Website Must-Haves For Monetizing Your Blog

5 March 2022

Everything is rising in price so more of us are looking for ways to supplement our income or even change careers completely. For many years, the choice for us was for me to stay home with the kids. It wasn’t worth leaving the home to work because my income wasn’t enough to cover childcare.

Honestly, I had always imagined working outside the home. I wanted the career AND the family. I wanted to be able to support myself and not rely on anyone else. Life had different plans. I am incredibly lucky that I have been able to stay at home for all of these years. However, I was always craving something more. Being a mom is the greatest blessing in the world but I wanted more.

The other day I read an Instagram post by Chicgeekyyc that said…

Since February 2020, 1.1 million women who left the labour force have yet to return.

Isn’t that number just staggering?!?!

I know the struggles, both personally and financially, that happens when you need to choose between family or finances. It can be heartbreaking and devastating to feel like you need to give up a piece of yourself.

I want you to know that it is possible to build and grow both pieces of you. It may not happen overnight but if you are ready to start supplementing your income, this month is for you and all of your dreams.

MARCH IS ALL ABOUT BLOG MONETIZATION

March is all about monetization. On Tuesday we covered the basics of blog monetization and you can grab the link to read that blog post now. I shared four pieces that you need to have BEFORE you begin to monetize your blog.

These steps are important to help you create a strong foundation so that when you BEGIN to monetize, you and your website are ready.

Today we are going to cover the pieces that your website must have in order to begin to monetize. All of these pieces are going to help you stay organized and help you run your new business properly.

Again, you are going to want to have these in place so that when you are ready to share the wonderful ways that you are going to monetize, you aren’t scrambling. Are you ready to jump in and begin to implement and bring to life your monetization strategy?

7 REQUIREMENTS FOR BLOG MONETIZATION

Requirements seem like such a strict word BUT these pieces of the blog monetization puzzle are going to help ensure that you can build on what you already have. We are going to cover many different moving parts for your blog monetization strategy but we will do it in a way that makes sense. No need to feel overwhelmed. Take it piece by piece and build it as you go.

EMAIL LIST

An email list is an important piece to have on your website even BEFORE you decide you want to monetize. However, if you haven’t already set it up, make sure that you do it when you are finally ready to monetize your blog.

This is going to help you connect with your ideal clients NOW. Whether they are ready or not to buy from you at the moment they sign up for your list, you want to nurture them. That is what an email list is all about.

Building that relationship with them and building trust so that they get to see what you know and what makes you an expert in your niche and the products or services that you sell.

When it comes to email platforms, it seems like there is an endless supply of them. I use Flodesk and recommend it to everyone. If technology isn’t your strongest asset, Flodesk makes email marketing easy. If you are ready to start using Flodesk, grab my referral code here. You will get a lifetime deal of 50% off. When you use this code, I will receive compensation from Flodesk at no extra charge to you.

MONETIZATION PLAN

You can’t get too far into anything without a plan. Even the creative person in me needs to have a plan. This is no different when it comes to how you want to monetize your blog.

This should be a task that you do right away when you want to start a blog. By brainstorming ahead of time ideas and ways that you can monetize, it will help you months into blogging. You will know what your ideal readers are loving and maybe what they are not so much in love with.

In Tuesday’s blog post, I shared about a course that I am taking on Udemy about business goals. He broke it down into three different pieces. I changed them a bit to better suit blogging monetization goals.

When you start to think about monetizing, break a piece of paper up into three different sections.

  • Section 1| Current products are the products that you want to have available between 6-18 months from having your blog.
  • Section 2| Next-generation products are a build-up of the current products that you will have. These will be available between 12-36 months from having your blog.
  • Section 3| Emerging products are your products and services that you are building up to. These are your BIG picture products and services. An example for me would be hosting a blogging conference. That is my BIG vision goal.

SERVICES PAGE

This page on your website is dedicated to sharing the services that you offer to your potential clients. If you are offering multiple options when it comes to products or services, you can break them down.

There are a few different ways that you can do this. If you have multiple products or services, you can create a page for each of them so that you can break down the specifics for each of them on an individual basis. You can also have one page that covers all of your services (like I do) and have a different section for each different service or product.

I am not a website designer so I can’t break down for you in exact detail what you should have on your service page. (Great idea for a guest blog post though.) When you talk about your products or services, you want to break them down so that you are talking about these points throughout the page.

  • Describe what your product or service is
  • What is it that you help your ideal clients with
  • Talk about the pain points that they experience
  • How does your product or service help with that pain point
  • Inspire them
  • Breakdown what they will actually receive and how they will receive it

BOOKING APP

You want to make sure that you have a way for potential customers to be able to book your services. A booking app is going to allow them to purchase services from you. Whether they are 1:1 appointments or group appointments, this booking part of your website will be set up so that they can either choose when they book or agree to set days for the services that you have.

BUSINESS WEBSITE PLAN

If you are going to use Wix as a website host, you need to ensure that you have one of the Business Premium plans. There are three different options when it comes to Wix for their business plans.

  • Business Basic
  • Business Unlimited
  • Business VIP

I use the Business Unlimited Plan and it suits my business needs. It allows me to accept payments and take bookings.

PAYMENT PLATFORM

Knowing how you are going to accept payment from potential clients is an important step. You can’t really make money if you can’t accept it through your website.

There are a few different options that you can use for this. Well, more than a few. I suggest offering a couple of different options because EVERY client is going to be different and may prefer a different payment method.

When it comes to my website, I offer PayPal, e-transfer, and Square.

PayPal and Square both allow me to send invoices. Square is my default payment method unless the client prefers to use PayPal. With both of these payments, they are pretty quick to receive.

With Square, it can take anywhere from 2-3 days to get my money depending on when they place the order. Most of the time it is in my account within 1-2 business days.

PayPal is faster and once it is paid, it will show up in my account. With PayPal, you can pay a little bit more to get it deposited instantly into one of your bank accounts. I use that option and don’t lose a bunch of money but it will also depend on how much someone is paying you.

E-transfer is offered to clients who live near me or in Canada. It is much easier and fee-free for most.

If you would like to start with Square, you can use this referral code. You can process $1,000 without fees when you activate a Square account with my link.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS PAGE

You should have this page on your website BEFORE you begin to monetize along with a privacy policy and a disclaimer page. Your terms and conditions page is going to lay out the different policies that you offer like payment policy or influencer policy.

You can even take this a step further and send these to every new client that you bring on. This will work best if you have services. If you have products, you can just add a refund policy to the packaging so that they know what your return policy is.

If you are looking for help coming up with a monetization plan and strategy for your blog, I would love to help you. A strategy session with me is the perfect way to get clear on the what and how of monetizing your blog. Book today so that we can begin to create a plan that fits your lifestyle, your vision, and your goals.

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