’ve wired a few hundred dollars to a scammer. If possible, make use of escrow facilities that will sometimes be advertised on dropshipping sites. However, here again check to see if the escrow service is legitimate too, as some fake ones have been spotted.

• Offering items at prices that seem too low

Well if it looks too good to be true, then it probably is. If you see that a supplier is offering merchandise at prices that are far below what others charge for the same item in the same quantity, then you need to ask yourself some serious questions about them. Most probably, the deal is not legitimate and even if they do send something, it may be merchandise that was stolen or is counterfeit.

• Not providing contact details

If you are going to do some high volume business with a dropshipper, then you should at least have their phone number in case you need to call them if there is a problem with one of your orders. A supplier that doesn’t want to provide one should look instantly suspicious to you.

Previously, we have seen some tips on how you can test the dropshipper that you intend to use and the fact that it is much better to have more than one dropshipper to do business with. But how do you find a good dropshipper? There are a few ways to do this. Here are some of them:

• Look through dropshipping websites

There are some website out there such as DH Gate, TradeTang and Alibaba that are a real treasure trove for all kinds of merchandise. Anything like clothing, electronics and jewelry can be found there. The good thing about these sites is that they are mostly aimed at business owners who are looking to acquire merchandise rather than at individual consumers. This means that you can easily find dropshippers or buy merchandise in bulk. This is the good thing. But the bad thing about these sites is that they also contain many scammers who will either rip you off and not send anything, or ship something different than what they advertise.

But there are ways to protect yourself from that. Obviously, you can apply what we covered in the previous article which would be to make a test order first to see if they deliver. But you should also check the seller’s feedback on the site. See how long they have been active and how many positive comments they have from others who have done business with them. Also, look to see whether they have a website and phone number. While this is not a guarantee of safety, it does make it more likely that you will be dealing with a legitimate supplier rather than a scammer. If possible pay with PayPal or a credit card and avoid sending money through Western Union or Money Gram, as these services are preferred by scammers due to the fact that the transaction cannot be reversed.

• Look at internet marketing forums

Most “make money online” forums will have a section that is dedicated to eBay selling or dropshipping. Check it out to see what others are saying. You may find the contact information for some good suppliers, complete with comments from forum members who have used them and were happy with their transaction. You might even find some members of the forum who are suppliers for a wide variety of merchandise and who can drop ship to your eBay buyers.

Dealing with someone from a forum can be safer than dealing with a seller on Alibaba, as the supplier will often be well known in the forum and have members who can vouch for him. But this is not a guarantee that everything will go well. Don’t forget to use common sense when you are looking for a dropshipper, no matter where you find him. Always try to check their reputation out before you decide to use them as a supplier for your eBay online business. If you are careful, then you will reduce the chances of getting scammed when doing business with one.

If you are going to be dropshipping and selling items on eBay, then you need to be really careful as to the dropshipper that you choose. Selecting the wrong one could rapidly ruin your reputation and cause untold problems. Even if the dropshipper that you are looking at claims to have the products that you want to sell to your buyers at great prices, there is still more that you need to do in order to be sure they will be able to deliver. Here are some tips to avoid any problems when dropshipping on eBay:

• First, start out slowly

When they notice an opportunity to make money online by selling things or by any other means, a lot of people go all in from the very beginning. This might be good in some cases, but with eBay selling this is not the best idea that you could go with. Why is that? After all, isn’t it good to make as much money as fast as you can? You can always try, but if you later find out that you have chosen the wrong supplier for your products, then you have just created a big mess for yourself.

What is a better way to get started? Actually, it’s simple: first make a test order for yourself. Buy one of the products and have the dropshipper send it over to you. You will then be able to see whether you have received the right item in the right condition and whether you have received it within the specified time frame. If you want to be even safer and make sure that the supplier will perform just as well when shipping things to your clients, then you can always list just 1 or 2 items for sale and then see if your buyers have received the item and were satisfied with it. In this scenario, in the worst case you would simply refund your buyers if they did not receive the item as promised or if they didn’t get exactly what you put up for sale.

Once you have determined that the supplier for the goods that you are selling is reliable, you can then start doing business at full scale with them.

• Try to find more than one dropshipper for your items

This will serve as a good backup in case one of your suppliers experiences problems or has run out of the items that you normally sell. It is much better to do business with more than one supplier, as your own business will not be disrupted too severely if you can’t use one of them anymore. Being in a situation where you have lost one of your suppliers and need to scramble to find another one is not good, as very often sellers fail to do their due diligence in this case and will choose a replacement without even bothering to check their reputation and whether they are any good.

One main part of succeeding as an eBay seller would be to keep your buyers happy and satisfied with the products that you offer as well as the service you give them. Now how do you do that? There are a few simple ways to accomplish this.

• Provide a Good Item Description

Many, if not the majority of, cases of customers being unhappy with what they purchased on eBay arises from the fact that they either misunderstood the item description or it wasn’t clear enough. This is a common source of conflicts between buyers and sellers, but it can be avoided relatively easily. Here is how:

• Upload clear pictures of the item

Avoid using stock photos. It is much better to put up pictures of the item that you are selling that you took yourself. A cheap digital camera or a cell phone cam will do. If applicable, take pictures of the product, as well as everything that will come with it such as accessories, etc. This will give the buyer a clear idea of what they will be receiving.

• Describe the condition of the item accurately

If the item is brand new and in the box, then obviously it can be sold as “new”. Don’t try to pass off a refurbished item as a new one, as it simply is not. There are times where you need to open the box and use the item to test it or to prepare it for sale. One common example is a cell phone that you’ve unlocked with software. Obviously, you need to take it out of the box and use it for that to happen. While it is still a “new” item, you should include that in the description. Most buyers won’t mind and actually understand the logic behind this. However, if you don’t mention this you may very well one day end up with a buyer leaving negative feedback and saying “OMMGGGG!!!!! the seller said it was brand new but there was a fingerprint on the side of the phone and a spec of dust on the screen! Liar! Thief!!!”

• If there is some damage to the item or something missing, mention that

If the item that you are selling does not come with items that would normally be necessary or at least useful to operate it, then you should let the buyers know in your description. For example, selling a laptop without a power cord or a gaming console without its controllers. Make sure that this is mentioned in a clear and visible way in your description.

Also, if you are selling an item that has some damage to it or is not fully functional, then you need to advise buyers of this as well. For example, if you are selling an iPhone that has a broken screen (many buyers get these to part them out or to repair them), then make sure your listing says in big bold letters that the screen doesn’t work.

In the internet marketing world, creating your own digital product and selling it is seen as a profitable venture to take part in. In fact, there are millions of ebooks and guides on different topics that are being sold each year. Many online entrepreneurs have seen this and want a share of the action. Many of them simply create an ebook which explains either various methods of making money on the internet or focuses on a specific topic, such as Adsense, CPA, site flipping, etc. While this is a good way to start, there are some additional things that you can do to give more value to your products in the eyes of your buyers and thus make them more likely to be interested in buying them. Remember, the buyers can’t really see what’s inside your product when they are on the sales page, so they will base their buying decision mainly on the perceived value that they see in your product overall.

Now how do you increase the value of a product? Here are some good ideas:

• Add bonuses

This can be an additional, smaller ebook on a related topic that will be useful to the buyer.

If the method that your guide is teaching involves building a website, you can include things such as PLR website templates or graphics as part of the whole package. You can also include various other web building tools too.

The bonus doesn’t have to be in the form of a “product” either. Another thing that you can include is a service. It could be in the form of a free one on one coaching session with you. Or it could be something like a few months of free hosting or a free domain name. Basically, anything that will make the buyer see added value in your item.

• Separate your ebook into several parts

This will give the impression that your guide is bigger and contains more content, while previously these were all chapters in one big ebook. You can present these as separate, smaller guides that inform the reader about something specific. The buyer will feel as if they are getting many ebooks for the price of one and might see your offer as more valuable to them.

• Create a video course

You can convert your ebook completely into a video or add a few videos that explain something specific that is taught in your guide. There are some buyers who prefer watching a video over reading an ebook. Others will see the inclusion of a video part in your product as an assurance that it is more detailed and gives easy to follow, step by step instructions. While creating a video takes more time and requires more effort than simply writing, it can be very well worth it in the end, as it can have a very positive impact on the amount of sales that you make from the product you are selling.

There is a lot of talk in internet marketing communities about using traffic from Craigslist to publish affiliate or CPA offers. While it is possible to do so, there are certain practices to avoid. Here are some things not to do when using Craigslist.

• Don’t use it for offers where it is not allowed

CPA networks are aware of the fact that some marketers use Craigslist. Some networks ban this type of promotion outright, some forbid it for certain offers, while certain allow it as long as you follow some rules set forth by them. If you do not want to get banned from the network and possible lose the earnings that you have made, you should comply with any rules that they have. When in doubt, contact your affiliate manager just to be sure.

• Don’t simply put in your affiliate links and banners all over the place

Craigslist is mainly designed for local businesses and individuals to post ads and not a place to spam affiliate offers. Any blatant affiliate links and offers will be flagged down rather quickly by users of the site. Simply put, do not direct link from a Craigslist post to an affiliate offer. Your post will probably be gone within minutes anyways.

• Don’t post in the wrong category just to get traffic

If you post an ad in a category that is irrelevant, it will get flagged down almost instantly. The bottom line is, keep your postings to categories where they are relevant if you want them to have any chance of staying up.

• Don’t attempt to trick or mislead people

This is one of the biggest things not to do when using Craiglist. While it was quite popular with black hat marketers about 2 years ago, Craigslist, affiliate networks and merchants have all come down on this and took action to prevent it from happening.

Now, what exactly is “misleading” people? Some examples would be: posting a fake job offer, telling people that they got the job, but that they simply need to complete a biz opp offer to “verify their info”. Or putting up an ad for an apartment and then telling people that they need to pass a credit check, then sending them over to a credit report affiliate offer. One other trick that was popular consisted of offering people a job and then telling them to buy a video conferencing software from an affiliate offer as the “training” for the job would be done remotely. In all cases, this is misleading people, as the apartment or job that was promised to them simply does not exist.

If you do this, soon enough, somebody will complain to the merchant and say “Hey! You promised me a job if I signed up on your site! How come nothing happened?” and you will simply end up banned.

Selling your own information product is something that is mentioned in many internet marketing courses. There are plenty of guides, some free, some others costing several thousands of dollars, which say that it is truly a way to succeed on the internet. Many marketers will ask themselves this important question: is all of this actually true, or is is actually just hype to get these guides to sell.

Well, the short answer is yes, you can make quite a lot of money by creating an info product and selling it on the internet. However, this is not the way to go when you are just starting your online business. The main reason behind this is that it will take a lot of time for you to create a successful product that sells well. In fact, this can take several months. You are thus much better off focusing on some other ways to make money online in the beginning and then moving on to product creation later on. So what do you need to succeed by creating an informational product and selling it online?

• A good product

This should be something that fills a need and that answers a question that people have. While the “make money online” niche is extremely popular, it is quite saturated at this point. Look at some other successful products outside of this niche. There are plenty of guides that talk about converting your car to run on water, getting rid of acne, whitening your teeth, building a wind turbine or solar panel to power your home, etc.

• A good sales page

The sales copy that you use must include all the necessary elements that will make the reader want to buy your product. As such, you will either need to study some copywriting techniques to create your own sales copy or hire the services of a professional copywriter. The latter option will not be cheap, however. It can cost you several thousands of dollars to have a sales copy professionally written. However it can make quite a difference in the amount of sales that your product will make.

• Getting others to promote your product

Of course, it is possible to use various internet marketing strategies to get sales for your product. But wouldn’t it be better to have others do the work for you? In that case you would need to recruit some affiliates. However, this does not mean that you can simply put your product up on ClickBank and expect dozens of affiliates flocking to promote something they never even heard about. You will need to go around internet marketing forums, talking about your product and promoting it to affiliates who will be interested in bringing sales to it. While this is certainly quite possible to do, it will still demand a lot of effort on your part to get affiliates to become interested in it.

If you are thinking of putting up a blog on the internet, one of the main things that you would be thinking of would be how to make some money from it. Perhaps you may have heard about some bloggers earning good money from their blog and were wondering whether it would be possible for you to do the same. Well, the answer is yes, but just like with anything else related to earning money online, you will need to put a lot of effort into it to make it work. Here let’s explore some of the easiest methods of monetizing your blog first:

• AdSense and other pay per click ads

This is considered by many bloggers to be one of the easiest ways to monetize a blog. It is also the most simple and straightforward. Essentially, you would be putting pay per click ads on your blog and will be receiving a certain sum of money whenever someone will click on one of the ads. These could be text ads, or banner ads. These days, advertisement distribution networks will automatically cause ads that are related to the topic of your blog to be displayed, so they will be more relevant and thus more likely to be click on by viewers. For example, if you have a blog that talks about politics, the ads that are displayed are likely to be more or less related to this topic, such as political polls, websites for candidates or political parties, etc.

While Google AdSense is the most popular of pay per click advertisement networks among bloggers, there are several other smaller ad networks out there such as AdBrite and Bidvertiser. The amount of money that you will make from having these ads on your blog will ultimately depend on how many visitors click on them. So the more traffic your blog gets, the higher the amount of revenue that you can generate from pay per click advertisements on it will be. This creates a good incentive for you to promote your blog well and to have regular interesting updates on it.

• Putting up a “donate” button on your blog

This is quite straightforward. You can put a PayPal (or Moneybookers, or AlertPay, or any other payment system) button on your blog that will be there to let users donate a bit of money to support your blogging efforts. If the content of your blog is very interesting and it is read by a lot of people, you can make some money just by donations from readers. However, don’t expect to make thousands a month, unless you have a REALLY high traffic blog. Sure, it’s possible that a billionaire will stop by your blog, really like it and then decide to make a six figure donation. This has happened. But the odds of that happening to you are roughly equivalent to the odds of winning the lottery. Still you will probably make a few bucks, enough to cover your hosting fees and maybe pay for your internet connection.