Have you ever wanted to make a bit of extra cash whilst doing something you like doing anyway?? I hate paying homage to strangers, but don’t mind if it’s making me money so here’s my shout out.
I am a fitness enthusiast and wanted to share information about health and fitness, so decided I would investigate starting a blog. I read loads of helpful sites on the internet and after trying to decipher several different sites, I discovered one called NeilPatel.com and his advice on how to start a blog, which really made sense to me and gave me all the information I needed, mostly as it was written in lemans terms that I could get my head round. The best part about it all is that, apparently, I can add links to my blog which will direct my readers to other businesses and then those businesses will pay me a commission if they sell any services because of my ‘referral’!!
This is great news – I get to chat about what matters to me AND earn money too.
Firstly, I should set up a name for my blog – this is called a domain name. This is what I will use to direct people to my website. Then I must decide whether to pay for the host company to put my blog onto the internet, or whether I should use a ‘free hosting’ service. It seems that if I use a free host, I might have a limited number of themes and plugins to use when designing my website. If I pay a little per month, then I will get more choice in what I can use to create my web pages (themes & plugins etc). Either way, I will definitely be able to add ‘affiliate links’ which are the things I might be able to earn money from!
Once I get my blog up and running with the host company, I will be able to design my site. I want to make it easy to navigate and put a lot of interesting facts about health and fitness onto it. The guide recommends that a blog should not only reflect the topic it is about but also the personality of the person writing it. I guess it’s like meeting someone – if a person is interesting and you can relate to them, you will stay friends but if nothing they say makes sense, or there is a personality clash, then they will find someone else to befriend! I would like my website to have lots of ‘friends’ so I plan on making it really fun and interesting!!
Because I want to make money from my site, I will have to apply for an ‘affiliate link’ with some relevant companies. I will need to go directly to those companies and ask about their affiliate services. Once I have an agreement in place they will pay a small commission for any business my blog sends their way and all I have to do is include the link on my blog. If we choose to use a ‘permalink’ it will stay on my blog permanently and the company would pay me a one-off fee for putting it on there.
I can’t wait to get started and know that if I need any further information, all I must do is have a look on Google and get everything I need to know all in one place.
