Friday, April 06, 2007

The Importance of Sixteen Cents

In blogging terms, I am just over a year old. I put my first test post up on 19 March 2006.

I didn't immediately rush to write. There was just one post in March, three in April then one in May. Regular posting really started in June. The following few months settled in at around 18 posts per month, then stepped up to the present level of 30-35 posts per month.

What on earth has all this to do with sixteen cents?

Well, as I put more time in, I thought that it might be good if I could generate some income stream from the blogs, create something that might help support me down track. Sort of a retirement plan. So as a first step I added Google Adsense to the blogs.

I quickly realised that this was going to be a slow process, although the fact that there were some ads on each blog was helpful in giving me some basic site stats at a time when I had no other data source.

The reason for this is simple. Revenue depends on the number of visitors, the number of those visitors who click on the ad link and then the payment per click. So you actually need a very large number of visitors to make real money.

Google pays when accumulated income reaches $US100. Yesterday there was great excitement when I realised that I was just sixteen cents off the critical $US100. I woke this morning and went to look at the stats only to find myself still three cents short! Still, I should earn that three cents sometime today.

It probably sounds a bit silly to be so excited over such a small sum of money. I suppose that I think of it as a small tangible reward over and beyond the real reward, the pleasure I get from blogging.

5 comments:

Lexcen said...

Jim, I was just asking myself the question of whether it is worth compromising my principles to gain extra cash with advertising on my blog. You've just answered my question.

Jim Belshaw said...

I think that's probably right, Lexcen, although I do not exactly share your views re principles. The thought of being able to research, write and publish full time on blog income is very attractive.

If you are interested, I can send you more detailed information on the stats.

Lexcen said...

Jim, I average about 50 hits to my blog per day. What would that translate to in cents or should I say dollars?

Jim Belshaw said...

Hi Lexcen. With ads, its page views that are the relevant stat rather than number of visitors.

The numbers do bounce around.In March, for example, I had a higher than average click-through, but the return per click was only 60 per cent of the months before.

Still, as a rough guide using my averages, 50 hits per day equates to around $5US per month.

Because I have several blogs its possible to compare returns between blogs. The return per click on managing the professional services firm is 70 per cent higher than any other blog simply because it is a business blog. The return per click on New England Australia is the lowest because the ad market place is so much smaller.

Hope all this helps.

Lexcen said...

Thanks Jim. It looks like I'll have to become more controversial before I can think about making money from my blog.