Content quality, advertising, and a lesson from Dooce®
If you’re even an inkling aware of what’s happening on the internet, you should know that making money with your website—not your company’s—is vastly becoming a huge thing. Ten years ago, pretty much nobody knew what a blog was. The same cannot be said today. Between the large availability of blogs (think blogger, livejournal, myspace blogs, etc.) and the rising spotlight on them (think celebrity bloggers, Fortune 500 companies, etc.), it seems that these days everyone and their cat has one.
So what about making money on your personal website?
If you’re anything like me, when you think about making money on a blog where you write about your personal life, you automatically think Google ads or Pay Per Posts. It is a general consensus among most blog circles I frequent that “those kinds of things” on personal websites are undesirable.
However, of those asked about their feelings towards advertisements, many of them used Dooce.com as an example of a personal website with ads that they didn’t mind. Curious, because as popular as Dooce.com may be, it is still a “personal” website. So what makes hers any different from Joe Regular’s?
Among many possible reasons, the obvious stands out: It’s because her content is so good. Her design could be awful, her website could be plastered with obstructive, flashing ads and we’d still read her entries. They’re catchy. Funny. Interesting. Regular. And she’s e-famous because of it.
It’s an odd situation. Most wildly popular blogs on the internet aren’t “personal”—they offer the reader something other than a snapshot into the owner’s life. They write about stuff that helps or enriches the reader—and they run ads. So what puts blogs like Dooce in this list?
She entertains. There isn’t anything spectacular about her life or the things she writes about, but the thing that sets her entries apart from Joe Regular’s is how she writes them. She retells ordinary events in ways that entertain us, she wows us with her amazing photos, and in the process, she creates a readership that will keep coming back for more.
And her ads? People are obviously clicking on them if she and her husband are able to be stay at home parents off of the income generated from her website. For those who don’t click them, they seem far less obstructive if you love her content—which many do.
Surprisingly enough, it doesn’t bother most people. After all, many of these bloggers live on the the income generated from their website. It’s a give and take deal; they provide you with quality reading and/or viewing material, but to subset the cost of the time it took to provide you with “the stuff”, they provide you with advertisements too.
Right there, I believe, lies the key to the rules of advertising and the discernment to know when to run ads and when to not.
Key #1: Who do you write for?
As a general pattern, bloggers who write for their readers gain the most subscribers, traffic, hits, dedicated readers etc. Nobody likes to feel like the fifth wheel. When people stumble across your website, do they feel like they’ve stumbled into a friend-only party with you and yourself, or do they feel as if they’ve found a place where they fit in?
Red light: You’re writing about your life for yourself.
Green light: You’re writing for your readers.
Key #2: What do your readers gain from reading your blog?
Is it entertainment? Hilarity? Inspiration? Maybe you’re writing to help others achieve their goals and overcome challenges in life. Maybe you’re sharing your knowledge on a particular subject, like your major or your line of work. Whatever it is, visitors become regular readers when they feel they can get something out of your blog.
Red light: Your readers aren’t gaining anything from reading your blog. You don’t put effort into making each entry entertaining, inspiring, educational or otherwise beneficial in some way to the reader.
Green light: Your readers are gaining something from reading your blog. They have a reason to come back – and they do; over, and over, and over again.
Key #3: Do you have enough traffic to make significant money from advertisments?
This is another pothole of advertising on personal websites: many of them don’t have the traffic volume needed to actually make any money off of those less-than-desired ads. If you’re going to put ads on your website, at least make sure the benefits will outweigh any negative effects it may have.
Red light: You don’t have a significant amount of dedicated readers or enough stable traffic. If you put ads up, you’re probably not going to make much money off of them.
Green light: You have a significant amount of dedicated readers and stable traffic.
Having said all this, it’s somewhat obvious that the “problem” with advertising on personal websites is not because the said website is “personal”; the real problem with advertising on most personal websites is the simple fact that many of them don’t meet the above three points. They’re written for the owner, about the owner, and offer the readers little – with that basis, how could you expect to make money?
If you want to run ads, run them when your blog shifts from a simple hobby to a (much loved) part-time or full-time job—and by job, I mean when you have a solid commitment to your website and its readers.
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It’s a good article here. I would say that placing ads on personal sites make it seem as if you’re selling billboard ads on your front lawn.
November 23rd, 2007 at 12:42 amI agree with Rilla: this is a very good article.
But my question is: what if it’s a personal website that doesn’t have any kind of ads…then how do we write? Do we write for ourselves cause it’s a personal site, or do we blog for the visitors? When personal becomes boring?
Reply: Thank you! :)
As for your questions… Well, it depends on what kind of outcome you’re looking for. This is how I see it: If you want an outlet for your thoughts and feelings and nothing more, write for yourself. If you want to have a place to discuss subjects and things, write for yourself, but make a point to engage your readers and make it interesting. If you want a website that has lots of things to offer readers (how-to articles, tutorials, stuff like that), and ultimately (if all goes well and you’ve got quality content worth reading) a popular/well-read/high traffic website, then write for your readers.
As for when does personal become boring… never, if you write the right way. (An example of writing the wrong way: “So today me and Kylie went to the mall, and we saw Marcus and Jeana together! CAN YOU BELIEVE THAT? Blah blah blah.” – That interests no one except those who belong in that circle.)
If you look at a lot of the blogs out there, it’s somewhat of a trend that the more a blogger writes for his/her readers, the more readers they have. Of course, there are a lot more determining factors (gaining exposure to your blog, quality of content, subject, etc. etc.) but it really appears to work that way. They don’t have to sacrifice the personal sense of their blog; they just need to learn how to write their entries in such a way that most everyone can find them worth reading. Does that make sense?
November 23rd, 2007 at 2:27 amI have to say, one thing I definitely struggle with is knowing if a certain blog will be successful or not. Since I’ve made the switch to a new host my most read post has been ‘Will Books Be Replaced?’ and when I generally write that style of blog — not life or fashion related, the attention it receives declines. I also think it’s hard finding that balance — what will interest you and what will interest the reader? I could quite easily blog about Tony Blair every day but I realise most people wouldn’t want to know (cue sighing).
The one thing with Dooce is: well, would her blog be where it is today without the memorable firing? The term ‘Dooce yourself’ is used around blogs whenever they mention their employers, which I find amusing. With blogs like Dooce they are commercialised (or at least have that ‘air’ about them) so I wouldn’t expect them not to have ads. To get away with them it’s many things: the writing style, like you said ‘what they do for you’ and a certain kind of layout also helps.
November 23rd, 2007 at 4:57 amGreat blog!
November 23rd, 2007 at 5:40 amThis is excellent, and exactly the type of blog I would have loved to write. Your points are incredible. Linking this.
I’m still a bit iffy about pay-per-post, only because they, at times, want to control the subjects of posts.
November 23rd, 2007 at 10:23 pmNice article. But for those serious peeps want their blogs to be monetized, they have to know what would be their niché.
I agree, 10 years ago weblogging is unknown to mankind. lol. :)
November 24th, 2007 at 6:18 amI mind the ads at Dooce more with this redesign, which seems to serve the purpose of having more ads.
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